West Virginia Senate: Byrd (D) 57% Raese (R) 34%

[skipos]

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/2006/State%20Polls/April%202006/West%20Virginia%20Senate%20April.htm

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

1. Byrd shouldn't be that close to slipping under 50

raese's inevitable negative ad blitz/'news' coverage is going to hurt him and this troubles me

[Lasher]

2. Rasmussen has a pro-republican bias

If you compare their Bush favorability ratings to those of other polls you will see that theirs is always among the highest, sometimes 10% or more higher than others.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/polls/

If you click on See all Poll Data at the above site you can view many other polls for a comparison.

BTW, Rasmussen's Bush approval rating at the above site should show 38%, not 36% for 5/15 - 5/17. This is the first error I have ever found at the RCP site. 38% is the lowest Bush approval rating that Rasmussen has ever reported.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/Bush_Job_Approval.htm

OK, I'm rambling.

The Rasmussen bias does not seem to be as significant in Senate race polls, and I would also like to see his approval rating higher than 57%. But I don't think we're ever going to see this much higher than 60%. There is a hard core right wing contingent out there that will never approve of any Democrat except maybe Zell Miller. My guess is they number about 30% of us.

My hope is that this 30% will be so demoralized by the antics of their boy Dubya, they will all stay home on election day.