Posted on 10/22/2008 6:32:21 AM PDT by tatown
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Wednesday shows Barack Obama attracting 51% of the vote while John McCain earns 45%. Obama has now enjoyed a modest lead every day for nearly a month.
It is difficult to overstate the stability of this campaign ever since the events on Wall Street brought a new wave of economic anxiety to the fore. Just before Lehman Brothers collapsed and started the Wall Street debacle, McCain held a very slight lead in the polls. Immediately afterwards, the race became more of a referendum on the Bush Administration and Obama moved ahead. The stability of Obama’s advantage in recent weeks suggests that it will be difficult for McCain to change the dynamic before the results are finally set in stone.
For the past eleven days, Obama has been at the 50% or 51% level of support every day in the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll. During those same eleven days, McCain has been at 45% or 46% every day and the gap between the candidates has stayed between four and six percentage points.
If you go back a couple of weeks further, the results are pretty much the same. It’s now been 27 days since Obama’s support moved below 50% or above 52%. During that period, the number voting for McCain has stayed in the 44% to 46% range and the gap between the candidates has ranged from four to eight percentage points (see trends).
Rasmussen Markets data shows Obama with an 86.0 % chance of winning in November (see market expectations for key states).
Tracking Poll results are released every day at 9:30 a.m. Eastern and a FREE daily e-mail update is available.
Fifty-five percent (55%) of voters have a favorable opinion of Barack Obama while 54% say the same about John McCain. Those figures include 41% with a Very Favorable opinion of Obama and 26% who say the same about McCain (see trends).
Forty-seven percent (47%) of voters say the economy is the top issue of Election 2008 while 19% name national security. Eleven percent (11%) say fiscal issues such as taxes and spending are the highest priority while 10% look primarily to domestic issues such as Social Security and health care. Only 7% name cultural issues as most important.
Polling released yesterday for West Virginia and South Carolina show McCain leading in both. New state polling results were released earlier this week for Colorado, Florida, Missouri, North Carolina, Ohio, and Virginia. See a video overview of the latest Fox News/Rasmussen Reports Battleground State polls.
Rasmussen Reports data indicates that Obama currently has the edge in every state won by John Kerry four years ago. However, of the states won by George Bush, McCain is trailing in four and five others are considered a toss-up. As a result, Electoral College projections now show Obama leading 260-163. When “leaners” are included, Obama leads 286-174. A total of 270 Electoral Votes are needed to win the White House.
Take a moment to predict how many Electoral College votes Obama will win this year.
Recent statewide Presidential polls have been released for Arizona, California, Colorado, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Kansas, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, New Hampshire, New Mexico, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia and Wisconsin Demographic crosstabs for all state polling are available for Premium Members. Learn More.
Daily tracking results are collected via telephone surveys of 1,000 likely voters per night and reported on a three-day rolling average basis. The margin of sampling error—for the full sample of 3,000 Likely Voters--is +/- 2 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Results are also compiled on a full-week basis and crosstabs for the full-week results are available for Premium Members.
Like all polling firms, Rasmussen Reports weights its data to reflect the population at large (see methodology). Among other targets, Rasmussen Reports weights data by political party affiliation using a dynamic weighting process. During the final two months of Election 2008, party weighting targets are updated each Sunday (see additional information). For polling data released during the week of October 19-25, 2008, the partisan weighting targets used by Rasmussen Reports will be 39.7% Democratic, 33.0% Republican, and 27.3% unaffiliated.
A review of last week’s key polls is posted each Saturday morning. We also invite you to review other recent demographic highlights from the tracking polls, our Quick Campaign Overview and a 50-State Summary of the Presidential Race.
It might actually be better than 50-45 for last night, but the number is certainly reasonable. I hesitate to put McCain’s number much under 45 given the real lack of “internal” movement. Anyway, I can say, without a doubt, that Obama’s number in the one-day sample today couldn’t have been higher than 50.25%.
The true “internal” number for the three-day sample is a margin of O+5.06% (with rounding it appears to be 6). Yesterday, it was O+4.55% (with rounded it appeared to be 4).
Another pro-McCain sample (in comparison to the three-day number) falls off tomorrow. Friday, a pro-Obama sample falls off.
I think that’s about it.
Yeah, we may be wishing real hard, but there is a rule of precedence of not getting the true feel of the race from the press. I will continue contacting every one I know to vote.
Name a Republican the DNC/MSM/Hollywood/Academia have NOT destroyed?
All we can do is hope people change their minds in the private polling booth.
The BOB DOLE Comments ARE INTENDED TO KEEP PEOPLE FROM VOTING!
These Obama troll are swarming here peddling bad poll data and trying to SWAY People into not voting !
It is really just my rolling estimate of rasmussen's raw data started from a period when both candidates were stable for a period of 5 days. I have no doubt my estimated raw numbers don't match ras's. But they help anticipate trends. In a three day rolling average poll, what falls off a poll can be just as important as what comes onto the poll. In the Ras poll, McCain had great polling days on Saturday and Sunday. Saturday's numbers fell off today's average, and Sunday's numbers fall off tomorrow. For the last three days I show McCain at 48 - 40 - 47 and Obama at 50 - 50 - 53. With that in mind, I suspect McCain's numbers will drop tomorrow. But note that he's actually gained 7 in the last two days in my estimate. Again, with a rolling poll what falls off can have more of an impact than what enters. I don't know what will enter, but I can make an educated guess at what is falling off. If McCain stays even tomorrow, that is GREAT news because the next day, a terrible day falls off for him.
Incidently, looking at the Gallup and Zogby polls, I suspect the Gallup poll will tighten today. Obama is losing one of his best days ever. Same for Zogby.
There has been some movement but what we have seen in the these polls is a shift related to Powell. McCain’s support is holding. Run hard and keep on Messge McCain and if conservative 527s have any money left this is the time. We have too much at stake.
Where is this tracking poll published? I can’t find it.
Trust me, these weren’t Hillary voters if you know what I mean.
Mason-Dixon now has McCain only 2 down in Virginia. Two days ago Rasmussen had McCain 10 down. Something is happening in Virginia.
“Heard McCain interview this morning. He said that in 2004 it was Kerry +13 over Bush at this point in one of the polls”
Not according to Rasmussen.
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/election_2004/week_by_week_numbers
I have Rasmussen premium now, and I get to see the daily results.
For today, McCain has 41% Certain voters, 3% likely voters, and 1% lean. Obama has 44% certain, 5% likely, and 1% lean. For some odd reason though, Rasmussen put down 51% as Obama’s total for the day. May be a rounding issue.
A 50 to 46 day falls off tonight.
not!
+6 Dem still?
For what it’s worth, I think it is a bit misleading for pollsters to insist on including leaners with a candidate rather than “undecided.” Or at least to show one set of numbers without showing the other so that we can get a sense of the volatility of the numbers.
There is no doubt they are enthused, but their turn out last time was good too, and they HATED George Bush in 2004 because he STOLE the 2000 election. The base was out in full force. That base has grown this year for sure, but they also lose some moderate dems that find Obama too far out there. Older voters in particular.
With the Palin addition, combined with a fear of Obama, I think our base will be out too. That is why I don’t think the margin will be that big. There has never been a 6% differene in party ID, and I think it would take a more serious enthusiasm gap that I am seeing. 30,000 people are making it out to see Palin. That’s a pretty good sign. I still think the Dems have an advantage in turnout, just not 6%.
Agreed. I think it is in the “likely” and “leaners” that you will find those voters subject to the Bradley Effect.
Yeah, to me it looks like a 44-41 race which is almost exactly the way AP sees it today and pretty close to TIPP. Lots of not sures out there. And nobody knows which way they will tip in the end.
I agree with you.
Thanks for the info.
What did he have for them yesterday, 50-46 as well?
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