Home > Kerry missing post-convention bounce
Expected to see boost in polls, Democrat’s surge never shows
By BILL STRAUB
So where’s the bounce?
Exiting from a seemingly successful Democratic National Convention and having delivered a well-received acceptance speech, John Kerry was expected to pick up a few points in what has been an extremely close race with President Bush.
So far, the polls have offered a different take.
Four surveys have been released since the Democrats left Boston, and three show hardly any bump. One, the CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll, shows the Democratic nominee actually losing ground — falling from a 2 percentage point advantage (49 percent to 47 percent) in a survey taken July 19-21 to a disadvantage — 50 percent to 47 percent.
If the numbers hold, it will mark the first time since 1972, when Democrats nominated South Dakota Sen. George McGovern in a raucous convention, that a nominee has failed to pick up a perceptible gain from the convention.
The only poll giving Kerry an enhanced edge was Newsweek’s. It gave Kerry a 4-point bounce and an overall 7-point lead over the incumbent — 49 percent to 42 percent. And that 4-point boost is modest by historic standards.
Going into the convention, Matthew Dowd, Bush’s chief strategist, suggested that the Massachusetts senator could leave the Boston convention with a 15-point bulge based on recent history, a claim that most analysts said set the bar too high. But DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe said he expected Kerry to exit with an 8- to 10-point edge. Kerry fell short of both predictions.
Democrats offered several reasons for the lower-than-expected results, and noted that the same polls that showed Kerry failing to gain ground also offer bad news for the Bush campaign.
Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm, among others, said a nation divided starkly along political lines provides little opportunity for a presidential candidate to pick up significant support during a four-day convention.
Just before the convention, polls showed that many more Americans than usual had already made up their minds about whom to support, leaving a small number of undecided voters to woo.
Unless something dramatic occurs during the Republican National Convention, which begins Aug. 30, Bush is similarly unlikely to see his poll numbers flourish.
Democrats also note that the primary season ended earlier than usual with Kerry running over his rivals, giving voters an opportunity to give the candidate a closer look before the convention.
And Kerry selected his running mate, Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina, well in advance of the gathering, depriving the ticket of any surge of support for that selection.
Still, some acknowledge they are perplexed. Political analyst Ruy Teixeira, who operates the Web site www.emergingdemocraticmajority weblog.com, noted that polls showed Kerry picking up the anticipated bounce among voters questioned on Friday, the day after the convention ended. But that edge dissipated when the results of questioning conducted on Saturday and Sunday were included.
It could be, he said, the shortest bounce on record.
"Hard to figure out," Teixeira said. "It must have been a very strange Saturday."
That doesn’t mean the Bush campaign can start celebrating. Teixeira noted on his site that, while the Gallup poll now shows him with a lead, the president also lost ground regarding public approval — a generally accurate measure of how an incumbent can expect to perform in the fall.