There a growing consensus now with just a few days of voting left in the 2018 elections that Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jared Polis will win his race. Polling in this race has been remarkably consistent showing an upper-single digit lead for Polis enduring throughout the season, and surviving all the frightful negatives thrown at him by Republican opponent Walker Stapleton. The likelihood of a Polis victory is further underscored by ballot returns showing serious underperformance for Republicans compared to the last midterm election in 2014.
With this in mind, we thought it appropriate to poll our users not just on who will win the race as we’ve been tracking weekly, but on what the margin of victory for Polis is likely to be. It’s a question with significant implications down the ballot, and without jinxing anything it does seem to be the more important question to ask as of now.
As with all of our highly unscientific user polls, all we ask is that you vote for what you honestly think will be the outcome–not your personal preference.
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Counting your chickens before they hatch is very unwise in Politics!
When did you hatch?
Moderatus —
so, are you learning lessons from your earlier efforts to predict chickens in various Republican primary races?
Is NutterSpeak for
I went with 1 to 5 percent. Polis is up by 7 percent in most polls. Add in the hidden homophobic vote which probably knocks 3 or 4 percent off that 7 percent lead.
I think you are right about the homophobic vote, but I start from a higher value of around 9% for what he would pull if he were a generic Democrat. 538 is predicting a 10% margin today with a range of 58.9%-49.8% for Polis and 48.1%-39.1% for Stapleton.
I think Unity will draw away a surprising number of votes, as high as 4%. Not enough to change the outcome, but it is where the homophobe Democratic/unaffiliated voters will go because Stapleton is such a bad choice. Though the Republicans want the Unity candidate to kneecap the Democrats I think they actually give somewhere for the homophobes to go other than to the Republican plus the fed up country club and educated Republicans.
I would be STUNNED if Unity Colorado pulls anything like 4%. In 2017, they finally made "minor party" status with just over 1,000 voters. Last time I looked at party registration, they had around 900 active voters and just over 200 inactive voters.
The purpose of Unity Colorado is not to get elected themselves, but to peel off enough unaffiliated votes that the Republican can win. I'm afraid this could happen in a couple of state House races.
Unity has moderately conservative positions. Why do you think they hurt Democrats more than they hurt Republicans? Whatever the intentions of Republicans helping Unity candidates the actual outcome will be to peel away more country club conservatives from Republican candidates.
I think Unity will come in between 1.5%-4%. Depending on the how many shy voters are misleading pollsters. Most likely on the low end of that, I would put my penny down on 2% making them around the same popularity as the Libertarians and a bit more popular than the greens. Sorry for being misleading with only dropping my high number.
There are a lot of disgruntled voters for a variety of reasons. People who see the two major candidates for governor as rich people trying to buy an office. People who are conservative but hate Trump style politics. People who vaguely hate the two major parties. And the homophobes.
Though the party is very small so are both the Libertarians and the Greens. They pulled 39,590 and 27,391 respectively in the 2014 election. Their registration numbers then were 26,746 and 9,073 respectively. Minor parties punch far above their registered numbers, especially new ones.
But the homophobes have a welcoming home in the GOP.
If that is their biggest/only issue, yes. Those people probably are already with the Republican and openly so just like the unashamed racists. I think what we were discussing is the modest number of people who would be with the Democrat except they are uncomfortable with this whole "gay lifestyle" thing. The same way that there are people who will be unwilling to vote for someone who is of the "wrong" race or religion even if on all the issues the candidate is the right fit. If they have a "moderate" alternative I bet a large percentage of them end up there instead of going full blown Republican.
Of the 2-ish percent who would otherwise vote for Polis and say they will in polls because they are shy about saying they will not, I think around 2/5 of them end up at Unity instead of going Republican.
As far as I know, Jared Polis is in a committed relationship with Marlon and they are raising two children together. So much for the gay lifestyle.
It's not like he is hanging out at Charlies or the Wrangler every night or at the Swim Club looking for action.
Did I not make it clear that I was mocking that kind of voter by putting "gay lifestyle" in quotes?
Ahh, Unity…… what a nice, fuzzy feeling it gives.
Thank you Ralph Nader and Jill Stein for teaching morons and imbeciles that their votes can matter, but not necessarily in a productive way.
How many environmentalists, clean government-types and peace activists (who were Nader and Stein's supporters) feel that their issues were addresses and positions advanced by George W. Bush and Donal Trump? Hint: think invasion of Iraq, Citizens' United, and Trump Digs Coal.
I seriously doubt there are 4% in Colorado who will vote for Unity. But if the race is close enough (i.e., within one percent), it could make a difference. We will see how much "unity" we will enjoy with a Republican state senate, Democratic state house, and Governor Stapleton.
I think Unity could make a difference, but not the one the Republicans hope for. I think the presence of Unity and Libertarian candidates cause more problems for the Republicans than the Democrats.
While getting a person not to vote for Polis is a good thing for Republicans it is only half as good as getting that voter to switch to Stapleton. Plus it gives somewhere for Republicans to go instead of just staying home, which they are also doing when compared to their 2014 ballot return numbers.
The gay thing isn't all negative. I know a fair number of gay Republicans and I think most of them will like Polis. In part, that's because so many gay Republicans are business people and Jared speaks their language there as well.
A good point. Though, I think that there are probably more homophobes who will protest vote than there are gay Republicans who will cross party lines. I have known so many gays who were giant racists like Robert Ortiz who was filmed screaming at his Lyft driver for not turning on the radio. They are a minority of the gay community, but a pretty large one. Probably about 1/4 of the out gays.