Anti-matter Bounce

A Gallup Poll published by USAToday and announced on CNN, shows that Kerry got a reverse bounce from the convention.

In the survey, taken Friday and Saturday, the Democratic ticket of Kerry and John Edwards trailed the Republican ticket of Bush and Dick Cheney 50% to 46% among likely voters, with independent candidate Ralph Nader at 2%. Before the convention, the two were essentially tied, with Kerry at 47%, Bush at 46%.

The change in support was within the poll's margin of error of +/- 4 percentage points in the sample of 763 likely voters. But it was nonetheless a stunning result, the first time in the Gallup Poll since the 1972 Democratic convention that a candidate seemed to lose ground at his convention.

Geee, what happened in 1972? There was a war going on, and Nixon crushed McGovern. In addition, Kerry was anti-war then but is... hmmm, I don't know what he is now. Nuanced, I guess. I don't think there will be a Bush landslide a la Nixon, but I have a feeling people will be surprised. You can't win on the hate-the-other-guy campaign. Just ask Bob Dole and Bill McBride (Jeb Bush's opponent in 2002).