Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead to 3.5 Points

by Jonathan Singer, Thu Sep 18, 2008 at 11:20:45 AM EDT

Here are today's numbers:

	Obama	McCain
Diageo/Hotline	46	42
Gallup	48	44
Rasmussen Reports	48	48
Research 2000/dKos	49	43


Average:	47.75	44.25

Just three days ago the average of the four daily tracking polls had John McCain and Barack Obama exactly tied, a strong showing for the Republican considering the large lead Obama held in the wake of the Democratic National Convention. Today, however, in the poll of the tracking polls, Obama has taken a 3.5 percentage point lead, which includes statistically significant leads in the polling from both Gallup and Research 2000.

With numbers like these, it would be difficult to say that there hasn't been a momentum shift in the campaign. It is true that national polling isn't what is going to decide this race -- I've been saying as much for a long time. But at least as far as these daily trackers are a barometer of the direction of the race, the Obama campaign cannot be too unhappy with the current trajectory or state of affairs.

Tags: Tracking Poll Update, White House 2008 (all tags)

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead

The state polls should follow the national polls. They are already starting to. I expect that Obama should start polling ahead consistently in Colorado and Virginia, and Florida and Ohio should start polling as ties again or narrow Obama leads.

btw, electoral-vote.com is screwed now because they put all those ARG polls into their database. ARG finds Obama leading McCain 51-45 in ILLINOIS. christ what an awful pollster. And they're not even consistently biased the way Strategic Vision is, ARG throws massive outliers both directions.

by Skaje 2008-09-18 11:28AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead

Consistent bias in one direction is known as a house effect. ARG's random bias looks a lot more like a house defect.

by noop 2008-09-18 11:51AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead

"The state polls should follow the national polls"
Why?
I am not a poll guy, I just read nate silver but it seems like states will go their own way.

But of course, for some weird reason I am hopefull about West Virginia so what do I know....

by gil44 2008-09-18 11:52AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead

By follow, I mean that as Obama does better in national polls, he should also start to do better in state polls.

by Skaje 2008-09-18 11:58AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead

The national trackers poll more frequently and release their results more quickly than state polls. So, the trackers usually pick up a trend first, which then shows up in state polls over the following days.

by noop 2008-09-18 12:05PM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead

National numbers are aggregates of state numbers, so if the national numbers move, the movement has to come from somewhere. This does not mean that national trackers use state as a sampling demographic. Typically they do not, but they often use region.

Of course, there can be real state-specific effects as well. I'm sure McCain's numbers are holding up pretty well in Alaska even if he is tanking elsewhere.

by KTinOhio 2008-09-18 01:42PM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead to 3.

If this shift back is anything like the move toward McCain, I'd expect to see the states move back toward Obama in a couple of days. It was ironic that two days ago, when those of us on the tubes saw the shift coming, the MSM was reporting like crazy that the map had "shifted." Unless something happens between now and Monday or Tuesday of next week, I'd say we're going to see it shift again.

by proseandpromise 2008-09-18 11:29AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update: Obama Extends Lead to 3.

My favorite was MSNBC.com, which on Tuesday of this week had a headline that said something like "Palin's effect reaches red and blue America" and then, with no hint of irony ran a headline yesterday that said something like "Obama storms back in the polls".

by the mollusk 2008-09-18 11:40AM | 0 recs

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Too many polls!

There have been so many polls that have come out in the past 48 hours. Obama is up in OH, he's tied in OH, he's down in OH. My head is spinning!

by Steve24 2008-09-18 11:37AM | 0 recs

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Re: Too many polls!

Do you remember the Simpson's Song?

"Just don't look"

by gil44 2008-09-18 11:53AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update

I wonder what Jerome thinks of these polls. It clearly has a lot to do with the economy but I also think it is showing that McCain's shine is starting to get a little bit dimmer. So is Palin's.

by JDF 2008-09-18 11:49AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update

I expect a post on how Barack losing the pro pedophilia vote is Obama's new ~~Black Voter~~, ~~White Voter~~, ~~White Working Class Voter~~, ~~Jewish Voter~~, ~~Latino Voter~~, ~~Values Voter~~, ~~Wal-Mart Mom Voter~~, ~~Hockey Mom Voter~~, ~~Pig-in-Lipstick Voter~~ problem.

I kid.

by enozinho 2008-09-18 11:57AM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update

At what point does David Gregory say: "Is the fact that Senator Obama can't get more McCain campaign employees to support him going to be a problem in November?"

by Beomoose 2008-09-18 12:05PM | 0 recs

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LOL

McCain's shine is Palin

by jsfox 2008-09-18 12:02PM | 0 recs

4a2fab88-ed3b-47a4-8f14-3ec8a24504ac_normal

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Re: Tracking Poll Update

I don't put much stock into the national changes at less than 4%.

My thinking is that out of the conventions, McCain got a bigger bump in more blue states, and had fired up his base, lessening the red states where Obama could compete.

Unless there are signs of their base retreating, and there are not, then it's pretty much of a nail-biter at this point.

by Jerome Armstrong 2008-09-18 12:10PM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update

He fired up his base but the bump among independents/undecideds seems to be fading. He can't win solely on the strength of his base the way Bush did, they aren't able to tilt blue states alone and they can't hold all the swing states alone. Its close and will be close right until the last vote is cast, but being behind is bad news for Senator McCain.

by Beomoose 2008-09-18 12:23PM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update

McCain's numbers more or less didn't move in blue states (just a 2 point shift), and only marginally moved in purple states (4.5 points). McCain's big gains -- to the tune of an 8.5 percentage point swing -- came in the red states. And that was all at the peak of McCain's bounce, which has since receded.

by Jonathan Singer 2008-09-18 12:24PM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update:

Ok, I'm waiting for someone to tell me how this is bad news for Obama.

by RandyMI 2008-09-18 12:02PM | 0 recs

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Re: Tracking Poll Update:

Well the theme throughout the summer was that Obama wasn't winning by "enough," I'm sure that meme comes back now.

by Beomoose 2008-09-18 12:06PM | 0 recs

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Ohio cross tabs interesting

In that CNN poll, they said in Ohio, they saw upper tax bracket voters moving towards McCain, and lower tax bracket voters moving towards Obama.

Hmm, maybe it is the economy, stupid.

by ProfessorReo 2008-09-18 12:06PM | 0 recs

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Re: Ohio cross tabs interesting

Does this mean that Ohio's middle class voters - you know, the ones making less than $5 million a year - are moving toward Obama?

by KTinOhio 2008-09-18 01:45PM | 0 recs

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Now that I think about it...

Don't the wealthy have more money tied up in the stock market than anyone else? Wouldn't it be in their best interest to vote for the party that doesn't look the other way while the market goes to hell?

by KTinOhio 2008-09-18 01:47PM | 0 recs