New CNN poll shows Webb with slight edge on Allen
By BOB LEWIS
AP Political Writer
October 30, 2006
Hampton,Va.(HFR:RICHMOND, Va.) -- A new statewide poll Monday showed Democrat Jim Webb with a slight lead in next week's close Senate race against Republican incumbent George Allen.
Among likely voters, the former Republican was the choice of 50 percent of those surveyed while 46 percent favored Allen and 4 percent were undecided.
Because Webb's edge is equal to the margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points, it means Webb is slightly ahead.
The result is based on telephone interviews Opinion Research Corp. conducted for CNN from Oct. 26-29 among 597 registered Virginia voters who identified themselves as likely to vote on Nov. 7.
Among the larger sample of 904 registered voters, the results were about even, with 48 percent of the respondents backing Webb, 46 percent for Allen and 5 percent undecided. One percent voiced support for an "other" candidate not identified in the survey.
Independent Gail Parker also is on the ballot.
The poll is the first to show Webb with an advantage in a mean and expensive campaign in once reliably Republican Virginia whose outcome could be pivotal in determining whether an embattled GOP can retain control of the Senate.
Webb, along with help from a national Democratic organization, is airing about $3 million a week in television ads to more than $2 million a week for Allen and his national GOP allies in the campaign's frantic final week.
While Webb supporters crowed over the results, longtime Allen adviser Christopher J. LaCivita said the poll was skewed because half of it was conducted over the weekend.
"It sure doesn't reflect anything we're seeing," said LaCivita, a national GOP consultant who lives near Richmond.
"Any survey conducted Fridays and Saturdays, everybody knows they're skewed toward Democrats," he said.
The latter two days of the survey, however, reflect two intensive days of news coverage of Allen's claim that selected sexually explicit passages in some of Webb's six gritty novels about war are demeaning to women.
"Virginians are a lot smarter than that, and he insulted their intelligence," said Webb spokeswoman Kristian Denny Todd. "It was a baseless attack on Jim that didn't make sense. He (Allen) was trying to attack Jim on works of fiction."
The fictional books reflect the bloodshed and dehumanizing conditions Webb saw and experienced as a Marine in some of the deadliest combat of the Vietnam War in 1969.
He has written one nonfiction book, "Born Fighting," that traces the heritage of Scots-Irish families in America, including his own, to their ethnic origins in Europe.
Webb continued Tuesday to campaign heavily on the Iraq war, seeking to link Allen with President Bush's handling of the war.
Allen campaigned with veterans groups with Virginia's senior senator and Armed Services Committee chairman, John W. Warner, in Hampton Roads, an area that's home to the world's largest U.S. Navy base as well as active duty and retired military households. |
