So Mason-Dixon comes out with a poll, done for the Richmond Times-Dispatch, that now says Kilgore trails Kaine by one point - well within the margin of error for the poll.
How did this happen? Just two weeks ago, several news organizations reported that Kilgore had a huge lead of nearly 10 points over Kaine. A couple things can account for this:
1. It's early. No one is paying attention to this race. It's the middle of summer and people will say anything to get off the phone with someone doing polling. "Yeah, yeah, I support the guy you said first, now let me cook my burgers."
2. Mason-Dixon included the name of Russ Potts, which none of the earlier polls had included (they included instead a category they called "other"). I predicted that including Potts could change the nature of the race, and it has.
3. Different polls include different assumptions. Remember back in 2004 when one poll would come out and say Bush was ahead and one poll said Kerry was ahead? Then on election day, the media were convinced, based on their numbers and exit polling, that Kerry had walked away with it. What happened? Mostly, the voter turnout models used by polling organizations were flat wrong. That skewed the polls toward Kerry.
The Mason-Dixon poll seems to confirm the earlier conventional wisdom that Potts is pulling from Kilgore. I can't explain why this is happening, but if you believe the poll, Potts has close to 10% and "double digits" each in Northern Virginia and Hampton Roads.
It's still too early to call this one, but my gut tells me Kilgore is still the odds-on favorite in conservative Virginia. You can get a poll to say anything you want it to. Combining this poll with the ones we've had to date just proves it.
