1. as a very close watcher of all polls for a very long time i can tell you with no partisan spin that newsweek, which doesn't poll very often, is routinely rather an outlier
2. rasmussen has been the most accurate pollster in the nation since 04---in 04, 06 and 08 scott, the founder of espn, nailed it
3. i can give you the links, i can give you the fordham university study that confirms (it's all empirics, after all, pure numbers) rasmussen #1
4. i can also tell you that it is a common knowledge that for whatever reasons republicans always do better at the polls than they do in their generics, by about 3%, says the common wisdom
5. that is, all my seemingly endless life democrats have held this apparently inherent generic lead over the party i'm such a reluctant member of, even in years that hold a november which turns out to be pretty solidly red
6. it's probably, in my opinion, because so many pollsters question
registered voters instead of
likely voters, and gop demographics tend to contribute to higher turnouts
7. rasmussen, for instance, asks only likely voters, it's what separates him from the rest, most notably gallup which stubbornly sticks to its surveys of all those who've motor-voter reg'd, or whatever
8. gallup today stunningly has reds up generically by +10, by far the highest for the party of lincoln in the 68 year history of our most prestigious pollster
Tidal wave? 10-point poll edge for GOP - Jonathan Allen and Richard E. Cohen - POLITICO.com
9. before barack, the highest gop margin was +5 in 02, that record shattered in george's reckonings the last 3 weeks straight, +6, +7, +10
10. of course the president's popularity or un- has great impact on ballots
11. independents are breaking in record numbers one way
12. seniors ALWAYS VOTE, seniors run this country, seniors have all the money, they're motivated and they know what's going on
13. in offyears, the influence of the elderly is greatly increased
14. they are breaking hugely away
15. the youth vote is notoriously unreliable and their hero, now far fallen, is not directly in front of them in this offyear
16. african americans, i'm sorry to say, turn out fewer in offyears
17. offyears generally are about
the most dedicated voters
18. the enthusiasm gap, last i saw, was over 20
19. the gop will generally run candidates amenable to tea and the beck crowd will in most cases rally behind her or him who gives them the best chance to stonewall barry, witness scott brown in teddy kennedy's seat
20. the house, naturally, is far harder to forecast than the gubs and the senate
21. in upper parliament, +6 appears in the bag---delaware, pennsylvania, indiana, north dakota, colorado and arkansas
RealClearPolitics - 2010 Election Maps - Senate No Toss Ups
22. meek's win in florida almost surely gives sunshine to rubio, the cuban tea drinker has lurched to a 10 point lead since the primary
23. reds require 10 pickups to take upstairs
24. they would need---harry reid (7), patty murray (8), russ feingold (9), alex giannoulias in obama/burris' bench (10), bitchy barbara boxer (11), richard blumenthal in biden's seat (12), governor manchin in bobby kkk byrd's west virginia chair (13)
25. that's not as tall an order as it appears---since his primary win dino rossi opened a 7 point lead in washington, ron johnson in wisconsin poked ahead of feingold by a point
26. and i can tell you that ms boxer who mustn't be called that is more vulnerable out here in fruits-and-nuts land than she's ever been, by far
27. manchin has lost exactly 11 points since just last saturday's primary, down to a 7 point advantage
28. in the house, rcp has moved 15 seats to the gop in the last 3 weeks or so, which is very unusual, rcp's house numbers usually freeze
29. today rcp has reds gaining 51 positions, giving opposition a 12 seat plurality on pelosi's cheap carpet
RealClearPolitics - 2010 Election Maps - Battle for the House
30. i would very much look at voter turnout as thus far demonstrated---those aren't polls, those are hard and real data
31. in michigan reds outpolled blues in the wolverine primary, 2 to 1
32. in arizona, where house dems are really in big trouble, republicans also doubled dem ballots
33. in florida (you all know how indicative chad country can be), turnout was 1.6 to 1 red
34. in missouri, which has picked the president more often and more accurately than any state, the most bellwether commonwealth in the country, which also had measure c on its ballot, refusing to accept obamacare's individual mandate (it passed, 71 to 29), red voters outnumbered their counterparts, 1.6 to 1
35. in usually reliably blue washington, which has a blanket primary, putting all candidates regardless of affiliation on the same ballot---analysts look to the evergreens the way they used to see maine before 1958---reds outvoted dems by a very small margin, about 1.1 or 1.2 to 1
36. house dems from washington are also rather famously in particular danger
37. charlie cook is an insider's stud, when he talks THEY really listen
38. ten days ago he made statements that msm headlines interpreted: cook sees gop romp
Political Prognosticator Sees a Republican House - WSJ.com
39. the analyst's actual words are quite a bit more measured than "romp," but if you parse them...
40. anyway, I SAW with my own eyes the insider's reaction to cook's recipe---that's when the pessimism really hit, leadership, membership...
41. finally, the governorships---there's way too much data to go over right now, but suffice it to say, reds are in a significantly stronger position in the capitols than they are in either the senate or the house
RealClearPolitics - 2010 Election Maps - Governor No Toss Ups
42. and i'm going to take for granted that you all appreciate the powerful part governorships play in presidentials
fyi
party on!