Thursday, October 30, 2008

Early Voting - A Question

WE'VE MOVED! Democratic Convention Watch is now at http://www.DemocraticConventionWatch.com

Early voting tallies are here, please take a look.

OK, now here's the question:

If you read the internet or listen to the TV, the pundits will tell you, basically, that people are voting their party. Therefore, someone might say "Obama is winning because the early voting is running +6D" or "McCain is winning because the early voting is running +6R".

However, I've been making a lot of phone calls. And knocking on a lot of doors. Sometimes, I put on a giant shirt, cover it with Obama buttons, don my Obama ball cap, and walk around a shopping center to see who comes up to me. And while the professionals will OF COURSE AS USUAL point out that this is not valid data, it strikes me that there are a lot of people who may not be voting their party.

The enthusiastic woman on the end of the phone, who was SO convincing, I asked if she'd help with GOTV. She can't -- she's employed by a local Republican elected official.

The guy from Alaska who has already voted absentee, but is here working for us. He's a long time Ted Stevens/Don Young fan. But he voted for Obama.

The people I KNOW PERSONALLY who are life-long Republicans, voting Obama, and ask me to not let on to any of the people we know in common.

My sense is that the vast majority of Democrats are voting Obama. I have however, personally spoken to several who aren't - they're going Nader -OR- they are writing in "Hillary Clinton". Still, not a McCain voter in the lot.

So, if you had to guess -- of the early voters: what percentage of the early GOP-registered vote is actually going to McCain? We'll never know for sure, since the early vote tallies will meld with the final tallies, and then there will be a total per state, not per party. Perhaps someone will be able to statistically hazard a guess, but what you put on the ballot is still private.