Now is not the time to start believing the RJ

Just when it's starting to look like Barack Obama might win Nevada, a poll in the Review-Journal shows that Barack Obama is winning in Nevada. Dang.

Na, your Gleaner kids. Just because the RJ's latest (last?) poll of the Obama McCain match-up has Obama ahead of McCan't 47 to 45, that doesn't mean Obama is doomed to lose the state.

In fact...

The last poll the RJ did before the 2004 election had Bush beating Kerry in Nevada 50 to 44. Bush ended up winning, 50.5 to 47.8.

In November 2000, the RJ poll found Bush beating Gore 47 to 43. Bush won 49.5 to 45.9.

What does that micro-retrospective of late-stage presidential campaign surveys commissioned by the local dead tree of record tell us?

A) Sometimes the RJ buys polls and publishes the results in the newspaper thingy, and;

B) Barack Obama could win Nevada.

Oh, one unique -- perhaps even, dare we say, newsy? -- bit that the paper didn't mention in its own coverage of its own poll is that this month's Obama-McCain survey marks the first time in the current century that the RJ and polling partner Mason-Dixon have found a Democrat leading a Republican in Nevada in the race for president (according to a quick scan of results archived on the paper's website). As bitter angry white man Brit Hume once said in another context altogether, that must be illustrative of something.

Since Obama's RJ lead is smaller than the seven points in the Reno paper's poll or the four-point lead in Nevada that CNN's pollster whipped out at the start of the month and that was echoed by Rasmussen, there might be a temptation to suggest that the RJ survey is an outlier that has over-polled wingnuts and understated the depth and breadth of Obama's support.

To quote arguably the most representative social observer, political analyst and thinker of the last century (calling Mt. PIlot to check cross tabs, at right), "Nip it. Nip it in the bud."

For one thing, Insider Advantage (can't swing a cat without hitting another pollster) also has Obama up by only two in Nevada, 49 to 47.

But more importantly -- and this really can't be emphasized enough -- fuck the polls. Fuck all the handicapping too.

Yes, what with the Democratic edge in voter registration, the Obama campaign's superiority on the ground, the Republican-sponsored destruction of the global economy, the public's disgust with all things Republican, the collapse of what is cynically called the Republican "brand," the influence of what is innocuously called the political "climate," polling results ... all that stuff and more bodes well for Obama.

But Obama supporters in Nevada must absolutely positively assume that the only way Obama will win the state is if every one of his supporters shows up on election day -- and even then they should hope for good measure that McCan't's flailing flibbertigibbet act makes some Republicans stay home. 

Recent opinion polls are encouraging. But remember, the last time Nevadans went to the polls that mattered, they elected Jim Gibbons. Unless and until they atone for that that offense, Nevada voters can not and should not be trusted, no matter what the polls say.

Comments

[Patrick]

The RJ is part of that "evil corporate media" ...right? ;P

[Depression Baby]

Racism is alive and well in Nevada. I can't believe that white old farts my age (70) could be so prejudiced in the 21st century. What rock have they been hiding under. If any of them read this may I say shame on you, you old assholes.

[Michael Green]

Sigh. Patrick, not all corporate media are evil. Some are just better than others. The New York Times and The Washington Post are part of corporations. The Wall Street Journal is part of a corporation controlled by perhaps the most evil media figure of the 20th and 21st centuries, but it remains an excellent newspaper, despite his best efforts and an editorial page whose writers would have considered Torquemada an amateur. The question is whether the news coverage is accurate and fair.

By the way, speaking of corporate media, The New York Times now can say it employs not merely Pulitzer Prize winners, but a Nobel Prize winner, Paul Krugman. The Nobel committee had to find an economist who understood from the git-go that what Republicans and their corporate (hate to use that word) allies were doing would cause a catastrophe and the committee did.

[Patrick]

Paul Krugman is one of the worst economic pundits around. His prize by the way has nothing to do with his economic commentary in the times. Krugman is one of the most dishonest and fallacious economic writers of our time.

His assumptions are piss poor and he makes straw men as if the world supply of straw was infinate.

[Patrick]

Stiglitz is actually bad too, I don't know who is worse, they both make the same bad assumptions and straw men.

[temujin... khan of the yakka mongols]

....Top O the Morning to you Patrick Lad...

..I don't know about you Darling, but I'm voting for the Irish guys. Irish Joe Biden from Scranton Pennsylvania and his running mate..Paddy O'Bama...
....Temujin
Harrisburg , Pennsylvania
Roar Lions Roar....
....P.S.....Nevada will be Penn State Blue this November Patrick Darling....

(Drinks a slug of John Jamison Irish Whiskey)

[CJ]

Well Patrick you sure are full of fucking opinions, that you do not coherantly back up. And you know what they say about opinions, every asshole has one.

But mostly you just give big exagerated proncouncements and then fail to cogently back them up. And so you know, since you have been sharing your personal opinions I noted once - and only once that, in my personal opinion, you got it right.

Chill dude...or do more homework.

[temujin... khan of the yakka mongols]

....Serves Patrick a bowl of French opinion soup with toasted croutons and cheese....

[The Penguin]

Penn State! JoePa! I KNEW there was something about Temujin I liked...who knew he was a fellow Pennsylvanian, and from Harrisburg, no less!

[Nancy]

Patrick - go home - Dr. Krugman is brilliant - there is a reason that he is at Princeton - there is a reason that he is carried front and center in many of the most important economic news sources in the WORLD and BEST OF ALL there is a reason he won the nobel prize in ECONOMICS! Has it dawned on you that your weird little theories might be the ones that are off base?

[Goldy]

Take it easy on Patrick. I used to date her.

[Patrick]

Krugman and Stiglitz have a tendency to caricature anyone who argues for free markets as "fundamentalists" which is so unbecoming of Nobel prize winners let alone legitimate economists.

They also tend to create straw men arguments out of free market economists. For example making the claim that free market economists ALWAYS assume perfect competition and then go on to use the wrong definition of perfect competition (a technical economic term, they use literally and their punditry writing).

Their erudite academic economic writing, which very few people read and which will never be printed in the New York Times, however is solid.

They don't make those same mistakes. They make those errors, likely on purpose, to sell books to people like all of you, who are eager to find a hero to prove you right.

They make millions that way and they get hammered by other legitimate economists over some of the points they make in their columns and non-academic books.

[Patrick]

What about Wolfpack blue? Or Michigan blue? or Air Force blue?

Mountaneer blue? Kansas or Connecticut blue? Or Memphis or Kentucky blue? Akron or Buffalo blue?

Delaware blue...the good old fighting blue hens?

[jowled woman]

I learned in child psych classes back in the 70's that children will engage in whatever behavior, good or bad, that will garner attention. *HINT*

[temujin... khan of the yakka mongols]

...Places a poo poo cushion under Patrick's seat...

[CJ]

Yea Patrick. Nice try at a diversion from your faulty political and economic arguments.

Ever hear of a citation? So why is it that you never cite anything but your own personal opinion?

Tighten up your arguments and may your little pecker and pea pickin heart be blessed by the great gestalt goddess Gorganzola.

[The Penguin]

mmmmmmm, gorganzola...

[CJ]

Methinks fondly of Patrick.

[The Penguin]

Actually, we should welcome differing opinions like that of Patrick and some others who post on here. For years we've been excoriating the blow-hard conservative talk-radio schmucks for excluding and browbeating people with opposing opinions (should they even allow them on the air in the first place). The least we can do as "progressives" is to respectfully hear what the other side has to say and disagree with them with a modicum of civility. Even if we think they're wrong we should be big tent enough to tolerate them, otherwise we're hypocrites of the highest order -- not unlike Rush and the other right-wingbags.

[Silver State Hispanic Activist]

I'm with Penguin. People come out of the woodwork to insult me whenever I sound any sacrilegious tones against Ruben Kihuen (whom I've yet to see in the front row at any recent rallies for Obama, Berkeley or Titus, btw.)

[tax man]

Remote Digital Picture Technology LLC lacks a business license in Clark County. What would the NPRI folks think!

[Myrna the Minx]

Patrick, doesn't it all depend on which free market economists Krugman is writing about and the venue in which he is writing? Many Friedman disciples ARE fundamentalist free marketers. In a way, Krugman is doing libertarians a favor by labeling who is thinks are fundamentalist free-marketers--trying to be as clear as possible. By the way, could you provide me the names of a couple of non-fundamentalist free-market economists? Please do not name Vernon Smith. Thanks.