Public opinion polls are always just snapshots of citizens' preferences at the time the poll is taken.
George W. Bush and Al Gore are literally neck-and-neck in national polls, showing a close race there. And while a new Deseret News/KSL-TV poll shows a 14-point difference in the 2nd Congressional District, that race, too, will tighten up as Election Day nears.
Close races usually brings excitement and high voter turnout. Maybe people are sidetracked by the Summer Olympics. But it seems so far people are not that enthused about November's election.
Utah has seen some expensive races in the 1990s. But 2000 looks like another top spending contender.
The national Republican and Democratic party committees will each dump at least $1 million in soft money into the 2nd Congressional District race. Both are buying TV ad time for Republican Derek Smith and Democrat Jim Matheson now. And while you won't see Bush and Gore advertising here — Utah has only five electoral college votes in the presidential contest, and the state will clearly go for Bush — across the nation records will be spent on the 2000 contest.
Who knows what will happen in the 2nd District? National House leaders thought Smith would win the seat — a close race, yes, but win, the Washington Post reported this week. But the new Dan Jones & Associates poll for this newspaper and KSL found Matheson holds a healthy 14-point lead — 46 percent to 32 percent with 15 percent undecided. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 7 percent.
Jones also found that Smith, the Republican, gets only 51 percent of the GOP vote. Matheson gets 26 percent.
Matheson also gets 23 percent of the vote of those who said they are "very conservative" politically. He gets 37 percent of the "somewhat conservative" vote.
Smith clearly has trouble in his own party. The quick answer to that oddity is Merrill Cook.
Smith defeated Cook, the GOP incumbent, in a bitter primary last June. Toward the end of the campaign the two men exchanged charges, with Smith calling Cook a liar and delusional. After his defeat, Cook said he wouldn't endorse Smith unless Smith publicly listed all the people who purchased some Smith-company stock.
Smith used the stock proceeds to put more than $600,000 into his campaign, personal money that helped defeat Cook.
Cook still has yet to formally endorse Smith. But Cook did say after Smith revealed the names of his investors that he no longer worried about a scandal there. In any case, Cook supporters will be key to Smith in the final election.
Cook is toying with the idea of running for GOP state party chairman in 2001. And so it makes sense that at some point he will become a Smith supporter. The question is how much of a supporter. Will he be John McCain-like? McCain finally endorsed Bush but in a lackluster manner.
Cook certainly doesn't control his supporters. And Republican voters tend to come home in final elections. But Smith faces a double whammy. Not only are too many Republicans not home now for Smith, Matheson leads Smith 46-27 percent among independent voters as well.
While the 2nd District is slightly Republican in voting patterns, independents are an important part of the mix in the Salt Lake County east-side district.
So Smith has to get back his Republican base AND attract independent voters. That could prove a tough tightrope to walk.
Meanwhile, Matheson is not playing up the fact that he's a Democrat and is talking conciliatory politics and cooperation in Washington, D.C. The race will certainly tighten up. And either man could win.
Watch for Smith — or his surrogate Republican National Congressional Committee — to try to paint Matheson as a Democrat (the preferred word will be "liberal" Democrat) before this is over.
Matheson — or his Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee stand-in — may do some name-calling, as well.
Republicans hold the 435-member U.S. House by only six seats. In the toss-up House districts around the country, like Utah's 2nd District, the contests will be bitter.
E-mail Deseret News political editor Bob Bernick Jr. at: bbjr@desnews.com