The Watering Hole

Well, the initial polls are in.  Obama won this debate too.  That makes it 4 for 4 for the Democratic ticket.

Meanwhile, back at the BertCave, Hookbender thinks the score is 0 wins, 3 ties, and 1 loss... ;)


Maybe I've got this all wrong.  Maybe McCain really is the candidate of change. He certainly seems to have a different message, and a different demeanor, every day.

You do know Obama's porkin Palin right? ;D

Yes, I think Obama won. McCain, well, it's over my friend. ;D

I love it when Obama laughs at McCain. Hilarious.

McCain needed to fiire his entire campaign group.  They totally suck.  They make him appear like a petty whiney baby at every one of these.  He keeps throwing out these insignificant ideas that he WANTS to be a big deal.  And then Obama shrugs them off only to make McCain look like a dumb ass for even bringing the shit up.  

I thought McCain had his good moments.....but 4th debate over all....I thought he got ass raped.  The bullshit with Bill Ayers and Acron didn't hold any water and McCain looked like a buffoon.

Better yet when McCain was asked about the mud slinging he got all upitty and upset and then Obama was like, "No one really cares about our hurt feelings....they care about what we are goign to do for them."  Slam dunk.....kick to the nuts.  

Obama in 08 for me.

Only McCain could take a question about negative advertising, and turn it into a whine about how Obama didn't forcefully renounce a statement by someone completely unrelated to his campaign.  I never thought I would see the day when the Republicans played the victim, and the Democrats came out looking tough and steady.

Fenderbender — Oct 16, 2008McCain needed to fiire his entire campaign group.  They totally suck. 

Worst run campaign fo sho.

So - what is the view on the Bradley effect ?

Your seeing an example of it with Hook. ;D ;D

just so Hook doesn't overhear - I shall comunicate in schoolboy french :)

mais qui - la hookbender est un "Bradley voting" merde.

:)

fingers — Oct 16, 2008just so Hook doesn't overhear - I shall comunicate in schoolboy french :)

mais qui - la hookbender est un "Bradley voting" merde.

:)

Which, if translated by a Chinese person back to Engrish, says:

"But - hookbender is " Lays mines in voting" Excrement"  ;D

I personally don't believe in the Bradley effect... I think that was a case of inaccurate polling, combined with a surging Republican candidate.  It doesn't seem to me like any of the people who are not voting for Obama because of his race have had any reservations about saying so to campaign workers and pollsters.  It's also been something like 25 years... people's attitudes are slowly changing.  Hook notwithstanding, remember, he does come from Alabama, and Obama will lose Alabama by 30 points.  That's an area where a lot of attitudes are informed by straight-up racism.  But, Kerry was white, and he lost Alabama by 26 points.  So Obama might even do better than him.

There was an interesting article on the Bradley effect, and whether it even exists at all, the other day:

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/10/the_bradley_effect_selective_m.html

My wife works in a local bank and they have customers who come in who think Obama is a muslim. She mentioned three in the last few weeks.

I was at the corner store the other day and asked an older white farmer what he thought about his choices for president.
He said "well...Looks like we are gonna have us a ****** muslim for a president"

But then....I do live in a rural area in the Appalachians .  

I thought Hooky just wrote that he thought Obama was white?  ::)

Y'all seen the Fifth debate?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdWeqiyn3zQ&feature=user

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4gdjTq_6gg&feature=user

BINGEWOOD — Oct 17, 2008Y'all seen the Fifth debate?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TdWeqiyn3zQ&feature=user

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4gdjTq_6gg&feature=user

Pretty good stuff from both of them.

Be interesting to see if the Bradley effect is gone.

I don't think it is necessarily about race though, but it is about the social atmosphere, people are unwilling to admit they are
still voting for the incumbent party when people are pissed off at them and change is in the air.

Similar effect happened in the UK election in 1992.
Labour were far ahead in the polls and expected to win, some newspaper early editions even ran with a Labour victory.
Yet the incumbents, the Conservatives, won the election comfortably.

Polls tend to underestimate the vote for the incumbent party.
The party in power always brings the recent baggage of being in government, and if things are not great, even their voting supporters are angry with them.

Two emotional effects are in play.

1. Punishment - kick the government by telling pollsters they will vote for the opposition.
2. Embarrassment - ashamed to admit voting for the government in the climate of the time.

Obama could get hit by a Bradley effect and it have little to do with race and more to do with "George Bush" currently being used as a term of insult for a failure.

I agree that it is unlikely that Obama is getting the polled the votes of racists, but the middle ground of mild racial unease, those who claim to be voting for him but have dark concerns about "who he really is"  overstates the Obama vote and understates McCain's.

Be interesting to see what happens - but the polls will likely overstate the Obama lead right up until election day.

Against that Obama may mobilise a new source of votes from groups that have low voting turn out - the youth vote alone could swing many states out of republican hands - there could be an anti bradley effect - whereby pollsters missed the changing demographic of the voting population.

We'll see in a few weeks.

Makes sense to me.

Re: Bradley effect or lack thereof:

So a canvasser goes to a woman's door in Washington, Pennsylvania. Knocks. Woman answers. Knocker asks who she's planning to vote for. She isn't sure, has to ask her husband who she's voting for. Husband is off in another room watching some game. Canvasser hears him yell back, "We're votin' for the n***er!"

Woman turns back to canvasser, and says brightly and matter of factly: "We're voting for the n***er."

I've now heard variations on this theme reported by ground game workers for Obama's campaign three or four times.  Apparently it's not unusual.  So, yes, people are racist, but I'm not sure it's affecting their votes.

This one, BTW, comes from fivethirty-eight.com ...

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2008/10/on-road-western-pennsylvania.html