One in Seven Voters Still Persuadable

According to an article by The Associated Press, one in seven voters are still undecided.

Who are they?

They look a lot like the voters who've already locked onto a candidate, though they're more likely to be white and less likely to be liberal. And they disproportionately backed Hillary Rodham Clinton's failed run for the Democratic nomination.

These people trust Obama less than decided voters do to handle the economy, the Iraq war and terrorism. They are less accepting that the Illinois senator has enough experience to be president.

And by a 17 percentage-point spread, more see Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin favorably than unfavorably, unlike the narrow majority of voters already backing a candidate who dislike her.

On the other hand, these wavering voters can be equal-opportunity skeptics. A quarter don't trust either Obama or McCain to deal with the economy and a third are uncomfortable with both on the federal deficit.

"I don't have a feel for either one of these guys," said Jeff Condatore, 47, an independent and computer analyst from Ringwood, N.J. "I don't like any of the choices."

Are you still undecided? Why?

One in Seven Voters Still Persuadable

http://politics4moms.blogspot.com/2008/10/one-in-seven-voters-still-persuadable.html

Still Thinking About Polls

Despite the prior two posts I've done in two days on polls, I don't usually pay a ton of attention to them. But my interest was piqued today on Yahoo.com by a headline I've seen all day, "Poll: Voters Souring on McCain, Obama Stays Steady." To be honest, I thought voters had soured on McCain about a week ago so I was expecting to see an even larger dip when I clicked over to the article.

The article is a couple of pages long and goes through all kinds of questions that were posed to voters on whether they find the candidates likable, experienced, honest, compassionate, inspiring, attractive, ethical, etc. On those questions, the poll shows that favorable reaction to McCain has trended downward since September. For Obama, his favorable results have trended upward.

The question I wanted answered was "who would you vote for if the election was today?" Well, if you read the article you won't find that answer. You walk away concluding that probably Obama has widened his lead on McCain based on the results given.

However, I noticed they had a link to a PDF file for the full poll results. If you go to page 6, it says the question was asked, "If the 2008 general election for President were being held today and these were the candidates, who would you vote for?"

According to the full poll results, Obama only leads McCain by 3 percentage points (39-42), with a 3 percent margin of error.

Another interesting fact to note is that at the very top of the full poll results, it says that this poll sampled 873 Democrats and 650 Republicans. Not quite an even amount.

I'm not a statistician by any means, but this is a good example of why you can't put all your eggs in the presidential poll basket.

Still Thinking About Polls

http://politics4moms.blogspot.com/2008/10/still-thinking-about-polls.html

Speaking of Polls

I found a really neat interactive chart at the Wall Street Journal site that plots the results of 26 different polls over the last five months. If you run your cursor over each dot, information will pop up regarding the particular poll. The chart does a great job showing you how many ups and downs this campaign has had and gives you a good visual look of where we are at today.

Go check it out!

Speaking of Polls

http://politics4moms.blogspot.com/2008/10/speaking-of-polls.html

Politics by the Numbers

Polls are a fixture of politics. Polls are also hard to depend on for answers. As you'll see below, these are results from polls taken a few days before last night's debate. The numbers range from Obama having a 5-point lead to a 14-point lead. Why the disparity? Usually it's in the methodology used to take the poll, the number of voters sampled, and probably most importantly, what is that voter's party affiliation.

But for what it's worth, here are the most recent poll results from several of the leading polls:

Zogby/Reuters/C-Span Poll
Democrat Barack Obama has a 5-point lead over Republican John McCain in the U.S. presidential race, according to a Reuters/C-SPAN/ZOGBY poll released on Thursday.

Rasmussen Poll
Barack Obama attracting 50% of the vote while John McCain earns 45%. That’s the fourth straight day with identical numbers and the twentieth straight day that Obama’s support has stayed in the narrow range from 50% to 52% while McCain has been at 44% of 45%

Gallup Daily Tracking Poll
National registered voters continue to prefer Barack Obama (50%) to John McCain (43%) for president.

LA Times/Bloomberg Poll
Three weeks before election day, Obama leads McCain 50% to 41% among voters likely to cast ballots Nov. 4.

CBS News/NY Times Poll
Heading into the final debate, the Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden has widened its lead over the Republicans, John McCain and Sarah Palin. 53% of likely voters support Obama/Biden while 39% support McCain/Palin.

Politics by the Numbers

http://politics4moms.blogspot.com/2008/10/politics-by-numbers.html

Conventions Bring Big Ratings

GOP presidential candidate John McCain attracted roughly the same number of viewers to his convention acceptance speech Thursday as Obama did before the Democrats last week, according to Nielsen Media Research.

It marked the end of an astonishing run where more than 40 million people watched political speeches on three nights by Obama, McCain and Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin. The Republican convention was the most-watched convention on television ever, beating a standard set by the Democrats a week earlier.

Three times in two weeks, political speeches were watched by more people than the “American Idol” finale, the Academy Awards and the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympics this year.

via FoxNews.com

Conventions Bring Big Ratings

http://politics4moms.blogspot.com/2008/09/conventions-bring-big-ratings.html

Latest Gallup Poll Numbers

The latest Gallup Poll Daily tracking update shows John McCain moving ahead of Barack Obama, 48% to 45%, when registered voters are asked for whom they would vote if the presidential election were held today.

These results are based on Sept. 4-6 interviewing, and include two full days of polling after the conclusion of the Republican National Convention last Thursday night.

Tomorrow's report will be the first in which all interviews were conducted after the conclusion of the convention. Gallup measures convention bounces by comparing candidate support in the last poll done entirely before a party's presidential nominating convention begins with the first polling conducted entirely after its conclusion.

via Gallup.com

Latest Gallup Poll Numbers

http://politics4moms.blogspot.com/2008/09/latest-gallup-poll-numbers.html

Race is Tight in the Polls

UPDATED: A commenter questioned where I was getting my polling information. He cited the Gallup poll which had Obama up by 9 points. I had also looked at Rasmussen and they had Obama at +3 and ABC News had Obama at +6. In some swing states, McCain had been down by as many as 17 points. He has whittled that lead down to 2 points.

For as much fervor as Obama garners wherever he goes, it would seem he'd be ahead in the polls with a substantitive lead over McCain. Instead, he is up only a few points which is causing pundits to speculate how McCain could pull out a victory in November.

Can McCain Back Into the Presidency? Real Clear Politics

How McCain Could Win Over Undecideds, The Wall Street Journal

A Deadlock-Proof Democratic Majority? The New York Times

Race is Tight in the Polls

http://politics4moms.blogspot.com/2008/07/race-is-tight-in-polls.html