"...which contender expresses himself more clearly (57 to 38 percent). "

I don't buy that for a second. I wanna see the internals.

I assume you're joshing.

If so -- good josh.

I didn't start to panic until tonight! Won't the President receive a bump from his performance in the 2nd debate or has mass media convinced the nation that was a Kerry win? I looked a polling data in Ohio and the President seems to be losing his traction...

I'm not worried about it, Gallup is a solid organization but they generally use small likely voter populations (under 800) and that can add to volatility so you occasionally have an outlier poll or two.

In this case they've shortened their polling duration from their normal three days to just two, probably to meet USA Today's publishing deadline, so they conducted it Saturday and Sunday which leads me to believe a "weekend bias" could be in effect. Either way the Wa/Po poll has it Bush +6, which jives with the IEM numbers.

Now if Zogby, who's numbers lead me to believe he's been smoking the good shit again, were to release his internals I'd give this poll a second look. Otherwise I don't put a lot of stock in Gallup.

I'm not *worried* in the "All is lost" sense. But damnit, Bush gave up an opportunity to knock Kerry out -- permanently-- and instead chose to let him back into the game.

With a slight lead. Maybe no real lead, but then tied up.

I would be VERY INTERESTED to know what Gallup's sample ratio of Dems to Republicans was.

Soro's recently slammed Gallup with full page ads in the National newspapers, so they MIGHT be cowed, by the direct attack by moveon.org, into altering the sample used.

Dammit Ace,

You are feeding the "Big Mo" facade. Check out the truth: http://daisycutter.blogspot.com/2004/10/daisy-addresses-troops_11.html

Chin up and get back to work ...

This poll is bullshit, "...which contender expresses himself more clearly (57 to 38 percent)" proves it.

Take a look at my trackback to this. Somehting is strange. CNN has a different sample and a different margin of error but same result for this poll than the AFP story Ace linked. Wierd.

http://carnivorousconservative.typepad.com/carnivorous_conservative/2004/10/cnnusa_today_ga.html

If you believe those polls then you deserve to panic. Most polls are controlled by lefties. How can the people polled say that bush is a stronger leader and more honest and then say they will vote for the guy who is weakest and least honest? Something is wrong there somewhere. I am not worried. Bush is going to take this election. We have to worry about the fraud angle though. That is where we could lose it.

Ace, check out the WaPo tracking poll, like Daisy says. But tonight's update shows Bush UP one from yesterday to take a 6-pt. lead - 3 pts. outside their margin of error. (Of course, we can't really trust that because WaPo is such a conservative-leaning organization, they've gotta be cooking the numbers for the President, right? bwahahaha.)

The truth is the polls are all fubared. We're in the midst of a major party realignment, so the ones that weight for party are wacked on bad assumptions based on 70 years of Democrat domination of voter registation. The rest I don't trust because they DON'T weight for party - so who are the slobs sitting at home answering the phone?

Have faith, brother - we're headed for a landslide if we keep our cool and turn out the voters. Myself, I've taken a two-week vacation starting the last week of the month so I can help the campaign.... Okay, okay, so the truth is the job reorganized our vacation schedule and is forcing me to take time off, but what a lucky time for them to do it, eh? :-)

Well, a core lack of honesty is no bar to the Presidency. I present Harding, FDR, JFK, LBJ, Nixon, and Clinton. Even though the public has never seen a phony, opportunistic liar so clearly ID'd as Kerry is before an election.

It would be a shame if Bush goes, if for no other reasons than 4 new Ruth Bader Ginzburgs arrive on the SCOTUS and the public having to take another big hit here from the Islamists before we get serious again.....

But.....

1. Bush has done a poor job articulating HOW things are being won in the WOT, and mounting a defense of the botched Iraq postwar, and clarifying his views on the announced Neocon policy of military imperialism -a series of successive, pre-emptive wars to keep us and "our best friend" safe from Iraq, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Lebanon, Pakistan, Jordan....oh, and N Korea outside that.

2. Reckless spending. His tax cuts for the wealthy were justified originally as rebating surplus dollars back to the people that paid in. Then became borrowing from China, Japan, and the EU to get the money to give more to the wealthy, on his rich crony's claims that the wealthy would not spend it on Palaces, but on job creation. He negotiated a deal where he gives drug companies a 600 billion subsidy to keep drug prices high for all Americans but non-means tested seniors, so rich and poor elderly can purchase drugs still more expensive than Canada or Mexico's prices - where they have no 600 billion subsidy to get low prices - those countries just bargained prices. And, Bush's refusal to exert any discipline on Congressional pork barrel spending.

3. A refusal to admit being wrong in certain things over 4 years and then working to correct mistakes - blind stubborness. A tendency to impulsive decisions arrived at without consulting others - like the 1 trillion Man to Mars program that was news to everyone in Congress. His famous declaration that he didn't talk to his father about going into Iraq - only to a "higher" Father. A pig-headed refusal to amend loser issues like stem cell policy, tax cuts for the wealthy, letting China rip us off on trade, get away with tech theft, copyright piracy because they are "useful partners" in the WOT and N Korea.

4. Inattention to massive job loss in key swing states until just before the election. Ohio, Pennsylvania, Iowa, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin, Maine, N Mexico, etc. other than saying his tax cuts were working. Ignoring the very wealthy mainly predominantly live far away from Northern Rustbelt states and don't spend their money there. And his advisors saying outsourcing was good for America..

However.....

Bush has a shot. Kerry is about the worst the Dems could offer other than Sharpton, Kuchinich, the Breck Girl, and Howlin' Howard. Biden, Gephardt, Lieberman might have disposed of W long ago.

I think of it as Carter vs. Ford, deja vu all over again.... Two bad candidates, a blast from the past - and I'm afraid the voters will pick the Carter retread...and wish they'd stayed with mediocre replay Ford dolt for the next 4 years.

But even Ford (1.2 mil/year)and Carter(2.5 mil/yr) created plenty of jobs.

For info - a link to how other Presidents have done on measures of economic prosperity from Truman on:

http://www.forbes.com/2004/07/20/cx_da_0720presidentstable_print.html

On most measures, Bush II is doing worse than Ford, Carter, or Bush I.

Does trolling make you feel important?

Nobody here believes you're a conservative.

I love this:

"A *majority* of Americans polled, 49 percent..."

I do not think that word means what you think it means.

Birkel -

I doubt you know the difference between a traditional Republican fiscal conservative, a Northeast Republican moderate, Midwest isolationist Republicans, a Religious Right conservative, a Horatio Alger Republican, a Neocon, and a Reagan man who used to be a Democrat.

Bush has some problems being masked so far by his being The Man they must follow till Nov 2nd - in that he has only done the bidding of three of his constituent groups, and ignored the others.

The Reaganites, moderates, isolationists, and traditional conservatives (paleos as the Neocons said during their peak of ascendency) want their voices heard - and other voices, particularly the Neocons - not to dominate. If they aren't heard, the Republicans may have as big a problem as the Democrats now have with Southern white democrats.