CNN poll of polls: Obama's lead shrinks to just one point

[Nambe]

Source: CNN

Sen. Barack Obama’s lead in national polls has shrunk to one point, according to CNN’s latest “poll of polls.”

Sunday’s poll of polls shows Obama leading John McCain 44 to 43 percent.

Obama held a three-point lead in Saturday’s poll of polls. The senator from Illinois was leading McCain 45-42 percent.

Read more: http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/09/07/cnn-poll-of-polls-obamas-lead-shrinks-to-just-one-point/

[Mind_your_head]

1. For the second time today, I have to ask "why"? And is this "believable"? n/t

[Name removed]

20. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[ogneopasno]

2. Gosh, good thing there are more than 50 days left! Otherwise

I might hyperventilate and think this whole thing is over.

[Union Thug]

3. post-convention bump. I'm not worrying until after the debates.

[LSparkle]

4. Yadda-yadda-yadda ... We've been here before ...

Before both conventions. The polls may be fucked
up (are they sampling younger voters -- who support
Obama in such large number -- who only use cell
phones?) or even if they're accurate, WE'VE ALWAYS
PREDICTED THIS WOULD BE CLOSE. I'm sure the Obama
campaign was prepared for this eventuality, and
are not panicking. WE SHOULD HAVE THE SAME RESOLVE
to move forward and not allow the corporatist media
to do a mind-fuck on us all.

[rwenos]

5. National Polls are Meaningless

The "national poll" in November 2000 had Al Gore winning by a million votes.

It's about the Electoral College, baby! I'm watching the following states, where the election will truly be decided:

Ohio
Virginia
Colorado
New Mexico
Montana
New Hampshire
Michigan
Pennsylvania
Minnesota
(maybe) North Carolina

Check out realclearpolitics.com, and the Electoral College map therein. The rest is, in the words of Mark Twain, applesauce.

[rusty charly]

18. yup

"The last time we took a look at how the Electoral College vote was going, Barack Obama had a total of 23 states with a total of 236 Electoral College votes and John McCain had a total of 19 states with a total of 157 Electoral College votes. These were based on the latest state by state polls. It is now a month later and there have been some changes made.

http://www.politicallore.com/election-2008/two-more-states-go-to-obama/374

Obama is leading in Ohio, but just by 2%, so that one also is still up for grabs. Minnesota is solidly in Obama’s column by a margin of 53 to 41%. Iowa with its 7 Electoral College votes is no longer a swing state. It now belongs to Obama by a margin of 55 to 40%. Obama also leads in North Dakota by a margin of 3%, so North Dakota is still up for grabs. Obama also leads in Florida by 1% and in Pennsylvania by 5% both still too close to call. New Mexico is now in Obama’s column with its 3 Electoral College votes by a margin of 63 to 40%. Nevada with is 5 Electoral College votes is slightly leaning towards Obama by a margin of 49 to 44%.

John McCain did not pick up any more states, but if his lead expands in Indiana, he would pick up 11 more Electoral College votes which would bing him up to 168.

Obama did much better. He picked up Iowa with 7 and New Mexico with 3, giving him a total of 246 Electoral College votes. He also has a good chance to pick up Nevada with its 5 which would bring his total to 251.

The swing states as of right now are Colorado 9 votes, Florida 27 votes, Indiana 11 votes, Michigan 17 votes, Missouri 11 votes, Montana 3 votes, Nevada 5 votes, New Hampshire 4 votes, North Carolina 15 votes, North Dakota 3 votes, Ohio 20 votes, Virginia 13 votes and Wisconsin 10 - 13 States with a total of 148 votes up for grabs.

Of course, this is only the way it is today In the less than two months before election day anything can and probably will happen. Right now Obama looks like he is cleaning up this race, if he can keep the momentum going out of the debates, he may just be all set."

[0rganism]

22. why do they keep saying NM has 3 ev? last I checked it was 5...

Overall, this is good news. Indiana has voted solidly republican for something like the last hundred years, so if IN's even close at all, we're golden. Florida is effectively out of reach, due to the intensity of systemic partisan corruption, but it's nice to know things are close enough that the repubs will probably have to spend their campaign dollars there, commit even more interesting election fraud, expose more of their election-rigging machinery, and put some of the machine's operators in prison to carry the state. It's gonna cost 'em.

Ordinarily, I'd put Ohio in the same column, but somehow the Ohio Dems have had a resurgance of late. I think it really is in play, and would be a very nice pick-up indeed.

[Politicalboi]

28. Me too

http://www.electoral-vote.com/

[DJ13]

6. CNN uses an average of several polls to come up with their number

It only takes one really whacked out poll to skew their result.

And Im sure they looked hard for one consistently pro-GOP whacked out poll when they came up with the idea just to insure they would get the result they want.

[bemildred]

7. Gallup Daily: Obama 49%, McCain 43%

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=102x3468393

One might almost think some of these polls used flawed methodology. If you take an average of flawed polls, do you get a sound result?

[Drunken Irishman]

8. Gallup Daily has McCain +3.

[bemildred]

24. So you feel their web site is lying about what they think? nt

[Drunken Irishman]

41. I am saying the link you showed was posted on Wednesday.

It's Sunday.

[bemildred]

42. Indeed. And tomorrow is Monday.

What will the polls say then?

[Drunken Irishman]

43. Hopefully that Obama has tied the race or closed the gap.

[bemildred]

45. Who knew that poll results could be this volatile?

It's almost like they don't mean much.

[Drunken Irishman]

46. They really don't...at least not this early.

Especially Daily Tracking Polls, since a lead is built based on a rolling average.

[bemildred]

47. Exactly, they are pure show biz, they do not mean shit.

There is a lot of money at stake though ...

[Edith Ann]

10. Polls

Polls aren't as accurate anymore because they use landlines to call people and ask questions. People between 18-35 rely on cell phones and texting to communicate. O'Bama got 30,000 text messages in 10 min. to help with his campaign the night of his speech. We are registering record #'s of Dems. There is no reason to register as a Dem at this point unless you intend to vote for O'bama. U-tube and cell phones provide interesting quirks to the system. If you watched Jon Stewart's show where he compared republican statements when made against dems. and then when made for republicans you know that any one can be outed for being disingenuous with the public. Some of Rove's techniques our now out dated. He can be caught almost in real time at what he is doing.

[bemildred]

25. I am largely of the opinion that polls are horseshit.

There may be exceptions, but mostly the way to bet is that they are a form of propaganda. Especially at this point in the election.

[Crabby Appleton]

11. That Gallup poll is 4 days old, the current daily tracking poll

is Obama 45%, McCain 48%

http://www.gallup.com/poll/110050/Gallup-Daily-McCain-Moves-Ahead-48-45.aspx

[bemildred]

26. It was a great convention they had, wasn't it?

Gripping stuff.

[The Hope Mobile]

48. I don't even want to mention what USA Today poll says

But WTF?? Does this mean people were pulled in by Palin's blatant BS?

[summer borealis]

9. The bullshit M$M have decreed ...

that Obama is so yesterday.

[JohnnyRingo]

12. To believe this requires that voters who formerly supported Obama...

...have suddenly had a change of heart.

Up until today, they were hopeful of an Obama/Biden victory, but as soon as they saw Palin on the ticket, they decided McCain is the best choice, even though his policies are a mirror image of Obama's.

Now I know some people can be pretty wishy washy and fickle, but to believe voters gave up their core values and switched completely to a McCain presidency just because he named an unknown from Alaska stretches it a bit much.

I'm reminded of the phoney baloney endorsement from James Dobson and Limbaugh, who vowed to not vote for McCain because he was too liberal, then conveniently found an excuse to support the Republican after his veep was named. As if they weren't going to all along.

[eagertolearn]

19. Most of the people or coming to Obama's side since Palins speech.

But I did talk to an educated professional (republican) who has been going to vote for Obama the whole time until now. He said "What did you think of that gal?" (I could just picture him smiling over the phone). I said so she is cute and spunky but can she run the country? He said they seem to think she can. I said "have you seen anything besides her speech"? He said no and had not seen any of the news that actually showed that most of what she had said was false! It just makes me sick. I just hope it is temporary this infatuation with the kind of "gal" she is. How can people be so short sided!!!!!!!:banghead:

[JohnnyRingo]

35. Does he know his vote will still go to McCain?

I can't imagine why someone would vote for Obama solely because of Biden either.
I admit, some people puzzle me with their twisted logic. Are these converts assuming McCain's demise is a given?

[eagertolearn]

49. Yes, but his main reason for voting for Obama was to end the war.

Now the repugs are trying to make it look like the war will end soon so I think that line is blurring for some repugs.

[SemperEadem]

13. so how is it

that he can raise $10 million in less than 48 hours after the snarling pitbull's speech and his own party only raised $1million? That is where one looks for the numbers. Polls are skewed and they didn't call me, so that number is suspect.

[D23MIURG23]

14. Depending on the dynamics of the youth vote...

polls might be even more useless than usual this year. Additionally, the electoral map is giving Obama advantages that won't show up in national polling of this kind.

All I'm saying is don't start disparing until the election or the post election vote counting fights are over, and don't worry, because it only lowers morale. In the immortal words of FDR: "The only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

[NCDem60]

37. Well, the dynamics of the youth vote up to now has been...

they don't show up on election day. There are just to many variables to know what is going to happen. I really expected us to have a much bigger lead at this point. While still fairly confident I am less so than a month ago.

[City Lights]

15. I'm with the Obama campaign here. National polls mean nothing.

State-by-state match-ups are where it's at.

The corporate media want a horse race and the national polling organizations will ensure they get it. :boring:

[Mark E. Smith]

17. Umm, so we're going to ignore all this pedestrian stuff and allow the ...

... Grand Old White Peoples' Party to rain garbage down on our candidate's head while we all hold hands and congratulate ourselves on our ability to appeal to the country's better nature?

Got a clue for you. The American people don't give a shit about nuanced speeches on the state of whatever important issue it is that is being trotted out for the day's consideration. They want red meat infotainment, and that includes national polling. And if Senator Obama doesn't give them what they want we're looking at a three-peat.

Try and see if you can't fit that in with your careful consideration of the 'state polls.'

[NBachers]

21. Every factor of scorched earth campaigning must be

followed. Unfortunately, a huge portion of the voting public wants a World Wrestling Entertaninment / American Idol / Big Brother in the House spectacle. They want charred political corpses and beating hearts ripped out alive. Yes, I know, it's stupid, and it's "not fair not fair." But that's what it'll take to get this election won. Do It or lose.

[movonne]

16. I think they are just jerking us around...it reminds me of the red, yellow and

green alerts...just how do they conduct these polls??? how can one day Obama be up by 5 then down -1 the next day...don't make sense...I just don't get it...

[bemildred]

27. No, the color coded terror alerts made more sense. nt

[0rganism]

31. variations like you describe are the MOE in action

a typical 1067-sample poll has a margin of error of about 3% with a 95% confidence interval -- that means there's a 95% chance the poll is within 3% of "reality". Even then, there are outliers -- 95% means a 1 in 20 chance that the MOE is even greater than 3%.

So let's say "reality" is Obama 49%, McCain 47% on both days. Day 1, the pollsters get a sample that's a bit more Obama friendly, and the result is Obama 51%, McCain 46% -- Obama by 5! Day 2, the sample shifts to McCain and you get McCain 49%, Obama 48% -- McCain by 1, what happened? The simplest explanation is Nothing Happened, it's just the sampling error. This is why one can often get better predictive results by watching trend lines on rolling averages of poll results than looking at any specific poll.

[ihelpu2see]

23. problem with poll of poll, any errors in the original polls will be amplified in

the "polling" of said polls...

[redsoxrudy]

29. Convention bounce

McCain is getting the standard 4-6 point convention bounce. While national polls do not mean squat the one bright spot I have seen is that in "poll of polls", while numbers have fluctuated, McCain has yet to break past 44 percent.

[VoodooGuru]

30. Not concerned.

As has been stated, the media run polls to sex up the horse race and get people paying attention.

50 days from now we'll all be laughing.

[2Design]

32. bs

[defendandprotect]

33. Michael Moore on Larry King the other night pointed out how WRONG the polls have been . . .

and when they reverse themselves, as in the 2000 election, they have to deny their own

EXIT polls in order to back Bush -- while those polls were phenomenally accurate as

proved by the press' review of the election results which show that Gore won no matter

how you count the votes -- including in Florida!

So . . . why believe this media garbage now -- ?

[defendandprotect]

34. CNN did a program on McCain tonight . . . missed the first part - they did Cindy's drug problem -

looked like a "get the stuff out front of us and acknowledge it program" ---

it's out there now and smoothed over?

[bemildred]

36. McCain Is `Tied or Behind' in Swing States He Needs for Victory

Sept. 8 (Bloomberg) -- For John McCain and Barack Obama, the race for the White House is a battle of the old and the new -- and it has little to do with age.

The U.S. presidential election is shaping up as a contest over the old America of Ohio's shuttered factories and Michigan's fading auto plants, as well as the newer America that loops from Northern Virginia's suburbs through the Sun Belt and west to Colorado.

While a sputtering economy and an unpopular war may give the Democrats an edge heading into the eight-week sprint to the Nov. 4 vote, other issues lurk in the background. Chief among them is whether Americans are ready to elect their first black president in Obama, 47, an Illinois senator.

``Democrats go into '08 as very clear favorites because of the obvious facts,'' says Merle Black, co-author of ``Divided America: The Ferocious Power Struggle in American Politics'' and a political science professor at Emory University in Atlanta. ``In that sense, it looks like Obama's election to lose.'' Still, Black adds, ``he might lose it.''

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aMkg.UvIx23w&refer=us

This is all so confusing, I just don't know what to think. Can we really not know 8 weeks before the election what the result is going to be? Is it really going to be up to the voters in November?

[farmboxer]

38. Republican manufactured and programmed voting machines

corporate media appears to be, once again, counting on the voting machines, otherwise the election is not ever close, Obama by a landslide, but Republican manufactured and programmed voting machines...........

[gtar100]

39. *IF* this were true, then people are changing their minds. I call BS!

The media wants a tight race. The GOP can only hope for a close race so they can get away with stealing it. But Obama just wouldn't go from 50% to 44% within two days. This is all about the sampling, not anything objective. I'm so sick of the manipulation of polls. And even more so, I'm sick of how they are used to manipulate public perception. This utter disregard for truth is shameful. Another reason to question the ability of American culture to survive in the long term.

[johnnyrocket]

40. I'm feeling good, he's TIED in Virginia, Obama will win it all.

[droidamus2]

44. Funny?

It's funny or maybe not that before the two conventions I told my significant other the following. Obama will get a moderate to small bump out of the Democratic convention and continue to lead McCain by less than double digits. The Republicans will have their convention (and say almost nothing) and McCain will all of a sudden get a huge bump (USA Today/Gallup now showing McCain up 54% to 44%) thus doing everthing they can to keep McCain in the race. Hopefully the rest of my 'political prophecy' will come true in that Obama will be 'seen by the media' making a comeback right before the election and will then come out with a big victory which will give the media a great comeback kid story all the way through the inauguration.

I will also make another prediction, in all the debates between now and the election the Republican, McCain or Palin, will obviously be on the losing side of the debate but the pundits, editorials and rightwing newspapers will come out saying how they were magnificent and 'hit it out of the park'. The probable story line will be that the Republican candidates showed they were real people and that the Democrats really appeared to be self-centered and arrogant (which in real talk means actually intelligent). No matter how much detail the Democrat gives they will say he gave no detail. No matter how little detail the Republican gives they will be said to have given a great deal of detail. Somewhere along the line the media will come up with the equivalent of 'who would you rather have a beer with' meme and they will righteously conclude that the debates rapped it up for McCain/Palin. Don't be surprised in the next 60 days if the media starts saying that the races in the House and Senate are getting much closer than expected even though the Democrats have been leading by big numbers for a couple of years and have registered new and cross over voters in much larger numbers than the Republicans.