And They’re Off

Texeira has a major new polling analysis of the state of the race on the eve of the RNC.

The Myth: The SBVT controversy seriously harmed the Kerry campaign. Bush comes into his convention in much better political shape than he has been for quite a while.

The Reality: The race has changed little since the start of the SBVT controversy. Bush enters his convention with basically the same political vulnerabilities he had previously.

Let’s go to the numbers. The poll that best provides a before-SBVT damage and after-SBVT damage picture of the horse race is the Gallup poll. That’s because Gallup polled both on August 9-11–about a week before media coverage of SBVT really heated up–and on August 23-25, right after the coverage peaked and just as the Kerry campaign began its push-back.

What do the Gallup numbers show? As Gallup’s release on their latest poll succinctly puts it: “No Change in Presidential Race Despite Attack Ads”. Just so.

I urge you to read the entire post because at this point the horse race really starts to matter and these are the numbers going out of the gate. It is a tie among “likely voters” and Kerry is slightly ahead among registered voters.