PA: Rasmussen: Romney within 5 of Obama

[MilesC56]

New Poll: Pennsylvania President by Rasmussen on 2012-07-18

Summary: D: 48%, R: 44%, I: 4%, U: 5%

Poll Source URL: Full Poll Details

[HagridOfTheDeep]

This is excellent.

[krazen1211]

Dem: 86 Obama, 7 Romney
Indep: 48 Romney, 38 Obama
GOP: 84 Romney, 9 Obama

Men: 48 Obama, 46 Romney
Women: 47 Obama, 42 Romney

White: 51 Romney, 41 Obama
Black: 98 Obama, 2 Romney

43 Dem/38 GOP/19 indep, 11% black

[Lief]

This is excellent.

I agree:

[Invisible Obama]

Romney is at the Republican floor again.

[HagridOfTheDeep]

Oh, come on. Almost all of those are states Obama was expected to win fairly handily. Romney should not be just five points behind in states like PA and NM.

The O+1 and O+2 states are battlegrounds that could go either way. I also happen to believe Romney is being underpolled, which makes me very content with the numbers we're seeing. Especially after two weeks of onslaught from Obama.

[IDS Speaker Ben Kenobi]

The O+1 and O+2 states are battlegrounds that could go either way. I also happen to believe Romney is being underpolled, which makes me very content with the numbers we're seeing. Especially after two weeks of onslaught from Obama.

It's been 6 days since he last won a state poll, and that one was North Dakota.

You're not concerned with the fact that most of these polls don't include Goode and Johnson?

[State Comptroller Atkins]

The polls were pretty similar at this point in 2008, ftr.

[timothyinMD]

Romney doesn't need PA to win, but obviously it would be a big help.  Down 4 is a decent place to be in an Obama by 10 state

[HagridOfTheDeep]

The O+1 and O+2 states are battlegrounds that could go either way. I also happen to believe Romney is being underpolled, which makes me very content with the numbers we're seeing. Especially after two weeks of onslaught from Obama.

It's been 6 days since he last won a state poll, and that one was North Dakota.

You're not concerned with the fact that most of these polls don't include Goode and Johnson?

Not in the slightest. They will receive minimal coverage leading up to election day and will eventually be non-factors. The only grain of concern I have involves Virginia. That will be Romney's hardest state to flip, and Goode could MAYBE screw Romney over there. Doubt it though.

[ShadowOfTheWave]

It is absolutely not excellent for Romney to be this far behind in PA in mid-summer, not that he would win here anyway. Bush & McCain were doing the same or better at this time, and they were better fits for the state.

[sg0508]

Keep in mind that Obama still won by a clear 10 pt margin in 2008 and yet did very poorly in western PA.  If he can nail down those blue collar voters this time in the western part of the state, forget about it.

[MilesC56]

Keep in mind that Obama still won by a clear 10 pt margin in 2008 and yet did very poorly in western PA.  If he can nail down those blue collar voters this time in the western part of the state, forget about it.

Well, that area in the southwestern corner has been trending R for some time anyway.

The only county that Sestak won in that region was Allegheny (and he ran behind Kerry's performance in the eastern part of the state) and he only lost the state by 2 points.

[Vosem]

You're not concerned with the fact that most of these polls don't include Goode and Johnson?

Well, polling seems to show Johnson hurts both campaigns approximately equally (if anything I seem to recall Obama is hurt very slightly more). Goode is more of a problem, but the Constitution Party generally does rather poorly -- if Goode doubles their 2008 total, he still ends up with just 0.3%. He might be a problem in his native Virginia, but he's insignificant beyond the borders of the Old Dominion. (It's not impossible the Old Dominion will be the Florida/Ohio decisive state, in which case Goode could well and truly screw Romney).

[sg0508]

Bottom line, if with higher turnout in a presidential year, Obama cleans up with at least 80% in Philly (the key threshold) and holds his own in the surrounding burbs, expect PA to be called immediately again at 8pm.

[Torie]

Romney doesn't need PA to win, but obviously it would be a big help.  Down 4 is a decent place to be in an Obama by 10 state

Bear in mind that Mittens needs about a 4 point swing to him nationally to win. The above represents a 3 point swing. On a national level, that is not quite enough. The wild card of course, is just how right is Dick Morris when he yammers ad nauseum every chance he gets, that most of the undecideds will break against the incumbent on election day. That is where the election stands today more or less.

[sg0508]

There's no reason to think that Romney is going to win here, especially with the minority vote in southeastern PA. I don't want to hear about the midterms either; had those elections been in presidential years where turnout is far higher, Toomey loses.

Again, the first thing Romney MUST do is find a way to win FL and OH because without them, the race is over.

[Senator Sbane]

Romney doesn't need PA to win, but obviously it would be a big help.  Down 4 is a decent place to be in an Obama by 10 state

Bear in mind that Mittens needs about a 4 point swing to him nationally to win. The above represents a 3 point swing. On a national level, that is not quite enough. The wild card of course, is just how right is Dick Morris when he yammers ad nauseum every chance he gets, that most of the undecideds will break against the incumbent on election day. That is where the election stands today more or less.

Ah the good old undecideds will overwhelmingly vote against the incumbent argument. I remember clinching on to that with hope that Kerry could pull it out in 2004. Most polls did have Bush below 50% after all. Combine that with the swing (not just trend but actual swing) against Bush in my city and the Bay Area which had me thinking Kerry would win, it ended up being a very sad night. Don't make the same mistake I made!

P.S.- Don't listen to Dick Morris. How can you post on this forum and not know that?

[© Tweed the Younger]

it's not over, folks.  Casey up four

[Vosem]

it's not over, folks.  Casey up four

Two days before the election as opposed to four months. When polls look like this two days beforehand, it's probably over (for Obama and considering the new numbers out of FL, VA, and HI I'm inclined to say for Senate Democrats as well).

[Zioneer]

Since it's Rasmussen, then Obama's probably actually at 50 to Romney's 44, or something like that.

[True Federalist]

You're not concerned with the fact that most of these polls don't include Goode and Johnson?

Well, polling seems to show Johnson hurts both campaigns approximately equally (if anything I seem to recall Obama is hurt very slightly more). Goode is more of a problem, but the Constitution Party generally does rather poorly -- if Goode doubles their 2008 total, he still ends up with just 0.3%. He might be a problem in his native Virginia, but he's insignificant beyond the borders of the Old Dominion. (It's not impossible the Old Dominion will be the Florida/Ohio decisive state, in which case Goode could well and truly screw Romney).

The Constitution Party's main problem has been ballot access as it never has been as well organized as the Libertarian Party has been, but where it does get access it typically does as well or even better than the Libertarians do.  Still, Virginia and Iowa are likely the only States where Goode has a chance to affect the outcome.

[Torie]

Romney doesn't need PA to win, but obviously it would be a big help.  Down 4 is a decent place to be in an Obama by 10 state

Bear in mind that Mittens needs about a 4 point swing to him nationally to win. The above represents a 3 point swing. On a national level, that is not quite enough. The wild card of course, is just how right is Dick Morris when he yammers ad nauseum every chance he gets, that most of the undecideds will break against the incumbent on election day. That is where the election stands today more or less.

Ah the good old undecideds will overwhelmingly vote against the incumbent argument. I remember clinching on to that with hope that Kerry could pull it out in 2004. Most polls did have Bush below 50% after all. Combine that with the swing (not just trend but actual swing) against Bush in my city and the Bay Area which had me thinking Kerry would win, it ended up being a very sad night. Don't make the same mistake I made!

P.S.- Don't listen to Dick Morris. How can you post on this forum and not know that?

Just because I "listen" to the toe sucker does not necessarily mean that I believe him.  It is probably true that undecideds do tend to break against the incumbent, but not always, and not all of them.

Addendum: Speaking of which ... punch here.

[pbrower2a]

In view of the following facts:

1. That no incumbent President has ever won 62% or more of the popular vote since at least 1900

2. That no incumbent has ever won less than 39% of the popular vote in a binary election (that excludes William Howard Taft in 1912)

3. That some incumbent Presidents have had approval ratings over 60% (Eisenhower in 1956)


and

4. Undecided voters are likely to be disproportionately more ideologically on the side of the lagging candidate


...I assume that undecided voters either do not vote or trend ineffectively to the losing candidate.  The only exception might be in the event of a sudden collapse of one of the candidates due to some military or diplomatic debacle or a breaking scandal whose effect would be so obvious that it has no other explanation. 

[Likely Voter]

When people talk about undecideds 'breaking' for one candidate or the other, that doesn't mean one candidate gets all those votes, it just means a majority of them. In 2004 the 11% who decided in the last week broke for Kerry, but it was just 52% vs 46%, so Kerry only got a net boost of 0.66%, not nearly enough to overcome the lead Bush had with the 'decided' vote. In 2008 undecideds broke for Obama, but again the net result was less than 1% boost.

So if Obama has less than a 1% lead, then one can say it is possible that undecided could swap that. But in the case of this poll, Obama would still easily win PA with a typical undecided break towards Romney.