Lo and behold, Newsmax has a story, focusing on some analysis done by Larry Sabato, the big political scientist at the University of Virginia, and the headline is “Bush Wins 2004 in a Squeaker, Analyst Says.” When I saw this I asked myself, “Hmm. Could I be this wrong in my analysis of the situation?” Larry Sabato’s analysis does not show a Bush landslide. While the scenario of a Bush win is real and suggested, Sabato warns that a switch in one state like Florida could throw the election into the Democratic column. He says Bush seems to have 231 solid electoral votes. The Democrats appear to have 210 solid electoral votes.
That stuns me. Sabato is a good guy. He’s right about a lot of stuff, but I just don’t agree with him on this. Another thing that’s getting a lot of attention is what’s called the president’s “reelect number,” the number of people who say they will vote for the incumbent no matter who the opponent. George W. Bush stands at 42%. Bush’s father had the same 42% in June of 1991, just over a year before the 1992 election, which he went on to lose. Bruce Bartlett had a column last week that deals with this.
You can’t look at these polls in which the Democrat is not identified because what people responding to the poll in that situation do is supplant their ideal candidate. The minute you mention a name like Howard Dean, Dennis Kucinich or even the French-looking John Kerry, then these Democrat poll numbers plummet. So the reelect numbers with Bush versus an unnamed Democrat are actually only interesting to pollsters. They are irrelevant in practical application. Despite Sabato, and these reelect polls, ole El Rushbo is sticking to his prediction, folks.