Reuters/Ipsos national poll: Obama leads by 7-points

[WI_DEM]

Reuters) - Americans are increasingly pessimistic about the future but voters do not seem to be holding it against Democratic President Barack Obama, who slightly expanded his lead over Republican rival Mitt Romney this month, a new Reuters/Ipsos poll says.

Three months before the November 6 presidential election, nearly two-thirds of Americans think the country is moving in the wrong direction. Only 31 percent say it is moving in the right direction - the lowest number since December 2011.

But Obama's lead over Romney among registered voters was 49 percent to 42 percent, up slightly from the 6-point advantage the president held a month earlier over the former Massachusetts governor.

The results of the monthly poll - in which a majority of voters agreed that the economy is the most important problem facing the United States - suggest that the Obama campaign's efforts to paint Romney as being out of touch with the concerns of middle-class Americans could be preventing the Republican from gaining momentum in the race.

"The overall 'right track, wrong track' is worse than last month - the news hasn't been great lately," said Ipsos pollster Chris Jackson. "But Obama seems to be, to some extent, inoculated against some of the worst of that."

The telephone poll of 1,168 adults, including 1,014 registered voters, was taken from August 2 to August 6. During that period, the Labor Department reported that U.S. employers hired the most workers in five months but that the nation's jobless rate had risen to 8.3 percent from 8.2 percent.

Even so, in a reversal from July, registered voters thought Obama was stronger than Romney in dealing with jobs and the economy, and with tax issues.

The poll indicated that 46 percent of registered voters thought Obama was stronger on jobs and the economy, compared with 44 percent for Romney. And on tax matters, 49 percent saw Obama as stronger, compared with 38 percent for Romney.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/08/08/us-usa-campaign-poll-idUSBRE8770SL20120808

[DavidDvorkin]

1. Now the Pew poll doesn't look so much like an outlier.

[Robbins]

2. Nope

It was close to truth.Not hard to Imagne since Obama's winning In the swing states.

[Cali_Democrat]

3. How much longer can Romney keep his tax returns from the American people?

I would think that the GOP powers that be are getting restless.

[WI_DEM]

4. it should begin to appear fishy that he isn't releasing them to counter the accusations

if there isn't truth in what Reid and others are saying.

[Cosmocat]

6. It's past that point

It is bad - almost inconceivable that it is 10 years of totally not paying taxes, but it has to be really bad.

This just shows a complete inability for Romney to even TRY to not bleed every last cent at any given opportunity.

He know he was running for president this year since the LAST TIME HE RAN.

He had four years to just do a simple, honest, tax return.

There is like a HAIR of fore site to that.

That is it, simple common sense.

But, this is some serious scorpion and frog stuff, his nature is so carnal, that he could not buck up and not greed his way to 10s of millions more by gaming, at best, his taxes.

Says A LOT about who he is.

[Monk06]

5. If Ipsos was involved in this poll you can't take it to the bank and exchange it for gold.

Their accuracy on political polling is within 0.3%. That's one third of one percent.