It's something of a rarity, but the banner headline on the polling front to close the week is not of the Obama-Romney variety. Nope, it is downballot, where a man who has served in the United States Senate for nearly my entire lifetime appears to be on the cusp of forced retirement.
After largely trying to gauge the race on internal or sponsored polling on either side, we get our first independent poll in the race in roughly a month. And it is very bad news for the incumbent.
Before we talk about that, let's take a look at the numbers on a rather thin Friday of data:
PRESIDENTIAL GENERAL ELECTION TRIAL HEATS:
NATIONAL (Gallup Tracking): Obama tied with Romney (45-45)
NATIONAL (Rasmussen Tracking): Obama d. Romney (47-45)
MONTANA (Rasmussen): Romney d. Obama (51-44)
DOWNBALLOT POLLING:
IN-SEN--R (Howey Politics Indiana/DePauw University): Richard Mourdock 48, Sen. Dick Lugar 38
A thought or two, as always, await you just past the jump...
- Obviously, it is a pretty light day on the polling front. That might make the bad news for Dick Lugar even worse, because on a quiet news day, his ten-point deficit when paired with Richard Mourdock is bound to get a lot more attention than it might on a day when it was paired with a ton of other political stories. I guess Lugar can always thank God it's Friday...
- If there is a stat in that Howey/DePauw poll that should be absolutely terrifying for Lugar, it is this one: only 12 percent of voters say that they are more likely to vote for Lugar based on what they've seen or heard over the last few weeks, while 32 percent say that they are less likely to do so. That's a sign that there may not be much that Lugar can do at the wire to try to reverse the course of the race, or blunt Mourdock's momentum. Essentially, it appears that Lugar is going to have to rely on a total Mourdock face plant at the last in order to have a shot.
- Once again, Rasmussen has Barack Obama outperforming a Senate Democratic candidate. Now, in Nevada, where Democrat Shelley Berkley is making her first statewide bid, that was to be expected (though maybe not the 19-point marginal spread between them). In Montana, however, where Barack Obama runs three points better on the margin than incumbent Sen. Jon Tester, that's an unusual outcome.
- Some interesting weekend reading: check out this piece by Mark Blumenthal, who looks at Barack Obama's standing in key states compared to Mitt Romney, and then looks at how they mesh up with where Obama was four years ago, when paired against John McCain.