A new survey from PPP (PDF) shows that 26% of Americans, most of whom are Republicans, think that ACORN stole the election for President Obama.
For the sake of comparison, a Gallup poll immediately following Gore's concession in the 2000 election showed that 18% of the county, a significant percentage of whom were African-American, believed that Bush stole the election.
In 2004, the numbers for Bush were even lower. Back then, in the wake of Kerry's concession, a Gallup poll showed only 13% of the country believed that Bush stole the election. (FWIW, I was among the 5% or so that shifted from 2000 to 2004.)
This is simultaneously a demonstration that hard-core conservatives live in an entirely different reality than the rest of the country, and that the hardcore conservative base is as much as twice as large as the hardcore progressive base. As both a media figure and a political organizer that operates primarily in the hardcore progressive world, I'd be lying if I didn't admit the size of the hardcore conservative base made be pretty jealous.
With the exception of 1995, polling has consistently shown that there are more Americans who believe Republicans are too liberal than there are Americans who believe Democrats are too conservative. Further, a larger percentage of Americans are Republicans who would prefer less-electable candidates with whom they largely agree on issues, than are Democrats who hold the same belief (source, PDF). And there are even more conservatives who think the 2008 election was stolen than there are progressives who think the 2000 election was stolen, which is pretty remarkable given the difference in margin between the two elections.
Many dismiss the importance of an active, engaged, ideological base, but such a base seems to have far more benefits than negatives. The base provides the resources to win elections. They provide turnout in low attention and enthusiasm elections. They fuel the primary challenges that keep party members in line, and thus allow you to pass legislation. They make your entire party appear to believe in something, rather than being wishy-washy and attempting to win for its own sake. The continuing base gap between conservatives and progressives is a major factor in why progressive governance remains so much more difficult than conservative governance.
Since August 15th, President Obama's job approval rating has mirrored the results of the 2008 election almost precisely. By superimposing the results of the 2008 election over Pollster.com's graph of Obama job approval rating since August 15th, you can see just how little has changed politically over the past year:
The graph adjusts for the undecideds in Pollster.com's job approval rating by multiplying the 2008 results, Obama 52.87%--45.60% McCain, by 0.9633. (This figure is derived by taking the 5.2% undecided in the Pollster.com graph, subtracting the 1.53% that voted for a third-party candidate in 2008, and then subtracting the resulting 3.67% from 100%.)
For the past 95 days, President Obama's approval rating has hovered in a very tight range, between about 50.5% and 52.0%. Similarly, his disapproval has also hovered in a narrow range, from about 42.5% to 45.0%. Both narrow ranges are neatly bisected by the results of the 2008 election, when those results are adjusted for undecideds.
For President Obama, essentially nothing has changed politically since November 4th, 2008. He has as many supporters as he did back then, and as many opponents. From November 5th through August 14th, his approval rating was unnaturally inflated by soft supporters who had actually backed McCain in 2008. Now, however, his coalition has shed all of those soft supporters, and has entered a period of balance nearly identical to that just before the 2008 elections.
The same can not be said for Congressional Democrats. One year ago, House Democrats won the national popular House vote by 8.88%, but are currently leading Republicans by just 3.19% in the national House ballot. Similarly, the Democratic edge is partisan self-identification stood at 10% (39%-29%) on Election Day, 2008 (according to exit polls), but now stands at 6% (40%-34%).
So, it would appear that President Obama has been able to maintain a bit more buoyancy than the rest of his party. This could perhaps be viewed as a political benefit to taking a relatively hands-off, "congressionalist" approach to major legislation such as the stimulus, climate change and health care. Then again, one could counter that passing that major legislation earlier, and making that legislation stronger, would have been more of a political benefit and could have been accomplished with a more hands-on approach.
Rasmussen emailed me this morning to let me know that Sarah Palin is way in touch with her own party. I mean, a full 59% of Republicans think that she share their values! Emphasis mine:
Fifty-nine percent (59%) of Republican voters say former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin shares the values of most GOP voters throughout the nation.
A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 21% of Republican voters disagree and think the 2008 vice presidential candidate does not share their values. Twenty percent (20%) are undecided.
Wow! Just 21% of Republicans think that Palin does not represent their values! That's, like, almost as good as Bob Dole! Back in 1996, just 19% of Republicans voted for either Clinton or Perot.
If McCain had been opposed by just 21% of his own party, then he would have only lost by another 3.8% to 7.7%!
And if Bush had been opposed by just 21% of his own party in 2004, he would have only lost Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Nevada, New Mexico, and Ohio! He would hae still managed 213 electoral votes--that's like, pretty good!
Oh wait--I'm forgetting the 20% of Republicans who are undecided about Palin. Hmmm... maybe she isn't quite closing in on bob Dole's level of national viability yet.
According to Pollster.com, among all American adults President Obama has a 52.2% approval rating. Further, among all American adults, only 22.8% self-identify as Republican. Finally, among self-identified Republicans, only 16.5% approve of President Obama's performance in office. Simple multiplication of these numbers shows that 3.8% of American adults both approve of President Obama's job performance, and self-identify as Republican. It also shows that President Obama's current coalition of supporters is only 7.2% Republican.
If one looks only at registered and likely voters, the Republican composition of President Obama's current coalition does not increase much. Even then, only 5.8% of the county are both self-identified Republicans and Obama job approvers, and President Obama's coalition is only 11.4% Republican.
By contrast, self-identified Democrats who approve of President Obama are 28.7% of all American adults, and 55.0% of President Obama's current coalition. Among registered and likely voters, Democratic self-identifiers soar to 65.2% of President Obama's coalition.
There are many implications of these numbers, but the primary one is that we are still a partisan, polarized nation, and not just in D.C. To this point, all attempts at bi-partisan, national coalitions have continued to prove futile. That really shouldn't be surprising, given that no presidential candidate or political party one has ever won more than 61.05% of the vote in a national election in about 200 years.
We can complain all we want about the broken promises of politicians, but at this point any voter who believes any politician when that politician says that s/he will bridge the divide between the parties--well, that voter is simply being foolish. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me eight zillion times, shame on me.
In this diary series, we've cycled through just about every ethnic group with available data. But there's one left: "Americans" - and the quotation marks are there for a reason.
In practice I am defining this group as whites who did not list an ancestry or listed American or United States as ancestry on the census form. Very few non-whites list American as an ancestry. There is also a correlation between the percent whites who list American ancestry and whites who do not list any ancestry, which is why I lumped them all together.
Who are these "Americans"? We can't tell, but there's lots of possible reasons to fall into this category: too many ancestries to list, unknown ancestry, patriotism, annoyance with labels, privacy concerns, getting bored filling out the census form, and sheer contrariness come to mind.
No matter, one thing is clear: nationwide, on average, the more whites describe themselves as "Americans" in a county, the less support for Obama among whites.
Take a look at the map below and see if you can figure out what the circled counties have in common:
Click to enlarge.
If you think these counties each had the best showing for McCain in their respective states, you're darn close, but not exactly right. Here's a hint: this diary is about the politics of European Americans - that is, those who identified a specific European ancestry in the 2000 census.
Hawaii, of course, is a state. And there's 600,000 Pacific Islanders on the mainland, along with 3.4 million Puerto Ricans, 1.2 million Cubans, 0.8 million Dominicans, and 1.7 million from the West Indies. So there's actually a large number of Pacific Islanders and Caribbean Americans who, if citizens, can vote in the United States federal elections and do have representation.
But Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam, and the Northern Mariana Islands are all United States Territories, and they do not have voting representatives in Washington DC, nor can they participate in the electoral college. (Additional US Territories have populations ranging from none to a handful.)
Well, no they actually weren't. However, there is more basis to claim that this election hinged on overseas wars and national security than there is for the numerous claims that it hinged on government spending and the national deficit. This is because a higher percentage of the country cites wars and national security as the top problem facing the country than cites government spending and the national deficit.
With only 13.2% of the country identifying the federal deficit and government spending as their top issue, compared to 15.0% for wars and national security, claiming that the 2009 elections are a mandate against expanding the government is preposterous.
Then again, many of the same people making that claim also don't believe in evolution, or that Obama was born in America. So, it isn't as though numbers like these will dissuade them from their delusions.
Here's a picture of Republicans shooting themselves in the foot:
Click to enlarge.
This shows the dramatic change in support from the Arabic-speaking community in Dearborn, Michigan. In 2000, Bush won with around 70%; in 2008, the community voted nearly 100% for Obama. I found no other community with change this stunning. This is what happens when you demonize a group of people: they stop voting for you. Quickly.
Of course, for those of you who read the previous diaries in this series, you know what I'm going to say next: we are not all of us alike. The Arab-American vote is not as monolithic nationwide as it is in Dearborn. We'll also explore communities with ties to other parts of Western and Central Asia below the fold.
Today, I am excited to announce a new feature on Open Left that will be updated every weekday between now and the 2010 midterm elections: the National House Ballot monitor. It is simply a small button that will appear over Quick Hits, providing my latest forecast of the national House vote. The button will link to a table, like the one below, that includes all of the polls I used to produce the forecast.
The current forecast shows Democrats with a 5.3% advantage in the National House Ballot. For the sake of comparison, Democrats won the 2008 House national vote by 8.9% and the 2006 House national vote by 7.9%. Republicans won by 2.6% in 2004, and by 4.6% in 2002.
In terms of predicting seat totals, the National House ballot is, at best, a crude and inexact measure. As the 2010 elections approach, a far more detailed, seat by seat forecast will take prominence over the national House Ballot monitor. However, it is still a useful stat to see where the current national political environment stands.
The forecast is based on a new and improved electoral forecasting methodology that I will be using in 2010. My preliminary research--which I hope to complete this weekend and release next week--indicates that this new method is about 7-8% more accurate in terms of mean error, and 15-16% more accurate in terms of median error, in predicting the final margins of 2008 statewide elections than Pollster.com and fivethirtyeight.com. Further, the method actually performed slightly better in 2006 than in 2008, showing that its strong performance in 2008 was not a fluke. I have yet to examine how this method would have fared in 2004, which is why I still consider the research preliminary.
The methodology is pretty straightforward, and I explain it in the extended entry. For now, here are the polls used in creating the current forecast:
National House Ballot, 2010 (Polls can be found here and here)
Well, we have some good news and some bad news to report in Maine today. First, let's start off with some good news. Maine Public Broadcasting just got the hot new Pan-Atlantic poll numbers.
Pan Atlantic's Patrick Murphy says the survey of 400 likely voters found 53 percent opposing Question 1, which would repeal Maine's gay marriage law, while 42 percent favor the measure and six percent remain undecided. [Empahasis mine.] The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percent.
Murphy says Question 1 is getting a different reaction in Maine's two congressional districts, with voters in the 1st District favoring the measure by a 20 point spread, while voters in the 2nd District remain nearly equally divided. He says among the state's Catholic voters, the measure has a narrow margin of support, 49 to 46 percent.
According the the Institute of Medicine, 98,000 people die every year from preventable medical errors--and this number doesn't include those seriously injured. This is the sixth leading cause of death in America, equivalent to two 737s crashing every day.
Trial attorneys see first-hand the effects medical errors have on patients and their families. The best way to have fewer medical maslpractice cases is to reduce the number of medical errrors. If less people need to seek legal recourse, that means patients are getting safer. Patients that are safer also means lower costs to the health care system.. Everyone can support this.
They ask you to contact Congress opposing "tort reform" being included in health care reform. Takes about a minute.
On the other hand, here's a verrrrry interesting poll from Clarus Research Group on "Health Care Reform and the Legal System"--interesting because it shows how successful a 30-year-or-so campaign for "tort reform" can be, and still leave a wide-open gapping hole. There's 18 questons overall, and I provide a quick look and comment to half of them.
To start things off, here are two broad-spectrum questions, which show the general success of the conservative war on courts:
Too Quick To Sue?
It's a core article of faith of the conservative war on courts that folks are just too litigious--even though it's corporations that file far more and bigger lawsuits.
Better or Worse?
And, of course, lawsuits are ruining the country! ("Leave the corporations and the police state alone!")
President Obama has repeatedly emphasized a bi-partisan approach to politics. Early on in Obama's presidency, the highly respected Pew poll declared that "Independents Take Center Stage in Obama Era," indicating that perhaps the country was following the President's lead in de-emphasizing partisanship. More recent polling trends on partisan self-identification suggests that this trend has continued. Over the last five months, Pollster.com shows self-identified Independents gaining significant ground at the expense of both Democrats and Republicans in their partisan self-identification chart:
However, before we declare a new non-partisan, Independent dominated era of politics, it would behoove us to look at the numbers more closely. This is because the polling data suggesting a sharp rise in Americans identifying as non-partisan is among all adults, not among the smaller percentage of Americans who actually vote. Among registered and likely voters, it turns out that the percentage of non-partisan self-identifiers is actually declining:
Over the past year, registered and likely voters in America have demonstrated little, if any, change in partisan self-identification. Democrats are still at 39%, just as they were on Election Day in 2008. Republicans have gained about 2%, moving from 31% to 33% of the electorate. Independents have actually dropped from 27% to 26%. It is also worth noting that third party voting in congressional elections hit a 20-year low in 2008.
The rise in Independents among less likely voters, and the corresponding lack of change among more likely voters, can perhaps be explained as an increasing alienation gap in America. Those people who were only loosely attached to civic institutions like major political parties have become even less attached, while with a greater degree of participation are doubling down. It is perhaps a symptom of increasing socioeconomic stratification in America, and with the seeming inability--or lack of desire--of elected officials to do anything about it.,br>
While their disgust might be understandable, the increasing non-partisan trend among non-voters is not going to change the political dynamic of this country at all. The more people who drop out, the more that powerful institutions will solidify their grasp on the system as a whole.
According to the latest CBS poll on Afghanistan (PDF, page 3), whether or not you a voter approves of President Obama's handling of Afghanistan has as much to do with partisan self-identification as with President Obama's actual policies in the country.
By a 2-1 margin, self-identified approve of President Obama's handling of Afghanistan, even though twice as many Democrats favor decreasing troop levels there as favor increasing troop levels.
President Obama has a net approval rating of negative 38% among self-identified Republicans in Afghanistan, However, three and a half times as many Republicans think troop levels in Afghanistan should be increased rather than decreased.
This partisan discrepancy can probably be explained by Afghanistan being low on the list of national priorities right now. In the same CBS poll, only 3% of Americans cited Afghanistan as the top national priority. As such, many Americans are relying on their partisan preference to determine their approval or disapproval of President Obama on Afghanistan, rather than their personal views on how many troops we should have in that country. When an issue is not high on your list of national priorities, it is a safe bet that a given voter less likely even be aware of a difference with his or her party leadership, and more likely to let a difference s/he does notice slide.
There are possible readings of these numbers which are a lot less generous to the electorate, but I won't go there in this article. As tempting as a "stupid electorate" conclusion is from numbers like these, in my experience it is best to withhold such conclusions until there are no other possibilities.
Earlier in the week, in my first House forecast for 2010, I looked at generic congressional ballot polling from August 20th through September 17th. At that time, the most recent survey from the nine polling organizations to publish generic congressional ballots conducted entirely since August 20th showed Democrats ahead by 3.5%.
However, several generic congressional ballots have been released since that time, which cumulatively show the Democratic position improving. Here are the most recent surveys from the eight polling organizations that have published generic congressional ballots which were conducted entirely since President Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress. Most of the surveys can be found at Pollster.com.
Not only has the Democratic advantage expanded to 5.4%, up 1.9% from a few days ago, but the only two polls showing Democrats in any real trouble are both Republican outfits. The four non-partisan polls in this group show Democrats ahead by 8.8%, identical to their margin in 2008.
The tea-party is over. Since President Obama's speech on September 9th, Democrats have clearly regained their electoral footing. For all the conservative organizing around tea parties since March, Republicans have made up no ground at all in the generic congressional ballot. While Obama's approval rating has dipped, his net job approval of +7.5% is identical to his victory margin in the 2008 election. The only people Republicans have won over are people who already voted for them in 2008.
The problem Republicans face is that their members of Congress and leading spokespeople are engaging in pretty much the same behavior as their more bombastic astroturf / grassroots supporters. The image of "average citizens" yelling at powerful members of Congress plays well. The image of members of Congress engaging in the same behavior--not so much. In a sense, the lack of what Matt Stoller called a "rootsgap" in his farewell article at Open Left is keeping Republicans in a poor electoral position, while it keeps Democrats from passing good legislation. However, the Progressive Block is helping to solve that gap, and today I feel more optimistic about the short-term political future than I have in months.
According to PPP, 35% of the country thinks either that President Obama was not born in America (23%), and / or that George W. Bush had something to do with the 9/11 attacks (14%). My favorite line in their press release is "a very troubled 2% of the population buys into both of those conspiracy theories." Ha!
On the bipartisan front, 25% of Democrats think that Bush was involved in the 9/11 attacks, while 42% of Republicans think that Obama was not born in the United States. While the relatively high number of Democrats who think Bush was involved in 9/11 does not really surprise me, it is something of a relief that a smaller percentage of Democrats hold that position than Republicans who believe Obama wasn't born in America.
I'm glad PPP did this poll, but I think they missed a chance to poll the actual Democratic equivalent of the "birther" conspiracy theories: that Bush stole the 2004 election. Those two conspiracies are equivalent because they deny the legitimacy of the President. Thinking that Bush was involved in 9/11 is more like thinking that Obama has a secret plan to indoctrinate American children with Islamo-socialism.
My guess is that belief in the stolen 2004 elections is more widespread among Democrats than Bush having foreknowledge of the 9/11 attacks. It certainly seems extremely widespread within the comment sections of the progressive blogosphere. I have never been kosher with that theory, and actually find it pretty irritating. This is both because I tend to find all conspiracy theories irritating, and because of the whining complaints about "a-list" bloggers like me being involved in a supplemental conspiracy to suppress evidence of 2004 theft (mainly because we are cowards who want to be taken seriously, or something). And I'm pretty sure that even writing this will result in a bunch of posts about how naïve and uninformed I am about the 2004 elections.
One thing I will say in defense of people who subscribe to all of these conspiracy theories is that such "radical" beliefs are to be expected when our political and economic system continues to fail such an enormous percentage of the country. Over the last 33 years, the bottom 90% of America has received less than a 10% of the growth in real income, and less than 25% of the total increase in our national wealth, even as the cost of education, health care, transportation, food and housing have all soared. When the system is failing people, they will inevitably turn to alternative ideas and conceptualizations for the cause our problems, no matter unsubstantiated those ideas may be. After all, why should you believe the official explanation for anything, when the people offering those official explanations have just been ripping you off for decades on end?
This is the first Open Left House forecast for 2010. I currently estimate a Republican net gain of 17 seats, for a Democratic majority of 240-195--Chris
Over the past month, nine polling firms have published surveys on the national House ballot. Looking only at the most recent poll from each of those nine pollsters, the results show Democrats maintaining a decent advantage.
A Democratic advantage of 41.2%-37.7% is a far cry for the supposed Republican wave we keep hearing about. Democrats are, after all, still winning.
These numbers are placed in more context--context which, I might ad, is something that blogs do a far, far better job of providing than any other medium when it comes to electoral forecasting--below the fold. The bottom line this, my first crude House forecast for 2010, is that Republicans are not currently poised to retake the House. Currently, I project a Republican gain of 17 seats, for a partisan balance of 240-195 in favor of Democrats.
Political speeches are designed for specific purposes. As such, their "success" should be judged by how well they achieve that purpose, not by the rhetorical and cultural implications contained within the text and body language. In the case of President Obama's joint address to Congress last night, the specific goal was to advance his push for health care reform. At least so far, all indications are that the speech was enormously successful in achieving that goal. Consider:
Advanced the legislative timetable. Among the five committees with legislative purview on health care, the Senate Finance Committee is the lone holdout in passing a bill. As recently as August 21st, the negotiators on that committee had rejecting even a September15th deadline for a framework for the bill, vowed to reduce its size to $700 billion, and pledged to keep working on a bipartisan basis. Now, committee chair Max Baucus released a framework of the bill on September 7th, put its size at $900 billion, and appears to have foregone the bipartisan negotiations. The draft of the Finance Committee bill will now be released next week, and the committee mark-up of the bill will begin the week of September 21st.
This acceleration of the legislative process happened because of the speech. The announcement of, and build-up to, the speech put Baucus in a position where he could have been the lone hold-out when the speech took place. Not wanting to be such a negative focus of the news cycle, Baucus finally began to take proactive steps to release a legislative framework, however flawed, and push a bill through his committee. So, the speech successful moved up the legislative timetable on health care reform. That could dissolve later on, but at least for now, it makes the speech a success.
About one in seven people who watched the speech changed their minds on Obama's health care plan. "Going into the speech, a bare majority of his audience - 53 percent - favored his proposals. Immediately after the speech, that figure rose to 67 percent," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland
This poll has been accurately criticized for oversampling Democrats. However, while that may call the overall percentages in favor of the President's health care reform plan, it has no impact on the trendline for support. The speech increased the popularity of the President's health care reform plan--and apparently by a substantial amount. Polling later in the week will be needed for confirmation, but once again, the speech has so far been successful at achieving one of its major goals.
Put Republicans on the defensive. President Obama said in his speech that he would call out Republican members of Congress who are lying about health care reform. On that front, the speech has already resulted in a major news story about a Republican member of Congress, Joe Wilson, apologizing to the President for his outburst during the speech. This is probably the first Republican in Congress to apologize during the health care debate at all.
While this may appear less "objective" a success than the other two bullet points here, it is safe to say that whoever is apologizing during a news cycle is losing that news cycle. For Republicans, an apologizing Congressman is their part in the news cycle right now, instead of their rebuttal to the President's address. That is a clear win.
The goal of the speech was to advance the President's health care reform agenda. Given that is pushed the legislative timetable forward, improved the popularity of the plan, and put Republicans on the defensive, it was successful in achieving that goal. So, leaving rhetorical and ideological analysis aside for the moment, the speech was a success for its own purposes.
Finally, last night's speech was also a big success for the Congressional Progressive Caucus, too. It marked the emergence of the CPC as a major player in the health care reform debate. President Obama specifically mentioned the bloc of House Progressives threatening to oppose health care reform without a public option as the major group that needs to be negotiated with:
To my progressive friends, I would remind you that for decades, the driving idea behind reform has been to end insurance company abuses and make coverage affordable for those without it. The public option is only a means to that end - and we should remain open to other ideas that accomplish our ultimate goal.
For a group that was last in line to meet with President Obama about anything this year, that is quite a step up in visibility and power for the Progressive Caucus. Negotiating power over the President's agenda has no longer been ceded entirely to Blue Dogs and Senate Gangs of Conservadems and Maine Republicans. Not only is that a clear victory for our efforts to increase Progressive power in Congress, but it is also a big victory for President Obama's agenda. By validating the power of the CPC in sucha major forum, President Obama has now given himself some space to work on the left.
Currently, the National House Generic Ballot at Pollster.com shows Republicans with a narrow 41.5%-40.7% advantage. Some may object to this, pointing out that without Rasmussen, Democrats actually hold a sizable 43.2%--38.8% advantage, showing that a single polling firm is heavily influencing the overall figure. Since a House generic ballot is a reasonably accurate measure of which party leads in the national House popular vote (though, admittedly, is not a very accurate predictor of seat totals), it is worth asking which figure is more accurate. Which major party is actually ahead right now.
Here are some thoughts on how to solve this problem:
First, removing Rasmussen from the figures altogether does not appear justifiable. Despite their huge error in 2000, their 2004, 2006 and 2008 polling appeared perfectly sound. Whatever problems it may have had a decade ago, automated IVR polling has emerged as a methodologically viable alternative to live-interview polls.
Second, in the fall of 2010, significantly more polling firms will be measuring the national generic ballot than currently are doing so. In 2006, seven polling firms conducted generic ballot tests in the final week of the campaign. In 2008, eight polling firms published generic ballot tests (seven here, plus Rasmussen). By way of comparison, in August of 2009, only five polling firms, including Rasmussen, conducted national generic ballot tests.
What I conclude from this is that Rasmussen should be included in the overall figures, but that it is still skewing the results too heavily. Assuming for a moment that additional polling firms would produce national generic ballot results equal to the simple mean of the four non-Rasmussen polling firms (Dem 42.25%--40.00 Rep%), here is what the national generic ballot would currently look like with more polling firms included in the measurement:
Six polls: Dem 41.1%--40.5% Rep
Seven polls (2006 level): Dem 41.4%--40.4% Rep
Eight polls (2008 level): Dem 41.5%--40.4% Rep
Nine polls: Dem: 41.7%--40.3% Rep
These hypothetical projections all fall into the same range, showing a narrow Democratic advantage. They also match-up well with the current median of the five firms that have published national generic ballots, the Pew poll showing Democrats ahead 45%-44%.
Given that the mean error on generic ballot simple means since 1998 has been 1.8%, projecting a 1.0% Democratic advantage instead of a Republican advantage of 0.8% doesn't change much. This shift is rendered even less significant by the inaccuracy of predicting specific seat totals in the House from the national popular vote. Within that range, either party could still end up with 230 seats (I hope to have an article explaining why this is the case next week).
Still, I hope that this analysis adds some depth to discussions of the national popular vote. I doubt it is as simple as either discarding Rasmussen entirely, or thinking that Rasmussen's numbers should be given such significant weight simply because they poll more often.
