There is grim news for Democrats in the generic vote numbers–which party’s candidate would you vote for in the election for the House. The realclearpolitics.com average of rercent polls shows Democrats leading by only a 45%-44% margin. As I have written previously, these numbers suggest that if the election were held today Republicans would win a plurality of the popular vote for the House and, probably, a majority of House seats.
Some interesting specifics on the latest polls. Pollster Scott Rasmussen is reporting that among likely voters Republicans have a 7% lead, 44%-37%, the widest Republican lead he has ever recorded. This is roughly comparable to the 47%-41% Democratic lead Rasmussen showed in the week before the November 2008 election. Democratic Pollster Stanley Greenberg is reporting a narrow 47%-45% edge for Democrats—a finding he and his Democracy Corps partner James Carville are understandably not trumpeting. Greenberg shows Democrats leading among likely voters by only 43%-42% but leading among “drop-off voters” 58%-26%. This looks like clear evidence that the balance of enthusiasm, which worked for Democrats in 2008, is working against them now. “Drop-off voters,” by the way, are more likely than average to be black, Hispanic, single, female, young and non-religious—all categories which gave Barack Obama higher than average percentages in November 2008.
