At least seven polls over the past week now show McPalin with a solid lead in Ohio, with five of them pinning the margin at about 4 points (SV, UC, Insider Advantage, Suffolk, SUSA and Rasmussen). Only one Quinnipiac poll has shown a residual Obama lead, but that poll's internals suggested a woeful undercounting of the south, as explained here: http://www.dailykos.com/...
Those who dissed me two weeks ago for insisting that the race in Ohio was dead even must now grudgingly label me an optimist.
For many months I have argued that both the polling outfits and the Obama campaign have given short shrift to southern Ohio. On top of Quinnipiac's problems, the SUSA poll released yesterday http://www.surveyusa.com/... reveals that the undercount is worse than I feared. In SUSA's regional crosstabs, the southeast numbers were either so small or so erratic, they were omitted from the chart. (Unclear if they were also omitted from the totals.)
Someone is trying to pass off buckeyes made of chocolate and peanut butter.
SUSA is the only major polling organization to reveal the percentages of its sampling pool that come from each region. Therefore, for SUSA to erase the numbers for the whole southeast region is epecially troubling. It means that no polling outfit will tell us both the southeast numbers, and how strongly they are weighed.
Why not? Because it would be a major embarrassment. Cursory review of the numbers we do have from past SUSA polls and from the UC Ohio Poll and Quinnipiac shows wild synchronic and diachronic variability in the southeast, with no agreement on even how heavily the region should be weighed. In the latest SUSA poll, the southeast is pegged as 5% of the statewide pool. But the southeast includes at least two of eighteen congressional districts in Ohio (OH-06 and OH-18), suggesting it ought to comprise at least 11% of the pool, as it has in some prior SUSA polls. (In addition, the biggest percentage population decline in Ohio since CDs were established has happened in the northeast.)
What's happening here is that the Appalachian underclass is being systematically undercounted. If this were happening in the AA inner city, the entire pontifocracy would be up in arms.
Instead, there seems to be a consensus that it really doesn't matter. THOSE people don't register and don't vote, even in proportion to their inconsiderable numbers. And we may not want them to.
This line of thinking -- rather odd for "progressives" you have to admit -- encounters a number of difficulties in 2008. At least three intensive registration efforts have reached into Appalachian Ohio this year -- the first by the Clinton primary campaign, the second through the statewide anti-suppression initiatives of the Democratic Secretary of State, and the third now underway by the Palin-fueled network of back-hollow churches and women's clubs.
So this year, Appalachians are registering, and will vote in record numbers, like everyone else. Palin will be here to roust up that vote personally, during the one-week window of same-day registration and voting from September 30 to October 6.
The pollsters have tremendous difficulty reaching these people because of systemic problems they're loathe to acknowledge. Poverty in the region is skyrocketing. People can't afford to keep phones installed, and landline-sharing between clustered houses is increasingly common. (How the heck do you phone-poll a community of 30 people that is sharing one phone?) Farmers are switching to cell phones that are often out of range in the hollows. And opinions in the region are so volatile, if not vulgar, this year, multiple-choice reponses won't quite do.
The most culturally-sensitive question to ask now in Appalachian Ohio would be: "Which of the following politicians do you think is less of a lying skunk?"
But will the hired pollsters ask it? Not a chance. They have clients, don'tcha know. And that's why Appalachian Ohio is, for the most part, being left out, Trotskyed from the latest SUSA poll, even though it's the swing region that plays a huge role in the 2008 election.
Do I suggest abandoning Ohio? No more than I'd suggest pre-election capitulation. Because even if Ohio turns out to be irrelevant in the electoral college, it will be essential for Barack Obama's ability to govern once he takes office.
What I do suggest is tossing the opinion polls for Ohio this year, rolling up sleeves, and digging in for trench warfare in the hills of southern Ohio. If you're not in a swing state, come to Appalachian Ohio for between now and election day to get educated.