Pew Research Center: Republicans Cut Democratic Lead in Campaign's Final Days

[DeepModem Mom]

Republicans Cut Democratic Lead in Campaign's Final Days
Democrats Hold 47%-43% Lead Among Likely Voters
Released: November 5, 2006

A nationwide Pew Research Center survey finds voting intentions shifting in the direction of Republican congressional candidates in the final days of the 2006 midterm campaign. The new survey finds a growing percentage of likely voters saying they will vote for GOP candidates. However, the Democrats still hold a 48% to 40% lead among registered voters, and a modest lead of 47%-43% among likely voters.

The narrowing of the Democratic lead raises questions about whether the party will win a large enough share of the popular vote to recapture control of the House of Representatives. The relationship between a party's share of the popular vote and the number of seats it wins is less certain than it once was, in large part because of the increasing prevalence of safe seat redistricting. As a result, forecasting seat gains from national surveys has become more difficult.

The survey suggests that the judgment of undecided voters will be crucial to the outcome of many congressional races this year. As many as 19% of voters now only lean to a candidate or are flatly undecided. The Democrats hold a 44% to 35% lead among committed voters. But the race is more even among voters who are less strongly committed to a candidate; those who only lean to a candidate divide almost evenly between Republicans and Democrats (5% lean Republican/4% lean Democrat).

Republican gains in the new poll reflect a number of late-breaking trends. First, Republicans have become more engaged and enthused in the election than they had been in September and October. While Democrats continue to express greater enthusiasm about voting than do Republicans, as many Republican voters (64%) as Democratic voters (62%) now say they are giving quite a lot of thought to the election. About a month ago, Democratic voters were considerably more likely than GOP voters to say they were giving a lot of thought to the election (by 59%-50%). As a result, Republicans now register a greater likelihood of voting than do Democrats, as is typical in mid-term elections.

The Republicans also have made major gains, in a relatively short time period, among independent voters.... Currently, Democrats lead by 44%-33% among independent voters....

http://people-press.org/reports/display.php3?ReportID=295

[ChiciB1]

1. This Has Been The Strategy All Along!! This Is What They Are

going to tell everyone if the Democrats lose. Well, we closed in the LAST 72 HOURS!!

Think about it!!

[Jackpine Radical]

3. I don't have to think about it.

I've been expecting it.

[depakid]

9. Yep been expecting it

They're going to steal elections in several states and once again, nothing will be done about it.

[BrokenBeyondRepair]

38. margin of error usually 4%... what a coincidence

[shawn703]

2. And so it begins...

By Monday, the "polls" will show Republicans picking up seats.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Doesn't matter if they've got the evangelical vote

if they've got the Diebold vote.

[bilgewaterbill]

10. I agree. I hate pollsters! nt.

[Bucky]

24. I'm a pollster. Why exactly do you hate me?

[bilgewaterbill]

48. I'll answer if you can prove you're a pollster.

1) Call me at home (with a recorded message that someone important is calling) right when I'm about to do something I consider important.
2) Call me on my cell phone (same recorded message) while I'm at work so that I think there is a problem at home.
3) Ask me a list of questions which by #3 I can tell by the phrasing which side you represent.
4) Rephrase questions you asked me previously so that it's obvious you are trying to get the answer you want.

When you do these things, I'll believe that you are a pollster and then I'll tell you why I hate you.

[Name removed]

5. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[AIJ Alom]

6. How ? Did FoxNews and CNN label Haggard as (D-San Fransico)

or something while I wasn't looking ? I mean I recall some conservative wing nut calling him liberal for wanting to support global warming, but did the magic label also go up ?

[Lasher]

28. It might be Saddam's death sentence

Arguably, this seems to be helping the GOP in the polls. The masses are stupid.

Saddam's guilty verdict: Bush's big, anticlimactic, pre-election surprise

Part one of Team Bush's show trial for Saddam Hussein has ended in Baghdad with no sense of surprise; as the news broke, even number-one Bush backer and partner-in-war Tony Blair "bizarrely declined to make any comment, preferring to address the issue" sometime later.

Of course Saddam was going to be found guilty of crimes against humanity and of course he was going to be sentenced to death "for his role in the killing of 148 Shiite villagers...in 1982." As though right on schedule, news of his fate emerged on the eve of U.S. midterm elections that are expected to be a wipe-out for Bush's Republicans, dogged as they are by scandals, rampant corruption and an endless, cooked-up war that even voters who once supported it now tell pollsters they abhor.

At least this phase of the former strongman's trial seems to have gone according to something of a plan in Bush's directionless, Iraq-war script. However, even supporters of his Iraq misadventure might ask: Wasn't this supposed to be a trial for the ages that would expose the whole, heinous catalog of evil linked to the former autocrat (whom current Team Bush power players like Donald Rumsfeld, in other roles not so long ago, helped empower in the first place)? Could it really be over so soon?

In fact, Saddam is also being tried on charges of massacring Iraqi Kurds in the late 1980s (events about which the Reagan administration kept silent). The ex-dictator's just-announced "death sentence automatically to an appeals panel"; in the meantime, his genocide trial is supposed to proceed. But if an appeal decision upholds the verdict in the just-concluded case, Saddam could be hanged by the end of December. If that happens, Iraqis - and the world - will be deprived of a full, on-the-record, in-court accounting of his crimes and their assessment in the context of what Bush has lauded as "the rule of law."

Journalist Robert Fisk has been no fan of Bush and Blair's Iraq caper, nor an apologist for tyrants like Saddam. Raising questions that Washington and London would probably prefer to ignore, he notes: "America knew all about atrocities and even supplied the gas - along with the British, of course - yet there we were yesterday declaring it to be, in the White House's words, another 'great day for Iraq.'...And now we're going to string him up, and it's another great day."

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/detail?blogid=15&entry_id=10601

[stepnw1f]

7. I Say We Have an Investigation into these Polling Companies

This has now happened in 2000, 2002, and 2004.... now 2006.

[0rganism]

8. Rove's "72-hour strategy" kicking into high gear

By Wednesday, we'll be wondering how last week's 16-point lead turned into a 5-seat loss in the house.

[LaCrosseDem]

17. 5-seat loss in the house?

the way things are looking I'll be surprised if it's that good. I'm about 50-50 on voting or getting my yardwork done at this point. Once again we have managed to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. I just need to remember to aim so as to

[Ken Burch]

20. Don't DO THAT!...YOU HAVE TO VOTE!

They're just trying to demoralize you. Pessimism is counter-revolutionary. Remember that.

On To Victory!

[heliarc]

34. Getting your yardwork done?

Are you so sure that its a good idea to skip voting in this election?

[DuaneBidoux]

40. Your duty is to vote. It is everyone's duty.

[LifeDuringWartime]

50. are you for real?

and you wonder why the republicans have been in majority for so long :eyes:

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

11. Nope.

We's gonna kick some ass.

Ya can't spin the most hated man in the world.

[RBInMaine]

12. Most analysts are predicting a BAD year for the R's!!

Folks, don't go dooming and glooming. Just get the hell out there, go to your closest D office (or work at home via MoveOn.Org etc.) and WORK LIKE HELL for a D victory. This Pew Research thing is just ONE poll, and some polls are biased. The Rothenberg and Cook reports both are predicting the D's to take the House and possibly the Senate. Now I'm the first one to say watch out for R dirty tricks, but DON'T GO CREATING A SELF-FULFILLING PROPHECY!! This is our best chance in YEARS!! So please quit the dooming and glooming and wallowing and PLEASE JUST GET THE HELL OUT THERE AND HELP OUR CANDIDATES CLOSE THE DEAL!! I have spend the whole weekend putting out signs and flyers, phone banking, and rallying here in Maine!! So please quit worrying, which solves NOTHING, and get to work in these final days!! THANKS!!

[TheWatcher]

13. As Mike Malloy Said on Friday Night

If they steal this again, there MUST be a response.

Our country is finished for good if Tuesday results in a Republican Majority or the absolute unthinkable, A Super Majority.

But if this occurs, even if it marks the End Of America, the ONLY response that should happen is the Beginning of the Revolution to take it back.

This MUST NOT STAND.

This CANNOT STAND.

And if we LET IT STAND, like Benjamin Franklin said, we deserve neither Freedom nor Safety.

At some point we must fight these people.

It might as well be now.

Let us hope that Tuesday will not make it necessary for us to take this country back by WHATEVER MEANS NECESSARY.

[expatriot]

14. If we're already convinced they're going to steal, they've already won.

People have told me, "Why vote? The system is rigged." Don't let your fears of a rigged system become an excuse for not working our butts off for the next 48 hours.

[LaCrosseDem]

18. I have contributed about $1K and worked ~20 nights

this cycle. And for what? Don't lecture me. I could have spent that time with my baby and toddler. This is a party that can lose the un-losable and I'm sick of it.

[heliarc]

35. Wow

Your defeatism defies the real care you should have for your toddler. If we don't find a way to beat the Repugs, than we are truly laying the world to waste for your children. They will inherit a world that you gave up.

I for one appreciate the time and moeny you have spent. I appreciate anything that people can give to beat these guys. But we have to beat them. And yes, there is fishy stuff going on, but it may very well be that if we keep our eyes peeled this time, we can catch them in the act in a way that the MSM can't ignore.

[Name removed]

41. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[expatriot]

57. keep your fingers crossed, we may actually taste the sweetness of victory...

thank you for your hard work... it may very well pay off... imagine that. how sweet the sound.

[treestar]

33. Yes, and what if it's not rigged? Or not rigged well enough for the repukes?

That possibility is still there, so everyone has to vote.

And the more people who vote the less chance they have of stealing.
They can only steal in close elections.

[bdamomma]

43. what a shitty response

Why vote, what a stupid comment, that just makes my blood boil, that is total ignorance right there.

[independentpiney]

15. "as many Republican voters (64%) as Democratic voters (62%) ...

now say they are giving quite a lot of thought to the election".
They make the jump that this means they are enthused about voting for their candidates and "now register a greater likelihood of voting than do Democrats,".

But earlier they say that "Democrats continue to express greater enthusiasm about voting than do Republicans".. without giving any stats, probably because it's a huge Democratic advantage. So it looks to me all that what many of these Republicans are thinking about is either voting for a Democrat or staying home on Tuesday.

[goforit]

16. Rig away assholes!

[featherman]

19. Meaningless...just a poll with some gobbledegook "analysis"

Don't get your panties in a twist.

[Ken Burch]

21. NPR gave huge play to this poll on Weekend ATC tonight...

I think they're still trying to immunize themselves against the "Liberal bias" canard.

And Andrew Kohut is basically an Establishment toady who tries to make sure that his polling always comes out in favor of the status quo in the end. That's why he's on the NewsHour all the friggin' time.

[OneBlueSky]

22. I call "Bullshit!" . . . trust me, voters are NOT moving to Republicans . . .

at least in my district . . . every available kind of evidence points to increasing movement AWAY from Republicans . . . and I can't imagine it's much different in most other districts . . .

[Countdown_3_2_1]

23. Polls Mean NOTHING! Turnout is EVERYTHING!

All that maters now is getting people out to vote.

[against all enemies]

25. What will bring out more democratic voters?

Knowing they have a lead or thinking they have to catch up?

[humbled_opinion]

26. There is no way that GOP wins.

The mood of the country is strongly in favor of Democrat candidtates. If the Democrats do not pick up the House and Senate both then we must consider that the race is fixed. If the race is fixed (Diebold) then we must move to take our country back. Those that do not understand their votes got stolen need protection.

[mom cat]

27. Pure Pasture Patties! CNN has it Dems 58. Repukes 38!

This is just the lies to try to justify the myth of the last minute surge! Don't buy it!

[In Truth We Trust]

29. Can you say: BULLSHIT!!! .......HCPB's right fucking NOW!!!

[tex-wyo-dem]

30. As far as them stealing the election again...

just my opinion, but I think it will be very hard for them to pull off more than a few very close races. I think the media has pretty well solidified in the collective thinking that Dems are going to take the House by a sizable margin, plus there has been more and more reporting every day about the vulnerability of our election systems, so anything blatant would be called on right away for investigation. Even if the Dems only end up winning by, say, a five or ten seat majority in the House and/or only end up picking up two or three Senate seats, I think there will be a lot of skepticism and questions asked, even by the corporate media.

The ones we really need to watch out for are the races that are within 5 points or less...those are the races that can be stolen and explained away without much fanfare.

[superconnected]

31. Gotta put this out ahead of the election to support the Diebold win

to say the polls just magically turned in the last days.

These guys really haven't changed since nixon.

[w4rma]

32. I believe that the Pew poll is managed by a Freeper.

A Freeper who has been posting on Freerepublic since the '90s.

[NuttyFluffers]

46. now that'd be an explosive revelation.

if only there was evidence....

[BigDDem]

36. Holy shit

doom and gloom rules the day around here.
The sky's not falling, quit whining and fucking vote.

[Stand and Fight]

37. To hell with this poll, people!

What matters tomorrow is that you get out and vote, and that you get everyone you know to do the same. There is no way in hell that we can allow this to happen again. These bastards play dirty and we all knew that the final days before the election would be like this. Stay strong. Vote. Encourage EVERYONE that you know to vote. We cannot resign our country to proto-fascism. It is our responsibility, as informed citizens, to rally around what remains of our DEMOCRATIC government. Ignore the spin, the lies, and get out there tomorrow and kick some ass. I'll see you all on the side of victory tomorrow night.

[Megahurtz]

39. Don't let this influence anyone NOT to vote,

however, to me it appears that they're are trying to steal it again.
The same machines are still at work and I don't trust them. I hope I am wrong.

[cassiepriam]

42. Perhaps many Americans deserve to live under a dictatorship.

It fits their morality and intelligence.

[HuffleClaw]

44. yeah sure

[NuttyFluffers]

45. ... my ass. and there's nothing more to say about that.

need ass smiley here.

[Moderate08]

47. That hard to believe?

Is it really that hard to believe that the American electorate just might support the Republicans? They just might see the current democrats as far left and elitist? This is not a Democratic Party represented by Bill Clinton, it is represented by Pelosi and Kerry. And despite Kerry's best attempts at defending himself, his comments last week were offense to American troops, and only brought back memories of his Genghis Khan analogies after Vietnam. This is the person the Democrats nominated for president just two years ago! No wonder the American people seem skeptical of this party.

People have had eneough of Republican corruption, and that is a key factor in this election. However, there are serious doubts about what the Democrats will do, and that may be creeping back into the minds of independants, while Kerry's gaffe may have inspired Republicans who werent going to vote to head to the polls.

Any means necessary to take the government? Are you mad? Just because you dont get the big win you had hoped for? This is why people shy away from the Democratic Party!

Our best hope is that someone like Bill Clinton will come around again, otherwise I think this election victory will be short lived.

[mvd]

49. The Democrats are not far left

It's the Repukes that are far right. Unfortunately, they've moved the "center" way over to the right. Pelosi and Kerry represent the values the majority of Americans talk about. We just have to do a better job of sending out the liberal (not a bad word - stands for good things like tax fairness, common sense on foreign policy, expanding access to health care, preserving our civil liberties) message. And even a moderate would be wrong when he/she says that Kerry defamed the troops. It was a joke meant to bash Bush. That is all.

[Ken Burch]

51. which side are you on?

Sounds like you're secretly hoping for a GOP win tonight because you think it's in the DLC's interest.

(Of course, this isn't surprising, since the DLC has never wanted the Dems to regain control of Congress.)

[Bridget Burke]

54. Yes. Unless you're a fool or a liar.

Or both.

[Cleita]

52. I trust Zogby more than the other polls and he says the House

will become Democratic. He's not so sure about the Senate because it's too close to call. Of course if the election is rigged again all bets are off.

[defendandprotect]

59. Isn't Pew financed by oil companies?

Also like Zogby.
I think I read somewhere at one time that Pew is financed by oil industry?
Supposedly, because it's a trust, no one is directly influencing them.

I say, if you can look at 2000 and 2004 and see the election was "rigged," then I don't think there's any reason to expect them to stop now. There's always the chance that they could be so overwhelmed this time by Democratic votes that they couldn't handle it without exposing themselves, but they may go that far.

The tone of the "media" also seems very subdued vs periods of Republican "wins" and I think they know that the fix isn't quite in yet.

[Riverman]

60. Pew Family is an aritocratic clan from Philadelphia and Delaware

Sunoco Oil hads been the family business. The Pew Foundation is their little pubic service. Thier polster would come up with pro-GOP results. Go figure!

[stepnw1f]

53. IGNORE THIS! (nt)

[The Stranger]

55. What about all of those posters celebrating yesterday and Sunday?

This is like deja vu all over again.

[OKthatsIT]

56. Baloney....they twist concepts

A survey by Pew in which media workers were asked to specify their own political affiliation was quoted last year (2004) as evidence that the media is controlled by liberals. This is a like finding that a large number of union members work in clothes factories and concluding that clothes factories are controlled by unions.

SourceWatch
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Pew_Research_Center

[bigriver]

58. Egg, face, face, egg

suck on it, Pew!