Polls, Polls, Polls: A Look at the Newest Nationwide & Specific State Numbers

July 16, 2008

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Keeping with tradition, it’s now time for the weekly poll roundup. We will be looking at a couple national polls released over the past couple of days as well as a handful of state by state numbers. It appears as though the race is tightening up a bit, which is not unexpected at this juncture in the contest. In the past we have seen the polls somewhat even out (at least to some extent) prior to the national conventions.

Here are this weeks polls - both state and national:

Public Policy Polling (PPP): South Carolina (7/9-11/08; 542 Likely Voters, Margin of Error 4.2%)

(D) Barack Obama: 39%
(R) John McCain: 45%
(L) Bob Barr: 5%

The Field Poll: California (7/8-14/08; 672 Likely Voters, Margin of Error 3.9%)

(D) Barack Obama: 54%
(R) John McCain: 30%

CBS/New York Times: Nationwide (7/7-14/08, 1,462 Registered Voters)

(D) Barack Obama: 45%
(R) John McCain: 39%

ABC/Post National: Nationwide (7/10-13/08, 1,119 Adults. Margin of Error 3%)

Likely Voters:
(D) Barack Obama: 49%
(R) John McCain: 46%

Registered Voters:
(D) Barack Obama: 50%
(R) John McCain: 42%

Registered Voters (w/Nader & Barr included):

(D) Barack Obama: 49%
(R) John McCain: 39%
(L) Bob Barr: 2%
Ralph Nader: 5%

Adults:

(D) Barack Obama: 51%
(R) John McCain: 39%

Adults (w/Nader & Barr included):

(D) Barack Obama: 49%
(R) John McCain: 36%
(L) Bob Barr: 2%
Ralph Nader: 5%

I think it’s safe to say that there are no real “jaw droppers”, however there are a couple different trends that are worthy of pointing out.

First, it’s clear that Bob Barr would be subsequently siphoning votes from John McCain, that’s a given. However when you look at the ABC/Post National Poll, Ralph Nader’s inclusion is seemingly hurting McCain more then it is Obama. Bizarre? No, not really. It goes to show that Barack Obama is holding strong among independents, as well as Hispanics - two groups who aren’t likely to cast a “protest” vote via Nader, or find themselves genuinely attracted to his brand of politics:

“The new numbers from Zogby: Obama 47%, McCain 40%, beyond the ¬±3.1% margin of error. This is on top of the CBS/NYT and ABC/WaPo polls, which respectively gave Obama a six-point and eight-point lead.

The internals also have a very surprising, and not entirely believable, number: Obama leads among Hispanics by an astonishing 71%-19% margin.”

Now, as I have stated many times prior to this, I think the numbers will shift - too what extent I don’t know - in the polling that will undoubtedly follow. Combine that with the Parties conventions coming up late next month and it’s safe too say that you would have a strong argument that it won’t be until early too mid September that the nationwide polls will truly begin to reflect voters preference.

While the situation regarding individual state polls is entirely different, various political mouthpieces have expressed their belief that the onset of the Presidential debates will cause some sort of noticeable shift in various swing states - areas where the are a good amount of “undecided” voters, individuals who will begin making their minds up when the two candidates are side by side, debating the issues.