Tightening up
The latest ABC / Washington Post poll shows a reasonably wide open GOP race and a Democratic race that has tightened up considerably in recent days. Here is a discussion of some of the internals:
Clinton continues to lead Obama among Democrats, although by a slimmed-down, eight-point edge, while Obama has a 13-point edge among independents. Independent voters helped the senator from Illinois win Iowa and broke heavily for him in New Hampshire. Many of the upcoming contests limit participation to registered Democrats, which Clinton’s advisers see as an advantage.
Obama holds a lead of nearly 2 to 1 among African Americans, whose influence will be fully felt in the Jan. 26 Democratic primary in South Carolina, where nearly half of 2004 primary voters were black. In the new poll, 59 percent of African American women support Obama and 35 percent back Clinton. Among white women, Clinton’s margin over Obama is 20 percentage points.
Obama now leads Clinton among men, 42 percent to 33 percent, and while she retains an advantage among women, it has been severely attenuated. She has an 11 percentage-point lead among women, down from 39 points a month ago. In both Iowa and New Hampshire, women made up 57 percent of Democratic voters, according to Election Day polls.
Although Clinton maintains her edge among women overall in the new poll, Obama has eliminated the 3 to 1 advantage she enjoyed among single women a month ago. Married women go for Clinton over Obama by 53 percent to 30 percent.
We’re not quite sure we understand the poll’s methodology entirely, but it sure isn’t oversampling Republicans:
This ABC News/Washington Post poll was conducted by telephone Jan. 9-12, 2008, among a random national sample of 1,130 adults, including an oversample of African-Americans for a total of 202 black respondents (weighted back to their correct share of the national population). The results have a 3-point error margin for the full sample, 4 points for the 612 Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents, 5 points for the 389 Republicans and Republican-leaning independents, 5 points for the 423 likely Democratic primary voters and 6 points for the 280 likely Republican primary voters.
One would think the 3:2 sample of D:R (including leaners) represents the pollsters’ estimates of the correct weighting of the current party identifications of those polled. If that represents reality, prospects really may be as dismal for the GOP as George Will thinks they are.
January 15th, 2008 at 2:18 pm
Will does not mention the 1974 post-Watergate election. He does not discuss how Republicans got into their ominous situation.
IMO the Republican establishment has consciously decided that their pickings are richer as a minority party under the status quo than as a majority party that provides limited, competent government.
I usually disagree with the Democrats’ policies and I dislike PC elitist liberals, but I loathe the Republican party, which afaic has lied to and betrayed me starting with the 1988 read-my-lips campaign.
George W. concludes his piece with
In view of their record, I could care less how they define themselves. Presumably they’ll brandish the cross and wave the flag as usual. Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel? That is sooo 18th-century. Today’s “conservative” scoundrels take refuge in patriotism from the get-go.
**************
It feels like the two major parties are arguing about which one will deliver the slower rate of national decline.