McCain Takes Huge Lead With Independents
September 9th, 2008 at 06:05pm Matt Margolis
Conventional wisdom says that the race for the presidency will be decided by the independents…
Well, according to Gallup, John McCain is now trouncing Barack Obama in support from the political middle, and also gained 5-point bump from Democrats after the Republican National Convention.
John McCain’s 6 percentage-point bounce in voter support spanning the Republican National Convention is largely explained by political independents shifting to him in fairly big numbers, from 40% pre-convention to 52% post-convention in Gallup Poll Daily tracking.
By contrast, Democrats’ support for McCain rose 5 percentage points over the GOP convention period, from 9% to 14%, while Republicans’ already-high support stayed about the same.
The surge in political independents who favor McCain for president marks the first time since Gallup began tracking voters’ general-election preferences in March that a majority of independents have sided with either of the two major-party candidates. Prior to now, McCain had received no better than 48% of the independent vote and Obama no better than 46%, making the race for the political middle highly competitive.
It’s quite obvious that Obama’s best days are behind him. His biggest liability in the general election is the fact that his meteoric rise in the Democratic primaries were fueled by ironclad adherence to left-wing positions. As the campaign has progressed, we’ve seen Obama try to tip-toe towards the center, with claims of being a uniter who can work with members of both parties. His record, of course, contradicts his new moderated image makeover, and people are seeing that all the wonderful things Obama claims to be (an agent of change, a reformer, opponent of earmarks, etc.) John McCain and Sarah Palin actually are… and have a record to prove it.
UPDATE: A bump, not a bounce? McCain maintains 5-point lead in Gallup tracking poll.
Entry Filed under: Campaign 2008, Republicans
9 Comments
1. Retired Spook | September 9th, 2008 at 6:33 pm
This comes as somewhat of a surprise to me. Most Independents I know have no core principles and don’t stand for much of anything. I figured they’d be right at home with Obama.
2. Richard of Oregon | September 9th, 2008 at 6:48 pm
Amazing how fast things can break sometimes. Retired Spook, you’re right that Independents don’t usually stand for much of anything. Except, they don’t like to lose so they end up putting lots of miles on the old band wagon. Something I don’t fully understand what clicked in their collectives brains that the ‘end is near’, but it did. Hence the rush to commitment.
3. kimberly4victory | September 9th, 2008 at 7:09 pm
This is great news, but there is still work to be done. The lefty kooks over at kos and huffington are all have giant cows over this lead in the polls, and they won’t back down. The “war” is just beginning. I can’t say this enough … volunteer and donate!!
4. navydad | September 9th, 2008 at 10:16 pm
K4V
It’s always good news to see the fringe taken down a few notches…especially the daily hogs, which has no integrity whatsoever! With this in mind, I don’t see much chance of a turnaround for Obama/Biden ( i could be wrong) since they’ve now been exposed for the frauds they are, eg., Biden is quoted as saying he stands behind his remark that Obama isn’t ready for the presidency. Obama has made so many gaffs lately that he might as well start the design of his biz cards for his new community organizer spot in Chicago, and all the while, the Clinton’s are laughing their asses off waiting for 2012.
5. Retired Spook | September 9th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
The lefty kooks over at kos and huffington are all have giant cows over this lead in the polls, and they won’t back down.
What are they gonna do, Kim; put away their nasty stick and get all nice-nice for the remainder of the campaign? As someone said the other day, nasty is all they know. They fully realize that what they’re doing is losing the election, but they just can’t help themselves.
I’ll say it again: when your adversary is engaged in self-immolation, your best strategy is to hide all the fire extinguishers and get the hell out of the way.
6. kimberly4victory | September 10th, 2008 at 12:36 am
I don’t know, guys. Don’t forget, Obama is from Chicago, where cheating to win an election is a given. I don’t trust him. Not one bit.
I got an email from the new Arizona Obama headquarters - that’s right, they’ve set up camp in McCain’s backyard. I might go down there and check it out and pretend I’m an Obamabot. I’m going to wear my purple toga.
Seriously, I may do it, just to get behind the scenes and see what they’re up to. I’ve always wanted to be a spy. :-)
7. phnx | September 10th, 2008 at 12:43 am
I think that the swing of independents to McCain ia a baclash to the vitriol of the left and the MSN toward Palin. The great thing is that the looney left can”t help themselves…the more dim their hopes of victory, the loonier they will become. To paraphrase B. Hussein…they are the ones that they have been waiting for. The only problem is that the majority of the voting public hasn’t been waiting for them.
Standby for a flood of conspiracy theories when the lose in November.
8. phnx | September 10th, 2008 at 12:46 am
Ohhh moonbats…yooouu whoooo…where are you????
^^^^^^^^^^crickets*********
9. Kahn | September 10th, 2008 at 12:53 am
I agree with phnx. The attacks by Obamas surrogates strip away his “Change we can believe in” tagline. What change? Attacks on kids? Name calling? It’s ridiculous. It’s like some clown commando group has taken over the leftist machine.
And whats worse for the left, is that they blew their chance to challenge palin on REAL issues. After wasting their attacks on her kids and all the other crazy stuff - no-one is listening to them anymore.