Today, pollsters are rushing forward a slew of new swing state polls ahead of the campaign’s final weekend. Its an attempt to set a final narrative ahead of voting on Tuesday. PPP is out today with a new poll of Colorado. The poll was commissioned by the left-wing League of Conservation Voters, who isn’t exactly an uninterested party. They have spent over $1 million in CO against Mitt Romney. Unsurprisingly, the poll finds Obama with a four-point lead, 50-46. Of course, to get to that result, PPP had to make some ridiculous assumptions.
In PPP’s poll, Democrats have a 4-point edge in the sample. The partisan split is D/R/I: 40/36/24. I don’t think in the history of the state have the Democrats made up 40% of the electorate in a presidential election. Even in the Democrat wave year of 2008, the GOP actually had an edge in the make up of the electorate. The partisan split was 31% R, 30% D, and 39% Ind. In 2004, the GOP had a 9 point edge over Democrats.
Since 2008, the GOP has added almost twice the number of registered voters as Democrats. The fastest growing group of voters is Independents. For PPP’s poll to be accurate, this year would have to see a 10 point surge in Democrats over 2008 and a collapse of the Independent vote. That is fantasy.
LCV, who commissioned the poll, will no doubt go into the weekend full of images of unicorns and pixie dust. But they are no more real than the world conjured up in this poll.