Interesting, I'm going to look into these numbers with more specificity. On another note:

Here is the text of Kerry's speech from the Senate floor about two years ago (October 9, 2002) where he states his position on Iraq before the war began:

http://www.independentsforkerry.org/uploads/media/kerry-iraq.html

Note especially the sections highlighted in blue.  Here is Kerry's position today:

http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/national_security/iraq.html

Did Kerry "flip-flop" in his position on Iraq?  No.  In fact, he has been completely consistent.  His position is the same now as it was then.  He stated the conditions under which he would not support the President's military actions.  Those conditions have been met - the President failed to take Kerry's advice, and because of that, we are sinking $200 billion into Iraq and 1,000 of our troops have died.  Kerry opposes Bush's approach in Iraq, but he said he would oppose it before Bush began the war, and Kerry has the same plan now that he had before the war.  Kerry has been completely consistency.  What am I missing?!

If you want to know Kerry's positions, you have to read original documents.

Love your optimism, but it is probably fair to say that the party ID number is at least partially tied to candidate preference. Certainly not to the tune of 13 points, but a little. Clearly, Bush is leading by a couple points. And with the debates coming and Kerry really finding his anti-Bush voice, I'm in a very good emotional place this weekend.

Go get yourself into a canvass or phone bank and finish this off. Start tomorrow!

There is no way in hell that Bush is going to win this election while losing among Indy's by 10%

So what's up with the Electoral Vote Map in the left column?  They don't say, that I can find, where they get their data or how current it is.  According to the map Kerry has lost about 100 electoral votes in the last week or so.  What gives?

That's nice, but now CBS/NYT has Bush up by 9.  They can't ALL be wrong.

And citing Zogby isn't very reassuring - Pollkatz has him as the most pro-Kerry pollster.

right now it`s  obvious that everyone is just poll crazy, a new poll every day. it`s pretty obviou is that bush is up 5-8 points right now but the interesting thing is kerry is up 14 points in the battleground states where it really counts.i hate to say it but the only poll that counts is on nov2nd, but if these pollsters tell us it`s over it may depress turnout on both sides.

The media don't care about anything but a good story.

Give them one!!!

While the Gallup poll can't withstand serious scrutiny, neither can the practice of using of reweighting the party ID internals with 2000 Party ID turnout. First, as a pollster noted on this site recently, party ID is NOT a constant.  More importantly, though, the turnout by party from one election to the next is serially independent -- there's no necessary connection. (Just think of turnout in 1994 compared to turnout in 1998.) If the turnout this year turns out to be similar to 2000 in terms of party ID, then that will be pure coincidence. You can't build into a model the assumption that it will. For instance, go back and try predicting the 2000 election based on party ID internals that year but after having reweighted them according to the turnout by party ID in 1996. And then try the same thing for 1996 by using the turnout by party in 1992. Your results won't be much better than the polls we're excoriating.

In light of this information from Gallup about their likely voter percentages (D/R/I), which are far removed from recent election numbers, what's next is to ask Time and Newsweek what they use to determine their likely voter party-ID percentages.  Because they have been showing the same 10-13% leads for Bush.

Actually a similar examination of these forecast turnout ratios from all the polls would be quite enlightening.  If we can refigure the Gallup numbers by using a more realistic turnout, we could produce new numbers for any other poll.

As I understand it, Gallup asks if people are excited about the election, and uses this (not alone, but as a major filter) to identify "likely voters."

Now people who expect their candidate to win are more likely to say they're excited. And people who expect their candidate to lose are less likely to say they're excited. And people who see major media coverage of their candidate are more likely to say they are excited.

So the excitement filter builds in three biases: It increases volatility (media events affect the filter), it favors percieved frontrunners, and it favors incumbents (who get so much more media coverage). But, as we see, real elections show little volatility, no edge from perception, and a loss from incumbency.