The poll that caught me by surprise My apologies for not getting a thread up earlier but the latest Guardian ICM poll has taken me by surprise – I wasn’t expecting it until next Tuesday which would have followed the paper’s normal pattern. Also the fieldwork took place at the end of the half term week in many places when a lot of people are away. Pollsters tend to avoid such periods because they have thrown up odd results in…
This article by Roger Simon appeared on the Politico site this afternoon. Click in the graphic to read the full feature. If this is the case then it could add even more uncertainty.
Does it underline Obama’s “Bush-McCain” rhetoric? In recent weeks we have tended to focus on the battle for the Democratic nomination now that John McCain appears a near certainty to win the GOP race. But the real battle, of course, is the election in November and, at stake, is whether the Republicans can continue to occupy the White House. Whenever Democratic front-runner, Barack Obama, has the chance he uses the term “Bush-McCain” to describe his party’s likely opponent in November….
Can Team Hillary stop Obama from making it ten in a row? On the eve of the Wisconsin and Hawaii primaries the Clinton team has put out the above video to suggest that Obama is a plagiarist. What you see is an Obama’s speech from Saturday in Wisconsin side-by-side with one made by the governor of Massachusetts, Deval Patrick speech in 2006. Interestingly the Obama speech is no longer available on YouTube. The big question is will it matter? Will…
It’s 5/2 that Darling will be out this year William Hill have put up a market, which is online, that “Alastair Darling Will Be Out Of Office By The End Of The Year? (2008)”. I’ve checked with the firm and “out of office” means no longer being chancellor. Given the poor poll ratings that he’s getting and the growing problems he’s facing this seems like a pretty good bet. The handling of Northern Rock will be a major Tory and…
Is nationalisation really going to have no electoral impact? Even though some are calling it “Labour’s Black Wednesday” there has been very little movement in the general election most seats betting following yesterday’s announcement by Alistair Darling that Northern Rock. The chart showing betting prices as implied probabilities has hardly changed on the past week. It’s the same with the spread betting markets where punters buy and sell the number of seats the parties will get at the election as…
Will going negative turn it round for Hillary? One of the great joys of the internet, YouTube and fast video streaming is that we can keep up to date with rapidly moving contests like the current ad war between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in Wisconsin. In the latest stage of the fight for the Democratic nomination the Hillary camp has gone negative – the latest TV ad featured above. This is a big gamble. There’s a massive danger that…
On a morning that has seen a second national opinion poll showing Labour an election-losing 9% behind there is a provocative piece from the Independent on Sunday’s veteran commentator, Alan Watkins. He argues, in his own style, that quite simply that the age of Labour is dead. He writes: “..Mr David Cameron is doing well but not quite well enough. In view of various disasters for the Government since October, he ought to be miles ahead in the polls. That…