Are Democrats Surging?

One month out from election day and there appears to be a new trend developing – Democrats surging in the polls. Steve Benen at the Washington Monthly gives the rundown from the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll,

On the generic ballot, a month ago, the GOP lead was 13 points, 53% to 40%. In the newly-released poll, the Republican advantage has shrunk to six points , 49% to 43%. (Among registered voters, Democrats actually lead by four points, suggesting the enthusiasm gap between the parties is still likely to be the deciding factor.)…

It’s a stretch to say the new numbers are good news for Democrats, but they’re at least better news. It’s certainly helpful, for example, that President Obama’s approval rating has ticked up in the poll to 50%, and support for the president’s handling of the economy is up four points to 45%.

Elsewhere in the poll, the "Pledge to America" appears to have gone almost entirely unnoticed, and among those who did hear about it, the plan isn’t particularly popular. It’s not exactly the stuff "mandates" are made of.

Also, support for the Affordable Care Act appears to be increasing, at least in this poll. Opponents of health care reform still outnumber backers, but a combined 47% support the new law — the highest level in nearly a year — while 48% oppose it.

And while Benen’s enthusiasm is fairly tempered there has been a genuine uptick of, well, hope amongst many Democrats on the heels of other favorable poll numbers – both generic ballot and race specific . But are Democratic politicians simply playing up less-bad  poll numbers to keep the base motivated down the home stretch? Are newly hopeful Democratic voters simply delusional? Are Republican’s still poised to stampede Democrats at the polls on November 2nd?

Yeah, pretty much.

Nate Silver of 538 and the New York Times breaks it all down,

The [latest Gallup ] poll gave Republicans a 3-point edge among registered voters — well within the range that Gallup has shown in recent weeks. But Gallup also introduced its likely voter model this week, and there, Republicans’ advantage was much larger: 13 points under one scenario — what Gallup calls a “higher turnout” scenario — and 18 points in another, “lower turnout” version of the model.

Those are absolutely terrifying numbers for Democrats. Although it’s not completely straightforward to translate the generic ballot into actual votes, were Democrats to lose the House popular vote by anything resembling that margin, their losses could be catastrophic. According to one formula that models turnover in the House based on the Gallup likely voter model specifically, a 13-point lead for the G.O.P. would translate into a gain of 71 (!) seats — and an 18-point, lead, a gain of 86 (!!) seats.

Nate isn’t actually predicting that Democrats will lose 80,  70, or even 60 seats. But 50 isn’t out of the question and with Democrats holding a 37 seat majority it doesn’t take a statistics geek like Silver to see what is coming.

And I, for one, welcome our new insect Republican overlords . More suntan lotion Mr. Speaker?