OBAMA IS BEATING McCAIN... IN MONTANA

The writing is on the wall

Between 2000 and 2004 George Bush increased his share of the vote in Montana from 240,178 (58%) to 266,063 (59%). But Montana is no Utah and the Democratic Party there has been in the midst of a robust renaissance. Populist Democrats Brian Schweitzer and Jon Tester are the governor and junior senator. The senior senator, Max Baucus, is more from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party but he does vote with the Democrats more often than not.

Today Rasmussen announced that if the election were held today, Obama would beat McCain-- by 5 percentage points. That's an exact flip in support from their last poll (in April), before people knew much about either candidate-- and before Obama handily bested Hillary in the state's primary.

Just like in the cookout poll, the only people who like McCain are elderly white guys. Obama has a 27 point lead among voters under born after 1978.

The last Democrat to win Montana was Bill Clinton in 1992. He did so with 38% of the vote. The first President Bush got 35% of the Montana vote while Ross Perot picked up 26%.

Rasmussen Markets data shows that Republicans are currently given a 65.1 % chance of winning Montana this November. With release of this poll, Montana shifts from “Likely Republican” to “Leans Republican” in the Rasmussen Reports Balance of Power Calculator. Nationally, Obama has been enjoying a modest but steady lead in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for several weeks.

And it isn't only in the presidential race that pollsters are noticing seismic changes in voters' intentions. There are reasons congressional polls auger so poorly for Republicans. The stock market, according to the Wall Street Journal, is now officially a bear market, the first since 2002 in the wake of the dotcom bust. Couple that with a 41% drop in the value of the dollar vs the Euro since Bush took over, a rise in gasoline prices from an average of $1.52 when Bush became president to over $4.00 now and an out-of-control unemployment catastrophe directly traceable to the policies implemented because of the wild right-wing ideology that the Bush Regime used in making all decisions.

So it should have come as no surprise this morning when The Cook Political Reports, a lagging indicator of voter sentiment (usually 5-6 weeks behind the curve in the midsummer) downgraded the chances of victory for another 27 Republicans. These were Cook's changes:

AL-03 Mike Rogers Solid Republican to Likely Republican
CA-46 Dana Rohrabacher Solid Republican to Likely Republican
FL-08 Ric Keller Likely Republican to Lean Republican
FL-09 Gus Bilirakis Solid Republican to Likely Republican
FL-18 Ileana Ros-Lehtinen Solid Republican to Likely Republican
FL-21 Lincoln Diaz-Balart Likely Republican to Lean Republican
ID-01 Bill Sali Solid Republican to Likely Republican
IN-03 Mark Souder Solid Republican to Likely Republican
IA-04 Tom Latham Solid Republican to Likely Republican
KY-02 OPEN (Lewis) Solid Republican to Likely Republican
MN-02 John Kline Solid Republican to Likely Republican
NE-02 Lee Terry Solid Republican to Likely Republican
NV-02 Dean Heller Solid Republican to Likely Republican
NJ-05 Scott Garrett Solid Republican to Likely Republican
NY-13 OPEN (Fossella) Toss Up to Lean Democratic
NY-25 OPEN (Walsh) Toss Up to Lean Democratic
NC-10 Patrick McHenry Solid Republican to Likely Republican
OH-07 OPEN (Hobson) Solid Republican to Likely Republican
PA-03 Phil English Likely Republican to Lean Republican
PA-05 OPEN (Peterson) Solid Republican to Likely Republican
PA-11 Paul Kanjorksi Likely Democratic to Lean Democratic
PA-15 Charlie Dent Solid Republican to Likely Republican
TX-07 John Culberson Solid Republican to Likely Republican
TX-10 Michael McCaul Solid Republican to Likely Republican
VA-05 Virgil Goode Solid Republican to Likely Republican
VA-10 Frank Wolf Solid Republican to Likely Republican
WV-02 Shelley Moore Capito Likely Republican to Lean Republican
WY-AL OPEN (Cubin) Solid Republican to Likely Republican

And please be clear-- these are just today's ratings changes. Plenty of other Republican seats have previously been declared ripe for the picking. For me the biggest shock on this list is Culberson, one of the most bigoted and ignorant men to ever serve in the House. His suburban district west of Houston must be catching on to what a loser they have representing them.

Like I said, Cook is very much a lagging indicator. Saying a race went from Solid Republican to Likely Republican, really should be looked at as a total toss-up. More reliable sources show Democratic chances to retire Scott Garrett, Ric Keller, Dana Rohrabacher, Virgil Goode, Charlie Dent, Michael McCaul, and Frank Wolf good and getting better. The 2 open Republican seats in New York (13 and 25) and the at large one in Wyoming are probably beyond toss-up and should be rated Leans Democrat. Cook will report that in September.