A spate of US opinion polls showing the Bush campaign to be under pressure, particularly on Iraq and its aftermath, is being ignored by British punters. Today’s claim by Edward Kennedy that “Iraq is Bush’s Vietnam” is resonating throughout the US media.

In most recent surveys Kerry has crept up one or two points on Bush even taking into account the wrecking effect of the Ralph Nader candidature. It’s clear that Bush has been undermined by the recent revelations about the post 9/11 period in the White House and the continuing problems within Iraq itself.

A new poll, carried out by Zogby International Poll asking the question “Do you think George W. Bush deserves to be reelected as president of the United States, or is it time for someone new?”. produced a split of 51-44% against Bush – the biggest margin yet.

All of this explains the decline in Bush’s price on the the Iowa Electronic Markets price (see previous post) which has him at the UK equivalent of 1.98 – or just below evens – the weakest for nearly a month. This is in stark contrast to the current UK prices where the best price on the Republicans is 1.69. The Iowa price is on who “gets mosts votes” not who actually wins. Even so the price difference on different sides of the Atlantic is about at big as it has been.

In recent days there’s been very little on the race in the UK media.

Meanwhile the extraordinary idea (see previous post) that Kerry should choose the Republican Senator, John McCain, as his runnning mate continues to gain momentum. Another US poll has him as third favourite, behind John Edwards and Hilary Clinton.