Unlikely Voter

Two races for Governor could be making moves, according to the weekend polling. In Oregon, Democrat John Kitzhaber seems to be surging against Republican Chris Dudley, while in New Mexico, Republican Susana Martinez seems to be reversing the state’s recent trend to run away from Democrat Diane Denish.

Since Democrat Joe Manchin, West Virginia Governor and Senate candidate, literally shot a copy of the “Cap and Trade” bill that DC Democrats tend to support, it’s been clear that Republican John Raese’s easy days of running against Barack Obama were going to get harder.

But the new Orion Strategies poll for Marshall University of the race just isn’t credible.

As I’ve not been shy about saying, I have an emotional attachment to the California Senate race. I live here, I’ve always lived here, and in fact Democrat Barbara Boxer was first elected to the Senate when I was first beginning to follow politics, back when I was 14 years old.

So I knew the television ad campaigns would make or break the race for Republican Carly Fiorina, and sure enough, we’re now seeing a tightening trend in the polling.

I still have the Washington Senate race as one of the four closest, despite Republican Dino Rossi taking a decent lead over Democrat Patty Murray in recent polling. This is why: both candidates have been capable of rattling off good polls, and one new result at any time can come out in favor of either candidate.

Tuesday is not only Soylent Green day, but it is also Senate Projection day now. Last week was pretty big for Republicans, and if the trend from then continues, we could see +8 be the projection, as well as a double digit chance of a majority shift.

In theory some races should start to tighten and others should just blow wide open, constraining the options Republicans have to gain further. But will the theory carry over to practice?

October marches on, and so does the House generic ballot polling. Last week Republicans were on the rebound and this week every single generic is showing Republicans back on top, as has not been the case lately.

So let’s see what the damage is.

Yes, yes, I can hear the groans from here already, but when I see two polls one day apart from each other that give diametrically opposite results in the Florida Governor’s race, I get worried.

Republican Rick Scott had similarly erratic polling in his primary race which finished close with 3% final difference, so as his polling against Democrat Alex Sink is swingy, I worry about the need for another divisive recount.

Right after the primaries in New York, when Republicans finally found out that Joe DioGuardi would be going against Democrat Kirsten Gillibrand, they got a big bounce in the polls.

Judging by the new Quinnipiac, that bounce had a finite lifespan, and that lifespan was not particularly long.

I said it over and over again when Democrat Harry Reid went on a polling run, and I will say it now when Republican Sharron Angle has gone on a run: trading tiny leads back and forth is the sign of a tied race with random statistical noise around it, not any genuine changes in public opinion or “Big Mo.”

So yes, despite the new Rasmussen poll, in my mind this race is tied.

I’ve given up on polling of individual House districts. Even if we see more than one poll of a given race, it’s usually all from the same pollster for the same client, a local newspaper or media alliance. These polls are erratic and without multiple sources to verify the figures, it’s hard to draw value from them.

So even though I’ll stick with the wide world of generic ballots to do my House analyses, I think some will be very happy to see The Hill’s new series of House polling of a dozen races and counting.

So Newsweek put out a new Generic Ballot. The magazine’s polling had drawn notice before in my House projection reports (this week’s edition coming later today), but this new one just seems completely out of line: Democrats +5 among Registered Voters. That filtering is expected to lean to the left after the 2008 anomaly, but this is ridiculous.

Scientific polling, based on the laws of probability and the compounding of likelihoods, is a mathematical activity. It’s all about the numbers. Without the numbers no poll has meaning. That’s why I highlight key facts like Margins of Error.

Your typical internal poll release is very low on numbers and instead is a one page memo. Those releases can be based on sound polling practices, but they are firstly designed to push an agenda. When I see this new Illinois poll, I am reminded of an internal poll release.

Wisconsin is traditionally the most Progressive state in America. Progressives win there. Progressives have long won there. Progressives have won there even in years when they lost in much of America. Wisconsin even went in for the La Follette-founded Progressive Party, making it a highly successful third party within the state for about a decade.

So I’m just at a loss for words as to how a conservative Republican can lead a progressive Democrat by double figures in the new Rasmussen poll.