CBS/NYT: McCain Below 40%
by Todd Beeton, Tue Oct 14, 2008 at 04:40:07 PM EDT
There are so many polls these days, it's hard to pick which ones deserve their own posts but the new CBS News/New York Times poll (699 LVs, Oct. 10-13) struck me as rather noteworthy. The poll shows Barack with a 14 point lead, the largest of any poll this cycle, and it's the first with McCain below 40% (Oct. 3-5 in parentheses):
Obama 53 (48)
McCain 39 (45)
The reason for this number can largely be attributed to some dramatic movement among Independents in the last week:
Obama 51 (39)
McCain 33 (49)
And this paragraph from the CBS analysis is telling:
Obama holds a more than 20-point edge when it comes to understanding voters' needs and problems, with 64 percent saying Obama does and 43 percent saying McCain does.
But perhaps most remarkable is what respondents said about taxes (h/t TPM):
If he were elected President, do you think (candidate) would raise taxes on people like yourself, or wouldn't he do that?Obama: Would 46%, Would Not 41%
McCain: Would 51%, Would Not 38%
Credit to the Obama campaign, which has taken hold of the tax issue, not shirked from it as Democrats have in the past. They have aggressively driven the narrative and successfully gotten the message out that not only will Barack Obama cut taxes for 95% of working families, but John McCain will tax employer-based health care benefits. The Republican messaging on the other hand has been vague and unevenly applied, relying on what they thought were iron-clad pre-conceptions of Democrats rather than creating a compelling message about McCain himself on the issue.
I wonder too whether McCain's insistence that he's not your run of the mill Republican, that he's a maverick, is actually hurting him here. It's almost as though because McCain has tried to distance himself from the party brand that he's not accruing some of the benefits that come with the brand, such as an automatic advantage on taxes. But at the very least, this result shows just how dominant the Obama campaign has been in terms of message control over the course of this campaign.
Tags: 2008 Presidential election, Barack Obama, cbs news/new york times poll, John McCain (all tags)
17 Comments