Oh what a great time for a campaign to "go dark." This guy is Karl Rove's dream come true. This guy might remove the term "McGovern-esque loss" from the lexicon.

This poll is total bullshit. This is meant to give the appearnace of a John Kerry boost after the convention. There will be no real gain for Kerry, the media have recognized that, and now they are doing their damnedest to manufacture one. Kerry has to have some kind of momentum post convention or else everyone will recognize he has no chance of winning and Donks will be discouraged and won't show on Nov.2. This poll is completely false.

This is good, but I'm waiting for about about Andrew Sullivan and his goddamn donkey. It's so cutesy I want to puke up three feet of small intestine.

It was ast month's poll that was completely rigged. Bush was behind even on the tax issue, which would be a first for a Republican.

I think this month's is legit. So the "improvements" are bogus. Whether they took a legit poll this time because they were embarrassed last time, or to give Kerry a perceived bounce in next month's poll is up in the air. Just don't get excited by the movement.

(Of course it could just be sampling error. I just don't buy it though. A Republican behind on the tax issue would be just about an impossible result to get if the sample was in fact unbiased.)

On that Donkey,

I think MeTooThen mentioned that earlier. I almost put it into a post, but I'm sure Sullivan would say that the Donkey is just there to signify this is donk convention week, and that there'll be an elephant there at the end of August.

I sort of wanted to use it anyway, because he pisses me off so much, but I decided it was just stretching too much to claim that that donkey means what it may easily be taken to mean.

Sullivan might mean that. He might be being cute about it. But it's hard to refute his inevitable defense.

The more of Kerry that people see, the less they like him. He'd do better by hiding in an underground bunker between now and the election and let the 527s do all his campaigning for him.

I just don't trust this poll.It SEEMS wrong.I have never believed short of the world coming to an end that Kerry could win but the rot in the system is a lot deeper than I would have believed,so it will be close.
CLOSE IS A BAD THING !!!!
No matter what the result I fear that the domestic madness will continue.The difference is that with GWB, many more Islamofascists will be convinced of the error of their cause ( ie DEAD).

First, it's just one poll. If the poll had shown Kerry heading for a landslide, it would be dismissed as a statistical anomaly. Remember, if it sounds too good to be true….

That said, whatever I think of the reputation of WAPO/ABC, THEY think of themselves as paragons of journalistic virtue. I just don't see them setting up a poll as part of a pro-Kerry conspiracy. I think that they are loathe to admit how poor a snapshot polls give (especially when it is one of their own), so they are essentially reporting this as "news" and not "noise".

Finally, so much will change in the wake of the near-inevitable terrorist attack pre-election. Everything that happens between now and such an attack is only relevant in how it sets up public opinion in the wake. Given the inherent unpredictability of such an attack in terms of time, place, scope, and success, I would say that the ability of both sides to position themselves politically post-attack fall somewhere between minimally effective and counter productive. What to do?

My recommendation is for Bush partisans and surrogates to do as much as possible to remind the public of what the terrorists would be trying to accomplish with such an attack, change our government. If you have any doubt about who you think should be president, it's a good rule of thumb to find the guy your enemies prefer and vote against him.

Clearly, we have to get rid of Independent women to pull this off. I've alerted the VRWC.

Also, remember: "close", i.e., within 1-2 percentage points means "within the margin of error of the poll".
Rather than giving a number, I would be happier if they presented the results in a graph, with a shaded bar representing the margin of error centered around the specific percentage number...

I don't think it's intentionally rigged either. Kerry has been slipping slightly for a while now, and his inability to get a bounce from Edwards or the backspin they've tried to put on the 911 report may be prophetic. If he doesn't get a bounce from the convention he's toast. The networks refusal to televise it is their attempt to keep the people from finding out what an ass he actually is. If they covered the whole thing, ordinary dems would stay away frrom the polls in droves and the "independants" would find themselves in the "decided" column.

"Close" could very well mean "big GOP lead". Remember how "close" it was just prior to the 1994 elections?

Well, it's possible that this poll is the anomaly, or that last month's poll is the anomaly, or that both polls are accurate and that Kerry's numbers really are falling compared to Bush. Does the prior trend for this poll show last month's numbers as being way out of whack?

Personally, I think it is entirely possible that Kerry has slipped this much. My recollection is that Kerry's standing rises when he is off the stage and Bush is on (mostly because coverage of Bush is primarily negative in the media). For the past couple of weeks and all of this week, it has been all Kerry, all the time. Kerry isn't the "unnamed Democrat" from 2003 anymore. It's all downhill from here for him.

I'm having a little trouble with this myself. Bush practically tied on healthcare? Before they've even begun to carpet-pander with the Medicare handouts?

As I see it, the Bushies have been holding their powder on healthcare and education, so there has to be something else at work here. My guess would be the fools and crooks Kerry surrounds himself with are taking their toll, and picking that empty suit for VP hasn't helped. We knew our mediocrity would surround himself with capable and effective henchmen; their mediocrity's been scraping the barrel.

If it's even remotely accurate, the poll's just terrible news for Kerry supporters.