Red (State) Storm Rising

The new ABC News/Washington Post poll released Monday shows the same modest trend toward President Bush, but a more remarkable across-the-board surge in the internal numbers.

Strongly support the candidates: Bush 56%, Kerry 40%

Trust more to handle:

Terrorism – Bush 56%, Kerry 38% (The core issue of this campaign.)

Education – 47%-47% tie (Amazing that Dubya ties Kerry here – but then when has Lurch talked much about education?)

Economy – Bush 48%, Kerry 47% (This should be better with the economy as strong as it is, but then again Bush really hasn’t defended his economic record, and Kerry’s been hammering away dishonestly at it for months)

Health Care – Kerry 50%, Bush 43% (Wasn’t the prescription drug boondoggle supposed to fix this area? Heh.)

Iraq – Bush 52%, Kerry 44% (And this is with Bush, again, not defending the war much or very well. Good thing Kerry is so confused about it, or he might have made some actual headway on this and terrorism.)

Taxes – Bush 48%, Kerry 46% (Bad, bad, bad. Dubya should be massacring Lurch on taxes. But like so much of his record of accomplishment, the President has done a piss-poor job of defending his tax cuts and the boon they’ve been to the post-Clinton bubble, post-9/11 economy. He’d be well advised to take Stephen Moore’s advice in his acceptance speech.)

Best Describes the Candidates:

Honest – Bush 47%, Kerry 41% (net change for Bush since 8/1 - +6 – Sure is fun to see a few hundred thou do more damage to Kerry’s reputation in three weeks than a hundred times that much did to the President’s over a year and a half.)

Has a Vision – Kerry 48%, Bush 45% (net change for Bush since 8/1 - +6 – This number is obscene, and speaks more powerfully than anything I’ve seen to the President being “AWOL” on making the case for his re-election. This will mean a lot of heavy lifting on Thursday night.)

Understands your problems – Kerry 48%, Bush 42% (net change for Bush since 8/1 - +5 – Feh. Kerry doesn’t even feel his own pain; he has underlings to do that for him. I can only ascribe this one to party brand labeling. Still, that Bush is even close on it is noteworthy, I guess, and is perhaps another harbinger of things to come.)

Make the Country Safer – Bush 53%, Kerry 40% (net change for Bush since 8/1 - +5 – That’s consistent with the numbers above.)

Strong Leader – Bush 54%, Kerry 39% (net change for Bush since 8/1 - +4 – Ditto.)

Shares Your Values – Bush 47%, Kerry 46% (net change for Bush since 8/1 - +3 – “50/50 nation…{shrug})

Favorable/Unfavorable:

Bush 50/40 (+10)
Kerry 43/40 (+3)

This last one is the key, IMO. Since domestic issues are basically a wash, this can only indicate that, as has been long assumed, national security is the overriding issue of this election, and for all the Democrats’ vicious attempts to hack apart Bush’s towering advantage, he still owns it lock, stock, and barrel. And the vehicle for making the horserace number match the internals is this week’s convention and Thursday’s main event.

Kerry has bumbled away the initiative in this race. If Bush can remember how to shut his yap or otherwise better regulate his choice of words, and picks up that baton, Brah-Man will never catch him.