Obama 332
image description
   
Romney 206
image description
Senate
Dem 48
image description
Ties 3
GOP 49
image description
  • Strongly Dem (208)
  • Likely Dem (33)
  • Barely Dem (91)
  • Exactly tied (0)
  • Barely GOP (25)
  • Likely GOP (53)
  • Strongly GOP (128)
270 Electoral votes needed to win Map algorithm explained
New polls: NJ PA
Dem pickups: (None)
GOP pickups: IN NC
PW logo Warren Surges in Massachusetts Cameron Claimed Britain is United Against Romney
Obama Maintains Lead in Virginia Is Netanyahu Trying to Get Romney Elected?
How Romney Bungled His Convention Speech Bonus Quote of the Day

News from the Votemaster

For Romney, Now Is the Time to Make His Case

Dan Balz at the Washington Post has an excellent column on Mitt Romney's predicament today. Romney is trailing in the national and swing state polls and is starting to give the impression that he would shoot from the hip in foreign policy. He won't release any more tax returns and won't explain the specifics of any of the policies he would follow as President. It is increasingly clear that he has to shake up the race to improve his chances. Other pundits agree with Balz, as do increasingly many Republican lawmakers and other voices on the right, but it is not clear that Romney sees it that way.

His chief strategist, Stuart Stevens, believes there is a wide disconnect between what pundits like Balz think and what the American people think. Maybe Stevens is right, but the polls and Intrade show that Romney is falling behind. Balz thinks Romney has to make the case for himself, not just the case against Obama. So far Romney has focused his entire campaign on a single number: the unemployment figure. That approach is not working, as a new NYT/CBS poll shows that voters now trust Obama slightly more than Romney on the economy. What Romney hasn't done is explain what he would do to fix things other than a big tax cut. He could have laid out his program in detail at the Republican National Convention, when he had a large audience, unfiltered by the media and with nobody talking back at him. He won't get that chance again. His next (and maybe only) shot is the first debate, on Oct. 3. He needs a clear win there to gain momentum. A tie probably won't change the status quo much.

Democrats Winning on Medicare

For better or worse, when Mitt Romney put Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) on the ticket, he also tied himself to Ryan's plan to replace Medicare with a plan in which seniors would get a government voucher and be told to go buy their own health insurance. In a new NYT/CBS poll more than 3/4 of the voters say they want to keep Medicare the way it is. Normally, Republicans have a lock on the 65-and-older demographic, but this is the one issue that could break the lock, with disastrous consequences for the GOP in Florida and Iowa, states with large elderly populations.

Both parties understand the potency of this issue. President Obama will address the AARP's annual convention by satellite this week; Paul Ryan will show up in person to make his pitch to the assembled seniors. Another factor in the battle for the senior vote is Bill Clinton, who is traveling around the country as explainer-in-chief, telling people that the Republicans' plan would mean greater-out-of pocket costs for them. It is true that as the baby boomers hit 65, the cost of Medicare is going to shoot up, but the two parties have radically different approaches for dealing with it. The Republicans' plan is to give every senior a fixed amount of money and have him or her pay for any costs above it. The Democrats' plan, which is incorporated into the ACA (Obamacare), is to reduce medical expenses in many ways, for example, by having panels of doctors determine which treatments work and which ones don't work (which Sarah Palin called "death panels"), electronic record keeping, more preventive care, health care exchanges, and much more.

Obama Getting Just Enough White Voters

If Obama can get 39% of the white vote, he is favored to win reelection. Three recent nonpartisan polls show him with 42%, 40%, and 41%. A Democracy Corps (D) poll shows him with 40% of whites without college degrees, the demographic most resistant to Obama. Part of Romney's problem is foreign policy, where he hasn't passed the "Commander-in-Chief test" yet. On jobs, he has made his point over and over, but it doesn't seem to be quite enough.

Obama Maintains a Huge Lead with Jewish Voters

Despite Romney's visit to Israel and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's almost openly campaigning for him, Romney seems to be going nowhere with Jewish voters. A new Gallup poll Gives Obama a 70% to 25% lead, an improvement over his 64% to 29% lead this spring and about the same as his lead of 69% to 25% against John McCain at this point four years ago. Romney's problem is that cozying up to his long-time friend Netanyahu won't do the job since most Jews are liberal Democrats and more than a few strongly dislike Netanyahu. After blacks, Jews form the second most reliable demographic group for the Democrats although there are a few exceptions (Sheldon Adelson comes to mind here) and there is probably nothing Romney can do to change this.

SuperPACs Go Downticket

Mitt Romney's foreign policy stumbles of the past week may have an effect on races for the Senate and House and even lower offices. As billionaires and superPACs begin to think Romney is possibly a lost cause, they may begin diverting their money to these races. Even with Romney getting full support, GOP-allied superPACs have outspent Democratic ones more than 3 to 1 on Senate and House races since June. This ratio is likely to get much greater now that the Grapefruit League games are over and the real thing has started. Karl Rove's groups, American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS, are planning to spend $100 million on Senate and House races and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is going to spend $100 million as well. While not quite in that ballpark, Americans for Prosperity and the Club for Growth are also going to prodigious sums to elect Republicans.

With so much money out there, Republicans can not only afford to defend their 25-seat majority in the House, but target Democrats in blue states and districts as well. However, all this funding does have a downside: it allows the targeted Democrats to paint their opponents as puppets of the 1%--assuming they have the money to get their message out.

Libertarian Candidate Gets on the Pennsylvania Ballot

Libertarian presidential candidate Gary Johnson, the former governor of New Mexico, has won one and lost one. A three-judge panel in Pennsylvania ruled that he has enough signatures to be placed on the November ballot. The Pennsylvania Republican Party fought to keep him off the ballot, but lost. No one expects Johnson to win Pennsylvania, but he could get 1-2%, making it even harder for the Republicans to win the state. A new poll in Pennsylvania gives Obama an 11% lead there, but that could be sharply reduced due to the new voter ID law the state legislature passed. Still, almost every vote that Johnson gets is a vote that would otherwise have gone to Romney.

Johnson also lost one battle. He will not appear on the Oklahoma ballot, but that hardly matters since even if he got 10% of the vote there, Romney would trounce Obama. A court battle is still pending in Michigan. Depending on its outcome, Johnson will appear on 48 or 49 states' ballots. As Romney continues to drop in the polls, more and more Republicans may concede that Obama is going to win and then vote for Johnson as a protest.

Today's Presidential Polls

State Obama Romney   Start End Pollster
New Jersey 51% 37%   Sep 09 Sep 12 Global Strategy
Pennsylvania 50% 39%   Sep 09 Sep 12 Global Strategy

Today's Senate Polls

State Democrat D % Republican R % I I % Start End Pollster
Ohio Sherrod Brown* 49% Josh Mandel 41%     Sep 12 Sep 12 Rasmussen

* Denotes incumbent

Email a link to a friend or share:

---The Votemaster

Previous Headlines

Sep15 Right-Wing Christians Behind Anti-Islam Film that Caused Riots
Sep15 Protests against the United States Spread throughout the Muslim World
Sep15 In New Hampshire, Voter Registration Battles Are about College Students
Sep15 More Jobs Created During Obama's Term than during Either Bush Term
Sep15 Romney Surge Needed for Republicans to Capture Senate
Sep15 Romney Asked Potential Veeps for Ten Years of Tax Returns
Sep14 Romney Doubles Down on Foreign Policy
Sep14 Advice from Conservatives to Romney
Sep14 Parties Settle on Early Voting in Florida
Sep14 The L Word Banned in Wisconson
Sep14 The L Word Banned in Wisconsin
Sep14 Fed To Buy Bonds, Stock Market Surges
Sep14 Married Voters Like Romney, Singles Like Obama
Sep13 Obama: Romney Shoots First, Aims Later
Sep13 Republicans Are Deeply Worried about Ohio
Sep13 Voter ID Laws Could Affect Downticket Races
Sep13 Florida Finds Far Fewer Noncitizens on the Voter Rolls than Expected
Sep13 Libertarian Gary Johnson on the Ballot in 47 States
Sep13 Incomes Are Back to 1989 Levels
Sep13 The Speech Ann Romney Didn't Give
Sep12 Romney Losing Men
Sep12 Biden and Ryan Can't Wait for their Debate
Sep12 Three Under-the-Radar Senate Races Get Attention
Sep12 Obama Won't Meet Netanyahu in New York
Sep12 Romney's Wealth Could Be a Problem in the South
Sep12 Ryan Buys Ads for His House Race
Sep12 Romney Wants to Replace Obamacare but Doesn't Know with What
Sep12 Some Questions for the Debates
Sep11 Obama Gets Substantial Bounce from the Convention
Sep11 What's Going on in the Nine Swing States
Sep11 Three Factors that will Determine Who Wins the Presidency
Sep11 Economy Is Doing Better in Swing States than Nationally
Sep11 Could Romney Be Swiftboated on National Security?
Sep11 In Maine, the Republican Party is Supporting the Democrat
Sep11 Battle for the House to Begin This Week
Sep11 Of Tuna and Poverty
Sep11 Obama Gets Substantial Bounce from the Convention
Sep11 What's Going on in the Nine Swing States
Sep11 Three Factors that will Determine Who Wins the Presidency
Sep11 Economy Is Doing Better in Swing States than Nationally
Sep11 Could Romney Be Swiftboated on National Security?
Sep11 In Maine, the Republican Party is Supporting the Democrat
Sep11 Battle for the House to Begin This Week
Sep11 Of Tuna and Poverty
Sep10 Early Voting Has Started
Sep10 State of the Electoral College
Sep10 Republicans Hold the Edge in the Senate
Sep10 Election May Depend as Much on Judges as on the Voters
Sep10 Romney and Romney Want to Close Loopholes but Refuse to Say Which Ones
Sep10 Romney and Ryan Want to Close Loopholes but Refuse to Say Which Ones