2004 User Predictions - Discussion

[NHPolitico]

Award for most insane prediction goes to Bush Nation(R-TX) who has predicted that Bush will win every state(including DC), with over 90% in all but 3 states.

He probably posted that to get a rise out of some Democrats here. I guess it worked.

[NHPolitico]

Clark would win AR in a cakewalk, but I'm not sure about the others YET.

That's a ridiculous statement. Clark is a liberal.  He's not Mark Pryor. Just being from Arkansas won't give the state to Clark in a cakewalk.

[NHPolitico]

Btw, shouldn't tossups always be equally distributed between the parties? I notice a lot of people mark states as tossups on their confidence maps, and then hand all or most of them to one party in the prediction map. That isn't really intelectually honest, is it?  

If you have a repeat of 2002 where the tide turns the weekend before Election Day toward one party (or turns long before then), that would tip all the states in one direction.

[NHPolitico]

But deep south is not just about geography but cultural and values and way of life.

Even if you use that Arkansas is not in the Deep South(parts are, most are not)

What I think is interesting about AR is that it's de facto segregated.  Might as well slice the state into two separate states that only have a love of the Razorbacks in common.

[NHPolitico]

I have been arguing that the South is cultural conservative and that's why they vote Republican - that that kind of cultural conservatism doesn't exist in Britain.  

"I'm sorry, we don't do God," as Blair's advisor said.

[NHPolitico]

I doubt it.

Can't Dave check IP addresses for repeat trolls?

[NHPolitico]

The key to stopping Dean is on Feb. 3rd with Clark on OK, AZ, and SC.

If Dean runs the table in Iowa and NH as is expected, his numbers in every state will be boosted. Clark or anyone else trying to stop him has to be up on Dean in these states to beat back the surge that will come. Being tied isn't good enough.

[NHPolitico]

Cowboys have no chance against the soon-to-be NFC champion Panthers.

Good call. One more weekend and you'll be quite the prognosticator.

[NHPolitico]

which states are "losable"?  NM?  WI?  I don't think any state is losable for the Dems.

I was referring to tossups: NM, WI, MN, IA and OR. PA would be in there as well, but that's one of the target states.

I do think Dean would win Pennsylvania.

Why do you think Dean is Pennsylvania's kind of Democrat?  For the record, Rendell likes Lieberman if I recall.

[NHPolitico]

The States that Bush won in 2000 have picked up 7 electoral votes, mainly due to an increase in population in the South and the Sunbelt. This trend does not seem to be turning around anytime soon.

If you guys abandon those areas, you will be consigning yourself to permanent minority status.

Not that I would care.

Clinton found a way to stay competitive in those areas. I would suggest that if the Dems have any hope of regaining the White House, they should look to the DLC and not to the turncoat Gore (who could not even win his own State!) and his new pal Dean.

Exactly. It's not the South that is anti-Democrat, it is a case of the national Democrat Party of Dean and Pelosi and Daschle and Kennedy being anti-Democrat (as defined by Southern Democrats).  People like Breaux could do well in every Southern state. The Democrat Party has chosen to not support people like Lieberman who could win in the South.

[NHPolitico]

I don't believe Edwards could carry NC, let alone any of the rest of the South.

Research 2000 poll of North Carolinians, 1/04:

Approve of presidential bid by Edwards: 55 % (vs. 39% last year)-- due to increase in number of Democrats in NC who support his bid.

Bush vs. Edwards: 53-40

Do you have a source/link for the NC info?

Yeah, you got a link?

Edwards' N.C. support up
Senator still trails Bush in state

By JOHN WAGNER, Washington Correspondent

Democrats in North Carolina are far more accepting of Sen. John Edwards' presidential bid, but he has made no progress convincing home-state Republicans that he should replace President Bush, according to a new poll commissioned by The News & Observer.
The poll, taken less than two weeks before Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucus, found that a majority of North Carolinians -- 55 percent -- approve of Edwards' White House bid, compared with 39 percent when he launched his candidacy a year ago.
The wider acceptance is due in large part to warmer feelings among fellow Tar Heel Democrats: 93 percent now approve of Edwards' run, compared with 67 percent a year ago, according to the survey by Research 2000 of Rockville, Md.

But the poll also showed Edwards continuing to face an uphill battle to beat Bush, if Edwards wins the nomination.

If the election were held today, Bush would prevail in the Tar Heel state, 53 percent to Edwards' 40 percent. Republicans would pick Bush over Edwards, 92 percent to 1 percent, the poll found. Edwards, meanwhile, would prevail among Democrats, 81 percent to 16 percent.

"Most North Carolinians now approve of Edwards' running, but when they match him up against President Bush, the bottom line is Bush comes out on top," said Del Ali, president of Research 2000.

The poll of 600 likely voters was taken Monday through Thursday and has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

It shows former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, the Democratic front-runner, trailing by a larger margin in North Carolina. If the general election were held today, Bush would beat Dean 57 percent to 38 percent, the poll found. If retired Gen. Wesley Clark of Arkansas, the only Southerner besides Edwards, were the nominee, the poll found Bush would prevail, 54 percent to 40 percent.

No Democrat has carried North Carolina in a presidential election since 1976, when Jimmy Carter from neighboring Georgia won.

If Edwards were to become the party's nominee, "I could see a heck of race in North Carolina, but it would still be Bush's race to lose," Ali said. "I can see absolutely no scenario where Dean beats Bush in North Carolina."

Edwards spent Friday campaigning in New Hampshire, the nation's first primary state, where voters will assess the Democratic field eight days after the Jan. 19 caucuses in Iowa.

A separate poll released this week by Research 2000 showed Edwards running fourth in Iowa. Dean led the pack, with support of 29 percent of likely caucus-goers, followed by Rep. Dick Gephardt of Missouri with 25 percent, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts with 18 percent and Edwards with 8 percent.

Recent tracking polls in New Hampshire conducted by the American Research Group have shown Edwards further back in the pack, with support hovering around 3 percent.

In New Hampshire, Edwards sought to improve his standing with appearances before several hundred college students in Manchester, a packed diner full of Democrats in Keene and a town hall meeting in Nashua. At all three stops, Edwards was received enthusiastically as he tried to sell himself as a Washington outsider focused on moving the country forward rather than sniping at his Democratic rivals.

"Together, you and I can change America," Edwards told about 75 people packed in Timoleon's Restaurant in Keene.

North Carolinians' assessment of Edwards' chances to do that has slipped some since the last N&O poll in November.

In the new poll, 19 percent said they think Edwards is "likely" to be the Democratic nominee, while 32 percent said there is "some chance," and 43 percent saw "no chance."

In November, 21 percent said Edwards is "likely" to be the nominee, while 34 percent said there is "some chance," and 36 percent saw "no chance."

The poll also showed Edwards continuing to hold a comfortable lead in a hypothetical Democratic presidential primary in North Carolina. Edwards drew the support of 40 percent, while Dean drew 26 percent. The other candidates were in the single digits.

Edwards' standing is better than that of some of his rivals in their home states. A poll late last year, for example, showed Dean and Kerry to be in a statistical dead heat among likely Democratic voters in Massachusetts. A similar poll in Connecticut showed Lieberman with a five-point lead over Dean.

North Carolina's primary is scheduled for May, by which time the Democrats are likely to have already selected a nominee.


Washington correspondent John Wagner can be reached at (202) 662-4380 or jwagner@mcclatchydc.com.

[NHPolitico]

which states are "losable"?  NM?  WI?  I don't think any state is losable for the Dems.

I was referring to tossups: NM, WI, MN, IA and OR. PA would be in there as well, but that's one of the target states.

I do think Dean would win Pennsylvania.

Why do you think Dean is Pennsylvania's kind of Democrat?  For the record, Rendell likes Lieberman if I recall.

Please excuse me while I roll on the floor in laughter.  Dean could never win PA.

That's my belief, too.

[NHPolitico]

Capito only won 60% because Humphries(an apalling candidate) kept some good candidates out of the primary with his money so he could have a rematch.
Stupid bastard.
With a good candidate Capito might have gone down in 2002, and it might be too late now. Typical...
BTW the GOP run a sacrificial lamb against Rahall in the Coal District
I don't see why they bothered but they did...

The GOP didn't run one in 2000, though.  The seat is a bellwether for congressional elections and will be at least until redistricting.   No trend has been established, but one could be established.

[NHPolitico]

Btw, shouldn't tossups always be equally distributed between the parties? I notice a lot of people mark states as tossups on their confidence maps, and then hand all or most of them to one party in the prediction map. That isn't really intelectually honest, is it?  

If you have a repeat of 2002 where the tide turns the weekend before Election Day toward one party (or turns long before then), that would tip all the states in one direction.

Well, but then they would cease to be tossups, wouldn't they?

No, tossups in my mind just mean states that could go either way. If the election is close, then they probably go both ways. If the election is a landslide, they probably all fall in one direction toward the winner.

[NHPolitico]

This topic is to re-start the discussions around the user predictions located at the 2004 Prediction page.  I have created another topic to discuss the technical issues with the feature.

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP)-- Howard Dean has moved out to at least a 2-1 lead in New York over his chief rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination, while President Bush's popularity has rebounded in the heavily Democratic state, a statewide poll reported Tuesday.

The poll, from Marist College's Institute for Public Opinion, had the former Vermont governor favored by 26% of Democratic voters surveyed with Sen. Joseph Lieberman of neighboring Connecticut at 12% and retired Gen. Wesley Clark backed by 10% of the Democrats. None of the other contenders cracked double digits in the new poll. Twenty-six percent of Democrats said they were undecided.

An October poll from Marist had Dean leading Lieberman, 18% to 16%, with Clark at 14% among New York Democrats.

But the new poll also found that Republican Bush appears to be a viable option for New York voters in a state where Democrats have a 5-3 enrollment advantage over Republicans. Among all registered New York voters sampled, 34% said they would definitely vote for the incumbent president in this year's election while 36% said they would definitely vote against him. Thirty percent were undecided.

A September poll from the Poughkeepsie, N.Y.-based institute had found 32% of voters planned to vote for Bush and 48% planned to vote against him.

The improvement for Bush's standing in New York was also evident in his job approval rating -- 52% in the new poll and 44% in the September poll.

Republican Gov. George Pataki has boasted that Bush will carry New York in this year's election, a feat not accomplished by a Republican in a presidential race since Ronald Reagan did it in 1980 and 1984.

The telephone poll of 617 registered voters was conducted Jan. 6-7 and has a sampling error margin of plus or minus 4 percentage points. The Democratic results, based on a sampling of 544 party members, has a sampling error margin of plus or minus 4.5 percentage points.

[NHPolitico]

Bush at 59% in Gallup Poll as 1/11...

Bush is in a good position at this time. With the capture of Saddam Hussein, and improvements in the economy, his job approval rating -- currently at 59% -- and his electoral strength against possible Democratic candidates have improved.

Although the results presented here are for "likely" voters, the poll shows little difference between the preferences of likely voters (representing about half the adult population) and the preferences of the larger population of "registered" voters.

Bush's advantage over Dean among registered voters has been as low as 3 percentage points (last September), and as high as 23 points (in mid-December).

Shortly after Clark announced his candidacy, he enjoyed a 3-point margin among registered voters over Bush (in a Sept. 19-21 poll), but in mid-December, Bush's advantage was 16 points.

While some political observers, as well as Democratic candidates, have suggested that Dean is less electable than other Democrats, the poll provides no corroborating evidence. At this point of the campaign, each of the major candidates appears about as strong as the other.

[NHPolitico]

Dean does have that problem with Jewish voters.  Also with Jewish voters, one would imagine theey always want a President that is Strong on the defense of Israel or at least protectionist of them.  Does Dean fit that bill?  He was againbst getting rid of Saddam, which did make ISrael safer.  No more Scuds coming there way or tyrannt paying for suicide bombers.  Also Bush has been taken the game right at the enemies of Israel and would definately be seen as strong.  

Not sure about NY, but I'm sure this will help him among Jewish voters.

Like Lieberman said, "If Dean had his way, Saddam would be in power, not in prison."

[NHPolitico]

Dean does have that problem with Jewish voters.  Also with Jewish voters, one would imagine theey always want a President that is Strong on the defense of Israel or at least protectionist of them.  Does Dean fit that bill?  He was againbst getting rid of Saddam, which did make ISrael safer.  No more Scuds coming there way or tyrannt paying for suicide bombers.  Also Bush has been taken the game right at the enemies of Israel and would definately be seen as strong.  

Not sure about NY, but I'm sure this will help him among Jewish voters.

I think The Jewish voting population is distributed this way:

25%: Vote exlcusively on Israeli issues.
25%: Vote somewhat on Israeli Issues.
50%: Vote mostly on American Issues.

So dean would probably win the Jewish vote 60-35% or so.

Sadly, I think you're lowballing it. I'd put Bush's support among Jewish voters at about 25%.  Still, that's better than in 2000, if I recall.

[NHPolitico]

<<On a related issue, Israel supporters here were listening when Dean said we "shouldn't take sides in the Middle East".>>
I'm Jewish, and I am not offended by the remark and do not know anyone who is.  I'm sure some people are though.

How about calling members of Hamas "soldiers"?

[NHPolitico]

Bush at 59% in Gallup Poll as 1/11...

Bush is in a good position at this time. With the capture of Saddam Hussein, and improvements in the economy, his job approval rating -- currently at 59% -- and his electoral strength against possible Democratic candidates have improved.

Although the results presented here are for "likely" voters, the poll shows little difference between the preferences of likely voters (representing about half the adult population) and the preferences of the larger population of "registered" voters.

Bush's advantage over Dean among registered voters has been as low as 3 percentage points (last September), and as high as 23 points (in mid-December).

Shortly after Clark announced his candidacy, he enjoyed a 3-point margin among registered voters over Bush (in a Sept. 19-21 poll), but in mid-December, Bush's advantage was 16 points.

While some political observers, as well as Democratic candidates, have suggested that Dean is less electable than other Democrats, the poll provides no corroborating evidence. At this point of the campaign, each of the major candidates appears about as strong as the other.

Americans like Bush's qualities, poll says
Yet Democrats said to have edge on many domestic issues

(CNN) --Two-thirds of Americans think President Bush has the right personal qualities for the presidency, yet nearly half or more think the Democratic Party would do a better job on major domestic issues, according to a new poll.

A CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll released Tuesday interviewed 1,003 adult Americans last weekend on Bush and national issues ranging from the environment to security.

The poll indicated that Bush's favorable standing with most Americans on his personal qualities is a main reason for his job approval rating of 59 percent in the most recent CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll and similar high marks in other polls.

The poll also showed that 55 percent of those interviewed agree with Bush on the issues that matter to them.

"With previous polls showing that voters are paying more attention to personal qualities than issues right now, it looks as if Bush's strength is who he is, more than what he stands for," CNN pollster Keating Holland said.

Split on issues
The poll showed that though most Americans give the edge to the Democratic Party on domestic issues, the Republican Party retains an advantage on security issues and world affairs, and Bush gets credit for that.

At least 50 percent or more of those interviewed said the Democratic Party would do a better job on such issues as the environment, health care and education.

Nearly 50 percent preferred the Democrats on issues such as the budget deficit, the economy and taxes.

But on issues such as terrorism, the Iraq war, world affairs and gun policy, those interviewed gave the nod to the Republicans.

On other questions, less than half of those interviewed said they thought a terrorist attack is likely in the United States in the next few weeks.

But that is not a personal concern for many Americans -- only about one in nine of those interviewed said they thought terrorism was likely in their community.

Three-quarters said they think Bush has addressed the fundamental security risks the country faces.

The poll had a margin of error of plus-or-minus 3 percentage points.

[NHPolitico]

But Bush is doing the job and shows he can, he has already checked this block.

Hm, I am still not convinced. He is allright as a texas governor or an oil tycoon, but I wouldn't really want him to be my president. Which he isn't, so I guess I shouldn't complain too much...

Haha...
The only Dem is would have trouble voting for is Kerry.

Why Kerry? He's similar to Edwards.

[NHPolitico]

I thought of putting this in the Economic Numbers section, but didn't think it was good enough of a fit.

Drivers of SUVs and other gas guzzlers may want to keep their vehicles parked over the summer.

That's because some experts are saying that gas could -- gulp -- hit the $3-a-gallon mark.

"It is not only possible, it is probable," said Fred Rozell, director of gasoline pricing for Oil Price Information Service, which tracks and reports on the oil industry. "In the summer, we consume more gasoline than we produce.

"[This year] we won't have that extra supply to help us."

Winter weather, bolstering demand for heating fuels, already has cut U.S. crude stocks to the lowest level since 1975.

And with simple economics -- in particular the supply and demand rule -- consumers can expect the price of gas to reach record levels. Those prices would especially be possible in Chicago, where government regulations require gas stations to supply more costly reformulated gasoline to reduce smog.

"This could be the year that gasoline prices start to change the way people behave," Rozell said. "They may drive less or look to buy more fuel-efficient vehicles and get rid of their SUVs."

That $3 threshold shouldn't come as a big surprise to pump watchers. Over the last few days, prices at the pump have done more than just trickle upward --they have soared. Prices have surged more than 7 cents a gallon in the last three weeks.

Several factors are being blamed for the uptick, including rising crude oil prices, a weaker U.S. dollar, colder weather that drove up demand for home heating oil, and two U.S. gasoline reformulations, said analyst Trilby Lundberg.

Earlier this week, the all-grades average retail price of gasoline was 8 cents higher than it was at this time last year. The national weighted average price of gasoline, including taxes, at self-serve pumps was about $1.55 for regular, $1.65 for midgrade, and $1.74 for premium.

But those numbers are only expected to rise.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, the forecast for prices to remain stable through the summer banked on crude oil being about $30 a barrel. In the last week, the price of crude oil has flirted in the mid-$30s and could rise further.

Retail analysts say gasoline costs rise about 2.5 cents per gallon for every $1-a-barrel increase in the price of crude oil. And combine that with near record low inventories -- some of the lowest since the long-line days of 1975 -- and drivers may want to learn that CTA map.

But not everyone is ready to buy into the higher prices.

"There is no way that anyone can predict the price of oil next week, let alone next summer," said Geoff Sundstrom, a spokesman for the American Automobile Association. "There is no need to start scaring the consumer with what prices might be."

Sundstrom said the reasons for the short-term increase have been the cold weather and the low inventory, both of which he says will be over in the next few months.

[NHPolitico]

I like Jennifer Aniston.

Aniston? Come on. Go with Katie Holmes or Jessica Alba or somesuch. Aniston?

[NHPolitico]

Bush v. Clark

Bush wins 328 over Clark's 210.  I know, I know...Arkansas goes Rep.  I just really don't see Clark being able to win over his home state.  I was actually going to put California as a toss-up b/c all recent polls in the state have Bush leading every Dem candidate.

That's about what I predict regardless of whom the Dems nominate.

[NHPolitico]

California should come around to the Dems eventually. Let's keep in mind that most undecideds break against the incumbent, so Bush will most likely do worse in some states than current polls predict. But I agree that Clark no longer looks like a strong candidate.

He's into time travel. Maybe he can go back and unsay all the dumb things he's said.