Boing! Obama gets a bounce ... (update) Posted by: McQ
on Saturday, July 26, 2008
In all honesty, I couldn't imagine how Obama couldn't get some sort of bounce out of his foreign trip, although initially, it didn't seem to be developing.
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Saturday shows that the bounce is continuing for Barack Obama. The presumptive Democratic nominee attracts 46% of the vote while John McCain earns 40%. When "leaners" are included, it’s Obama 49% and McCain 43%. Just four days ago, the candidates were tied at 46% (with leaners). Obama is viewed favorably by 57% of voters, McCain by 55%.
With the week of media exposure Obama had (while McCain was reduced to a marginal presence) it was hard to imagine him not receiving such a bounce. However, in some key battleground states, the race seemed to tighten a bit. So while he is enjoying an overall bounce in his national percentages, that may not tell the whole story. Any victory will be won state by state (as Al Gore learned).
And while bounces are certainly good, the trick is to sustain them and turn them from a "bounce" into a solid lead. We'll see if he's able to do that.
UPDATE: Speaking of "state by state", here's an example. One of the things Democrats have been saying is "the South is back in play". Well if SC is any indication (and it usually is) that's not particularly true:
Research 2000 for Daily Kos. 7/22-23. Likely voters. MoE 4.5% (No trend lines)
McCain (R) 53 Obama (D) 40
Obama is getting only 15 percent of the white vote. Kerry, for his part, got 22 percent of the white vote in 2004. This poll closely tracks black turnout with the 2004 election (31 percent versus 30 percent in 2004), and we can assume those numbers will be greatly boosted thanks to Obama's presence in the field. However, those white numbers make it extremely difficult to make a go of this state. Perhaps that's why the Obama campaign talks more about Georgia than they do about South Carolina.
He can talk about Georgia all he wants, but the only thing he has going for him in GA that's different than SC is it is Bob Barr's home state and it has always had a large libertarian vote. But I have little doubt that it will again end up in the red this year, albeit by a smaller percentage than in the past.
Not sure what Bob Barr has to do with the Libertarian vote, since he’s not particularly libertarian... but if Libertarians are "pull the big L lever" types, it might make a difference.
More of a "favorite son" protest vote against both Obama and McCain is how I’d characterize it. Libertarians have always done fairly well here in GA. And while I still have my reservations about Barr’s "libertariansim", he is the LP candidate.
