If I hear this one more time, I'm going to go John McCain on someone.
You think it's easy for a candidate to just walk in and blow the doors off the popular vote, but it isn't. Elections aren't just black and white here. You can't assume because one president isn't popular the other candidate should have an easy path to victory. Bill Clinton left office with nearly 60% approval, yet his own vice president failed to win the election. George Bush's approval ratings in 2004 were under 50%, yet he became the first president in God knows how long to win reelection, even with an approval rating below 50%.
Then there is the whole Reagan, Carter race. For all the comparisons we see to 1992, 2004, 2000 and some other past election, 1980 probably mirrors this election more than anything. You had a very unpopular president, an economy in shambles and a strong, outside of the beltway celebrity who could give good speeches and promised change. Yet even with the popularity and base, only two months before the election, Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter were
http://www.cnn.com/ALLPOLITICS/1996/analysis/back.time/9609/15/index.shtml">tied at 39%. That was after Reagan had built a 28-point lead on Carter earlier in the year. Now imagine what DU would have been like had Obama led McCain by nearly 30-points in May, only to drop to a tie with him by September? Talk about meltdown.
Yet there are some differences.
Reagan was running against a very unpopular president. Obama is not. Yes I think Obama has been successful at tying McCain to Bush, but the reality is, McCain is not Bush. Unless John McCain legally changes his name to George Walker Bush, he never will be. There is just enough difference to ease the minds of voters, especially since McCain is not officially linked to the Bush administration. That minimal difference is a big reason why Obama's lead is 5 points and not 10 or 15, as it almost certainly would have been had he gone up against Bush or Dick Cheney.
Reagan, though, had the luxury of running against a failing sitting president. It was easy for him to make the case because Carter was running for reelection, but I have a feeling had Ted Kennedy won the nomination, he probably would have put up a better fight than Carter did, because he was not Jimmy Carter and ultimately, the race came down to whether or not you were for Carter or against Carter. Even with all of that, however, Reagan was still only tied with Carter in September and polled at a dismal 39%. In the end, he won the popular vote by 10-points. Yes a solid win, but not until he blew a huge lead and fought in the final month of the campaign.
What we are seeing with Obama is something no Democratic candidate has seen since 1996: a consistent lead in the polls. Obama has yet to trail McCain since winning the nomination and traditionally polls above 45% on average, whereas McCain can't even crack 45%. McCain is closer to polling in the 30s in many polls than he is hitting 45% and that has to be a concern. Just as Carter polling at 39% in September was a major concern for his campaign.
So yes, the polls are close. But they're close because they generally always are close.
But ask yourself, would you rather be 5-points up consistently, or 5-points down? For all the negative talk about Obama's numbers, McCain has yet to show any sign of poll growth and that right there tells me he is tapped out on support and won't rise much unless Obama has a meltdown. That ceiling has to be an issue for McCain's campaign, which explains why they went negative so early. But I don't think it will amount to much, since it hasn't already. And I'd rather Obama slowly build a consistent but commanding lead over time then to go the Dukakis and Reagan route by building a commanding lead fast, only to watch it disappear over night.
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