(Real Clear Politics) General Election: Romney vs. Obama (Romney Losing by 1.9%)

Real Clear Politics ^ | May 24, 2012 | rcp

[xzins]

Poll Date Sample Obama (D) Romney (R) Spread

RCP Average 5/9 - 5/23 -- 45.5 43.6 Obama +1.9

Rasmussen Tracking 5/21 - 5/23 1500 LV 45 44 Obama +1

Gallup Tracking 5/17 - 5/23 3050 RV 47 46 Obama +1

ABC News/Wash Post 5/17 - 5/20 874 RV 49 46 Obama +3

NBC News/Wall St. Jrnl 5/16 - 5/20 RV 47 43 Obama +4

FOX News 5/13 - 5/15 913 RV 46 39 Obama +7

Mason-Dixon 5/10 - 5/14 1000 LV 44 47 Romney +3

Wash Times/JZ Analytics 5/11 - 5/12 800 LV 43 44 Romney +1

IBD/CSM/TIPP 5/9 - 5/16 778 RV 43 40 Obama +3

[xzins]

To make matters worse, Romney is losing electoral tally by 225 to 170. Obama needs 45 electoral votes to hit the 270 victory mark, and is leading in toss-up states of Ohio, Michigan, and Virginia which total 47. He's also behind in Wisconsin making it 57.

Still too close and too far out (5 months) to call, but Obama is up in the RCP's Likely Voter polls as well as the Registered Voter polls.

[woweeitsme]

Polls, schmolls...none are really worth anything yet. They won’t really be valuable until Sept/Oct...and then I’d likely only trust Rasmussen.

[xzins]

If Romney is down by 3+ points at the end of October, I would tell conservatives not to waste their votes on the hand-jammed pick of the GOP-e and to vote the conservative candidate Virgil Goode of the Constitution Party in order to send a resounding message.

[silverleaf]

not to worry

a plain vanilla RINO VP will add energy to the GOP ticket

McCain’s former campaign advisors are all over this right now, steering the Romneybots into not repeating the “Palin mistake”

sarc

[ilgipper]

Obama looks to be in the mid 40s. Not a good place to be for a candidate with no record to run on. The campaign against him has not even begun in earnest. Can he win? Yes. Will he? Unlikely. My only concern is the electoral votes in the midwest. If Obama concentrates all his money on Ohio, can he win it by a hair. That is a distinct possibility.

[xzins]

I’m from Ohio, and from Portman’s old congressional district, and I like the man. He’s solid on life, on intelligence, and conservative record. Like everyone he has his blips in the record.

However, he isn’t exciting. He doesn’t bring in any new constituency, and he doesn’t have deep pockets that I know of.

So, if Romney has to gamble, then his gamble should be on Rubio, but I think Rubio smells blood in the water and doesn’t want to ruin his future prospects.

[deport]

To make matters worse, Romney is losing electoral tally by 225 to 170.

---

That is the key stat as we elect on the basis of EC votes not popular votes. But popular votes do indicate acceptance.

[abercrombie_guy_38]

Romney and the GOP MUST go over Obama like there’s no tomorrow . Otherwise, it’s his to lose.

[Jim Scott]

No fan of Romney but it is astounding to me that Obama, with all of his blatant failures and the poor state of the U.S. economy is leading in the polls, even by a few percent. He should be trailing Romney by 10 points, at least.

If the citizens of America are too apathetic and distracted to realize what a disaster this man has been - assuming they have no clue as to his Marxist political philosophy - and re-elect him in November, this country will have, in effect, committed national suicide.

This frustrates me and millions of other Americans who know we'll all go down with the ship that was once a great hope for the world and one of the most successful nations that was ever formed. All because too many took too much for granted, lost sight of the truth and allowed our internal enemies to distract us, lie to us with complete impunity and, in effect, destroy us while we paid them to do it. God help America.

[xzins]

I’m from Ohio, and EVERY election in Ohio depends on voter turnout from the northeast of the state versus the south/southwest of the state.

If Cleveland turns out big, it is always a cliffhanger.

Obama might have hurt himself with black ministers with the gay marriage thing, but in final analysis, I don’t expect blacks to desert him.

[Perdogg]

I am sorry a lot of the polls aboved cited oversampled democrats, every one knows that. Meaning that 0bumma is down about 5-points.

[Yashcheritsiy]

AFAIAC, Romney needs to drop out now and stop stealing votes from Virgil Goode.

[Diogenesis]

Romney is the chosen LOSER by the DNC, GOPe, and MSM
to continue Obama’s reign as Tyrant,
OR to create the a new, equivalent Tyrant.

What would be the likelihood that conservatives
would make their candidate the author of
BOTH gay marriage AND RomneyCARE/ObamaCARE
who, in his guise as Gov.Loser.Romney also tanked
the entire Mass. economy (to 48th in US re: job growth).

BOTTOM LINE:
Romney has no chance — and the MSM
has not even BEGUN to release its stored material.

[Raycpa]

If we factor out RV polls and just look at Likely voter polls, then it appears Romney is leading by an average of 3.

Rasmussen Tracking 5/21 - 5/23 1500 LV 45 44 Obama +1

Mason-Dixon 5/10 - 5/14 1000 LV 44 47 Romney +3

Wash Times/JZ Analytics 5/11 - 5/12 800 LV 43 44 Romney +1

The average is watering down the likely voter results.

However, if we look at sequence it could appear that Romney peaked about 5/14 and fell sharply this week. But these being different polls such an observation is not valid.

[Drew68]

I imagine polling will be neck and neck until election day. As a country, we’re pretty equally divided between the givers and the takers. Plus, I believe gas prices are a major influencing factor and right now they’re dropping which only helps Obama. Gas falls below $3 a gallon and people will forget all about gay marriage.

[Calliecat]

Obama might have hurt himself with black ministers with the gay marriage thing, but in final analysis, I don’t expect blacks to desert him.

Agree, it will never happen.

[Yashcheritsiy]

No fan of Romney but it is astounding to me that Obama, with all of his blatant failures and the poor state of the U.S. economy is leading in the polls, even by a few percent. He should be trailing Romney by 10 points, at least.

It doesn't surprise me.

Romney does not present much contrast to Obama - and people know this. People are not excited by him. He doesn't give people any really good reasons to vote FOR him, he just serves as the placeholder for voting AGAINST Obama.

But once we leave the cocoon of Free Republic and get out into the real world, as much as many people may not really like Obama all that much, there isn't a sense of "ANYBODY BUT OBAMA!!!!!" that pervades hard-core conservative sites. In short, most people really are not going to be fired up ONLY by the prospect of voting against Obama. Perhaps they should, and many of them will end up doing so, but it's not the psychological attractor for them that it is for FReepers.

Romney just doesn't excite people, since he doesn't present much difference from Obama, other than a few superficialities. Picking a RINO Veep is only going to make that worse. The conservative base has little actual affinity for him, and the independents and the "middle" simply don't see any ideological or practical leadership in the man. People can talk about his "bid'ness experience" all they want, but the fact remains that when you look at Mitt Romney, the average person sees an empty suit with spectacular hair.

[WILLIALAL]

Real Clear Politics average polling is the worst place to gather info. There is no bench mark to qualify any poll in their average. If some reputable name puts out a bogus poll, it is added to the average.
Stay away from this site if you are poll watching. Stick with one or two polling firms that use likely voters.

[pieceofthepuzzle]

Looking at the data, the Gallop poll of >3000 ‘registered voters’ showed it at a virtual tie (Obama +1). That a relatively large poll of registered voters shows it as a tie at this point is bad news for Obama, no matter how they try to spin it. Gallop had Carter up +8 over Reagan in May of 1980.

My gut tells me that Obama will lose by a substantial margin, but anything can happen with a volatile electorate.

[LibLieSlayer]

We tried to warn the gop/e.

LLS