I just think that his charisma will wear off quickly once he is elected. I get the feeling it will be time to put up or shut up over the next four years. Throw in the fact that he be looking for re-election, so he has to be careful.

I don't get that feeling at all. Why would you get that idea? ;)

Have you read that? Seriously? No one can be stupid enough to believe that shit, right? :D

i don't think PA is tightening really

#1 it's Mason-Dixon poll, which has had 2-3pt Republican lean all year everywhere versus other polls.
#2 it's one poll

Show me another 2-3 polls that agree with it and maybe we have somethign to talk about, but I think Obama takes PA by ~7%.

flere, what are you hearing about NW Indiana? I know it's traditionally a Democratic area, but it shouldn't have a major effect on the state as a whole.

Basically there have already been a lot of back-and-forth charges about voting fraud or voter suppression. It looks like we're going to see a lot of lawsuits before it's all done, which will be made worse if Indiana turns out to be close.

or polling for that matter, or assumptions, or thinking or speculation, discussion or debate. Might as well lock the thread until Wednesday.

Ah, not surprising. I'll have to talk to some friends back home about it.

Thanks.

Your wild sarcasm is noted, but does not mirror my points in any way. My discussion regarding the weighting of polls is simply meant to point out that people should be very wary of using those polls as a predictor given their methodology. I make no claim that what I'm pointing out will make McCain or Obama a winner. The poll weights generally favor the Democrat candidate thus far (with the exception of the one that Fozzie pointed out yesterday). It's easy to say that means that it's conservative bias, but the statistics lean that way regardless of the bias of the analyst.

:)

Interesting that Ed Rendell is now urging Democratic voters to get out and vote which mirrors the leaked information concerning Obama's internal polls in Pennsylvania. He believes the race is closer than most polls indicate.

Rendell says race is closer than polls indicate | Wilkes-Barre News | The Times Leader

I would be surprised if Obama lost PA. There would have to be some radical voting changes for Philadelphia and Pittsburgh for that to happen.

That's kind of a silly conclusion MBBF. Even if Obama is up by 10 or more points, it makes sense to make sure you GOTV so there is no surprise. Furthermore, there are several close down ballot races for the House and strong turnout could be decisive in those races.

Looks like Obama's putting ads up in Georgia, North Dakota, and Arizona. That's gotta sting for McCain.

Not sure what I concluded. I merely noted that he believes the race to be closer than the polls suggest. I agree with what you and Ronnie said.....they need to get the vote out and avoid being complacent.

The only reason it would sting is if we had a repeat scenario of 2000 where the loser lost his own state in a close election.

Um, you concluded that he believes the race is closer than previously thought. I dispute that Rendell's statement automatically leads to that conclusion.

LOL.....he said it! I just posted it and noted his comment.

You're reaching here.

And I'd say that it's probably both.

Yep, if I'm Obama, I want my supporters believing that I can lose, even if polls show me up by 30%. The last thing Democrats need is to get cocky and screw things up by not voting.

I think John Titor paid a visit to the offices of The Onion. Check out this front page from 1993.

Trucker | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

:D

So, MBBF, just to make it clear to everyone. If the election results are within the margin of error of the polls your are disputing, will you concede that the weighting was indeed accurate?

:deadhorse:

dola: Maybe I should say:

If the voter turnout is heavy on the Democrat side, as the polling has been, will you concede that the weighting was accurate?

It is hard to judge based on anything but exit polls because, no matter what poll it is, it fluctuates day to day and week to week.

Something interesting.

The last two elections, it has come down to the Republicans "Get Out The Vote" operations that were the tipping point versus Gore and Kerry. They were admittedly far superior then the Democrats actions in this field.

This time around, McCain is taking the money ticketed for that and using it on last minute ad campaigns. So all the coordinators and all such stuff are being required to pay their own way. I'm honestly surprised here. Money spent on GOTV has a pretty much 1-1 relationship with actual votes being cast for your candidate. TV Ads, don't really have that same ability.

In Final Stretch, McCain to Pour Money Into TV Ads - washingtonpost.com (Reg required or BugMeNot)

I wish there was a :jawdrop: icon to go with :eek: . Is Sarah Palin seriously trying to say that reporters saying that she's attacking Barack Obama are violating her First Amendment rights??????

If the words are true, Palin has gone below Dithering Danny Quayle on my list of.. well.. I won't say what.. She might think I'm infringing her right to free speech:

Political Radar: Palin Fears Media Threaten Her First Amendment Rights

ABC News' Steven Portnoy reports: In a conservative radio interview that aired in Washington, D.C. Friday morning, Republican vice presidential nominee Gov. Sarah Palin said she fears her First Amendment rights may be threatened by "attacks" from reporters who suggest she is engaging in a negative campaign against Barack Obama.

Palin told WMAL-AM that her criticism of Obama's associations, like those with 1960s radical Bill Ayers and the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, should not be considered negative attacks. Rather, for reporters or columnists to suggest that it is going negative may constitute an attack that threatens a candidate's free speech rights under the Constitution, Palin said.

"If [the media] convince enough voters that that is negative campaigning, for me to call Barack Obama out on his associations," Palin told host Chris Plante, "then I don't know what the future of our country would be in terms of First Amendment rights and our ability to ask questions without fear of attacks by the mainstream media."

Edit: Oh good! There is!

:jawdrop: :jawdrop: (this might get to rolleyes territory) :D

Apparently she hasn't read the entirety of the First Amendment. I seem to recall something in there about freedom of the press.

I looked at the 2004 map again and I am struck as to how this could look different this year. The solid block of red states in the whole South, Plains and Interior West is impressive and underscores why a 50-state strategy is a good one.

Zogby has McCain up 1 in a one day poll which is volatile. I'm sincerely hoping this is an outlier

My Way News - Study: Media coverage has favored Obama campaign

NEW YORK (AP) - John McCain supporters who believe they haven't gotten a fair shake from the media during the Republican's candidacy against Barack Obama have a new study to point to. Comments made by sources, voters, reporters and anchors that aired on ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts over the past two months reflected positively on Obama in 65 percent of cases, compared to 31 percent of cases with regards to McCain, according to the Center for Media and Public Affairs.

ABC's "World News" had more balance than NBC's "Nightly News" or the "CBS Evening News," the group said.

Meanwhile, the first half of Fox News Channel's "Special Report" with Brit Hume showed more balance than any of the network broadcasters, although it was dominated by negative evaluations of both campaigns. The center didn't evaluate programs on CNN or MSNBC.

"For whatever reason, the media are portraying Barack Obama as a better choice for president than John McCain," said Robert Lichter, a George Mason University professor and head of the center. "If you watch the evening news, you'd think you should vote for Obama."

The center analyzed 979 separate news stories shown between Aug. 23 and Oct. 24, and excluded evaluations based on the campaign horse race, including mention of how the candidates were doing in polls. For instance, when a voter was interviewed on CBS Oct. 14 saying he thought Obama brought a freshness to Washington, that was chalked up as a pro-Obama comment.

When NBC's Andrea Mitchell reported Oct. 1 that some conservatives say that Sarah Palin is not ready for prime-time, that's marked in the negative column for McCain.

ABC recorded 57 percent favorable comments toward the Democrats, and 42 percent positive for the Republicans. NBC had 56 percent positive for the Democrats, 16 percent for the Republicans. CBS had 73 percent positive (Obama), versus 31 percent (McCain).

Hume's telecast had 39 percent favorable comments for McCain and 28 percent positive for the Democratic ticket.

It was the second study in two weeks to remark upon negative coverage for the McCain-Palin ticket. The Project for Excellence in Journalism concluded last week that McCain's coverage has been overwhelmingly negative since the conventions ended, while Obama's has been more mixed.

Well, duh.

I wonder if there are similar studies from 2004.

Yeah, I know. I just happened to see it in the headlines & I figured I'd drop it in for anyone who wanted to argue or bitch about it.

http://www.cmpa.com/PressRel/Archive...ess%20Ever.pdf

In a nutshell, Kerry 58% positive vs Bush 36% positive.
In 2000, both Gore & Bush were about 2/3rds negative.

edit to add: I might as well go ahead & mention that the CMPA gets ripped by the left for being funded primarily by conservatives although both liberal & conservative commentators have cited their work. The less maligned PFEIJ (referenced in the original story I posted) had 2004 at Kerry 57% positive/17% negative positive and Bush as 15% positive/55% negative.

Some of this is natural. John McCain has run a bad campaign, when his bad campaign gets reported on you have negative comments. Maybe he should have picked a running mate that wasn't a joke and not changed his message every week.

I've been disgusted with the bias in cnn.com's choice of stories and headlines as the election has neared. It has been more more blatant that I expected.

???

Never mind what you think of her (or even what I think of her for that matter), without the presence of Palin I doubt McCain gets even half the positive coverage he's gotten. She's been the only selling point he's had for weeks now.

Obviously you started out giving them way too much benefit of the doubt. Their slant has been around for years, it's NBC that seems to have taken a decided turn (including MSNBC that is)

Perhaps with the social conservative base of the party, but not with the media. I haven't seen much positive coverage of Palin, whether her high unfavorability rating is being talked about, analysis her performances in live interviews, reports of rifts between herself and McCain, the $150,000 in clothes, Troopergate, or various other things coverage of her tends to be negative.

But maybe I missed some of the instances where the media has mentioned her in a positive light, I can't say that I watch a ton of news on the big networks.

I know about the liberal slant, the difference that I've perceived during the last couple months of this campaign are the choice in wording of headlines and links, maybe you'll tell me that's always been extremely biased too but it seems lately like they've turned towards a... tabloid-esque style of reporting that hasn't existed until recently, using extremely misleading headlines as the links to their main stories.

The biggest example to me was the story that was linked when Joe Biden released his health records:

Democratic VP nominee Biden releases medical records - CNN.com

While most of the story was about the information in Biden's health report, there was also this little bit:



So what's the headline on CNN.com that day that links to the story?

"Biden Releases Medical Records; Palin still has not"

That one sentence is the only thing in the article about Palin. No Democrats were bitching about the fact that Palin hadn't, it was a one line throwaway in the story. More time was spent discussing the fact that Obama was less forthcoming about his health information than McCain, though still, 95% of the story was about Biden. So why the hell is your headline focusing on Palin as if there's some scandal here?

I am used to CNN more accurately and more faithfully describing the actual content of their stories instead of implying controversy that doesn't actually exist.

Minor I guess, but it feels disingenuous and bothers me.

In the terms of the study, things like positive comments from supporters at rallies & such are counted (just as something negative would be). Although I only watch a relatively small amount of TV coverage, I've seen several blips of that nature. Otherwise, damned if I recall seeing any other positive coverage of McCain's campaign (not that I figure there's been a lot to work with on that score).

dola, not related to the presidential race but the reason I always refused to read foxnews.com at all was the way that the Fox site presented itself. It always resembled the national enquirer more than CNN or any other news production.

The difference is much less than it used to be, but there are still signs that Foxnews is trying to score a VERY different audience than I'd expect out of a reputable news source.

Looking at the "Health" section of each site, here are the current Fox stories:



The bolded ones are actually bolded on fox's site, not my doing.

CNN's health headlines:


Yeah, I'm still not quite ready to bring myself to consider foxnews.com a serious news source. CNN is sinking to their level fast though.

Hmm, usually FOX can be counted upon to deliver the best vehicle for their titillating media, but I'm thinking a switcheroo here would be in order.

Ummmm.....yeah. I was willing to give her the benefit of the doubt she wasn't a total moron, but she's totally blown any doubt out of the water.

Palin pranked by a Montreal radio station.

Too bad there isn't something in there about journalistic integrity.

That being said, call it for what it is. It is negative campaigning, but I think BHO has done his share of it as well.

LOL, it's really sad that people are still sticking with the old "BHO". "Oh no what is he doing! He's putting on a turban and bombing American cities. How did we elect a Muslim???"

I thought his middle name was Harold? But it's Hussein? oh fuck...

Me and my family tend to vote Republican (almost always local, often national) and every member of my family thinks the "Oh no, he's an Arab" is the dumbest election ploy ever. And to drive home the point my dad thinks he is a communist, my mom likes Sarah Palin, my brother could be JIMGA and they all think the Hussian name dropping and Obama dressed as an Arab pictures are beyond ridiculous.

I wish the no call list applied to political robocalls. I get about 8 per day from McCain, Saxby, etc. Tonight I had a message from Ann who wanted me to know she's a Joe the Plumber too and I should be concerned about my taxes and my safety. She's sure that as an "average American" I need to have the republican party look out for me.

http://www.nbc.com/Saturday_Night_Li...c-open/805381/

:lol: