The Home Stretch

Less than 4o days now until we find out just how disgusted American voters are with the state of our government and Barack Obama. While there are endless numbers of opinions and predictions on how the totals will shake out, it is universally agreed that the Republicans will gain significant ground.

As with all elections, there are many factors to consider when trying to divine where the voters will be five and a half weeks from now.

We know (or at least we think we know) that the Obama Agenda is unpopular with a majority of Americans.

We know that with the growth of the Tea Party movement, Republicans and Republican leaners are far more enthused about voting this year than the Left.

We know that many voters begin to move from undecided toward their roots as election day nears.

We know that polls underestimate Republican strength more often than they underestimate Democrat strength.

So what does what we know suggest will actually happen?

As of today, September 24, 2010, I believe the GOP will take back the house by a narrow margin. Forced to choose a number I will settle on a pick-up of 47 seats leaving the House at 226R-209D.

In the Senate there are so many polls with conflicting numbers that the final tally could wildly vary based on just a relatively few votes. My fearless prediction is that the GOP will pick up 8 seats to bring the next Senate to 49R-49D-2I, leaving Democrats with razor thin control.

Very interesting post today from DJ Drummond at Stolen Thunder.

DJ is providing some much needed perspective on the various polls this year.

I remain unconvinced that the polls showing Obama up by 3 to 8 points are valid. Pollsters this year seem to have all gone off the tracks to one extent or another. I suspect that they all believe that Obama should be ahead and thus they are to an extent cooking the polls to bring that about.

There are two distinct groups of polls. First there are the media polls done by the networks and major newspapers. These are almost always suspect and I ignore them as useless.

Then there are the other polls done by Rasmussen, Gallup, IBD, Zogby, Battleground, etc, which are from a technical standpoint highly accurate. The problem comes in the various weighting standards that are being used. When Gallup releases not one, not two, but THREE different polling models with large differences in the results, then how sure can anyone be that any of the polling is accurate?

Barack Obama is clearly the most radical major party nominee ever. Sarah Palin is drawing huge crowds, and John McCain keeps fighting. This race is not over yet.