That is the very good question. For all the talk about voter dissatisfaction and Obama being the head of an unstoppable movement, He isn't leading McCain all that much in the head-to-heads. And that's before McCain and the right wing start attacking Obama on being too liberal (something that they are pretty good at doing).

Any talk of "history" is premature. It'll be hard fought battle.

I'm not going to get into personal attacks, but the candidates' positions on the issues are going to be under an intense spotlight during the general election. His voting record in congress is slightly to the left of Hillary Clinton and John Kerry. If his inspirational speeches can make enough moderates forget about his voting record, he could conceivably get to 270 electoral votes, but that's going to be an enormous challenge on his part.

The answer is in the poll I think you're citing.

http://www.bizjournals.com/dayton/st...1/daily28.html

"The effect of Bush's job performance had a small impact on the prospect of voting for McCain. Only 23 percent of voters said Bush's performance made them less likely to vote for McCain, while 63 percent said it didn't make a difference. In a similar poll, only 23 percent of voters said they were so angry with Bush that they wouldn't vote for McCain."

Super interesting IMHO. The higher that number goes, the better Obama will do vs. McCain

And the question becomes why would that number be higher? McCain's media status as a "maverick" has obviously done what no one thought could be done, and that is having the Republican nominee NOT be tied to the failed Presidency of George W. Bush. McCain was enough of a thorn in President Bush's side that he escapes a lot of the brunt for it.

And I think his reported struggles to court the conservatives in his party only help in that view of McCain.

Head-to-head polls in February mean nothing. You know that already.

We're all just armchair prognosticators and as we get new information, our ideas about what might happen will change. Because surely no one saw things being how they are right now, conventional wisdom be damned. At least on the Democratic side anyway.

With all of that said, I'm throwing out convention and the past and I'm saying that historically the two main candidates in the general election were usually cut from the same cloth, making it easier to compare them to each other relatively equally.

Polling isn't as random as one would suggest and because of the demographics of the Democratic race, the Bradley effect can be thrown out of the equation. People aren't going to vote for McCain because they think he can be a better President than Hillary or Obama.

The GOP used depressed voter turnout of the Democratic base to fuel their victory in 2004. That's not going to happen this year unless someone plans to go kill a few million people or perhaps, some other world altering situation happens to change the complexion of this race.

But I'll go ahead and put all of this out here so that when I'm wrong, we can bump this part of the thread and all of the fortune tellers among us can point to how history taught us so much. I'll be impressed if that's the case, too. Not because I mind being wrong in this case, because I wouldn't.

Personal feelings aside, I'm thinking solely about the outcome and in the end, I think that 'history' of a different sort will be the trump card in this race.

But again...there is a long road ahead, a lot can happen and we shall see it all unfold.

DC: I don't think it was depressed D turnout as much as an energized R turnout. I remember hearing that there were 4000000 extra R votes in that election.

Cronin: Maybe so, but they have been polling likability for a while now and that number has been the best predictor of victory. For me it makes sense because the swing voters that decide elections don't pay much attention to the issues and vote more on likability than anything else. Issues, generally, are only important to people who've already made up their mind.

Vic: Obama's votes aren't that simple. He's missed a lot of votes over th past couple of years and that "most liberal" label is based on a percentage, not aggregate votes. There also just haven't been a lot of "liberal" causes to vote on. He'll get beat up on some surveillance votes, but what liberal votes does he really have? But of course I don't think those votes will matter to swing voters anyway.

It's based on the actual votes that he has cast in the senate, and the National Journal's 2007 Ratings have him listed as the most liberal senator in 2007.

I do agree that he will probably be able to continue to mask a lot of his senate votes and positions on the issues though his abstract campaign speeches on "hope" and "change". Two 25 year old women in my office are cult followers, although one of them doesn't know what his stand is on any of the issues, and the other one only knows that "he's going to end the war in Iraq." They are probably a good representation of the most politically illiterate generation in American history. Are there enough of them to put him over the top? I guess we'll find out.

hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

I know a ton of people who are Obama fans who are driving me nuts with their talk about him and surely hearing someone on television be asked, "Why are you voting for him" and have them say "because he inspires me" is irritating.

But, the most political illiterate generation in history? Let's not get carried away, Father Time.

Vic: I know it's based on actual votes, but what I'm saying is that the methodology is flawed in that it tracks percentages without accounting for raw number of votes. If you look at Nation Journal's data Hillary actually voted the liberal position more often than Obama, but her total votes was much higher so her percentage was lower. Does this make her more or less liberal than Obama?

The other flaw in the data is that while campaigning Senators tend to be most likely to show up when the vote is the most partisan. Obama could miss a 65-35 vote, but the pressure from party leaders would intense for him to come back for a close party line vote.

This isn't to say Obama isn't a liberal, but I think his 10-15th most ranking average from the prior two years is more in line with reality.

I'd also argue that the youth of today aren't any more detached than other generations. Most people don't have any idea what the issues even are, never mind actually have a position on them.

dola

There's also some questionable uses of liberal and conservative. The first economic vote is:

Clinton voted no, the conservative position, and Obama voted yea.

As I further looked at the votes the difference between Hillary, the 16th most liberal and Obama comes down to two votes where they voted opposite each other(Hillary the conservative position) and two votes where Hillary voted the conservative position and Obama didn't vote. I'd say the real story is that Hillary and Obama are voted almost identically.

Right slams Obama as 'shady Chicago socialist'

As a sidenote, he was endorsed by the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel and the Houston Chronicle for Sunday's paper.

I've been away from this for far too long.

As alluded to. It has already begun.

On the other hand, the left don't need to slam McCain, all they have to do is watch a stuttering old man talk about staying in Iraq for another hundred years.

That is already losing a lot of steam, as McCain isn't allowing his statement to be taken out of context anymore. In his interview with Larry King, McCain noted that we have now had troops in Japan, Germany and South Korea for over 50 years. "As long as Americans are not being injured or harmed or wounded or killed, it's fine with me and I hope it would be fine with you if we maintain a presence in a very volatile part of the world where al Qaeda is training, recruiting, equipping and motivating people every single day."

I wonder what he's going to do when we create the next terrorist training ground and have to station there as well?

That's right, just keep talking Johnny Straight-talk. Just keep talking.

What's Obama gonna do?

At this point I am still an Obama supporter. However my hatred of McCain has declined somewhat. I still don't trust him, but I think he's less inherently evil than I at first suspected.

I don't know, but I bet I know what YOU think he's going to do. And that's coddle all his Muslim pals. Right?

Is it possible we could get a thread about the general election and get all the nail-biting GOP'ers who know they have a crap candidate into their own thread without continually crapping on this one? Kthx.

Plus I seriously doubt any liberals (with a name or not) would ever say anything that could be suggested to be an attack against McCain. Because if they did, the timesonline.co.uk would surely report it. Surely they would.

So you can launch personal remarks towards me, but you cannot answer a question that was in no way personal towards you?

Additionally, since we already all know that Obama is likely to be the next President, wouldn't it be better to know what he's going to do vs what McCain is going to do?

Um, what?

So you're saying that liberals don't need to resort to swift boat-like attacks against McCain because his numerous faults say everything we need to know? Or that conservatives have finally given up the myth of liberal media bias in our country and are now busy getting their panties in a twist over the London Times' coverage of our election? Literally baffled trying to figure out what point you're trying to make here.

The point is that conservatives attack liberals and liberals attack conservatives. Always have, always will. Whether it's covered that way or not is another story. No pun intended.

Anybody know of a good place to check for where Obama will be speaking and whatnot in Ohio? I checked his site but couldn't find a good list of events where he will be attending.

Yes and no.

I think that a lot of these visits are shotgun deals (no pun intended) where they make the plans early, but release the specifics at the last minute. I think it gives more flexibility for pulling last minute deviations.

His web site is probably the best place to look and to stay attended to. I'm sure he'll be visiting there again as it gets closer, but the secret service probably doesn't want him releasing his moves super far in advance either.

I am a little confused here as well, especially since the London Times is one of the more conservative UK papers, though it tends to be much more balanced than the Telegraph (very conservative) and the Independent (very liberal).

Well, there's also Susan Eisenhower. You may have heard of her grandfather. ;)

The two newest Texas polls have Obama down by just 5% and 2%.

Holy heck, it was cold out hiking to the polls today.

But I voted nonetheless, for Hillary.

I also braved the cold to go out and vote for Mr. Obama. I figured it'd be pretty sad if I donated money to him and didn't even vote.

Too bad the tavern next to the polling place wasn't open.

You know why Wisconsin gets such good cell phone service? More bars in more places.

Very nice.

Don't quote me on this, but I'm pretty sure I heard that my town has the most bars per capita in the nation. We might've lost that title as the town is growing but the bar concentration is shrinking.

Although an unincorporated town about 5 miles from me has two bars for about 10 people.

http://www.politico.com/blogs/bensmi...sin_exits.html

They're saying Obama won big in Wisconsin, chipping into Hillary's normal demographic strongholds.

Don't forget, Kerry won huge in the 2004 exit polls in an electoral college landslide over GWB, taking down Ohio and Florida by surprising margins.

And that means what to me? My great-great grandfather was head of the 4th ward of Chicago and was the financial alderman of the city during much of the early 20th century. He helped build the Chicago machine and was a staunch democrat. Yet, his grandson and the rest of the family since then has been republican.

My point is that names don't mean much unless they are leaders of the party. Lest we forget Obama and Cheney are related and they are on opposite sides of everything.

I haven't forgotten. I was just reporting what I read. There were a couple exit polls that were off this year as well. A California exit poll on Drudge had Obama winning. Hillary won California.

CNN projects Wisconsin for Obama.

9-0 sure is a bitch. He'll win Hawaii to give him 10-0, so...geez. Gotta love spending all money they're making on new signs just for Texas for Obama. lol...hope the GOP is sharpening their knives, 'cuz he held serve in his first chance at the helm in the race.

We'll see what happens. I'm tired of hearing about superdelegates. Let's wait until Denver to hear about that.

It appears that McCain's advisors have already told him to forget about Huckabee and Clinton and start campaigning against Obama. Here's a quote from his victory speech tonight:

"I will fight every moment of every day in this campaign to make sure Americans are not deceived by an eloquent but empty call for change."

9-0 (10-0) is certainly an impressive feat in a close race.

Didn't Bill Clinton lose nine primaries in a row in 1992?

Allow me to ask a really stupid question: how can you possibly predict a winner with 3% of precincts reporting? Obviously I'm missing a basic element of how polling and these elections work, so please enlighten me.

Hillary probably isn't going to address her losses in this speech in Ohio right now. Love the new signs, "We've Got Your Back, Hillary!"

She won't even address him by name. Just "my opponent." Love the "avoid him, let's talk about us" theory of this. Her people have to be scrambling and they need to stop the bleeding, but man...if they can pull it off, they'll prove their mettle that's for sure.

They poll people after they leave the polls, to ask them how they voted. If those people lie, then the exit polls are wrong. But provided those folks are right, you can capture a pretty good idea of how the voting is going to go. Not just media companies conduct exit polls, but campaigns do too.

It's not a stupid question, though. And the news networks do an awful job of explaining this stuff. They're like ESPN, but with matters of the nation rather than just talking NBA trades.

He lost seven of the first nine.

I think they're both purposely speaking over each other today. Swapped to FOX to watch it, because I knew they wouldn't show Hillary for that long, giving a stump speech.

Damn, that's a pretty big crowd he's got in Houston.