Oct 25 2008
It’s All Ground Game Now
Something big is happening in Northern Virginia. I have been out of the country for a week and I came back home to the place I was born, raised and where I raised my family to find I did not recognize it. The area has become obsessed with the presidential election! There are signs everywhere and it looks to be a dead heat between McCain and Obama.
Why is this abnormal? We live inside the DC Political Industrial Complex. Politics is as normal as Starbucks and McDonalds around here. People rarely get that jazzed up to the point of strewing signs across every yard. Many folks also work in the federal government and tend to keep their views pretty much low key.Â
So when I came back and saw the battle of the lawn sign raging like I have never seen in my adult life I was stunned.Â
Even more news greeted my return which surprised me and gave me hope. LJStrata (my better half) and DJStrata (oldest daughter) attended the Fairfax County GOP Organization Meeting with district chairs and precinct captains working with volunteers to Get Out The Vote (GOTV). The meeting drew around 400-500 hundred people and stunned the coordinators, who have never seen turnout like this on the GOP side. And the GOP has been the best at this for years.
To put this in context I am told that Obama has 400 paid GOTV leaders in the entire state of Virginia. I get the feeling that we are going to, once again, see the difference in intensity between the paid activists and the motivated volunteer.
DJStrata also attended the Obama rally in Leesburg, VA last week an noticed something very strange. 10,000 people attended the Obama rally, but almost half of them left halfway through his speech. At McCain-Palin rallies people keep coming all the way to the end.
I am going to be making a prediction on VA based on the crowd size of the Palin event at Leesburg this coming Monday. Back in September McCain-Palin attracted 23,000 in the center of Fairfax County (Fairfax City to be exact). This is an area Obama cannot afford to lose or even tie in. He has to win big and I am not sure it is happening for him.
Yes, I can see the polls, but I keep seeing independent data that shows Palin may be turning this race around on the ground. I think there is a wave building against the DC/NY Political Industrial Complex(PIC) – which is definitely the target of the public’s ire regarding that 90% wrong track polling. And the Democrat Congress is also highly visible in that wrong track number and a major part of the NY/DC PIC.
So when Americans see a ticket with two Democrat members of Congress on it they have to be wondering what is the point? And then there is the Maverick Senator and his outsider VP. Governor Sarah Palin is one of us normal Americans who simply rolled up her sleeves and tried to make things better – and succeeded. The NY/DC PIC has been in full arrogant apoplexy that one of the common folks has dared to try and brake into national leadership. The crap that spewed from the left and right at Governor Palin and her family was just the kind of crap Americans are fed up with coming from the PIC on ANY subject, let alone targeted at We The People.
Let’s see how the Palin rally does, and if it does well I think I would be ready to declare the polls a lost cause and a November VA surprise here in the Commonwealth.
Update: I meant to point out that, according to Gallup, the early voting is not benefitting Obama at all:
This data is interesting because it begins to look at votes cast, it is the first of the exit data. And contrary to the bottom line numbers in the Gallup turnout models, which show Obama up anywhere from +5% to +12%, in actual votes cast or planned to be cast he is tied! Now how is that mathematically possible? It really shouldn’t be possible. The exit polls in the same survey should mimic the survey bottom line – but the don’t. This is another mathematical indication the pollsters have totally lost the pulse of the electorate.
And recall that Obama’s vaunted GOTV effort in Ohio fell horribly short during an early voting window that was tailored made to get him massive new votes. He only got 20% of his target then, which is one of the problems with targeting non-traditional voters. They are non-traditional for a reason.
Update: I should also note the one thing the Obama GOTV effort seems to be wasting its time with is destruction of McCain-Palin signs. As noted at Powerline, many GOP signs are mangled and ripped apart (only to be replaced or fixed). This is not going unnoticed by the voters.
One thing to keep in mind… there are 3 Palin rallies in Virginia on Monday. The first in Leesburg, another mid-day in Fredricksburg, and the third in Roanoke. Many who came to the Fairfax rally traveled from all over VA and MD to see her.
You may wish to consider the entire turnout for VA in all three rallies over one single day. I expect it to be AMAZING!
go vote. I will, my family will. just go and let the will of the people decide for good or ill.
[…] in Virginia, AJ Strata was back home and noticed Something big is happening in Northern Virginia. I have been out of the […]
I was reading the spin journalism over on Politico and other sites yesterday saying how the northern Va GOP had basically thrown in the towel.
Sounds a bit different from what AJ is saying about the volunteers and signage in the area.
Just more spin trying to propose it is all in the bag.
I don’t buy it just like I have massive doubts about the polls this year especially when you go past the top line numbers and delve into the cross tabs.
Keep your powder dry and gotv.
I have also noted that some one finally woke up to the agenda Obama and Co is putting forth and the Chamber of Commerce is now jumping in nationally to work the issue.
People are beginning to pay attention to the substance now, the issues.
Obama is on the wrong side of the drilling issue.
It is beginning to become clear that his and the Democratic party’s fingerprints are all over the credit crisis.
Joe the Plumber exposed his “tax cut” as something other than advertised. It’s a handout, and even the potential recipients don’t want it.
Joe Biden reminded us of Obama’s foreign policy weakness.
It’s all coming together…….
Something in the air?…
AJ Strata reports on Sudden Election Excitement Syndrome in northern Virginia and signs of hope for McCain: Something big is happening in Northern Virginia. I have been out of the country for a week and I came back home to……
[…] mode would mean it is very easy for McCain-Palin to pull off a shocking win on election day. And as I noted early, early voting poll results from Gallup tend to show this is a close race, not a walk in the park […]
I cant help but notice the contrast between what you report where you live and what I see where I live. There are practically no lawn signs here for either candidate. There ARE a lot of “Yes on 8” signs, sometimes every house on the street has one. I have seen a couple of McCain lawn signs, no Obama signs at all and no bumper stickers. On the freeway, I see an occasional bumper sticker, but not many.
My kids are elementary school age. They report that the kids say “John McCain is mean, and will die right after taking election. Sarah Palin is dumb and wouldn’t make a good President. Obama would lower prices of things in the stores”. So they are getting fed a pretty good dose of Democrat propaganda someplace.
The one thing I can say is that I see no overwhelming support for Obama either in public displays or in conversation at work or at the local cafe but I have been swamped with work the past couple of weeks and haven’t been out much.
Signs pointing to a McCain Victory
http://www.americanthinker.com/2008/10/signs_pointing_to_a_mccain_vic.html
Bad News for Obama in Colorado Early Voting
http://hillbuzz.wordpress.com/2008/10/24/bad-news-for-obama-in-colorado-early-voting/
Gallup: No increase in protion of first time new voters
http://www.gallup.com/poll/111331/No-Increase-Proportion-First-Time-Voters.aspx
How can that be? Haven’t be told that Obama has been registering new voters so anxious to vote for “The One”?
Polls Overestimated Obama’s Strength By Average of 7 Percentage Points This Year
http://gatewaypundit.blogspot.com/2008/10/ruh-roh-polls-overestimated-obamas.html
Is it different in the general election polling?
Also, the IBD/TIPP rolling poll continuously shows todays college age youth (17 to 24) overwhelmingly prefer McCain over Obama even though we have been told over and over again that this is the age group that is coming out to vote for the first for Obama
Rock the Vote
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2008/10/021851.php
A lot of things we hear on the news don’t add up with what we see on the ground. It is no wonder that many of us feel disconnected from reported reality.
A final thought:
McCain Versus the Juggernaut
We stand with him
http://weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/015/737mifbf.asp?pg=1
If Obama wins, we wish him well. But for now, we can only echo the words of the 30-year-old Abraham Lincoln. On December 26, 1839, responding to the confident prediction of one of his political opponents “that every State in the Union will vote for Mr. Van Buren at the next Presidential election” and that Lincoln’s opposition to the Van Buren forces was therefore bound to be in vain, Lincoln responded:
“Address that argument to cowards and to knaves; with the free and the brave it will effect nothing. It may be true; if it must, let it. .  .  . The probability that we may fall in the struggle ought not to deter us from the support of a cause we believe to be just. .  .  . Let none falter, who thinks he is right, and we may succeed. But if after all, we shall fail, be it so. ”
As it happens, the Whig ticket Lincoln supported won that 1840 election. So might, against the odds, the party of Lincoln win this year.
I don’t see a lot of signs for either candidate here in southern Indiana, but more for McCain than Obama.
I did hear there was a Palin rally in Fort Wayne this weekend and tickets sold out immediately.
I live in Pittsburgh, PA, and my neighborhood is COMPLETELY Obama dominated… I’m really scared about the outcome here, esp. since PA is a so-called “battleground state”. Just this morning, I was driving out to do some errands and at least half of the houses in my neighborhood have Obama signs in the yards. (There is one house that has a huge McCain-Palin sign in their front yard that keeps getting stolen, but is always replaced within a day.) I only hope that the homes with no signs in the yard are McCain-Palin supporters who chose not to display their support. I’m glad to hear there are other areas of the country where McCain signs outnumber Obama signs.
Looks like Rasmussen is deciding to skew their polling sample even more Democrat for the next week.
It will now be 40.0% Democratic, 32.8% Republican, and 27.2% unaffiliated.
http://virginiavirtucon.wordpress.com/2008/10/24/interesting-tidbit-on-polls/
Interesting tidbit on polls
Posted on October 24, 2008
I was having dinner a night ago with a friend of mine who is a statistician for a well-regarded private polling company. They do some work for Republicans in California, but most of the work they do is for Democrats or Democrat-leaning operations (Unions, etc.). Anyway, her shop was retained to do a few Presidential polls for targetted states on behalf of a union so the union could decide where to spend their ad dollars for the last week. They did Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Missouri. After mocking the hell out of the voter id spreads used by Rassmussen, Zogby, etc. (and this is coming from a committed Dem who will be voting for Barry O) she said the results of their polling lead her to believe that McCain will definitely win FL, OH, NC, MO and NV. She says Obama definitely wins New Mexico. She said that Colorado and New Hampshire were absolute dead heats. She said she thinks there is a 55% chance Obama holds on in Pennsylvania and a 75% chance McCain wins Virginia. She absolutely laughed at the public polls showing Obama leading Virginia–and pointed out that all of those polls rely on Dem turnout being +4 and as much as +7, when in 2006, Republicans actually had the advantage by +3. She also pointed out that the numbers for Obama in SWVA look absolutely awful and that McCain is running 10 points better then Allen did in NoVa.
Anyway, her companies conclusion is that the election will come down to Colorado, New Hampshire and the Republican leaning district in Maine, which in her opinion might very well decide the Presidency (apparently the district in Nebraska that Obama thought he might be able to get is now off the table). She said she has very little doubt that the public polling is part of a “concerted voter suppression effort†by the MSM. She said IBD/TIPP was the only outfit doing public polling that was “worth a bucket of warm pissâ€.
I just had a flash of a Monty Python skit cross my mind only it was Obama on election day walking through the neighborhood with provisional ballots yelling “Bring out your dead!”.
Frogg,
Excellent link – thanks. Will make it a post ASAP.
[…] Reader Frogg passed along this really interesting commentary from a professional pollster who is (a) a die hard Obama supporter and (b) laughing at the public polls: I was having dinner a night ago with a friend of mine who is a statistician for a well-regarded private polling company. They do some work for Republicans in California, but most of the work they do is for Democrats or Democrat-leaning operations (Unions, etc.). Anyway, her shop was retained to do a few Presidential polls for targetted states on behalf of a union so the union could decide where to spend their ad dollars for the last week. They did Ohio, Florida, North Carolina, New Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Colorado, New Mexico, Nevada and Missouri. After mocking the hell out of the voter id spreads used by Rassmussen, Zogby, etc. (and this is coming from a committed Dem who will be voting for Barry O) she said the results of their polling lead her to believe that McCain will definitely win FL, OH, NC, MO and NV. She says Obama definitely wins New Mexico. She said that Colorado and New Hampshire were absolute dead heats. She said she thinks there is a 55% chance Obama holds on in Pennsylvania and a 75% chance McCain wins Virginia. She absolutely laughed at the public polls showing Obama leading Virginia–and pointed out that all of those polls rely on Dem turnout being +4 and as much as +7, when in 2006, Republicans actually had the advantage by +3. She also pointed out that the numbers for Obama in SWVA look absolutely awful and that McCain is running 10 points better then Allen did in NoVa. […]