TODD LEAVES ‘OBJECTIVE JOURNALIST’ TAG BEHIND FOR OBAMA EXPRESS WITH HYPERBOLIC VOTER TURNOUT STATEMENT

I’m not a 70-year-old man, so I don’t regularly watch Meet the Press, but apparently on this morning’s show NBC News political director Chuck Todd made the most ridiculous claim (0:23 mark above) I’ve ever heard from him. Todd said black voter turnout in next month’s election could be close to 100 percent in some normally red states, which would result in an overwhelming victory for Democrat Barack Obama over Republican John McCain.

“You look at these early voting numbers,” Todd said. “Georgia’s one of these states, along with North Carolina and Florida, that we’re seeing early voting and because they’re states that have to keep track of these statistics, we know exactly how many African American ballots are being turned in and it is through the roof.

“Turnout among African Americans might actually be somewhere between 95 and 100 percent in some of these places, in some of these states.”

So where are these “magical” numbers Todd is referencing? Beats me. I’ve looked everywhere and the only thing I can find is an Associated Press story saying that blacks are significantly outperforming their 2004 early voting turnout in North Carolina, Georgia and Florida. But no mention of anything that would support the 100 percent turnout claim.

And that’s too bad because I’ve always had a high degree of respect for Todd. I’ve met him, I’ve talked briefly with him about politics, and I’ve spoken highly of him in every situation.

But lately, he’s become little more than an echo of his leftists colleagues at MSNBC.

Compare Todd’s statement to something highly-respected pollster John Zogby posted on his Website.

“I have alluded before to this strange, magnetic pull that brings Obama down to 48 percent or 49 percent, a danger zone for him,” Zogby said. “McCain’s gains are among white voters, where he now leads by 12 points, and with men, where he again has a healthy lead. There is still a lot of campaign to go. A lot of campaign to go.”

Zogby was set to release poll numbers in eight battleground states reportedly showing Obama leading in six, but all within the margin of error. That means that while McCain must carry all of those states to take the White House, he needs to only improve a point or two each day to win them — which is what he has been doing in most polls for the last few days.