While Jim Messina and the rest of the Obama campaign continue to whistle past the electoral graveyard, even Obama media allies are now reporting that The One is in serious trouble in early voting. “With both parties spinning early-vote totals,” writes Molly Ball of The Atlantic, “here’s the bottom line: Republicans are significantly improving on 2008 in several big early-voting states.”
This deviates significantly from the talking points provided by David Axelrod, who told reporters on Wednesday, “If you look at the early voting, in Nevada, Iowa, Florida, Colorado, Ohio – we feel very, very good about the numbers that we’re mounting up in those states.”
Ball called the “Tea Party wave” back in 2010 by looking at early voting stats. Now she has concluded that Republicans will probably win North Carolina, Florida, and Colorado. She puts Ohio in Obama’s camp, but admits that it’s “tricky to assess,” and provides little evidence for her contention that Obama will hold the state. Her breakdown on early voting goes like this:
- Colorado: Republicans, 38-35. Most Coloradans vote early, so this will go GOP.
- Florida: Democrats, 43-41. Republicans “share of the early vote … is 5 points higher than their share of voter registration.” Democrats will lose the state.
- Iowa: Democrats, 43-32. But back in late September, Democrats had a whopping 44 point lead.
- North Carolina: Democrats, 48-32. But in 2008, Democrats barely carried the state and had a 21 point lead. So Republicans will win it.
- Nevada: Democrats, 44-38. While Ball says Democrats are winning the state, this margin isn’t large enough for a big Obama win – not when everyone expects election day itself to go strong for Romney.
- She refuses to call Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, or Wisconsin. And New Hampshire is not a real early voting state.
Here’s the situation: Obama’s off seriously from 2008. And everything the media pushes to the contrary is a lie.