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Polls: Obama McCain Race Dead Heat In One And Obama Surges In Another

June 8th, 2008
By JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief

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The latest Gallup Daily Tracking poll shows the face between presumptive Democratic and Republican nominees Senators Barack Obama and John McCain remains a dead heat — but a Rasmussen poll finds Obama starting to surge.

Why the apparent surge? Rasmussen attributes it to growing unity within the Democratic party.

Gallup Poll Daily tracking finds 46% of registered voters saying they would vote for Democrat Barack Obama for president if the election were held today, while 45% would choose Republican John McCain.

The race between the two has been very close since Gallup began tracking it in mid-March, with the vast majority of Gallup Poll Daily tracking reports showing a statistical dead heat. (To view the complete trend since March 7, 2008, click here.) In fact, over the past 10 days the race either has been exactly tied or has shown one of the candidates with only a one percentage point advantage. That may soon change, as Obama has run slightly better versus McCain in each of the past two individual nights’ polling, following Hillary Clinton’s decision to drop out of the presidential race and endorse Obama.

Since Obama clinched the Democratic nomination, there has been much talk of a joint Obama-Clinton ticket. While some of her supporters have pushed for this, Clinton has sought to ease the pressure on Obama by saying the decision is his alone, though she has said she would accept the vice presidential slot if offered. Gallup finds a slim majority of Democrats, 52%, in favor of Obama choosing Clinton as his running mate.

As we’ve warned here, polls are (a) snap shots, (b) see-saws, (c) often contradictory.

And Rasmussen Reports has a different take on the race than Gallup:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows Barack Obama’s bounce growing to an eight-point lead over John McCain. Obama now attracts 48% of the vote while McCain earns 40%.

When “leaners” are included, Obama leads 50% to 43%. On Tuesday, just before Obama clinched the nomination, the candidates were tied at 46%. Data from Rasmussen Markets gives Obama a 95.1 % chance of winning.

Why the “surge”?

Obama’s bounce is the result of growing unity among the Democratic Party. Eighty-one percent (81%) of Democrats say they will vote for Obama over McCain. That’s the highest level of party support ever enjoyed by Obama. Still, three-out-of-ten voters are either uncommitted or could change their mind before Election Day. Fifty-six percent (56%) of those swayable voters are women and most earn less than $60,000 a year. There are more conservatives than liberals among these potential swing voters.

So while McCain continues his efforts to reassure voters fed up with the Bush Administration that he isn’t Bush Lite, Obama is going to be working hard to reunify his party and win over more conservatively oriented swing voters who could vote for McCain if he doesn’t overcome their objections and alleviate their fears — fears the GOP will be trying to accentuate.

The Rasmussen poll has yet one more tidbit of lousy news for the nation’s news media:

Other survey results show that voters—by a 4-to-1 margin–believe reporters try to help their favorite candidate rather than report the news objectively. Most believe Obama has been the reporters’ favorite so far in Election 2008 and 44% believe most reporters will try to help Obama in the fall campaign. Just 14% believe that most reporters will try to help McCain.

Impact: Throughout the campaign, look for the McCain camp to often point out what it considers to be slanted news coverage, since many Americans are already concluding that is the case and voters will be receptive to the charge.



This entry was posted on Sunday, June 8th, 2008 at 11:25 am and is filed under Democratic Party, Elections, John McCain, MSM, Bush Administration, Newsweek Blogitics, Republican Party, Independents, Media, Barack Obama, Media Criticism, Conservatives, 2008 Elections, Independent Voters, Democrats, Hillary Clinton, Republicans, Politics. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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