Posted on 10/11/2004 7:48:38 AM PDT by nckerr
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic challenger John Kerry (news - web sites) expanded his slight lead over President Bush (news - web sites) to three points in a tight race for the White House, according to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Monday.
The Massachusetts senator held a 47-44 percent lead over Bush in the latest three-day tracking poll, up two points from Sunday. Bush's support dropped one point and Kerry's support rose one point in the new poll.
The close race turns up the pressure for Wednesday's final debate in Tempe, Arizona, when the White House rivals will have another chance to make their case to voters on domestic issues.
The poll found six percent of likely voters are still undecided about the race with barely more than three weeks to go until the Nov. 2 election, and 16 percent of the voters who identify themselves as independents are undecided.
Bush made small gains among young voters and Kerry picked up strength among women voters ahead of the debate -- the final chance for both candidates to speak directly to an audience of millions of voters.
"Wednesday's debate is vital because many sub-groups remain close and because so many independents have yet to make up their minds," pollster John Zogby said.
The poll of 1,214 likely voters was taken Friday through Sunday and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.9 percentage points. The rolling poll will continue through Nov. 1 -- the day before the election.
The last two days of polling came after Bush and Kerry battered each other over Iraq (news - web sites), jobs and taxes during a debate on Friday. The economy and Iraq are consistently listed as the top issues in the race.
A tracking poll combines the results of three consecutive nights of polling, then drops the first night's results each time a new night is added. It allows pollsters to record shifts in voter sentiment as they happen.
The poll found 48 percent of voters thought the United States was headed in the wrong direction and 45 percent thought it was headed in the right direction.
It also showed independent candidate Ralph Nader (news - web sites), blamed by some Democrats for drawing enough votes from Al Gore (news - web sites) to cost him the election in 2000, earning the support of 1.7 percent of likely voters.
Thanks for the summary. Makes me feel better.
I am worried by this poll...lest we forget, Zogby had Gore up by 2 on election day 2000....Gore, did in fact, get more votes than Bush...the only other poll on that day that had Gore up (by one) was the CBS poll, while Fox had it a tie.
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If you look at the stats.. there were several polls - all which were within the margin of error.. did gore get the popular vote by 2 percent or less? I am guessing much less. I dont know the total number of people who voted in 2000.. but he supposedly won by 500,000 - most of which came from california and new york, if memory serves me correctly.
Where is News'weak's poll? After the first debate they couldn't get the news out fast enough that, according to their poll, Kerry had taken the lead.
How many times will this be posted???
This is a conspiracy if I've ever seen one. Every other poll has Bush by 3-5. Along comes Zogby to muddy it up. They need at least one poll to refer to when they start their lawsuits. Zogby was more than happy to help those rats.
Don't worry about this poll. It was Zogby's telephone poll. This 3 point stuff is his interactive which was not so accurate in the 2002 election.
If my memory serves me, I think Gore won the vote by 1.5%...and I think the vote total was upwards of one million or more...however, Bush as we know won the EC vote tally....But my REAL point was that we cannot simply dismiss the Zogby poll.
On election day 2000, Gallup had Bush up by 2, ABC had Bush up by 3, Battelground was Bush by 5, POA had Bush up 9, Newsweek had Bush up 2, Washington Post had Bush up by 3.
I think the poll is probably somewhat accurate. However I do think, that the margin of error is in the republican favor. Soley because I do not think Republicans take time to answer polls.
Therefore, my guess it is a dead heat. In which case, we referred to the EC. Bush wins the EC again.
Everyone in here should sign up for ZOGBY. GO to their website and do it!
Gore won the the popular vote by 0.4-0.5%.
yeah, right. after that masterful performance friday, kerry blows away...no one.
Stop confusing Zogby interactive with his telephone surveys. His ineractive poll is voluntary and subjective to whoever wants to take it. Maybe we should Freep it and mess up his results.
Total Votes...105,399,588 Gore.....50,996,039 48.38% Bush.....50,456,141 47.87% Difference..539,898 0.51% A win of 2% or more wouldn't have been close in the EC..
Zogby is smoking something!!!
This is the last poll you will see with a Kerry lead.
So you are saying that these polling results are soley driven by data obtained from the internet?
If that is truely the case, then Zogby should not be in the business.
Any data obtain from any type of internet polling is suspect.
To date their has not even been accurate statistical analysis of WHO is actually on the internet.
Not to mention, in order to find WHO and study their surfing habits and whether or not they would take time to particpate in on-line polls.
It is a total joke.
This is total bull. Bush is leading in all the polls that matter. Zogby was dead wrong in 2002 as he is now.
Total Votes...105,399,588
Gore.....50,996,039 48.38%
Bush.....50,456,141 47.87%
Difference..539,898 0.51%
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Okay.. this is what I was trying to get at.. there was NO 2% lead for Gore which Zogby had predicted. Bush got nearly a full 2 percentage points more than what Zogby said while Gore's margin of error was hardly even half a point.
Does anyone else see the problem with the way Zogby weighs his polls?
Of course all these numbers are within the margin of error. The point is that Bush needs to have a lead out side of the margin of error to win (and get above the coming onslaught of voter fraud).
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