*The Debatewise Blog
Predictions
Polls are fallible. No sample of a few thousand people can be truly representative of a country of 300 million. Not that the entire country matters in an election anyway, only the vulnerable seats, only the battleground states, are important and many of the polls there are within the margin of error. Plus there’s the Bradley effect and the fact George Bush was said to be way behind in 2000 and 2004.To predict what’s going to happen on November 4th we need to look elsewhere. Not to the Democrats who are bullish in public but nervous in private, but to the Republicans. What are they saying? What is the sense of their prospects coming from their camp?
Judging from recent events, not good. Colin Powel’s endorsement of Obama has led to a flurry of Republican support for the Democrat. There are increasing stories of infighting within the Republican campaign, of senior advisors jumping ship and looking to protect their future by blaming someone else now. Even Sarah Palin stands accused of betraying her running mate and thinking only of 2012.
As someone who desperately wants Obama to win there is a temptation to read what I want into these news stories. I’m a nervous Democrat (albeit a British one), I want Obama to win so much I’m worried something will stop it happening.
To seek the truth I take great interest in what Fox News, the Drudge Report and other bastions of Republican opinion say. And when you filter out their undoubted bias what you’re left with is the sense they know their time is up. John McCain can’t pull his campaign together, Sarah Palin is becoming a liability. Everything they’ve tried to take control of the news cycle has failed. Even claims proclaimed loudly from the rooftops that an attack on a McCain volunteer proves the latent violence of Democrats turns out to be more evidence of the desperation of Republicans.
So I suggest not to trust polls but to look at what your opponents say and judge a) how desperate they are and b) how often their claims turn out to be disproved. The greater the multiple of a x b the more chance you are of being right.
Which means I may be celebrating come November 5th after all.