f the latest polls are to be believed, Vice President Al Gore has a big problem.
While most polls give Gore a substantial lead over Bill Bradley, the former senator from New Jersey and Gore's only Democratic rival for the nomination, the same polls show him headed for a crushing general election defeat in November 2000 by George W. Bush, the presumed GOP nominee.
As many as one-third of Democratic voters, most of whom voted for President Clinton, are considering voting for Bush, polls grimly predict.
But if history is any guide, the problem is not with Gore's campaign. The problem is with the media's quest for premature speculation on who will win, and the political pollsters who are all too happy to accommodate them.
These current polls are simply snapshots of the moment. As past early polls in previous elections reveal, there is often little resemblance between what they show and the results on election day.
For example, in December 1975, one year after Jimmy Carter had tossed his hat into the 1976 presidential race, public opinion polls had him winning a mere 3 percent of the vote. Democratic stalwart Eugene McCarthy was quoted that year as saying that Carter was not going far in his quest for the nomination. Meanwhile, state chairmen and national committeemen predicted that Hubert Humphrey would be the Democratic nominee.
But after winning the Iowa caucus, and suprising George Wallace in the Florida primary, Carter's campaign took off. Humphrey was not in serious contention, nor were a number of other prominent Democrats by the time of the convention. Carter, of course, went on to win the over the incumbent, President Ford.
In the 1988 presidential campaign, Vice President George Bush was seen as severely wounded by his third-place showing (behind Bob Dole and Pat Robertson) in the Iowa caucuses. Yet only days later he bounced back to best Dole in New Hampshire. From there he went on to win the New Hampshire primary, the nomination, and the presidency.
Perhaps the campaign most similar to the current Gore-Bradley battle is the 1984 Democratic primary between Walter Mondale and Gary Hart. Two weeks before the New Hampshire primary that year, polls showed Mondale had a commanding lead over John Glenn, running second, and Gary Hart, in third place. Few predicted that Hart would upset Glenn and Mondale to win in New Hampshire. The pollsters no doubt were as surprised as Mondale and Glenn.
(Hart's later downfall was also unpredictable. It came as he was discovered keeping company with a woman, Donna Rice, who was not his wife.)
Gore may take little solace in the fact that Carter won the 1976 nomination despite being the early underdog. After all, today it is Bradley who is the clear underdog in the two-candidate race for the party's nomination.
But even if Bradley wins a few primaries, most analysts suggest the nomination is clearly Gore's. One key reason is that the process for electing convention delegates is largely influenced by the Democratic Party's national leadership, who are behind Gore. It was a more open process during Carter's days.
Gore also has a lot of political strength among organized labor and African-Americans. And he has one of the best fund-raisers in history, President Clinton, working on his belalf.
Despite the fact that George W. Bush has raised tens of millions, and has high poll ratings, there is one important element still missing: Most voters still don't know Bush or what he stands for on many key issues.
And Bush should take little solace from the fact that his father, far behind Michael S. Dukakis after the conventions in 1988, was a come-from-behind winner. The moral of the story is that early leads have a way of evaporating.
Of course, anything can happen in the course of an election. Edmund Muskie lost his chance for the 1972 Democratic nomination on the day that he allegedly let a tear fall from his eye as he criticized a news story about his wife.
Although most polls may be accurate in terms of voters' feelings at the time they are taken, they rarely rise to the level of self-fulfilling prophecies. As more information is provided to voters about the candidates, and as the electorate begins to focus on the race, opinions change.
There is a lot of time between now and November 2000 for Bush to lose his lead over Gore. The voters, in turn, will have all the time they need to decide between Gore and Bush. And no poll can absolutely guarantee what a voter will decide behind the closed curtain of a voting booth.
Robert A. Jordan is a Globe columnist.
