GOP National Picture

A graph based on the same national polling referenced before, this time for the Republican side. John McCain is obviously surging, but his level of support is much closer to the percentage of voters Barack Obama is pulling in than to what Hillary has. If all of these campaigns stay in the race through February 5, the fragmentation of the race will likely have some odd consequences. McCain could move into a dominant position by winning almost everywhere without getting more than forty percent of the vote anywhere. Alternatively, if the states go in different directions the delegate allocation rules (which vary from place to place) could start looking very significant.

Comments

Synonyms for surge: billow, intensifying, rise, swell, well forth, amplify, boost, enlarge, build up, magnify, grow, snowball, soar.

Posted by Steve W. | January 12, 2008 10:23 AM

"...but [McCain's] level of support is much closer to the percentage of voters Barack Obama is pulling in than to what Hillary has."

Closer to the percentage, but not close (based on two data points - Iowa and New Hampshire) to raw numbers of votes. Turnout on the Democratic side of the two contests was much larger than on the Republican side, so Obama's 30-something percent is much larger than McCain's 30-something percent, and Hillary's is larger yet.

Not nearly enough attention getting paid to that aspevt of the story.

Posted by Robert Earle | January 12, 2008 12:15 PM

This chart, and the one presented earlier, would be easier to understand were the horizontal axis to have time moving rightwards - as it conventionally does in charts.

Posted by ndm | January 12, 2008 1:28 PM

What is wrong with adding Ron Paul? Will your excuse be that you ran out of room on the page (like Fox did not have enough space for another body in the trailer)

RP has the money and support from a segment of the population. No different then the other candidates so why not include him?

Finally, we do not need the media creating some arbitrarily define cutoff point as to who we should be thinking about voting for. Really we are capable of that.

Over the past 50 years the media has consistently sided with the establishment to the detriment of the people even while saying "We are doing it for your good". Your track record sucks.

We need the media to present all the facts and we can make a decision. Do not presume to make it for us since past reporting mistakes (eg Iraq) make it obvious you are not working in the interest of the readers.

Posted by Jo Shmo | January 12, 2008 3:18 PM

Shame on you! If you add up all the votes from Iowa and New Hampshire Ron Paul has received 30,000 votes. How many has Giuliani received? And yet you put him on your "chart".

I used to think The Atlantic had journalistic integrity. Now I see that they are "Fair and Balanced"... just like Fox!

Posted by mike | January 12, 2008 7:04 PM