Posted on 09/15/2012 7:29:24 AM PDT by nhwingut
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Saturday shows Mitt Romney attracting support from 48% of voters nationwide, while President Obama earns 46% of the vote. Two percent (2%) prefer some other candidate, and four percent (4%) are undecided. See daily tracking history.
(Excerpt) Read more at rasmussenreports.com ...
I’m nervous. We lost a point. Could be statistical noise. Maybe not.
The events in the Middle East should have hurt Obama. Doesn’t look like that is happening. Maybe the opposite, the rally ‘round flag phenomenon, is the reality. We will know for sure in a few days. Expect major phony polls supporting the “Is Obama Getting a Boost from the Mideast Crisis” meme.
“One of the proudest things of my three years in office is helping to restore a sense of respect for America around the world, a belief that we are not just defined by the size of our military.” Barack Hussein Obama
The real key is what occurs in the 11 swing states that Rasmussen tracks but is only available via subscription. Those states have 146 Electoral College votes and include Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin.
“If I don’t have this done (economy fixed) in three years, then there’s going to be a one-term proposition.” Barack Hussein Obama
The media has never been more corrupt than this week. The stories out there today (recapping the week) are so over the top they make Pravda look objective.
Imagine if Bush were prez this week when the U.S. credit was downgraded (2nd time), oil hit over $100 barrel, gas prices went over $4, unemployment claims hit 2 month high, Middle East went bat sh!t crazy, and the prez heads off to Vegas fundraising?
Instead it’s all about “Romney’s bad week.” It’s like bizzaro world.
Not sure why anyone would have expected otherwise. The rally 'round the flag phenomenon is the norm. Americans rallied around Jimmy Carter for the longest time during the hostage crisis. This stuff is good for Obama where the election is concerned. Sure, it's terrible in the long run, but Obama is only worried about getting elected right now.
I’d bet they’re being forced to show R in the lead, though not nearly as much as reality, given that there are still no internals listed for these numbers.
This shows the effectiveness of the media undermining Romney with such a vengeance. They have to work so hard at it now, their slip is showing. Plus, it’s having less and less effect. The events themselves are likely to play out in a way that harms Obama.
Well supporters of the rally 'round the flag" theory have been pretty scarce around here the past few days. The semi-official FR position has been that the Mid-East crisis is downer for Obama.
With the MSM doing a full court press on the issue I'm afraid you are right. Will the support hold up through 3 debates and a ton of Romney ads? Maybe. Maybe not.
As hard as it is to believe, the happenings this week may well be the Jihadists knowing contribution to the Obama re-election campaign. I find it very hard to believe they want to see Romney in the White House. So I believe they are thinking that their actions will help keep Obama in that spot.
I think Romney has to give it a little time, get his facts right about what looks like the obvious White House negligence on Embassy security and then hit Obama with some big time ads in the battleground states. That should help level the playing field.
These pols prove if you only sample Black Democrats then Obama pulls ahead.
Give me a break.
There has been a clear expectation here that Obama will be hurt by the Mid-East crisis. In the long run he probably will be but in the short run, like the next 60 days or so, maybe not.
Don't kid yourself. This is a big deal and it can affect the outcome of the election. Movement in the polls we trust over the next few days will give us a good indication of what that affect will be.
I can’t imagine a single person that was even leaning Romney would suddenly rally to Obama as a result of the middle east blowing up. That make absolutely no sense at all.
“The events in the Middle East should have hurt Obama. Doesn’t look like that is happening.”
The horrible economic news out in just the last three days should have people out in the streets screaming for Obama’s rewsignation. But the Middle East News has pushed all of that to the side.
NBC Evening did not even mention that Egan-Jones had Downgraded America’s Credit last might. NOT AT ALL...
This HUGE, and affects every single American, but NBC Did not mention it.
Romney WINS on the Economy, but only if the sheeple know about it.
I think the history is clear about how these things play out in the short term. People almost always rally around the flag and their leaders.
With the MSM doing a full court press on the issue I'm afraid you are right. Will the support hold up through 3 debates and a ton of Romney ads? Maybe. Maybe not.
I think Romney has a great way to attack Obama here, but I find the R/R campaign to be a miserable bunch of mush so far - neither memorable or inspiring. The "in" is simply "weren't they supposed to love us if Obama was elected, what happened?" Remember all that silliness the O campaign and media fed us in 2008? The Muslim world supposedly hated Bush and would love us if we only elected Obama. Well? What happened. It's a way to attack Hussein and tweak the media.
I think Romney has to give it a little time, get his facts right about what looks like the obvious White House negligence on Embassy security and then hit Obama with some big time ads in the battleground states. That should help level the playing field.
On this particular issue I think Romney has been okay so far. Look, the one thing Obama is really, really good at is campaigning. Sure, they get a ton of help from the mainstream media - but there is no doubt Obama is a top notch campaigner. Obummer is a great orator, comes off as the happy warrior (concealing his radicalism with a friendly smile), and is very likable. People want to like him. That's a huge advantage. At this point, I am just not sure if there are any more opportunities to change the dynamics of this race. I guess the debates are the last real chance.
So the variance in these polls is akin to flipping a coin 1000 times every day. Sometimes you are going to get heads more often then tails. Other times you are going to come up tails more often. This is known in the statistics world as "noise" - that is to say, each particular set of data is not precise. That's why Obama comes up 46% on some days and 43% on other days. The truth is somewhere in the middle. On any given day, the luck of the draw may show Romney or Obama up or down.
My point is, there is not a significant amount of people out there who are bouncing back and forth between Obama or Romney based on the news cycle. The "rally around the flag" concept is nonsense. Obama can bomb Iran tomorrow and nobody committed to vote Obama out of office is going to suddenly support him for re-election - and vice-versa with respect to Romney. Same with the "job reports". The next job report could show a jump to 10% unemployment and Obama's supporters will still stick with him. It is laughable when the mainstream media point to a "favorable" jobs report as a reason for an Obama bump.
The only thing to take away from this flood of mostly useless polls (the only polls worth our time are state polls of likely voters and weighted according to state demographics) is the fact that they show a consistent 5-8% of voters who are either undecided or prefer another candidate.
Folks, those represent Romney votes. Let's make that perfectly clear. The Obama-loving mainstream media will use every trick in the book to show a "horse race" when in fact, the race is pretty much over and is Romney's to lose. The trick they are using right now to keep the race close is with these undecided voters. And just forget about those who "prefer another candidate." Who? We dont' have a Ross Perot as a third party choice this time. The fringe candidates out there are not even going to get 1% of the vote. So more than 99% of the voters out there are going to choose between Obama and Romney.
So why so many undecideds? This is because a good number of voters who plan to support Romney do not feel comfortable making their views known. Could be they are afraid of being considered racist or it just could be that, understanding the intolerance of the other side, they would rather just not go on the record as opposing the current administration. Like in Nazi Germany, there are a lot of people who are just afraid to speak out against the government and wish to keep their political views to themselves. But on November 6th, they will send a message with their votes.
Bottom line is you just cannot have a civil conversation about politics with your neighbors or co-workers anymore. I actually have neighbors that refuse to talk to me or associate with me because I put Republican lawn signs in my yard. I don't dare bring up politics in the workplace either. Years ago, I remember having discussions with co-workers all the time on politics. These days, it can be a career-ender so I keep my mouth shut.
Obama is consistently 42-47% in these polls. He's not going to get a significant amount of those calling themselves undecided. He's going to lose. If he was going to win, he'd be 50% or above by now.
The variability in these polls is too much to allow any substantive consideration of 1 or 2 point swings. The variability is so much that it is often outside the MOE. I personally don’t believe voters change their minds from day to day as much as these highly volatile polls suggest. It’s much more likely that the variability in how the polls are conducted (the sampling mix, who is called, what days polling occurred during, how the questions were asked, etc.) accounts for a significant amount of the variability.
One statistic I personally have not seen reported is the number of people called vs. the number of people who agreed to participate.
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