Every day there is a national poll showing Obama up and another down. He's up. He's down. He's left. He's right. He's center. He can't get the white vote. He can't get the woman vote. He can't get the racists. He cannot close the deal.
All the talking heads are doing their best to keep this race as close as possible and keep the narrative that Obama can't win. It's our job to show that he can and we start first by ignoring the national polls.
Why?
Because David Plouffe said so.
During a brief interview in Denver, Plouffe told the LA Times the following:
"We don't pay attention to national polls,..."
Instead, as Plouffe reviewed the status of the race, he said he and his colleagues concentrate on other matters. Such as, most importantly, the undecided voters in the 18 states they see as the campaign's key battlegrounds and -- in those locales and elsewhere -- efforts to spur turnout of Obama supporters.
"We stay laser-focused on these two factors each and every day," he said.
The obsession on turnout is a key reason he turns a blind eye to the national polls -- and remains pretty positive in his assessment of the race, handwringing among some Democrats notwithstanding. .
Pollsters generally base their sampling group on past voting patterns. But the electorate in 2008, Plouffe said flatly, "is going to be changed in some fundamental ways from 2004."
Remember people this is the same team who went deep in every state, city, county, and district digging for delegates because they understood that the primary race was about delegates not inevitability.
Like the Obama campaign, we must stay "laser-focused" on our objective to elect Barack Obama.
Remember, it’s the state polls that matter and Obama is still ahead in the blue states, most toss up states, and even in some red states like Virginia. So let’s all take a collective breath together, relax, and turn off the television when the talking heads start discussing the various national polls.
BTW: Don’t forget to donate by August 30, 2008.
http://www.barackobama.com
UPDATE: Eugene Robinson had an excellent article in today's Washington Post on this very matter titled The Worrywart Party. He had some very sage advice for us all:
"The party will have had a successful convention if, at the end of the week, Democrats stop all the worrying and declare a moratorium on second-guessing. Go shake some hands and kiss some babies."
UPDATE II:
Just for fun: