If you were a bookie... Polls and bets on the 2004 elections

You can... if you eat a couple of popup ads AS you go in... Just to gain entry, then you can navigate with blocker running.

I got a "page not found" when I tried to open that, Thomas.

it opened for me, nice colours but impossible to read.

Ouch! He changed it from a .jpg into a .gif just after I posted. This should work better. If not, just go to his homepage www.pollkatz.homestead.com ; there's a thumbnail of the histogram on the top of the page in the middle.

Unfortunately, he also added some later data, which made me like the outcome a lot less.

(Dys, if you use Internet Explorer, you can probably expand it to full size by moving your mouse to the bottom right corner of the image and clicking on the icon that surfaces. That also makes it much less pixelous, pixelful, pixelesque ... whatever.)

Interesting picture. Looks like recent trends have hurt Kerry significantly. Good ! It is more than well-deserved. I believe we will have to wait a few more weeks to see how it all looks going in to the finals.

My money (and hopes) are still on Bush.

That was last week tho ... Unfutz hasnt got a new one up (or hadnt earlier today, anyway) - but I suspect the next one will look distinctly different. Lot of state polls have been heading Bush's way the past week (Florida, Ohio, Wisconsin, Iowa, Pennsylvania, Nevada ...)

I'm sure there will a buncha fuss and interest in the polls over the coming week, but the polls following the Republican Convention ... the Post-Labor Day polls, are going to be the first ones that will begin to paint any sort of meaningful picture, IMO. I think it is an accurate assessemt that the apparent sudden increase in the number of new polls specifically is to provide a baseline against which to compare post-convention polling, and given the "Bounce Hype" that swirled around the Democratic Convention, I assume there will be great attention paid to The National Mood in the days following the close of The Republican Convention ... moreso, I expect, even than was accorded the Boston dog-and-pony show.

Today's Gallup:

I go along with P Diddie that the race is now essentially tied.

However, I would still rather be in Kerry's position than Bush's position right now.

Despite Gallup, I think that much of the change is due to the Swift boat phenomena, which I think has max anti-Kerry impact the first few days attention is really focussed on it, (Kerry's sailor buddies say he didn't deserve medals!!!). This anti-Kerry impact is likely to dissipate in the following weeks as more of the Swift boat people's stories show inconsistencies.

As that occcurs, Kerry benefits.

It is important to keep in mind that Kerry's whole foray into veterans' support constitutes an invasion into Republican territory. Most white vets tend to be Republican, and whatever Kerry takes out of this is something of a bonus.

Once the Republican convention is over, remember that the the Labor Day holiday is the traditional kickoff of the election season. From there on, expect Kerry to hit on the economy, and right now, (or really ever), the economy is not going to be a good topic for Bush.

What Kerry is doing, from what I can see, is electoral infighting. In prizefigting, frequently one man will keep hitting his opponent in the midsection and ribs, (infighting), for the first few rounds, ignoring the chance to go to the head. While he might lose a couple of early rounds, you frequently see the results later in the fight, where his opponent runs out of stamina from all the punches in the abdomen and ribs early on. At that point, the boxer then starts going to the head of his now-exhausted opponent, and knocks him out with a punch that would not knock him early in the fight.

Whatever Kerry takes away from Bush in the form of the white veterans' vote is a plus.

That would be more significant IF the nationwide popular vote determines the Presidency. But it does NOT. The electoral college vote does.

http://www.geocities.com/wubwub/bushkerrystate2004.html

One thing should be said-this Electoral College-popular vote difference really only occurs in contests where the difference is less than one percent.

Gore won the popular vote by about 0.5%, and lost Florida by a couple of hundred votes. If Gore had won by 1%-certainly the vicitor usually wins by that amount-he gets the Electoral College votes.

Look at it this way. Florida produced six million votes. If Gore had won just one half of one percent more in every state, he has an excess of 30,000 votes in Florida, and takes the state.

Yes, I know all the predictions are for a close race, but I have to question if the race finishes under 1% in the popular vote two consecutive times.

So I would not dismiss popular vote polls as insignificant. Except in the most razor-sharp elections, they are a pretty good indicator of how the Electoral College vote is going to go.

Plus, the electoral college calculation Larry links to - David Wissing's Hedgehog Report - tends to show numbers a lot more positive to Bush than many of the other sites that do the same thing.

Thats not to do with David being a Bush supporter (he is) and others not, because for some reason most of these sites are run by Republican supporters. As will have been clear from the number of links posted to it in this thread, Dales' ECB is the favourite of several of us - hardcore Republican he is, but in assigning how states lean he's always fair, making his estimations on the basis of the last few polls.

At the moment he has the score at Kerry 194 / Bush 178, or Bush 260 / Kerry 259 if you include the states that lean only slightly either way.

What's more, for double-check purposes he also has maps that go purely on the very last poll that appeared for each state, counting or not counting the Zogby Interactives. (The former has Bush 284, Kerry 249 if you include the slight-leaners (or tossups), while the latter has Bush 291, Kerry 238 with tossups).

New Time poll out, Aug. 24-26:

Bush 46 (+2)
Kerry 46 (-5)

3-way race:
Bush 46 (+2)
Kerry 44 (-4)
Nader 5 (+1)

Thats both among likely voters. This one is among all registered voters:

"In your opinion, do you think President Bush deserves to be reelected to a second term, or do you think it is time for someone else to be president?"

Deserves Reelection 46% (+4)
Someone Else 49% (-5)
Unsure 5% (+2)

Bush job approval rate:

Approve 51% (+1)
Disapprove 45% (-1)
Unsure 4% (+1)

The four two-way race polls out in the past week show an average 1,3% lead for Bush. That compares to a Kerry lead of just over 3% in the 11 polls previously done in August.

Interestingly, the same poll also had the issues list: who do you trust more to ...

On all counts, Kerry lost ground compared to three weeks ago. But on some counts he lost considerably more ground than on others, which is the interesting part.

Hors concours is health care, the only issue thats been a hold beyond doubt, namely for Kerry. But perhaps because his lead was so big (+18), he also lost a lot - now he leads by only +8 (47:39).

All the other issues either were or are now reasonably close. But on some almost nothing changed:

Tax policy
bounce to Bush: 3%
current lead: Kerry, +1%

The war on terrorism
bounce to Bush: 2%
current lead: Bush, +10%

On some, a moderate shift took place:

Providing strong leadership in difficult times
bounce to Bush: 6%
current lead: Bush, +11%

Situation in Iraq
bounce to Bush: 6%
current lead: Bush, +8%

Economy
bounce to Bush: 6%
current lead: Kerry, +3%

And on some, a very sizable change of mood materialised:

Being commander-in-chief of the armed forces
bounce to Bush: 10%
current lead: Bush, +8%

Moral values issues
bounce to Bush: 8%
current lead: Bush, +8%

Understanding the needs of people like yourself
bounce to Bush: 12%
current lead: Kerry, +3%

Its the more personalised issues that he's lost most ground on. What they call character issues I guess. As always, the challenge for the Dems is to bring the debate back to the actual policy issues, while for the Reps it pays to "go for the man rather than the ball", as we say about soccer here. Alas, a juicy personal story is much more attractive for the media (and, admit it, the voters too) than a discussion of policy disagreements ...

Well, there's always the odd poll out ...

For example, that beautiful +5 comma something per cent Kerry lead we saw turning up in my graphs the week after the Democratic Convention, demonstrating a two-point jump compared to the stable 3 point lead he was already enjoying pre-Convention, post-VP announcement - you wont see it back again next time I upload an update of my graphs again.

See, after the WaPo poll that showed just a 1 point lead for Kerry on the first of August, there were four polls in a row showing Kerry with a 5-7% lead. Thats pretty consistent for the usually widely divergent polls, hence what the graph showed up. But then there was that Gallup poll, in complete dissent, showing a 3 point Bush lead. Add a one-off poll by Money/ICR that showed the candidates tied, and gone was the post-Convention bounce in my graph: the average in the end merely went from a 2,4% Kerry lead to a 3,3% one. Anyways, you'll see, next time I upload the graphs.

The next ten-day period, mid-August, the same happened: 3 polls showed the Kerry lead down to a mere 0-3%, but Zogby showed one of 7 points, so again the average hardly changed: -3,0%.

This time, the odd one out is NPR. Four polls out thus far that were done since the 20th showed numbers from a 3-point Bush lead (Gallup, LAT) to a 1-point Kerry lead (Fox). But Polling Report now also lists a NPR poll that was done August 21-24, and has a 5-point Kerry lead, with Bush losing and Kerry winning ground compared to early June (when nine polls showed an average 1,6% Kerry lead):

Bush 45 (-4)
Kerry 50 (+2)

3-way:
Bush 43
Kerry 47
Nader 3

Bush job ratings (compared with late July):
Approve 49 (no change)
Disapprove 48 (-1)
(Compared with early June those have hardly changed either)

New ABC/WaPo poll, Aug 26-29, numbers compared to four weeks ago (just after the Democratic Convention):

Bush 49 (+1)
Kerry 49 (no change)

3-way race:
Bush 48 (+1)
Kerry 48 (-1)
Nader 1 (-1)

Thats both among likely voters. No noticeable effect from the whole SVFT thing there.

Among registered voters, Kerry did have to yield more (tho from a better position):

Bush 48 (+3)
Kerry 49 (-3)

3-way race:
Bush 48 (+4)
Kerry 47 (-3)
Nader 2 (no change)

Job approval Bush:
Approve 50 (+3)
Disapprove 47 (-2)

ICR/Excel did a new poll too (thats the one done on behalf of Money, I think?), only 3-way numbers tho. Surprisingly, it shows Kerry up - compared to three weeks ago:

Bush 45 (-1)
Kerry 48 (+2)
Nader 2 (-1)

I think it's going to get worse before it gets better... if it gets better. Arnold was tearing up like Giuliani did yesterday. I think the Kerry's 15 minutes are just about up.

Occom:

The economic news seems to be turning sour. People never really did buy into this "The economy is beginning to roar" baloney people like Kudlow and Kramer fed them.

Kerry had a bad week with the Swift boat people. But it really is the economy, stupid.

I would rather be in Kerry's position than Bush's right now. I think Bush is riding the crest of a successful issue-Swift boats-that is going to soon fade away.

Kelticwizard, I don't want to get into on this thread out of respect to Nimh, but I disagree. I don't think the swifties are going away... I don't think the economy trumps National Security (this time) and I think it's more Kerry's inability to attract than anyone else's ability to attack that is changing the numbers. As much and as many people don't like Bush, they don't really like Kerry either. IMO they will stick with "the evil they know". We'll see.

What the hell ... ?

You'll remember the IEM 2004, the political stock exchange - Timber's been posting graphs from it, me too. Its like a sophisticated form of betting.

So, what ... which speech they didn't like?



Well weird.

I don't think the poll numbers could be reacting to convention speeches that fast, nimh...

This is probably the expected Swift Boat blowback.