Presidential race endgame: Beware the game-changing October surprise

IT IS almost too late for an October surprise. But Democrat Barack Obama and Republican John McCain should be wary of the last weekend.

The final days of the last two presidential races featured unexpected twists that appeared to have an impact on the outcome, shifting the allegiances of some undecided voters in what turned out to be very tight races.

With the days counting down before the presidential fight between Obama and McCain is decided on Tuesday, the chance for a game-changing moment that could reverse Obama’s lead over McCain in national polls is dwindling, but still alive.

“The last weekend can be a very weird and strange time in a presidential campaign,” said Steven Schier, a political analyst at Carleton College in Minnesota.

“It is when the last of the voters who haven’t been paying attention tune in and the last of the undecideds make up their minds. Strange things can happen,” he said.

In 2004, al-Qaida leader Osama bin-Laden injected himself into the campaign on the last Friday of the race with a new videotape. The tape reminded voters of the lingering risk from terrorism and President George W Bush’s efforts to keep the United States safe.

Democrat John Kerry, embroiled in a tight battle with Bush in most polls, saw the race slip away in the final days. He later blamed the tape for erasing his hopes of victory.

In 2000, the last wrinkle in the campaign broke on the Thursday night before the vote — Bush, then the Texas governor, had been arrested in 1976 for driving under the influence and had not publicly disclosed the arrest.

Bush campaign aides blamed the late disclosure for costing him what had been a slim lead in opinion polls over Democrat Al Gore down the stretch. Bush narrowly lost the popular vote, but won the Electoral College to claim the presidency after a disputed recount in Florida.

Exit polling indicated the revelation had played a role in denting Bush’s momentum in the final days of the campaign.

“Gore clearly gained ground over the last few days of the campaign because of the DUI story,” said pollster John Zogby.

So far, no thunderbolts have appeared in the race’s final days to fulfill the US political tradition of “October surprises” like the collapse of hostage negotiations with Iran before President Jimmy Carter’s 1980 loss to Ronald Reagan.

The phenomenon surfaced in 1968, when President Lyndon Johnson halted the bombing of North Vietnam a week before the 1968 election. It was not enough to help his vice-president Hubert Humphrey beat Richard Nixon.

But the October surprise in this year’s presidential race occurred in September — the economic crisis and Wall Street bailout that wiped out McCain’s edge in opinion polls and shifted the race toward Obama. The outbreak of a spiralling global economic crisis in the midst of a US presidential campaign was unprecedented and helped Obama as polls showed voters favoured his leadership on economic issues.

There is little McCain and Obama can do to plan for any last-minute news events. Both will spend the weekend racing through battleground states like Ohio, Florida, Missouri and Colorado as Tuesday’s voting draws near, with Obama holding a lead in recent national polls of between 3 points and 8 points. A Fox News poll released on Thursday gave Obama a 3-point edge, down from 9 points last week. But 6% remain undecided and other polls show an even higher rate of undecideds.

“At this late date there are still plenty of undecided voters who are about to make up their minds,” Schier said.

“Late events can really determine the outcome of close races.”

However, with the sand in the 2008 campaign hourglass about depleted, there is still a stubborn wedge of people who, somehow, are still making up their minds about who should be president. One in seven, or 14% percent, can’t decide or back a candidate, but might switch, according to an Associated Press-Yahoo! News poll of likely voters released yesterday. Who are they? They look a lot like the voters who’ve already locked onto a candidate, though they’re more likely to be white and less likely to be liberal.

And they disproportionately backed Hillary Rodham Clinton’s failed run for the Democratic nomination. For now, their indecision remains intact despite the fortunes that have been spent to tug people toward either McCain, the Republican, or the Democrat Obama.

Fuelling their uncertainty is a combination of disliking something about both candidates and frustration with this campaign, and politics in general.

“We have a lot of candidates who have never really hurt, have never had to struggle” economically, said Jeff Wofford, 28, a pastor and Republican from High Ridge, Missouri, who may back McCain. “A lot of candidates are interested in working the political system, but aren’t really interested in changing things.”

Overall, the share of these voters — sometimes referred to as “persuadables” — has barely budged from levels measured in June and September AP-Yahoo! News polls, conducted online by Knowledge Networks.

But the survey — which has repeatedly quizzed the same group of 2,000 adults since last November, shows considerable churning below the surface. Of those now changeable, nearly three-quarters said in June their minds were made up and half said so just last month.

“These tend to be people with a lower level of knowledge about the election; they don’t follow politics as closely,” said Michael McDonald, a political science professor from George Mason University in Virginia, who studies voting behaviour.

“If they can’t distinguish between the candidates at this stage, the question is if they will vote.”

Election Day is Tuesday. The survey found Obama leading McCain among all likely voters, 51% to 43%. About four in 10 persuadables lean toward McCain, and about as many are considering backing Obama, while the rest are either undecided or lean toward other candidates. Viewed another way, about one in every 10 supporters of Obama or McCain says he could still change his mind.

Even so, persuadable voters could be especially fertile hunting ground for McCain in the closing days of a contest in which most polls show him trailing.

These people trust Obama less than decided voters do to handle the economy, the Iraq war and terrorism. They are less accepting that the Illinois senator has enough experience to be president. And by a 17 percentage point spread, more see Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin favourably than unfavourably, unlike the narrow majority of voters already backing a candidate who dislike her.