Rasmussen released two new polls today, stil "behind the wall."
More below the jump......
TN-SEN: They now have it Corker 51-47, after Corker was up 53-45 previously just a few days earlier. The favorable/unfavorable ratings are practically even, 53/46 for Ford and 54/45 for Corker. But the key downers might be two things: (1) 50% of respondents want the GOP to hold the Senate, only 45% want Dems to take it; and (2) Bush has a 51-48 job approval/disapproval in this poll.
Both candidates show equal loyalty from their own party's voters, with indys slightly favoring Ford...but there are too many Goopers, too many conservatives, for Ford to get over the hump in this poll. Ford trails among most demographic breakdowns, although Rasmussen inexplicably doesn't poll on race which is ridiculous since that is a key factor in any statewide southern contest.
To the extent the turnout sample in this poll is wrong, the results are wrong, but I have to say the numbers look reasonable. Yes the Bush approval looks high, but it's not unbelievable given that this is the Bible Belt even if not quite as conservative as further south. I do hope the turnout sample ends up wrong, in which case Ford has a fighting chance to pull the upset given that the past week's GOP internal polls showed Corker up only 1-2 points.
MT-SEN: It's Tester up 50-48, with the trendline parroting the conventional wisdom that Burns is closing. Rasmussen had Tester up 50-46 just days ago, and it was 51-47 a few days before that. But then the differences are small enough to be argued reasonably as just statistical noise.
The favorable/unfavorable numbers clearly favor Tester, who is at 52/47 compared to Burns' 47/52. By a 48-46 margin respondents prefer GOP Senate control, but Bush's approval/disapproval is at 49/52 with 44% at "strongly disapprove."
Tester earns slightly more party loyalty with a 95/4 Dem edge, while Burns is at 90/10 with GOP voters; indys split 54/39 in favor of Tester, but needless to say Montana has a lot of Gooper voters just like Tennessee. Women break in favor of Tester by a slightly larger margin than men break for Burns.
I tend to trust Rasmussen after they did so great in 2004. They nailed the Prez race both nationally and in all 18 battleground states they polled, and they nailed the Senate contests except for a couple, Alaska and Colorado, where they didn't poll at the last minute anyway.
But ultimately no pollster is perfect, and I'm hoping Rasmussen gets it right on Tester and wrong on Ford. Ford is the underdog now for sure, but he's not out of it if turnout follows the internal Dem model more than public or GOP models.