Opinion: If crowds are a barometer, McCain’s losing to Obama there too
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John McCain and Barack Obama increasingly seem to be operating in separate political universes.
Obama continues to draw jaw-dropping, record-shattering crowds while McCain struggles to fill small venues. The contrast was most glaring Saturday in Albuquerque, New Mexico, a state McCain desperately needs for the inside straight draw he needs to reach the 270 electoral votes necessary for victory.
That day, McCain pulled fewer than 1,000 people to a sun-dappled plaza in the New Mexico State Fair grounds despite the campaign’s best efforts to drum up a crowd. That evening, Obama drew what police said were about 45,000 to a rally several miles away –- and more than tripled that total the next day at two rallies in Colorado, another battleground state.
For a video diary of a campaign day on the trail with...
...John McCain, view this video.
Polls seem just as lopsided. The most recent average of national polls, compiled by realclearpolitics.com, indicates Obama is up 7.6%, and up in the key battleground states of Colorado, Ohio, Florida, Nevada, Missouri, North Carolina and Virginia –- all states that President Bush carried in 2004.
So it seemed odd to hear McCain insist to Tom Brokaw on NBC’s ‘Meet the Press’ that the race is tightening and he is doing “just fine.”
A campaign official, speaking on background, later explained the internal polling numbers that McCain’s campaign has collected. Their data show McCain down only 4 percentage points nationally –- a sharp improvement from a week ago -- and closing fast. They also show him down only 3 percentage points in Virginia, and up 1 in Ohio, North Carolina, Florida and Missouri.
The Arizona Republican needs to capture all five states. Assuming they lose in Pennsylvania, which the campaign believes is probably out of reach now, McCain needs to pull 10 more electoral votes out of some combination of Nevada, Colorado, New Mexico or Iowa -– all states where even the internal numbers look bleak.
“Check with me Wednesday,” the official added. “If we’re still within the margin of error, we’re going to win.”
-- Bob Drogin
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