ARG Poll: Obama Leading in West Virginia?

[rpannier]

The American Research Group released a set of new state polls today with an especially odd result: Sen. Barack Obama is ahead in West Virginia by eight points.

Minnesota: Obama 47%, McCain 46%

Missouri: Obama 49%, McCain 46%

Montana: McCain 50%, Obama 45%

New Hampshire: Obama 52%, McCain 43%

Ohio: Obama 48%, McCain 45%

Texas: McCain 57%, Obama 38%

West Virginia: Obama 50%, McCain 42%.

link:
http://politicalwire.com/archives/2008/10/09/arg_poll_obama_leading_in_west_virginia.html

[Irishman26]

1. I don't know...

He's only up 1 in Minnesota, but he's up 8 in WV? Doesn't seem very logical and there's a small pessimistic voice in me saying that these numbers likely aren't very accurate. Don't get me wrong, I think Obama has the charisma and demeanor to win over anybody, anywhere. He could very well steal WV. But it's how these numbers look relative to the rest of the nation that throw me off a bit. By that I mean it doesn't make much sense that it would be closer in MN, OH, FL, CO, and NV than it would be in WV. Unless my understanding of the WV demographics is outdated.

[endthewar]

2. Not to play Debbie Downer, but

the internals of the poll look kind of questionable: http://americanresearchgroup.com/pres2008/WV08.html

In particular, the party sampling they chose:

55% Democrats
35% Republicans
10% Independents

Seems like an oversampling of Dems to me. On the bright side, Obama is leading with Independents by 12 points, so he probably is still leading in the state even with factoring in this oversampling of Dems.

[No Elephants]

3. Does that represent the current voting population though? A lot of Dems have been registerered.

[endthewar]

4. I thought about that too, but a 20-point gap?

Just seems unrealistic. Dems have had huge registrations in many other states and the party sampling gap is never this large. Nationwide, the percentages are somewhere around 40% Dems, 30% Repubs, 30% Independents (according to John King on CNN). Most polls use a party sampling difference somewhere between +5 and +10 for the Democrats, not +20. However, Obama is leading Independents by 12 points in this poll, so that tells me that he probably is still ahead even when you factor in possible Dem oversampling. :hi:

[bornskeptic]

6. West Virginia is one of the most Democratic states

as far as party ID. Of course it has a Democratic Governor and two Democratic Senators.
Here is the current composition of the state legislature:
House of Delegates -72 Democrats and 28 Republicans
Senate - 23 Democrats and 11 Republicans
The catch is that West Virginia Democrats tend to be economically liberal, but socially conservative. In the last two presidential elections the Republicans managed to make use of that social conservatism to collect WV's electoral votes. On the other hand, Clinton won WV twice by double digits and Dukakis won WV as well.While I don't for a minute believe that Obama has an 8 point lead, the difference in party ID is not at all strange.

[occe]

5. WV

I think Obama can definitely snag WV on Nov. 4 :9. :thumbsup:

[specialed]

7. I'm from wv...my mother is

a weird type of racist she believes in equal pay for equal work no matter what but she has a social racism about her where she won't associate with black people. However she is voting for Obama because she things he would be better at the JOB. See how that works? I barely get it. And no I didn't carry the hate Gene forward.