| I'll repeat what I said earlier, the only poll that matters is the one in the voting booth...but let's face it, we're political junkies so here's your latest fix.
State Journal:
A previous survey of state voters from West Virginia Wesleyan College for The State Journal conducted Sept. 21-22 by Orion Strategies showed Republican presidential candidate John McCain with an 11-point lead. The latest numbers from an Oct. 20-21 survey of 600 voters now show McCain 5.7 percent ahead.
"What it's showing is the differential has come down 50 percent, from 11 to six in a month," said Robert Rupp, political science professor at West Virginia Wesleyan. "It's still going to be a steep battle for a few reasons.
One of the interesting things is the poll - along with the other state pollster I highlighted earlier today - show West Virginians believe the state is on the right track. That's different than their believing the nation is on the wrong track.
That's a credit to Gov. Joe Manchin and the boost from higher coal prices. But so much for the State GOP's poormouthing of the state's economy which they were counting on. So much for "Unleashing Capitalism."
However, the bad news is Attorney General Darrell McGraw is locked in a tight race with Dan Greear. I've not even heard Greear's own campaign advisor say a positive word about him, so it looks like the negative campaigning by against McGraw is having an effect.
The poll showed 15.2 percent of West Virginians say race is important to them in the election, but unfortunately it appears the pollster or the writer made an assumption whether race was considered a negative factor. However, that 15.2 percent is down from earlier polls and it's also down from the national Newsweek poll earlier this year where 21 percent of respondants said race was a factor in their support. Twenty percent believe Obama is Muslim when he's Christian. My guess is that 20 percent would never have voted for a Democrat any way so I doubt if Obama coming here is going to sway those low information voters anyway.
However, one consistancy throughout the polls has been the soft support for McCain. It appears the pollsters who push leaners the most are the ones who have the better numbers for McCain. But those voters could easily be swayed the other way.
As far as McGraw, he's been in tight races before and won. He's done a good job representing the people of West Virginia. If the people knew how much Greear would represent the coal barons and big corporations over them, Greear's support would be from Don Blankenship and his ilk and no one else.
But no one has shown a positive reason to elect either McCain, Greear or Shelley Moore Capito for that matter. All the Republicans have are smears and attack ads. Will West Virginians be swayed by lies, or will they support the candidates like Obama, McGraw and Anne Barth who support the working people of the state? That question can only be answered at the ballot box.
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