A new poll finds Democratic Sen. Barack Obama is gaining ground in some key battleground states in his battle with GOP Sen. John McCain for the White House:
The latest FOX News/Rasmussen Reports state polls show that Barack Obama has increased his lead over John McCain in Pennsylvania and Virginia. The candidates are within a single point of each other in Colorado, Florida and Ohio.
Barack Obama has gained ground in five new state polls — Colorado, Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Virginia — compared to previous Fox News/Rasmussen Reports polls.
In Pennsylvania, Obama now leads by eight percentage points, 50% to 42%.
In Virginia, it’s Obama 50% and John McCain 47%.
The candidates are within a single point of each other in Colorado (Obama 49%, McCain 48%), Florida (Obama 47%, McCain 47%), and Ohio (McCain 48% Obama 47%).
National polls and other state polling conducted by Rasmussen Reports indicate Obama gained ground before last Friday night’s debate, probably as a result of the economic turmoil that has dominated the news. Since the debate, the Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll shows little change in the national numbers.
Regardless of the timing and the cause, however, the overriding trend from the past week is a shift in the battleground states that favors Obama.
McCain faces a variety of problems: the worsening economic crisis, the failure of the bailout which he touted as his having helped pass (before it passed), his own campaign stumbles and missteps — and the continuing nosedive popularity ratings of President George Bush…who has now set yet another southward record for himself.
Twenty-seven percent of Americans approve of the job George Bush is doing as president, the lowest rating of his tenure, a Gallup poll indicates.
Bush’s approval rating is down 4 percentage points from the 31 percent he had in a Gallup Poll taken before the financial crisis buffeting Wall Street intensified, pollsters said.
The latest poll, released Tuesday, was conducted before the House voted against a $700 billion plan to bail out U.S. financial markets
The timing of the decline indicates the credit crisis and government’s response to it are responsible for the low showing, the Princeton, N.J., polling agency said. Results indicate only 28 percent of respondents approved and 68 percent disapproved of Bush’s response to the financial crisis.
Among Republicans, Bush’s job rating fell to 64.
The next possible “game changer”: Thursday’s debate between Vice Presidential candidates Democratic Sen. Joe Biden and Republican Gov. Sarah Palin.
Usually Veep debates don’t matter but this one could: Palin started out as a plus on the ticket but her negatives have continued to rises amid news reports filling in blanks about her and her unimpressive showing in mostly-controlled interview settings. Her press has been so bad that if she shows up and gives even a respectively flat debate performance the narrative will be that she exceeded expectations. And nearly four days of debate prep (most assuredly on content, style and prepared zingers) is likely to have helped. Will she become a big positive again for McCain with all but Republican base voters?
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.