Can we glean anything from the late Democratic polls? Maybe we can. Consider that, absent ties, there are but six possible permutations for the order in a three-way race among Can we glean anything from the late Democratic polls? Maybe we can. Consider that, absent ties, there are but six possible permutations for the order in a three-way race among Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards: CEO, COE, OCE, OEC, EOC, and ECO. (Some of which make for nice acronyms!) Of these, I can find polls that account for the first four of the possible six orderings. With a hat-tip to today’s Polltrack feature at the National Journal (subscription req.), complemented by the new Reuters/C-Span/Zogby results, here they are:
- COE: American Research Group
- CEO: LA Times/Bloomberg
- OEC: Reuters/C-Span/Zogby
- OCE: Des Moines Register
Maybe this just means the race is too damn close to call. But notice that the only two combinations missing are those with Edwards at the top. He’s consistently second or third...sometimes by a lot, sometimes by a little, but always out of first. It’s difficult not to conclude, even from this jumble and with all the arguments about poll sampling methods, that it’s an Obama-Clinton race. --Tom Schaller
