Think It's Not Hurting?

If you think that all this internal slashing and burning between Clinton and Obama isn't hurting, just take a look at the poll numbers. Rasmussen, in particular, shows that McCain is 10 points ahead of both Democrats nationally now. Another item of note is the fact that we are now seeing the highest confidence levels in the War on Terror since 2004. I think it's interesting that 73% of Republicans believe we're winning as opposed to only 30% of Democrats, but that's not really surprising at all, both because of the constant anti-war drumbeat of the Democrats and because of the general pessimism that infects the Democrat party (at least when Republicans are in positions of power).

If nothing else, the constant fighting has surely led to an overall drop in poll numbers for the Dems, as well as an increase for McCain. Looking at the RealClearPolitics.com average poll (which considers six major individual polls), McCain is edging out both Democrats across the nation. If you look at the charts, you can see a definite drop for both Dems (or you could look at it as a definite rise for McCain) in December which has continued pretty consistently until now. Perhaps most significantly, look at the following favorable/unfavorable ratings all three candidates according to Rasmussen:

	Favorable	Unfavorable
McCain	56%	41%
Clinton	44%	54%
Obama	46%	52%

It's simply unrealistic to think that the constant bashing of both Democrats (by each other) has not contributed to the fact that more people dislike both of them than actually like both of them. This trend seems to bear out Rush Limbaugh's theory of causing as much chaos in the Democrat party for as long as possible. We've also seen the numbers of Democrat defectors saying they'll vote for McCain if their preferred Dem candidate doesn't secure the nomination. Add all these things together, and you have a lot of bridge-mending ahead of the eventual Democrat nominee, especially when you consider nothing will be resolved before June at the Democrat convention (which should be quite a fireworks display all by itself).

All of this is also opening the door to some quiet suggestions of Al Gore stepping in to 'save the party' at the convention. Whether he would even accept such a request is still complete speculation, but some are floating the notion of a Gore-Obama ticket. While it should be easy for a strong, bold conservative to destroy the platform of such a ticket and run away with the election, McCain is anything but a strong, bold conservative, so Gore-Obama could be formidable, at least in the PR sense.

I have no doubt, however, that once the MSM focuses on McCain, any potential lead will quickly evaporate, but the further ahead he is when that happens, the better his chances are of actually winning the White House. Of course, given his own base's reluctance to support him, I still think it's an uphill battle for McCain.

Anyway, these numbers are, at this point, just that - numbers. It will come down to the actual voting to really determine things, but it's interesting to watch political cannibalism in action, isn't it?

There's my two cents.