Opinion poll latest

I have been having a quiet day today so I have only just seen the latest opinion poll from the Guardian, you may remember that last month they had the tories with a massive 15% lead while other polling companies had the lead falling to as low as 1%.

Well the poll has seen the lead fall to 5% which as would mean that Labour would be 30 seats short of a majority but more importantly would be the largest party in the house.

So although its not as good as the other polls that we have mentioned on this blog over the last few weeks it can be seen to confirm the trends that the tories support is falling, labours increasing and that there is everything to play for.

I would also remind people who laughed at my prediction that Labour would win by at least 31 seats when i made it a year ago that maybe just maybe i will be collecting the bets on offer at the time.

The Great White Sort

During the course of this year's Presidential Election Campaign there was an often seen trope amongst Rethuglicans Republicans. That is the claim that black voters were only voting for Obama because he's black, and that this makes them racist. 

Well let's take a look at that claim. In this election Obama received a whopping 95% share of the vote. Pretty racist huh. After all black people wouldn't support a white candidate to that high a degree; white candidates like Bill Clinton (83% of the black vote in '92, 84% in '96), Al Gore (90% in 2000) or John Kerry (88% in 2004). Isn't it lucky that we have those lovely tolerant Republicans to point out racism for us. And isn't it terrible that Obama won just because of the black (/Youth/Middle Aged/Catholic/Jewish/High School Graduate/University Educated/Female/City Dweller/Suburban Dweller) vote. [/sarcasm]

And so to the title of the post. The main demographic that Obama didn't win was white (f*cking crackers) people (especially men). This isn't neccessarily totally damning since this is a group that trends towards Republicans anyway, so it's better to look at it more closely. To see where white voters switched to Obama, and where they switched away.

The graphs show a greater than 15% increase in the Democrat's share of the white vote between 2004 and 2008 in 15 states. Most significantly in Colorado, Indiana, Virginia and North Carolina; four states which went from Republican in 2004 to Democrat this year. This I think further illustrates Obama's widespread support and refutes the notion that he only won because of black voters voting along racial lines.

On a side note it's interesting to note that the four states in which the Democrat's share of the white vote fell by more than 15% [Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi and Alabama] are all in the Deep South.

Not that I'm trying to imply anything about these states. I'm sure they're perfectly nice Kind people there and it would be unKind of me to say other wise. K.

On yet another sidenote here's a wonderful picture of newspaper front covers.

The Bradley Effect

Talking to people recently it has come through that the main question with regards to the US election is whether Obama's seemingly intimidating lead in the polls is actually a product of the Bradley Effect.

I'm not concerned. I think Obama's not only going to win, he's going to win big.

The First Post

Well here it is the first post of the new blog and what a great time to start blogging, the opinion polls are getting better, the tories are having a bad week and it looks as if our brothers and sisters accross the big pond are voting in record numbers (dont you love early voting) for Barack Obama and that 8 wasted years are about to come to an end.

So against that background we enter the world of blogging, dont you just love the excitement.