RUSH: Okay. Let’s get some of the election analysis. The midterms are 13 days away, two weeks ago from yesterday. Tom Bevan co-founded Real Clear Politics, and it’s a website that many political scientists, political operatives, political experts cite constantly. What Real Clear Politics does, among many other things, is average all of the so-called responsible polls out there into something called a Real Clear Politics average of polls. And political experts from across the aisle cite Real Clear Politics and trust it as an unassailable source.
So Tom Bevan, co-founder of this place, was on Fox Business Network today. He said that, if there was a blue wave, that it would be cresting at this point in time, meaning it’d be building, we’d be seeing the top of it here. And Tom Bevan said in all the polling data that they have in Real Clear Politics and are analyzing, it’s not. There is no cresting. There is no blue wave. If a wave was coming, it would be building, he says, and it isn’t.
But, on the other hand, the generic ballot is holding. Meaning the Democrats are not running away with it. They still have a… Depending on three- to five-point lead in the generic ballot, but they’re not expanding it. There’s no growth. There are no Democrats pulling away, as would happen with a blue wave. Trump’s job approval is rising. Democrats are in the advantage, Bevan says, but they’re not building on anything.
There’s no wave that’s gonna wash everything away and leave only Democrats standing. He says the House races are really tight. They are race-by-race real battles. “Hand-to-hand combat” is how he described it. He forecasts that Democrats might win the House, that they do have an advantage right now because they have a range of 70 competitive races. And the range of pickup as they look at polling data now is anywhere from Democrats picking up 10 to 41 seats.
They’re projecting a Democrat pickup of 25-1/2 seats, which gives ’em a slight advantage. Democrats need to pick up 23. That’s the magic number. Anything above that, Democrats have an advantage in the House. The range of the pickup, according to the polling data, Real Clear Politics takes a look at anywhere from 10 to 41 seats, they project a pickup of 25 seats, 25 and a half; so two and a half seats more than they need.
But with even a tiny shift in just a couple of races, the GOP can hold the House. So all of this synthesized and stripped away to its bear essence, there isn’t a blue wave, there isn’t this blue wave that’s going to sweep every Republican away and leave only Democrats standing. The generic ballot is not moving in Democrats’ favor. Trump’s approval numbers are rising. Over on the Senate side, Bevan and Real Clear Politics project the Republicans are gonna gain two seats. Two weeks ago, they were predicting no change.
The Republicans wouldn’t gain or lose any. Two weeks before that the Democrats were going to pick up seats in the Senate. So in the past month, we’ve gone from Democrats picking up a couple to Republicans gaining a couple. And that’s the momentum and that’s the trend. And he made the point that it’s a whole new world with Trump. Gender gap, education gap, the rural-urban gap, all of these things don’t mean nearly as much as they have in the past because of Trump neutralizing much of it.
And Trump is the great unknown as these rallies continue. Now, another retired historian and political analyst sent an email that I received (let’s see) just this morning. I’m not gonna identify who is is. Doesn’t matter. I don’t know you’ve heard of them. But I just want to share with you some of the things I get. Some of it is, by the way, legitimate. Some of it is obviously to try to influence me into promoting whatever it is that’s sent. I have to be very, very careful about this. I’m just… I’m gonna relay this to you dispassionately.
This guy, who is an historian, who has studied American politics and congressional races along the lines of Michael Barone, just not as well known. As he looks at things, he sees an absolute red wave, and he did not believe this until last night. He’s been seeing trends the past two weeks, but he has been reluctant to convert any of these trends into an actual prediction until now. He says the numbers he’s looking at from Nevada are exceptional. In Minnesota, Keith Ellison is cratering the whole Democrat Party.
Now Amy Klobuchar is in a seven-point race. She was not too long ago in a landslide victory situation that was so secured that she wasn’t even gonna have to spend any money. Now her lead is down to seven. [Karin] Housley is only down three in the governor race, two points, and Ellison, Keith Ellison, who is cratering, looks like he’s gonna lose by more than seven points. This guy says he’s getting reports from on the ground in Minneapolis and throughout the state that red areas are turning out in droves.
Once again, Republican early voting is through the roof, and nobody predicted this. The Democrats’ own early voting and the Republicans so far own it. And all over the country it looks like. And this is a stunner. This is something people have not seen and nobody predicted this! In Nevada, Dean Heller is now on track to win by 35,000 votes. California, 39. California, 49. California 49 absentees.
All three seats would be safe. Antonio Sabato is up two points in his district. So California’s even got places, pockets where Republicans are looking good. Arizona, Republicans up over Democrats 12.4%. That’s up 3.9% over 2016. The Arizona 1, a Democrat seat is now close. All of these thought to be Democrat locks just a month ago are now toss-ups. And this guy says to me, “I think we’re a in a position here to actually gain a couple of House seats, maybe seven to nine Senate seats at this rate if these kinds of trends — and it’s all based on polling data — continues.”
Now, you might be asking, “Rush, who is this guy? We’re not hearing this anywhere.” I know you’re not hearing it anywhere. That’s the point. It doesn’t matter who it is. The fact that I’m relaying it to you is all you need to know, that I’m taking it somewhat seriously at least to the point that it’s interesting. I’m not endorsing any of this, folks. I don’t… I’m not familiar enough with the data myself. I just have instincts, and I process information like everybody else, and I’m just telling you.
I don’t know how things are gonna end up, but I do know that none of this is the way the Democrats and the media thought this was gonna play out. There isn’t any blue wave, and even they are beginning to pull back from that now. Even they are beginning to admit that there isn’t one and that there could be big trouble. NBC/Wall Street Journal poll, Politico, these kinds of places are pulling back from it. I don’t think there ever was gonna be a blue wave.
This is my point. I think we’ve been lied to. We’ve had a media soap opera narrative that has been part of the effort to defeat Trump and Republicans for the last year starting with the generic ballot last December. So it… But regardless, however the Democrats are telling the story themselves, however they’re lying or whatever, it isn’t unfolding as they expected. They expected to be able to make a blue wave happen just by predicting it, just by talking about it, just by reporting stories made to look like it was happening.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: Here’s in other story, this from Bloomberg news: “Polls Could Be Missing a GOP Surge. Here’s Why. — It certainly looks like Democrats will do well in the midterms. But this cycle presents some unusual risks for pollsters.” Now, the mainstream media does this every election cycle. Where was all this doubt for the last six months? The last six months there was gonna be a blue wave; there was no doubt about it. It was gonna sweep the Democrats to massive control of the House of Representatives and the Senate, and it was, “Bye-bye, Trump.”
And that’s been the soap opera script for at least nine months. The Drive-Bys were assuring everybody every day, “Democrats are gonna crush it! It’s gonna be curtains, curtains for the Republicans. Now, “Polls Could Be Missing a GOP Surge,” “a late surge,” and guess what they’re saying? “That’s what happened in 2016: Hillary Clinton’s lead over Donald Trump fell sharply in the last two weeks of the campaign. Although the polls picked this up, or at least most of it, it’s a good reminder that even mid-October surveys can miss late change.”
This story was written before the bombs.
“Could it happen again? It probably won’t,” don’t worry about it, Bloomberg says.
But it could, it could, it could! It could go either direction. Democrats could still win big or they could lose big. It could go either way!
What is all this indecision all of a sudden? Versus all of this ontological certitude of just a month ago? “Polls Could Be Missing GOP Surge.” I don’t know. I don’t doubt that it’s true. I’m just saying the media does this every election cycle. They lie and my report for nine months, six months, five months, you name it. Then when the polls have to be shown to be correct so they still have their reputations, all of a sudden, “It could be really, really close — much closer than we ever, ever knew!” It’s a cycle, and you can predict it.
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