FIRST THOUGHTS: A TIE BALLGAME

[gateley]

From Chuck Todd, Mark Murray, and Domenico Montanaro
*** A tie ballgame: Major news organizations released three new national polls yesterday, and they all signaled the same thing: After the party conventions and VP picks, this presidential race is pretty much tied. The Washington Post/ABC poll had Obama up one point among registered voters (47%-46%). A CBS survey had McCain ahead by two (46%-44%). And CNN had the race deadlocked at 48%-48%. Tonight, our NBC/WSJ poll -- generally considered the gold standard of national surveys -- comes out at 6:30 pm ET on Nightly News and MSNBC.com. Will it show a similar result? The bad news for Team Obama is that this tied race is occurring in a pro-Democrat political environment, and skittish Democrats -- who haven’t won the White House since 1996 -- are going to wring their hands over any piece of bad news, which is never good for morale. The good news for them: In 2004, John Kerry found himself behind after the GOP convention by a significant margin, and he had to use three strong debate performances just to pull within striking distance. It doesn’t look like that will be the case for Obama and the Democrats this year. <snip>

*** What to watch for: The next thing to look for in polling is to see where in the battleground numbers shifted the most. Has Palin put the Republicans back in the game in the agricultural Midwest? Will these soft GOP states like Indiana, North Carolina, Missouri, and Montana start tilting back to the GOP? What about the soft toss-ups like Florida or Michigan? Will they match the national number or tilt slightly GOP (in Florida's case) and slightly Dem (in Michigan's case?). Of course, the quality of publicly available state polls is not good, which will make judging the battleground even more difficult. Still, to truly know what's in play and not, keep an eye on the candidate schedules. <snip>

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More opinion and interesting video clips interspersed throughout the article: http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/09/09/1366015.aspx

[pleah]

1. Bullshit.

I don't think it is as close as the spinners are saying.

[gateley]

2. I'm not agreeing with them, just putting their opinions out there. I like to

hear from all sides, rather than just picking and choosing whatever will support my beliefs and hopes.

Even some of the most aggravating criticism of us or our candidates sometimes has a nugget of truth embedded. :shrug:

[pleah]

3. Well, ya did ask for my first thought.

:) :hi:


I know that politics is politics, but I still don't believe the polls.

[gateley]

4. Understood. Just didn't want you to think I was in lock-step with their analyses.

:hi: