WASHINGTON: A British writer once likened public opinion polls to “children in a garden, digging things up all the time to see how they’re growing.” If that is so, America’s pundits and pollsters — aka political children — are laying waste to the garden of diverse and ever-changing public opinion. On the eve of the only scheduled Presidential debate in Philadelphia on Tuesday night, Republicans and Democrats are carving up polls to claim their candidate is ahead, leaving the voting public baffled.
The latest CNN Poll of Polls averaging six other polls shows Kamala Harris marginally ahead of Donald Trump 49-48, which is within the margin of error. While there is broad consensus in the polling community that Harris’s momentum following her elevation to the top of the ticket has tapered off, less clear is whether the Trump campaign has re-energised: At best, it is described as “holding steady.”
But within those polls, both sides are cherry-picking data to argue they have the upper hand — such as, Trump is ahead when economy or immigration are factors; and Harris is ahead if age and cognitive functions are factors. On Tuesday, Harris supporters wheeled out a poll showing she was within two points in Florida, considered a Trump pocketborough; the Trump campaign gloated over jumping into a 49-46 lead among independents, a 14-point shift from August when Harris commanded an 11-point lead in a field that had multiple candidates.
The big question now is whether a decisively positive performance by one or the other candidate — or a fiasco for either — will move the poll needle categorically one way or the other. On current form, it seems unlikely — because in a deeply polarized America, both sides seem set to argue that their candidate won the debate, their perspective colored by an inherent bias that does not recognize anything positive or gains for the other side. Few presidential debates in US political history has been so keenly anticipated, and has had so much tension preceding it.
In fact, so toxic is the partisan divide ahead of the debate that there are doubts if the two candidates — who have never met in person — will even shake hands at the 90-minute, no-audience event to be hosted in Philadelphia by ABC News. Trump would likely want to — if only to tower over her intimidatingly as some Democrats suspect. The fact that they have never met face to face has surprised many observers, considering Harris was Senator for four years when Trump was President, and she has been vice-president for a further 3 and half years since. Either by design or accident their paths have never crossed — till now.
Trump and his surrogates have already laid the ground for rejecting any suggestion that he will lose the debate by alleging even before the face-off that ABC News has rigged the event and that Kamala Harris will get the questions beforehand. Even his own supporters are praying he will restrain himself and somehow come across as “presidential” — but no one is holding their breath. “Tomorrow, Trump will do what he has always done: create spectacle, lie, and offer no practical solutions. He has no new tricks up his sleeve,” the anti-Trump Lincoln Project said ahead of the debate.
The latest CNN Poll of Polls averaging six other polls shows Kamala Harris marginally ahead of Donald Trump 49-48, which is within the margin of error. While there is broad consensus in the polling community that Harris’s momentum following her elevation to the top of the ticket has tapered off, less clear is whether the Trump campaign has re-energised: At best, it is described as “holding steady.”
But within those polls, both sides are cherry-picking data to argue they have the upper hand — such as, Trump is ahead when economy or immigration are factors; and Harris is ahead if age and cognitive functions are factors. On Tuesday, Harris supporters wheeled out a poll showing she was within two points in Florida, considered a Trump pocketborough; the Trump campaign gloated over jumping into a 49-46 lead among independents, a 14-point shift from August when Harris commanded an 11-point lead in a field that had multiple candidates.
The big question now is whether a decisively positive performance by one or the other candidate — or a fiasco for either — will move the poll needle categorically one way or the other. On current form, it seems unlikely — because in a deeply polarized America, both sides seem set to argue that their candidate won the debate, their perspective colored by an inherent bias that does not recognize anything positive or gains for the other side. Few presidential debates in US political history has been so keenly anticipated, and has had so much tension preceding it.
In fact, so toxic is the partisan divide ahead of the debate that there are doubts if the two candidates — who have never met in person — will even shake hands at the 90-minute, no-audience event to be hosted in Philadelphia by ABC News. Trump would likely want to — if only to tower over her intimidatingly as some Democrats suspect. The fact that they have never met face to face has surprised many observers, considering Harris was Senator for four years when Trump was President, and she has been vice-president for a further 3 and half years since. Either by design or accident their paths have never crossed — till now.
Trump and his surrogates have already laid the ground for rejecting any suggestion that he will lose the debate by alleging even before the face-off that ABC News has rigged the event and that Kamala Harris will get the questions beforehand. Even his own supporters are praying he will restrain himself and somehow come across as “presidential” — but no one is holding their breath. “Tomorrow, Trump will do what he has always done: create spectacle, lie, and offer no practical solutions. He has no new tricks up his sleeve,” the anti-Trump Lincoln Project said ahead of the debate.
