#75 Why Isn't Anyone Talking About West Virginia?

On June 6 and September 24, John McCain led Barack Obama in West Virginia by 8 points in the Rasmussen Reports polls. In the polls between those two, the spread was smaller but McCain always led. Today (Oct 9), the Rasmussen Reports poll--which in state after state has consistently given McCain the highest poll numbers of all the poll takers--has Obama ahead by 8 points, 50 to 42. Maybe it's an error on the posting, and maybe McCain is actually still ahead by 8 points.

If it isn't an error, then Obama has gained 16 points on McCain in fifteen days. That doesn't sound possible. But if it's correct, it can only be the economy. West Virginia's miners and other hard-working citizens must be feeling the economic slowdown more than the other states, several of whose citizens have also gravitated toward Obama recently. Indiana, on the other hand, which had been a tossup, seems to be crawling back toward McCain, and the Idahos and Utahs of this country, and Texas and most of the deep south states, also seem to be solidly for McCain.

Florida, however, has a slug of new voter registrations, especially on college campuses, and those new voters are expected to favor Obama strongly. I suspect the same thing is happening in North Carolina, one of the few southern states where Obama is now expected to do very well, maybe even carry it in November. Virginia is another southern state that has been solidly Republican but that Obama could possibly carry, or at least do well in. He and McCain are both pouring money into all three of these states.

If Obama carries Florida or Ohio, by the way, I think the election is over. That is, as long as racism does not cause the 6 point drop between the polls and the voting that the recent Stanford study has indicated is historically the case.

These current poll numbers are all available at http://www.usaelectionpolls.com/ which, however, lists only ten states as pro-Obama. In my post #74 I listed 21 states as being for Obama. They list 18 states as favoring McCain; I list 22 states for McCain. So either I'm too optimistic, or I've jumped the gun on some of these states, or the website is behind the times.

If the October 9 polling numbers are correct in West Virginia, then that website needs to update its assigning of states. The website still lists West Virginia as in McCain's column.

It will be fun (perhaps in a sick sort of way) to see what other changes occur over the next 25 days.

-- triton --