Presidential Poll Quickie: Oct. 9, 2008

I have an irrational love of numbers. The only numbers people interested in politics get to obsess over without reservations are polls. So here’s a brief summary of the latest national presidential election polls and polls in states that John McCain and Barack Obama appear to think are in play.

Although the October 7, 2008 presidential debate between Republican presidential candidate John McCain and Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama was widely seen as essentially a draw — which would benefit the front runner, Obama, but not affect climbs or falls in the numbers — there has been some movement in the polls since that debate.

National polls have seen McCain slowly and so far not significantly gaining on Obama. While a Gallup poll still has Obama leading by 11 percentage points with 52% over McCain’s 41%, a Rasmussen poll has Obama at 50% over McCain’s 45%, a Hotline/FD poll has Obama at 47% over McCain’s 41%, a Reuters/C-Span/Zogby poll has Obama at 48% to McCain’s 44%, and a GW/Battleground poll has Obama at 48% to McCain’s 45%. Obama’s numbers are generally down two or three percentage points from polls earlier this week, but they are outside the statistical margin of error.

In projections for the electoral college that average-in trends over several different recent polls, Obama is now projected to win 349 electoral votes over McCain’s 174, with North Carolina’s 15 electoral votes considered a toss-up. A candidate needs 270 electoral college votes to win the presidential election.

The battleground states of the moment are Colorado, Florida, Indiana, Ohio, Missouri, Nevada, and North Carolina, which add up to a total of 98 electoral votes — enough to nearly swing the election one way or the other, although McCain would have to pick up all these states and 9 more electoral votes from elsewhere to win, since Indiana’s 11 electoral votes are currently credited to his 174. If McCain manages to hold on to all his current electoral votes, he would be most likely to pick those remaining 9 votes up in Michigan, New Mexico, or Virginia, which all currently poll for Obama at an average of 6% each.

Here are the developments in those battlground states:

Colorado (9 electoral votes) had been called a tie by the Denver Post earlier last week, with projections that it might return to its old habit of leaning GOP after generally favoring Obama following the Democratic National Convention in Denver. A recent Fox News/Rasmussen poll and an InAdv/Poll Position poll, however, have both put the mood there at 51% Obama over McCain’s 45%.

Florida (27 electoral votes) has been leaning slightly Obama recently, but the state is certainly still very much contested. The Republican-leaning Florida Chamber of Commerce has polled McCain at 45% to Obama’s 42%.  A non-partisan Mason/Dixon poll has Obama at 48% to McCain’s 46%, and a Rasmussen poll has Obama at 50% to McCain’s 47%.

Indiana (11 electoral votes) was called a tie by a Research 2000 poll earlier last week, but a more recent CNN/Time poll has McCain leading Obama 51% to 46%, and an even more recent Rasmussen poll has McCain even farther ahead, at 50% to Obama’s 43%.

Ohio (20 electoral votes) remains hotly contested, although it is currently leaning slightly towards Obama, who has lost a few percentage points in that crucial swing state. Earlier in the week, an ABC News/Washington Post poll and a poll by the Democratic-leaning PPP had both predicted Obama 6% ahead, at 51% to McCain’s 45% and 49% to McCain’s 43% respectively. Then, a later Fox News/Rasmussen poll had predicted McCain taking the lead at 48% to Obama’s 47%, only to have the most current polls by CNN/Time and ARG once again put Obama in the lead at 50% to 47% and 48% to 45% respectively. A three percent lead is close to the margin of error, so Ohio is essentially undecided.

Michigan (17 electoral votes) recently saw McCain pull his ad funding as the state seemed to slip further and further into the Obama camp, but Michigan will remain one of the states that McCain will have to pursue if he wants to retain a chance of winning. The numbers, however, are not at all good for McCain. The Democratic-leaning PPP’s recent poll has predicted a 51% to 41% lead for Obama, and, more significantly, the conservative-leaning Rasmussen has Obama ahead 56% to McCain’s 50%. This follows a tie two weeks ago.

Missouri (11 electoral votes) had Obama take the lead polls earlier in the week by CNN/Time (49% to McCain’s 48%) and by Fox News/Rasmussen (50% to McCain’s 47%), but the most recent poll by ARG puts McCain ahead once again at 49% to Obama’s 46%. Missouri may be the state currently credited to Obama’s electoral votes by long-term tendency that McCain needs to secure in order to have a chance to win.

Nevada (5 electoral votes), once a McCain state, has seen Obama’s consistent lead waver in magnitude over the last few polls, bouncing from 4 points (Rasmussen) up to 7 points (Reno Gazette-Journal) and back down to 2 points (InAdv/PollPosition). The state is certainly still in play.

New Mexico (5 electoral votes), where McCain had hoped to benefit from his popularity in neighboring Arizona and his hard-line talk on illegal immigration, still has Obama ahead by 5% each in recent Rasmussen and Albuquerque Journal polls.

North Carolina (15 electoral votes) is the most hotly contested state, with the Charlotte area polling heavily for Obama and the rest of the state leaning towards McCain. Unlike Obama’s native Illinois, where Chicago’s high Democratic numbers among blue collar workers and African Americans regularly overrule the rest of the state’s steady Republican base, Charlotte is not large enough (yet) to do the same in North Carolina. The polls there have been all over the place this week. The Democratic-leaning PPP put Obama at 50% over McCain’s 44%. CNN/Time called the state at tie at 49% each. SurveyUSA put McCain at 49% and Obama at 46%. The Republican-leaning Civitas/TelOpinion polled Obama at 48% and McCain at 43%. Rasmussen puts Obama at 49% over McCain’s 48%. The state is an important prize for the McCain campaign, so look for a lot of campainging there in the coming weeks, with plenty of appeals to the Southern conservative base by Sarah Palin.

Virginia (13 electoral votes) has traditionally been a GOP state and is one where McCain still has some chance of success, albeit the current polls by Suffolk (12%), SurveyUSA (10%), Fox News/Rasmussen (2%), and the Democratic-leaning PPP (8%) all put Obama fairly comfortably in the lead, if less so since the last presidential debate.

The McCain campaign will also need to keep an eye on states where McCain only leads by an average of 6% or less in the polls. Currently the only state in that category is West Virginia (5 electoral votes).

Presidential Poll Quickie: Sep. 28, 2008

I have an irrational love of numbers. The only numbers people interested in politics get to obsess over without reservations are polls. So here’s a brief summary of the latest national presidential election polls and polls in states that John McCain and Barack Obama appear to think are in play.

Recent national polls appear to more clearly favor Barack Obama over John McCain that has previously been the case. A Gallup poll has Obama ahead at 50% to McCain’s 42%, a Rasmussen poll has Barack Obama ahead at 50% to McCain’s 44%, and a Hotline/FD poll has Obama ahead at 47% to McCain’s 42%.

Current electoral vote totals put Barack Obama at 286 electoral votes and John McCain at 252 electoral votes, a gain by Obama of 13 electoral votes over last week.

In Florida, John McCain continues to hold on to the slightest of leads over Barack Obama, at 48% to Obama’s 47%.

Iowa appears to have gone from a battle ground state to solidly for Barack Obama, with all more recent polls putting Obama ahead of McCain in that state, and the most current Iowa poll putting Obama at 51% to McCain’s 43%.

Michigan no longer appears to be a battle ground state. The newest poll there puts Barack Obama 13% ahead of John McCain, at 51% to 38%.

Missouri appears to edging towards a toss-up, with John McCain’s lead over Barack Obama there melting to 48% to 46% in one poll and to 47% to 46% in another poll.

In hotly contested Nevada, John McCain holds on to a slim lead of 46% over Barack Obama’s 45% in the most recent poll.

After John McCain pulled ahead in New Hampshire earlier in the week by two points, four successive polls have shown Obama in the lead, with the most recent one putting Obama at 48% and McCain at 44%.

In the usually solidly Republican North Carolina, Barack Obama now leads John McCain at 49% to 47%, according to the latest poll, following two polls that had tied the two candidates at 45% each and at 46% each.

John McCain seems to be currently ahead in Ohio, which has been back and forth frequently. A poll earlier last week had reduced Obama’s lead to a tie at 46% to 46%, and the newest poll gives McCain a slight lead at 47% to Obama’s 46%. Unless something drastic happens, Ohio will, as usual, add suspense to the presidential election until election night and make its 20 electoral votes a deciding factor.

Barack Obama continues to hold on to his lead in Pennsylvania, with 47% to John McCain’s 43% in the most current poll and 49% to 45% in one the day before.

Virginia, which has voted Republican since the end of the Dixiecrats, now appears to have tilted in Obama’s favor at 50% over McCain’s 45%. The polls in Virginia have been going back and forth frequently, so nothing is settled yet — it looks like this state might be one of the ones to watch election night. Virginia has 13 electoral votes.

After only showing a one-point lead in the Big Ten Battleground poll two weeks ago in Wisconsin, Barack Obama is now once again clearly in the lead in that state, at 49% to John McCain’s 43%.