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10.31.08: Barack Obama leads John McCain by 4 points, 45% to 41%, in a poll just released by the Florida Chamber of Commerce. This response shows considerable movement in Florida's electorate since the last Florida Chamber poll, conducted October 1st, in which the McCain ticket lead Obama by 3 points, 45% to 42%. Pollsters for the powerful business group contacted 601 likely voters from Oct. 26-27 and the poll has a margin of error of 4 percentage points. The poll also shows 9 percent of Floridians are undecided -- a total that's a bit higher than most other surveys --...

A mere month and a half ago Florida looked like it would be a strong McCain state. However, Obama has been steadily chipping away at McCain’s lead to the point where it is now pretty much a toss-up state. Of course, McCain must win Florida if he hopes to have any chance at the White House. The good news here is that according to the early voting polling, McCain seems to have an surprising edge. The conventional wisdom had been that (and the evidence seems to support this) early voting favors Democrats and Sen. Obama. Indeed, Obama has been encouraging...

McCain Campaign Advisers News Teleconference Speakers: Bill Mcinturff, Lead Pollster, McCain-Palin 2008 Mike Duhaime, McCain Campaign Political Director Christian Ferry, McCain Deputy Campaign Manager Rick Davis, McCain Campaign Manager Brian Rogers, McCain Campaign Spokesman Rich Beeson, RNC Political Director [*] ROGERS: Hey, everybody. Good morning. Thanks for joining us for a call this morning to talk about the state of the race with our campaign manager, Rick Davis; Lead Pollster Bill McInturff; Political Director Mike DuHaime; Deputy Campaign Christian Ferry; and the RNC’s political director, Rich Beeson. With that, I’ll turn it over to Rick. Everybody’s going to talk...

I was on a random college football board and someone supposedly posted the numbers, so take it for what's its worth. Keep fighting hard for every vote! (no matter what the polls say)

OBAMA'S EARLY VOTING LEAD IN FLORIDA IS ONLY 7.5% Based on the total early and absentee ballots casted so far(2,979,991.20), and based on both McCain & Obama getting all the party's support, and Obama getting 5% more of independents, according to the latest media polls, Obama is only leading with approx 7.5 % in early voting, while John Kerry led Bush by 16% in early voting and lost to Bush with 5%, and based on reports that Obama is supposed to get a huge lead among early voters and in voter turn out, Barack Obama is about to lose Florida...

The Democrats' latest tally for ballots cast through Wednesday shows that Democrats have cast 205,205 more absentee or early votes than Republicans have. What's even more eye-popping is that so far, nearly 3-million people have voted (2,982,896). Of the 1,302,982 absentee ballots cast, Democrats cast 35.64 percent, Republicans cast 49.41 percent, and others cast 14.95 percent. Of the 1,679,914 early votes, Democrats cast 53.22 percent; Republicans, 30.32 percent; and other, 16.46 percent.

This will cheer you. Democrats are beaming that their party is outperforming the Republicans in early voting, releasing numbers Wednesday that show registrants of their party ahead 54 percent to 30 percent among the 1.4 million voters who have gone to the polls early. . . . But party breakdowns for turnout aren't the same as final tallies, and at least one poll offered a different view for the campaign of Republican John McCain. A Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll gave McCain a 49-45 lead over Democrat Barack Obama among Floridians who have already voted. And Republicans continued to show a...

Kissimmee (Orlando) FL - - Portraying harmony like never before, Bill Clinton hailed Barack Obama on Wednesday, a power pairing designed to inspire Democrats already smelling victory. "Barack Obama represents America's future, and you've got to be there for him next Tuesday," Clinton, with Obama at his side, said to the cheers of a partisan crowd. Heaping praise on President Bush's predecessor, Obama said of Clinton: "In case all of you forgot, this is what it's like to have a great president." Obama even prodded the crowd to cheer more, saying "Bill Clinton. Give it up!" And there was Clinton,...

Look in later today for our On the Road piece from Wilmington, North Carolina. We're a bit ahead of our coverage, which occasionally happens out here with the long distances, input, output and timing demands. Tonight we'll be at the Obama-Clinton rally in Kissimmee, Florida, and we're breaking in from Miami, where John McCain just concluded his "Joe the Plumber" rally at Everglades Lumber. After the rally, we witnessed a near-street riot involving the exiting McCain crowd and two Cuban-American Obama supporters. Tony Garcia, 63, and Raul Sorando, 31, were suddenly surrounded by an angry mob. There is a moment...

As the presidential race enters its final week and the candidates step up their efforts to woo the space vote, both sides are trotting out the biggest space guns they can find: Apollo astronauts. Over the weekend, Apollo 7 astronaut Walt Cunningham toured cities around Florida to help promote Republican hopeful Sen. John McCain’s campaign by backing the candidate and his space platform. Cunningham said he had never campaigned for a candidate before but said that unlike Democratic contender Sen. Barack Obama, McCain had a track record supporting NASA and was more reliable on the issue. Obama, he said, was...

Poll gives McCain lead in Florida early voting

MCCAIN: It's great to be back in Florida. We need to win Florida on November 4th, and with your help -- we're going to win here, and bring real change to Washington. We need a new direction, and we have to fight for it. I've been fighting for this country since I was seventeen years old, and I have the scars to prove it. If I'm elected President, I will fight to shake up Washington and take America in a new direction from my first day in office until my last. I'm not afraid of the fight, I'm ready for...

Crist says internal polls show McCain ahead in Fla. By Klaus Marre Posted: 10/29/08 04:03 PM [ET] Florida Gov. Charlie Crist (R) on Wednesday cited internal polls showing Republican presidential nominee John McCain ahead in the Sunshine State. According to the RealClearPolitics average of polls in the state, Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) leads by 3.4 percent, and the best McCain has fared in any individual poll recently is a tie in a Reuters/Zogby survey. However, Crist, citing an internal poll, said on MSNBC that McCain is turning things around in a state that is critical in his quest...

Gov. Charlie Crist, his predecessor Jeb Bush and other Florida Republicans introduced John McCain to a crowd in the parking lot of a West Miami lumber yard Wednesday. The Republican presidential nominee came onto the stage outside Everglades Lumber to the theme song from Rocky and began his remarks just after 10:30 a.m. ''On Nov. 4, we've got to win the state of Florida, my friends, and we're going to win here,'' McCain said. He talked about the need to reduce America's oil dependency, cut government spending and lower taxes. ''I'm going to make government live on a budget just...

Mattie Lee Blitch has been dead 23 years but she's still registered to vote in Palm Beach County. Recent college graduate Brett Ackerman is registered three times in two counties. And convicted felon Joseph Muro just signed up to vote — from a state mental institution for the criminally insane. With balloting well under way in the general election, the Sun Sentinel found more than 65,000 ineligible and duplicate voters on Florida's registration rolls. That includes at least 600 dead people, 32,000 voters registered more than once and a growing number of convicted felons — now more than 33,000 —...

TALLAHASSEE — The Republican Party of Florida sent out mailers last week urging voters to cast ballots early, but included the wrong locations of early voting sites in Palm Beach County. The incorrect information also was on the party's Web site, www.rpof.org, as early voting got under way Monday. A vendor incorrectly listed early voting sites for the January primary election, GOP spokeswoman Erin Van Sickle said in an e-mail, calling it an "honest mistake." The sites were not correct for the primary, either, according to the county supervisor of elections office. All 15 locations identified in the mailer were...

URGENT FLORIDA FREEP NEEDED. ORLANDO – EARLY THURSDAY MORNING. ABC’s Good Morning America will broadcast LIVE from Church Street Station in Downtown Orlando, Thursday morning, Oct 30. This is the morning AFTER the big BO infomercial. Directions: Exit any downtown Orlando exit from I-4. Church Street Station is on Church Street, 50 meters west of I-4. Parking under I-4. Couldn’t be easier! Be there WITH SIGNS, THE BIGGER THE BETTER, at 6:45 AM. Will post msg later tonight on how we can all recognize other FReepers.

Yesterday Sen. John McCain boosted his TV advertising units in seven key swing states — Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia, closing the gap between his advertising and Sen. Barack Obama’s. On Sunday, Oct. 26, McCain ran just 331 TV ad units in those seven states — 308% fewer than the 1,350 ad units Obama ran that day. But on Monday, Obama’s lead in these key battleground states shrank to 113% — or a margin of 1,528 ad units, after McCain’s campaign increased the number of TV ad units it ran in those states by 308%, to 1,353...

Please join Senator John McCain for a Joe the Plumber Rally in Miami, FL Wednesday October 29th Everglades Lumber 6991 S.W. 8 Street Miami, FL 33144 Doors Open at 7:30 a.m. Please click here to RSVP online and print your ticket to attend this event

Crist extends voting hours This is a very big deal: Florida Governor Charlie Crist, to the shock and dismay of Florida Republicans, just moved to extend early voting hours, a move likely to widen the Democrats' lead under a program on which the Obama campaign has intensely focused. "He just blew Florida for John McCain," one plugged in Florida Republican just told me.