Althouse: If Obama is so far ahead...

October 29, 2008

If Obama is so far ahead...

... why isn't he that far ahead?

How weird would it be if McCain won? How would people go about absorbing it?

253 comments:

«Oldest ‹Older 201 – 253 of 253

Rocker 419 said...: Harry Truman vs. Dewey, 1948. Everybody thought Dewey would win, there was no question. Truman went to bed that night, thinking he had lost. And then theres that famous photo of him, holding up the CHICAGO Tribune, "Dewey Defeats Truman" on the headline. McCain will win folks. And the Dem-Libs can cry "racism" and "he stole the election" until theyre blue in the face. The Polls and the pundits and the newspapers are LIARS and WEASLES!!! You read it here first...; 10/29/08, 7:57 PM
TWM said...: I read every Doyle post and he is obviously trying to convince himself not to be afraid.

McCain could win this.

As to the reaction if he does I refer you back to an HBO (?) documentary when Kerry lost that had all those Air America hosts reactions among other things. It was a mixture of sadness, horror, disbelief and suicidal thoughts.

Man, it was great TV.; 10/29/08, 7:58 PM
mccullough said...: John

No way Obama wins Indiana.; 10/29/08, 7:59 PM
The Drill SGT said...: Congrats MMM

I stopped playing competitively 20+ years ago when I got married. My wife doesn't like my teaching approach.; 10/29/08, 7:59 PM
The Drill SGT said...: all is lost :)

I just got a McCain fund raising call (in VA), from what sounded like a Black man who could not read a script very well.

seems to me that:

a, he was unlikely to be a volunteer, and
b. they went to the low bidder for the call center.

I told him I already gave and already voted.; 10/29/08, 8:03 PM
mccullough said...: Drill Sgt.

Sounds like a scam. If the crooks were smarter they'd be soliciting for Obama. Much easier to fleece whitey by doing that.; 10/29/08, 8:06 PM
Mason said...: Troops in the streets for 2-3 weeks if they hold. If not, an exercise of the 2nd amendment by patriots of all races and political persuasions that love this country. Calm and the rule of law will be stored, although it won't be pretty. Pray for our country. We must respect elections.; 10/29/08, 8:06 PM
Willys said...: If McCain is elected? How will we know?; 10/29/08, 8:06 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: Congrats MMM

I stopped playing competitively 20+ years ago when I got married. My wife doesn't like my teaching approach.

Yes. Grats to your Mom. Bridge is a very difficult game to master. Takes a lot of smarts and a cunning devious mind lol.

As to Drill Sgt. I agree completely. When I tried to play cards with my first husband we would get into screaming matches, throw the cards or lapse into glacial silence. All his fault of course.... [wink]; 10/29/08, 8:10 PM
DADvocate said...: Idiots like Doyle can't admit or realize or understand that when someone fraudulently registers and votes at the same time, as in Ohio, it is voter fraud as well as voter registration fraud.

I liked this from a commenter at Doyle's blog.

I just thought I'd leave a comment here because no one else does and it looks kind of lonely here.

I don't want you to think this is a pity comment but, I guess it kind of is.

Hah! When you can't handle not having comments at your blog, you just become a troll elsewhere.

Of course, if McCain wins there will be riots and liberals crapping in their pants.; 10/29/08, 8:11 PM
K T Cat said...: Shameless teaser: I have the reason that the polls are wrong and a prediction for the election.

Gratuitous blog post link.; 10/29/08, 8:12 PM
Trooper York said...: Jeeez, I hate cats.; 10/29/08, 8:14 PM
Daryl said...: The only reason people believe Obama is "inevitable" and McCain's victory is "unimaginable" is because the liberal media is trying to demoralize the Republicans and PUMAs.

Don't bother voting. Obama's guaranteed to win.

And if he loses, poor black people will riot in the inner cities and rich unmanly intellectuals in Madison, Wisconsin will have difficulty "absorbing" it all.

It will be a tragedy for all walks of life in America.

Those are the threats we've been hearing. I don't believe it. Except the part about nebbisihy liberal Woody Allen types having mental breakdowns at being unable to imagine that one of our two major political parties wins the White House.; 10/29/08, 8:16 PM
stavr0s said...: McCain will win by a surprising majority. Inner cities will burn. Liberals will not know whether to shit or go blind. If we are extremely fortunate, Chrissy Matthews will choke to death on his own frothing drool live on tv.; 10/29/08, 8:18 PM
TmjUtah said...: Me? I intend to buy some stock in a transportation fund, then go to work at my new job (start Monday) a little more confident that I won't take a pay cut due to taxes in 2010, see my 401(K) stolen and nationalized, or be laid off because the company can't afford me due to new taxes and regulation.

McCain is not my ideal; not even on the same continent.

But he's real, and I'll take that any day.; 10/29/08, 8:18 PM
Synova said...: Obama can win by an EC vote or two, but if McCain wins, I hope to God it's by a huge margin.; 10/29/08, 8:18 PM
Synova said...: So... if this "tape" that the LA Times has turns out to be something that would have swung the election but they only release it after Obama wins...; 10/29/08, 8:20 PM
Roux said...: How will they absorb it? They will riot in the streets leaving all the white liberals with a look of disbelief.; 10/29/08, 8:21 PM
Trooper York said...: I don't think it is fair to make fun of Doyle when he is not around. I mean he was whacking off the whole time Obama was on and probably came about three or four times. So he must still be sleeping.

Cut the guy a break, allright.; 10/29/08, 8:23 PM
TK said...: Polls and media reports are individually junk, but if one looks at the big picture and tracks the trends, it's possible to arrive at a reasonable guesstimate.

Lopsided media activism certainly has an effect, so at least 10-15 points of Obama's final popular vote total will have resulted from our so-called mass-media, who will be the real losers in this election no matter which party prevails. Regardless of the outcome, more than 50% of the American population will never trust the mass-media again.

Partisanship aside, as an armchair handicapper of many things statistical, if I was forced to bet real money on the race today, I'd bet on Obama to win by 1-5 points in the popular vote (EC vote is too fluid to call).

However, as a pragmatist, given the closeness of the race, I'd probably make a McCain by 1+ back bet for half the amount just to be safe.; 10/29/08, 8:28 PM
Meade said...: God, how I love plays at the plate!; 10/29/08, 8:37 PM
Anonymous said...: Personally, I'm rather concerned of how ugly it could get if McCain wins. Not a guarantee, but a possible result.; 10/29/08, 8:40 PM
Pyrthroes said...: Anyone who trusts polls or pollsters in context of a blatant propaganda blitz by print and TV outlets, has already "absorbed" enough to resemble a super-saturated sponge. Drying and hardening after wringing out, sponges can only scrape crumbs off kitchen counters. "Mugged by reality," BHO's true-believing Nuremburgers may well find themselves in dry-sponge mode, capable only of scraping crumbs.

Last year, France's Nicholas Sarkozy faced Segolene Royale, a Sandbox Socialist familiar to Obama/Soetoro's adoring multitudes. As Sarkozy said, France required a definitive result: High voting margins on heavy turnout. France obliged; Segolene Royale slunk away, and has not been heard from since.

Should Obama lose unequivocally, forfeiting power to intimidate and suborn all opposition, we think the truth regarding his non-native birth and probable status as an Indonesian foreign-student from c. 1981 will prove impossible to conceal any longer. Everyone from Granny Dunham to Michelle, not to mention Howard Dean plus BHO's major donors, certainly knows his Constitutional deficiencies already.

How will supporters react, faced with the additional, irrefutable proof that their candidate has been an egregious fraud and dissembler from Day One? Cognitive dissonance will make the last eight years' Bush Derangement Syndrome seem playfully benign.; 10/29/08, 8:42 PM
MadisonMan said...: With 80% of the population thinking the press is in the tank for BHO

I believe the correct stat is 80% of Republicans. Not the general population.

As for bridge, Dad does not play with Mom. His style of play is waay to unorthodox. But they learned that long ago, one reason they've been married for 59+ years. (The other reason being that as far as I can tell, Mom always gets her way).

trooper, my cat is currently on my lap. But she's nice and warm and the house is cold.; 10/29/08, 8:47 PM
Unknown said...: Don't blame me for the polls, I voted for Nader....; 10/29/08, 9:01 PM
MadisonMan said...: For all you people claiming Obama is a socialist, the local paper today ran an interview (column?) with the Socialist Candidate for the Presidency. Not surprisingly, Mr. Moore (not Michael, Brian) thinks Obama can't be a socialist because he's joined at the hip to Wall St. banks, just as McCain is.

Moore is on the ballot in only 18 states, but if he wins them all, he gets 270 electoral votes.

It's an amusing article. I don't think it was meant to be, however.; 10/29/08, 9:15 PM
MadisonMan said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/29/08, 9:15 PM
Merry said...: Up until this fall, I lived in DC, and for whatever reason I got called for every poll imaginable. You wonder who the Nielsen raters are? Me. Who's got the long census form? Me again. Who is answering the Health and Human services polls on whatever in America? Me, me, me!

I had a couple political polling calls this summer, but my absolute favorite was the one that started out with some demographic information, and then went into, "Do you think the country is doing basically okay, or that it is heading very seriously down the wrong track?"

I managed to stop laughing long enough to ask who was funding this poll, but she gave up on me soon after. Every time I see one of those "80% of Americans think the country is heading in the wrong direction" polls, though, I can't help but wonder how they are asking the question.; 10/29/08, 9:37 PM
TmjUtah said...: I don't see how Obama wins without Hillary's! hardcore supporters.

There aren't that many Leftists out there, too many people are old enough to remember Carter, and vote fraud (even on a grand scale) is pretty inefficient as a way of winning states.

And Obama's still an empty suit who reads a script well. Or a campus commie living a wet dream; he's by no stretch a uniter and his resume might appeal to a Noonan or a Huffington but his CV looks pretty light to anybody who has to work for a living.

If the LA Times sacks up and shows that video, we can all get on with our lives. It might even defuse some of the riots that are certainly already planned and organized - win OR lose.

Can't have a post racial messiah without an object lesson on what happens when race is on the line.

They'll probably burn Detroit; it will improve property values.; 10/29/08, 9:53 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: This comment has been removed by the author.; 10/29/08, 10:07 PM
Dust Bunny Queen said...: I don't think it is fair to make fun of Doyle when he is not around

Are you kidding? Of course it's fair. That's how it worked in high school and that's how it works in the world of the main stream media and obviously in the world of "teh internets". Sneaky behind the back stabing and innuendo. Rumor and gossip and out and out lies.

Come on.....where's the fun.; 10/29/08, 10:13 PM
Anonymous said...: How would people go about absorbing a McCain win?

The Palestinians in Gaza who contributed money to Obama's campaign and voted absentee for him will spontaneously explode.; 10/29/08, 10:17 PM
Anthony said...: I weill be flabergasted, dumbfounded, gobsmackered, and whatever other nonsense word I can imagine.

One question I have though, are you Obama folks planning to riot? Just let me know. I wasplanning on getting drunk on Election Night, no matter who wins -- if you are planning to riot though I figure I will need to stay sober.; 10/29/08, 10:53 PM
integrity said...: I'd absorb it rather well. I love revenge, McCain is and always has been the best revenge against repubs. That puppy will sign any piece of shit legislation we put in front of him, and I get to watch repubs have to eat it!

On the other hand, I love and voted for Obama.

I can make either win work for me, and either win will screw the right-wing royally. Maybe we should have Mr. McCain (our bitchboy) nominate an abortion doctor to the supreme court. We can take this anywhere, Johnny boy you will be ours. And you'll love every minute of it, especially pissing off the right-wing nutters.; 10/29/08, 11:12 PM
reader_iam said...: You know what? I'm actually beginning to enjoy blogger integrity: another character in the [performance] arthouse that is Althouse.

So shoot me.; 10/29/08, 11:19 PM
reader_iam said...: I mean, TitusX...XX grew on me, over time: why not integrity?; 10/29/08, 11:25 PM
Anonymous said...: Um, I am sorry to pop your bubble, buy Obama is NOT black, he is BI-RACIAL, and that is a whole different kettle of fish than black according to my AA friends. Interesting isn't it?; 10/29/08, 11:28 PM
Webrider said...: I don't know. In the pigs are flying, Ruth Marcus actually said she was concerned about Obama actually being able to govern, given his shifting positions and adherence to the "usual Democratic tactics" in running his once touted campaign which was supposedly above all that. I was stunned to see that, before the election.; 10/29/08, 11:57 PM
Anonymous said...: What do you mean, "If McCain wins"? McCain's going to win. He's ahead by 13 in the latest ATNorth poll.

Which is just as scientific as any of the other garbage.

In fact, everyone stay home. The Diebold machines are already projecting McCain the winner, if you look at them with the special X-Ray goggles you can get in the Banana-Almond Honey Bunches of Oats box and the back of some Japanese comic books.

Best Regards. And bar your doors.; 10/30/08, 12:01 AM
Webrider said...: As for how will I "absorb it"? I'll be out in the street doing a happy dance if McCain wins. Not because I think that much of McCain, because there is a little too much truth in integrity's comments about McCain signing anything they put in front of him, but because we were saved from the destruction to our constitution and economy that Obama would have wreaked.; 10/30/08, 12:03 AM
Juba Doobai! said...: Man, what a question! I sure as heck hope that people in my community will not yap about racism! Elections are what they are. Many of my fellows seem to think that folks ought to vote for Obama cuz he's black and there'll never be another chance to vote for a black guy. Me, I'd never vote for a liberal black guy cuz I know where he's coming from: race, class, and grievance politics. I'm tired of hearing about that trinity, tired of seeing people use it as an excuse for failure.

You can be your bottom dollar that some morons will riot—when have they ever not? Then there are those who will quietly blame racism and say "see, ain't nobody gonna let a ****er/brotha do nothin'." I'm serious. I've heard the expression often enough to roll my eyes at the learned helplessness and inanity of it.

Me, I'll be rejoicing if Obama doesn't win. I'll be dancing where I am cuz America will have dodge a seriously communist bullet! Now, with Sarah Barracuda in there, we can clean out the fever swamps that is the Democrat Congress.

McCain-Palin '08!; 10/30/08, 12:57 AM
TRundgren said...: Cities will burn to the ground amid cries of racism.

I will enjoy the look of horror on the faces of the collective media Obama cheerleaders and laugh my ass off as Palin shoots them a bird with a wink.; 10/30/08, 1:05 AM
renowebb said...: I work in construction Sothern cal. and during lunch we talk about the election. What i have notice is the Obama supporter have not reg to vote every singe one of them. Unlike the MaCain support who have. I'am union worker and we make a good wage even for Cal. Losers; 10/30/08, 1:27 AM
Kev said...: To them, a plumber is someone with the requisite pieces of paper saying he's a plumber. To us, a plumber is someone who gets paid to work on pipes.

Well stated. And it reminded me more than a little bit of the attitudes held by some MSM members toward bloggers: You're not a "real" journalist unless you have a journalism degree, work for a major media conglomerate, etc.; 10/30/08, 2:10 AM
Dantravels said...: I think we will have riots. Riots of the sort that will make the Rodney King riots looke like a street party. Accusations of a Zimbabwe-like, "stolen" election will be teh news for weeks.; 10/30/08, 4:43 AM
AllenS said...: I think we'll have riots in the big cities with large AA populations no matter who wins. If Obama wins, AA's will think they can get everything that is owed to them. If O loses then they will riot because of a belief that the election was stolen from them. Why? Because the MSM have been telling them that there is no way he can lose.; 10/30/08, 7:34 AM
Unknown said...: Anyone who doesn't vote for McCain is obviously a racist.

Anyone who votes for Obama must be a racist then also - only of a different stripe.

Because if it were a white guy with a resume that thin he never would have made it out of the Democratic primaries.

So, that's some kind of reverse discrimination the Dems have going on there. Is it because we really can't expect Obama to have a resume like Hillary's?

Ah, the soft bigotry of low expectations.; 10/30/08, 8:22 AM
Clioman said...: Let me see if I've got this right. If I vote AGAINST a black man because of his skin color, I'm a racist. But if I vote FOR a black man because of his skin color, I'm a ...what? A Democrat?; 10/30/08, 8:24 AM
plutosdad said...: I am taking the day off just in case McCain wins. I work in a practically hostile work environment, my boss pounds on his desk shouting about evil Republicans. I have left the office to work in conference rooms and have considered talking to HR since I've asked him to stop the hatemongering and he says he will but he doesn't. But he's a pretty nice guy usually and don't feel like getting him in trouble.

So if McCain wins he's going to blow a gasket and do something that might get him fired. I don't want to be around to hear the venemous things he will say.; 10/30/08, 9:36 AM
A. Scooterdawg said...: Possibly because partisanship is by far the strongest determinant in voting. The Democratic candidates for whatever in my congressional district can almost always garner 30% by simple virtue of being the Democratic candidate.; 10/30/08, 10:04 AM
M. Simon said...: PUMA power will decide this election. And caucus fraud. A lot of Ds are pissed about it. Up in arms vote for McCain pissed.

The Ds have a huge advantage in early turn out in FLA and other states. Yet exit polling in Florida FWIW shows a McCain lead.

Obama is not going to win. And that is going to mean cities burning. In the usual neighborhoods.; 10/30/08, 1:53 PM
MTfromCC said...: 1. He is over 50 in most state polls for over 270 EVs.

2. Barr and Nader account for 2-3% total.

3. The "tightening has been a slight uptick in McCain's national percentage to maybe 43-44%. That has definitely stalled as of today

4. The last 3-4% of undecideds tend to vote in proportion to the election generally, or not vote at all. Some experts also speak of the final few percent "breaking for the clearly perceived leader" if one is as far ahead of the other as Obama is now ahead of McCain.

5. That's polls. Ground game will make this a decisive victory for Obama.

IMHO.; 10/31/08, 9:01 PM
Redford said...: I thought it was pretty poor on the McCain side of things that they were not able to find some republican sho who had actually done the required plumbing courses to read their script. I mean, how hard can it be?; 11/17/10, 4:39 AM