The pollsters
“While the political pundit class and the major network broadcasters are pulling their weight for Obama, I do not think it is fair to argue that all the pollsters are doing the same,” Richard Baehr writes at www.americanthinker.com.
“I think this is a very difficult environment to be polling. Estimating how much of an increase there will be in turnout by African Americans or young voters is guesswork at best. Jay Cost has shown that the variability in polling results this year is a good bit larger than in 2004,” Mr. Baehr said.
“The party identification distribution of those polled also has a big effect, with near 90 percent support by both Democrats and Republicans for their party’s candidate. Some pollsters weight their surveys to fit their party ID model and others don’t. …
“I trust Rasmussen more than Gallup among the large survey size daily trackers because his numbers have been less volatile all year, and I can compare his national numbers to his state numbers to see if they make sense, and by and large they do.
“I do not trust polls sponsored by shamefully partisan organizations such as the dailykos.com, whose Research 2000 surveys are used to fire up contributors and activists. Other partisan pollsters — Strategic Vision, Democracy Corps, and PPP seem to have a bit more credibility, though I trust them less than nonpartisan surveys, and their history this year is predictably favorable to one side or the other compared to poll averages.
“I trust tracking polls more than I do the once-every-two-week surveys by various national newspaper and TV stations or newsmagazines, which tend to have smaller sample sizes in their surveys.
“If Rasmussen shows a tie or near tie next Monday in its national tracking poll, plan on a long election night.”
Taxes and markets
“Are Barack Obama’s proposed tax increases adversely affecting our financial markets? We say yes, unambiguously,” Jack Kemp and Peter Ferrara write in Investor’s Business Daily.
“The senator has done a masterful job distracting attention from his tax increases with his $500-per-worker tax credit supposedly for 95 percent of Americans,” the writers said.
“Obama has also set forth more than half a dozen additional refundable income tax credits targeted to low- and moderate-income workers for child care, education, housing, welfare, retirement, health care and other social purposes.
“These tax credits are devised to phase-out based on income, which will ultimately increase marginal income tax rates for middle-class workers. In other words, as you earn more, you suffer a penalty in the phase-out of these credits, which has the exact effect of a marginal tax rate increase. That harms, rather than improves, the economy.
“With the bottom 40 percent of income earners not paying any federal income taxes, such tax credits would not reduce any tax liability for these workers. Instead, since they’re refundable, they would involve new checks from the federal government.
“These are not tax cuts as Obama is promising. They are new government spending programs buried in the tax code and estimated to cost $1.3 trillion over 10 years.”
Bad ad
The Heritage Foundation on Tuesday asked Sen. Barack Obama to immediately pull two ads that the think tank said misrepresent the views of Heritages Rea Hederman.
“The campaign has released a 30-second TV ad with false information and repeats it on the campaign Web site,” Heritage said in a press release.
Heritage’s attorney, Alan P. Dye, in a letter to the Obama campaign, said, “Two recent campaign advertisements seriously misrepresent the views of my client, the Heritage Foundation. They suggest, quite falsely, that the Heritage Foundation and one of its analysts support your tax plan.
“The print ad on your Web site as well as your ad entitled ’Try This’ reference a quote from policy analyst Rea Hederman. In fact, Mr. Hederman never said what is quoted there. Rather, the words you quote are from a New York Sun reporter who interviewed Mr. Hederman and summarized his views erroneously.
“That the reporters summary is erroneous is evident from the actual quotes from Mr. Hederman presented in the article, which make it quite clear that Mr. Hederman believes your tax plan would be bad not only for the country, but for the middle class. By omitting the direct quotes from Heritage that are contained in the article and attributing to Heritage a conflicting statement not made by its analyst, the advertisement appears to be an intentional attempt to mislead.”
The lawyer added: “Surely there can be no doubt within your campaign as to how Heritage truly views your tax plan. When one of your economic advisors, Jeffrey Liebman, made this same misrepresentation in a September 4, 2008, letter to the Wall Street Journal, Mr. Hederman promptly sent a corrective and very public letter.”
Hitting the exits
“I’ve long considered myself a bad Republican,” San Francisco Chronicle columnist Debra Saunders writes.
“During the Bush administration, for example, I’ve felt free to whack George W. and Republicans in Congress for passing big-spending bills, such as their pork-rich 2002 farm bill, the underfunded prescription-drug bill and earmark spending. But in 2008, I find that I’m a piker in the bad Republican department,” she said.
“Enter Christopher Buckley, the satirical novelist and GOP legacy prince who wrote a piece in the New York Times in February excoriating Rush Limbaugh and other conservatives for not supporting John McCain for president, despite McCain’s conservative credentials and unassailable character. This month, Buckley announced he would vote for Democrat Barack Obama for president, as McCain’s campaign had rendered the former POW ’inauthentic.’
“Republicans Colin Powell, William Weld and Scott McClellan also have endorsed Obama. On Friday, Limbaugh lashed out at Buckley and company, as he asked, ’What the hell happened to your theory that only John McCain could enlarge this party, that we had to get moderates and independents?’ …
“Limbaugh should ease off on the ’moderate’ bashing. Buckley, Powell, Weld and McClellan don’t represent moderate Republicans so much as they represent themselves — and a small universe of New York and Beltway conservatives who have not retreated to the middle, but simply bolted for the nearest exit.”
• Greg Pierce can be reached at 202/636-3285 or gpierce@washingtontimes.com.
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