New poll data:
The momentum in the Democratic nomination race has clearly swung toward Barack Obama. Not only has he won all of the post-Super Tuesday contests, but he has steadily gained in Gallup Poll Daily tracking to the point where he has overtaken Clinton as the national leader for the first time, holding a statistically significant lead in each of the last three tracking poll results.
Obama’s standing has improved among most Democratic subgroups over the past several days. But one of the more substantial shifts has been the changing preferences of middle-aged Democratic voters, who have moved away from Clinton and toward Obama in the past week. Obama has also made gains among three other groups that have favored Clinton throughout much of the campaign — women, Hispanics, and self-identified Democrats. Obama and Clinton are now running even among these three key groups in the most recent Gallup tracking data.
Watch out for fat women wearing viking helmets.
The Other Steve
It’s going to be over March 5th. Clinton needs to win Ohio and Texas by at least a 20 point spread, and I just don’t see that happening.
Elvis Elvisberg
Really, not Kate Smith?
L Boom
We can hope. The big question left then will be how willing is she to destroy the party and challenge the nomination? Difficult to say at this point.
cleek
i have no doubt that she can launch enough wingnut-approved talking points between now and when she’s finally wrestled off-stage by the DNC bouncers to really hurt Obama.
Woodrow "asim" Jarvis Hill
Dude, not to pour cold water on this, but today’s Gallop? Not looking so hot for our guy.
This is the problem w/tracking pools in an election like this; they’re so up and down, you can’t sort out what’s really going on. Only the votes, and the delegates, count, and a victory by HRC in WI throws the whole narrative up in the air, and puts everything back in play.
No need for anyone to be singing anything, yet.
demimondian
Somebody made a fascinating point about the Iowa market analysis of Clinton versus Obama — right now, the option on her winning the nom is exactly priced as the options of her winning both Texas and Ohio, as if they were independent events. That is, the market believes that she’s got to win both of them, and do it big. That’s a really, really bad sign: it’s down to two competitive states, Obama needs only to win one, and she has less money than he does. That’s not a good spot to be in — not the end of the world, but definitely Wile E. Coyote hanging by his front claws bad…
crw
btw, the final Wisconsin American Research Group poll now shows Obama beating Clinton 52-42. This is big, because ARG is the only poll that had been showing Clinton winning previously. Looks mainly like women are getting turned off Clinton. Is her substance free negative campaigning backfiring? Cross your fingers, we may be looking at another Obama blowout.
Source
Billy K
It’ a well-known fact that polls have a
LiberalMale bias.Punchy
Fine, Cole, you win. I declare Uncle! Now please explain….
Haltelcere
Interesting poll numbers.
Seeing these numbers I speculate that if Edwards desires to throw his support behind Clinton, he’ll have to do it very soon to have any effect on the polling trend (maybe first thing tomorrow depending on how today’s primaries go).
But if Edwards desires to support Obama he can continue to watch the slope of Obama’s polling and, as long as that slope is positive (and Clinton’s slope remains negative or less positive than Obama’s) Edwards can maintain a “neutral” stance and not endorse either candidate at this time.
As long as said polling trends remain the same, Edwards proclaiming support for Obama, or not proclaiming support for anyone has the same result.
Basically, I’m just wordily saying that, given the polling trends for this month (and without knowing the results of today’s primaries), the only effect Edwards may have on the nomination process is to throw his support behind Clinton. And he’ll need to do it soon.
Jay
Woodrow, just the fact that Obama has gotten where he is, consicering the tag team Clinton Machine, is amazing and says good things about the electorate.
[Diggin’the new wide look.]
L Boom
This is actually my biggest worry: that Obama will win but in doing so leave him damaged enough that McCain will have plenty of ammunition going into the general. There’s a suspicious little part of my brain that keeps wondering if she’d rather McCain win this election so she can challenge him again in 2012. There’s also a weird sort of ruling class unity vibe I’m worried about, too.
I keep thinking it’s like a classic Nietzschean “Be careful when you fight with monsters, lest you become one” thing and it’s really starting to seem like they’ve spent so much time fighting Rove and such that they’re finally turning into them. Hell, Bill wanted to talk strategy with Rove after the 2004 elections. Who knows? Maybe Hillary will go Republican if she doesn’t get the nomination. It’d almost be worth it just to see the wingnut heads explode after a critical mass of cognitive dissonance.
libarbarian
Sorry to be a history-nazi but ….Vikings never wore horned helmets and, furthermore, no self-respecting Viking would EVER have been caught dead in one of those stupid silver-winged-helmets like you’d see in a lame-ass Wager production.
demimondian
Yeah, libarbarian, but, then again, Viking women knew their places, and didn’t sing in public like in some lase-ass Wagner production.
libarbarian
I just hate Wagner for giving people and image of Vikings that was not just “inaccurate” but also really …. dumb-looking.
Zifnab
Bomb Iran McCain is going to beat Barack Obama in a wave election year by doing… what exactly? The man is a posterchild for the Republican Iraq War. He’s the very definition of what’s wrong with the core of the party – pandering, incompetence, fear-mongering, zero ethics – and he’s historically been on the wrong side of every vote since 2004. All the smear-jockeying in the world isn’t going to save McCain. He needs substance, and that’s something his entire party has been lacking in for half a generation now.
Roonieroo
Well, as a middle-aged female democrat, if you asked me back in January who I was leaning towards it was Clinton. I am firmly in the Obama camp now due to a growing understanding of his positions vs Clinton’s and not due to any of the attacks/gossip. Well, okay, to be fair the negative crap coming from the Clinton camp just made me look harder at finding out what the reality was on Obama’s stances because I was getting too disgusted with Clinton.
But while I agreed with more of Obama’s positions his “experience” problem was something I need to figure out in relation to who his advisors/cabinet would be.
I’m getting more comfortable with who he listens to based on an interview with Susan Powers on Salon that got my attention. Frankly, I’m seeing more hope for our future with who Obama talks to then the same old people we had the first time around with the Clintons. I like some of them but there are a lot that I really don’t like and I don’t think they are the right people for this point in time.
Advisors/cabinet matter. If you don’t think so then you haven’t been paying attention these past 8 years or heck these past 16 years!
I’m part of that swing you are seeing in those polls. But, whoops, I forgot. I’m a Texan. I don’t count for the Clinton camp, I only count in the Obama camp. Maybe that is part of the switch for me also.
Woodrow "asim' Jarvis Hill
Jay, no questions. Because, in no small part, of his ability to bring fresh energy and faces into the election system, I’ve gone from simple Obama supporter, to volunteering for the campaign here in NC.
What I’m saying, is that playing the polls as a sign that it’s over for Clinton is a mug’s game. She’s canny, and there’s every fear that this negative attack mode ate into Obama’s support base. I’d rather not have to play the “defend polls” game, ’cause they can and have turned on us, outright lied (in both directions), etc. The point isn’t the polls, it’s the votes.
Does that make sense?
Perry Como
This post is sexist.
Nellcote
FYI some Obama advisors:
http://www.gwu.edu/~action/2008/obama/obamaorg.html
grumpy realist
Hey, don’t knock Eileen Farrell. Great singer. I’ve got some of her recordings around here somewhere…..
(And yeah, one of the reasons I like opera is for the most part it still doesn’t give that much of a damn as to how large a singer is and cares more about the voice. You think a 100-lb model type is going to be able to belt out a fine, robust Verdi aria? There’s a wonderful clip of Tetrazzini on YouTube in her 60s singing along to a record of Caruso. Absolutely charming!)
demimondian
Oh, Dame Farrell could certainly fill a room. In more senses than one.
But, for what it’s worth, Kiri Te Kanawa is a sylph of a thing — and has far the better voice, for my money.
Dennis - SGMM
I get the feeling that Obama may actually listen to people with opinions contrary to his own. Hillary lost my confidence in her ability to listen when she ran that panel on health care reform back in ’92. It didn’t help when her husband invoked executive privilege to keep the proceedings of the panel from the public.
Jen
You also appear to be an empirical thinker. It was only a matter of time. Welcome to the Magical Unity Pony.
O/T, did you know that you can get booted from TalkLeft, by the site admin, for “chattering”….with the site admin? Fascinating but true. I must find another hobby now.
I like John so much better.
Zifnab
Wow. I’ve been booted for “foul language”, “disrespecting religion”, and “spouting left-wing memes that embrace hate and intolerance”, but I’ve never been booted for “chattering” before. That is new.
Jen
Yeah, it means going back and forth and back and forth, until the site admin who you were going back and forth with, decides to enforce the rule about going back and forth because you got the best of him. It’s kind of like how Bill O’Reilly will cut your mic.
I also noticed an interesting trend whereby he announces that he isn’t going to engage with people. Like, a lot. Then frequently, he engages with them even further than his announcement, even. (I would have thought, first rule of not engaging with people, don’t engage with them.)
To be fair, you get booted from the thread. Then you can go to another thread. But they also boot you from the thread for going off-topic. So until they open a thread of “Big Tent Democrat is an Enormous Jackass”, you can’t win. :)
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Yeah, Clinton supporters make the room really cold. Leaves us Pony Molesters all shivering, jaws all a’vibrating. We all have to group together and keep warm with our love for each other, love for The Candidate, and our love of gouging, sexist remarks against Hillary’s vagina.
Anyways, Jen, what’s with you and getting kicked from sites. First RedState, then TalkLeft? You don’t play nice, do you? Saddle chaffing your ass, making you grumpy?
Jen
I actually played very nice at TalkLeft. I admit that I did not, particularly, at RedState, but I knew I didn’t have long, so I wanted to make the most of it. They just have translucent skins that are not shimmery and pretty like the pony’s.
zsa
This would be the Minnesota offensive line?
Punchy
Who boots ya for those things? DKos? RudeState?
By the way, is there a better way than the above to describe this site? fucking crazy language, a disinterest in Jesus and his Obama-like cult, and stories about Larry Craig’s proclivity towards music, specifically the jazz and skin flute?
Sorry…just chattering.
OriGuy
Eileen Farrell sings Isolde (no helmet, horns or otherwise.)
4tehlulz
ZOMG U W1|| B B&
RareSanity
Very Funny…
Your journey to the magical side will is now complete.
BTW, what does “OL” comment formatting button do?
RareSanity
Dammit, sorry…
Zifnab
DKos is way too crowded. I don’t recognize half the regular commentors there, so I stay clear. RudeState’s banned me twice, once for each of the above reasons, and Malkin banned me for posting links to the WaPo.
jcricket
In theory it would create an ordered list (1, 2, 3, 4) instead of LI which just creates bullets. In practice, I’ve never seen it work, despite the “preview” showing the numbers quite clearly. Not sure why.
Zifnab
blah blah blah
blah blah blah
Looks like it just tabs things over.
Zifnab
OL = FAIL!
zzyzx
OL makes an ordered list. Why?
Because people like them
Because they’re fun?
Because the button is SO clickable.
DougJ
Gallup tracking polls are garbage — they had Bush up 13 points versus Gore 5 days before the 2000 election.
I’m an Obama guy now, but let’s not buy into bogus numbers.
zzyzx
Curse you clickable button!
Billy K
I say to hell with OL. Why is there no Italics button!?
RareSanity
But there is…
RareSanity
Oh…wait…I just saw…nevermind
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
It’s the em button.
Newer versions of HTML are trying to turn visual elements (italic fonts) into language elements (emphasis). It’s so it can be compatible with blind-accessible apparatuses (shouldn’t that be “apparati”?).
But for normal people, em is italics, and strong is bold.
Billy K
But I don’t want to emphasize….
I want to italicize.
Too much dissonance with the world of typesetting.
And to think all this time I’ve been manually tagging my italics.
Tim in SF
Sheesh.. took me ten minutes to figure out the Eileen Farrell reference.
Hilarious!
limbaugh's pilonidal cyst
Fer cripesakes John Friggin’ McCain is more ready to lead the country (albeit the wrong way) than Clinton.
*Wonders if that would get him booted from TalkLeft*
Scary to think that she’d actually be picking a cabinet if she were elected.
cleek
why is there an OL button, but no UL button ?
anti-dot-ism ?
discrimination ?
cleek
oh sure… show me the Unordered List in preview, then take it away in the post. sure. that’s just great. fine.
dslak
Once you realize that the Clinton method is to turn their presidency into a “permanent campaign,” it gets even scarier.
Dennis - SGMM
Now wait just a darn minute: Joe Lieberman would make a fine Secretary of State.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
firebrand
Don’t count out the Clintons just yet. There’s a story up at Politico that says that the Clintons are now going to try to get at Obama’s pledged delegates. If you thought they couldn’t get any sleazier, think again.
dslak
It’s unlikely that Israel would want him.
zzyzx
So I think it all comes down to tonight. If Obama can pull out Wisconsin, Clinton won’t know what to do next if even going negative all the time didn’t work. She’d probably have to keep on going but it would be more liable to backfire. Obama’s closing in on TX and OH so that will probably be game over.
If she wins though, the dynamic changes. Negative attacks will be proven to work and then we might be in for an UGLY couple of months. Please spare us from that Cheese Loving People of the North!
ThymeZone
I think Tzipi Livni already has the job.
Oh, you meant here, in this country?
Ha ha. Funny.
Dennis - SGMM
Mock if you will but, when President Hillary appoints Attorney General Dianne Feinstein the laugh will be on you.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Fine, I could use a great laugh after Ashcroft, Gonzales, and Muskasey have made cry until my tear ducts were empty.
p.lukasiak
Speaking of polls…
here’s one from the key state of Florida
McCain 49% Clinton 43%
McCain 53% Obama 37%.
dslak
OMG p.lukasiak! We’d all better vote for Hillary now!
Zifnab
So that’s the key state of Florida. How about the key state of California?
Ooops! So we get Florida but lose California. I will continue to ride the Magic Unity Pony, thank you.
ThymeZone
Oh yeah, McCain, behold his mighty power.
I’ve got money on him getting 40% of the popular vote or less. His craziness, is insistence on talking about Vietnam, his big mouth, bad temper, and history, plus he being the War Candidate, doom him to crushing defeat.
Why we even bother polling that contest right now is beyond me. Waste of time, means absolutely nothing.
Zifnab
If you were a serious person, you’d realize it means you should vote for Hillary in the primary.
dslak
Given the intra-party fight about seating delegates, Florida’s not a good bellwether state in the first place. If the situation is resolved amicably before the Democratic convention, then it might be worthwhile to look at how Florida is leaning.
Currently however, the well there has been poisoned.
Dork
It’s Laughing Out Loud, without the laughing.
So, just kinda Out Loud, ya know. BTW, I’ve always thought “B-Quote” made a great rap name.
EnderWiggin
I only recently read TalkLeft because of the link to the “Periodically” nonsense. Just curious, is that site sort of a left wing equivalent to RedState, meaning a place for the dumbest/most extreme/most machine controlled of the parties members to congregate?
Hypatia
Well, Farrell wasn’t really fat by opera standards. Now, if he’d chosen Jane Eaglen, it would have been clear right away.
Obama transcends bogus numbers.
grumpy realist
Demimondian–I’d agree with you but there is a definite difference between being able to sing normal opera (Verdi, Mozart, etc.) and Wagner.
Wagner’s more of an endurance contest than anything else. Which is why you need a certain, ah, massiveness in order to have the necessary stamina and not drop dead on stage. Add to that the volume that some of these singers belt out and, hey, they can be as hefty as they like.
(I still enjoy Sophia Loren’s comment on her body: “All you see is due to pasta.”)
DougJ
This post is sexist.
What’s wrong with being sexy?
borehole
EnderWiggin, no, TL used to be great. I don’t know about the comment section; maybe it was always a fever swamp-in-waiting.
I kinda like BTD, just for pure, distilled assholatry. I mean, the guy actually responds to criticism with “Whatever.” What adult SAYS that? Much less types and submits it? Supposedly he’s Armando from DK, but I had a life back when he was a big online muckity-muck, so all I know about the guy is that “Swords Crossed” sucked.
Y’know, I haven’t had my USRDA of rubbernecking. I’m gonna go try to find the thread Jen got banned from.
chopper
oh man, i’d forgotten about that! man, that was rich. “swords crossed!” ooh, sounds like a kung fu movie, only *really really boring*.
jcricket
You can take John out of the Republican party, but you can’t take the Republican out of John.
He delights in presenting shiny ponies as available to all, but then really only delivers them for the ultra-rich 1% crowd.
brendanm
I won’t argue about the past but Swords Crossed is currently teh awesome… and we’re all avid Balloon Juice readers too, so don’t hate =)
tomjones
Gods i hated armando.
empty
Your move to the magical side is truly complete.
I couldn’t find any interview with Susan Powers on Salon but here is a list of Obama’s national security and foreign policy advisors:
Former Amb. Jeffrey Bader, Bill Clinton’s NSC Asia specialist
Mark Brzezinski, Bill Clinton’s NSC Southeast Europe specialist
Richard A. Clarke, Bill Clinton’s counterterrorism czar
Gregory B. Craig, Bill Clinton’s State Department director of policy planning
Ivo H. Daalder, Bill Clinton’s NSC director for European affairs
Richard Danzig, Bill Clinton’s Navy secretary
Philip H. Gordon, Bill Clinton’s NSC staffer for Europe
W. Anthony Lake, Bill Clinton’s national security adviser
Susan E. Rice,Bill Clinton’s Africa specialist
Dennis B. Ross, Bill Clinton’s Middle East negotiator
Daniel B. Shapiro, Bill Clinton’s NSC director for legislative affairs
Sarah Sewall, Bill Clinton’s deputy assistant secretary of defense for peacekeeping and humanitarian assistance
Robert Malley, Bill Clinton’s Middle East envoy
Mona Sutphen, former aide to Bill Clinton’s National Security adviser Samuel R. Berger
Zbigniew Brzezinski, President Carter’s national security adviser
Maj. Gen. J. (Jonathan) Scott Gration, a 32-year Air Force veteran
Lawrence J. Korb, assistant secretary of defense from 1981-1985
James M. Ludes, defense and foreign policy adviser to Sen. John Kerry,
Gen. Merrill A. (“Tony”) McPeak, former Air Force chief of staff and now a business consultant
Denis McDonough, policy adviser to Tom Daschle,
Samantha Power, Harvard-based human rights scholar and Pulitzer Prize winning writer, foreign policy adviser
Bruce O. Riedel, Bill Clinton’s NSC staffer for Near East and Asian affairs
There are several people in there not named Powers or McPeak that I think are very good. And you can make an argument that even Bill Clinton’s people recognize Obama’s qualities. But, holy crap, to say
There is a slight disconnect from reality there. Or is it magic?
chopper
alls i can says is, never, but *never* count out a clinton.
they’ve got southern ways. guns at dawn and country charms. hell of shady backroom dealings.
crw
Nice cherry picking. Per the very next link on Rasmussen, Obama outperforms Clinton in Minnesota, and in fact in most other states. Florida is the exception so far, and the very analysis of those results indicate the delegate controversy is a large part of the reason.
Jen
p-luk, another thing I posted that got deleted last night from TalkLeft — *nimble* fingers that guy has, to compensate for the wit — were Rasmussen polls from Minnesota, Wisconsin, PA, and Oregon. They all go red if it’s Hillary and blue for Obama. By the way, those + Florida are all the recent Rasmussen polls, as of last night. And that Fla. poll is Clinton (red) v. Obama (red), McCain winning either way.
Not what I’d call the winningest argument.
borehole
Sorry, Brendan, I didn’t know it was still extant. I’ll definitely check it out.
You got rid of that stupid fencing logo, so that’s a good sign right there.
Jen
Borehole, you’re BORED, but your boredom flatters me.
Jibeaux
Billy K
You should rename it. No snark; not trying to be a smartass. The lameness left a mental stain. I would never in a million years think to go there.
brendanm
We’re actually planning to significantly overhaul the whole site in the near future, so this might be a natural time for that. I’ll see what the other contributers think, thanks for the suggestion.
To make a token pretense of staying on topic ;-) I don’t think Clinton will be dropping out anytime soon. National polls don’t mean nearly as much as the Texas and Ohio polls, which are narrowing but still show HRC up by a significant margin. She doesn’t have to win boatloads of pledged delegates there if she can use victories to convince supers to support her.
I’m guessing if Texas and Ohio don’t go well, she’ll throw in the towel, but we’ll see.
borehole
Jen, mucho appreciado, and I was this close to asking for a link. Got through a couple threads before I realized you weren’t necessarily using the same handle. That was around the same time I realized I’d overestimated my masochism.
“Well, now that I’ve figured out what is predictable, I agree that it’s predictable.”
To be fair, he pretty much had to ban you after that. Kinda hard to be a smarmy jagoff when someone’s right there wearing an “I’m with the smarmy jagoff” t-shirt.
Jay C
I fervently share your hope, TZ: but I doubt it. One has to remember that even though Karl Rove is gone from the White House, his malevolent spirit, like Sauron’s ghost, lingers on, working its evil on the political process: all those “negatives” you cite about McCain are quite true, and quite negative: but the once the Republican Noise Machine gets working on the spin, all those flaws suddenly aren’t going to be looking so… well, flawed:
His craziness: Individualist and maverick
his insistence on talking about Vietnam: A genuine American war hero
his big mouth: outspoken and blunt
bad temper: doesn’t suffer fools lightly
and history: decades of experience
plus he being the War candidate: his biggest attraction
Sen. Obama and the Dems ought to have a damn good campaign strategy lined up: it ain’t gonna a pretty season.
Jen
Someone had already taken “Jen”! What are the odds? I use jibeaux at dKos but I haven’t been there lately. I like to read it, the comments are just too crowded.
Conservatively Liberal
A couple of weeks ago I came on here and I noticed that I had three rows of option buttons for formatting. I went to town and wrote a post using just about every option, but when I went to post it the formatting did not post and the options reset back to a single row of buttons.
I want more buttons! :)
I like this place because IMO John runs it like a free speech place should be run. You should be allowed to be as smart or as stupid as you wish to, and let the community have at it.
Freedom of expression at its best.
Things are looking good for Obama, and I hope it stays that way. I like how the Clinton camp are pushing the meme that the press pushed the so-called plagiarism story. I like the AP response*:
*H/T rashomon @ The GOS
Birdzilla
The fat lady has yet to sing