It’s kind of looking that way, according to a report in The Hill, though it’s a squeaker.
The new Miami Herald/Tampa Bay Times poll released late Sunday finds Obama topping Romney by 1 point with 48 percent support among likely voters to 47, an edge well within the survey’s 3.5 percent margin of error. Former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate, tallies 1 percent, with 4 percent of voters undecided. …The Hill
The Democratic-leaning PPP poll gives Obama a 4-point lead.
There’s been a big swing of independent voters’ support to Obama since the video came out showing Romney’s speech to fundraisers in Florida.
Both polls were conducted as a leaked videotape from a Romney fundraiser showed the GOP candidate saying that “47 percent” of Americans were dependent on government and could be expected to back Obama.
In the PPP survey, 89 percent of voters said they were familiar with the comments and 50 percent said they were inappropriate to 44 who did not have an issue with the remarks. Independent voters, though, said the remarks were improper by a 58 to 37 margin.
Both polls found Obama leading Romney among independent voters by 11 points. …The Hill
Obama is also ahead of Romney when it comes to foreign policy. And Obama is the winner, of course, when it comes to sustaining Medicare.
___
Nate Silver asks whether Omaha matters. In 2oo8 Obama did pretty well in Nebraska and that put Nebraska Republicans on notice. They responded by redistricting — pretty much guaranteeing a Republican hold on state. As of yesterday — Sunday — Obama will find Nebraska difficult going, particularly in Nebraska’s Second District where he won in 2008. The Second District was then moved “farther behind the [Republican] battlements.”
… The Nebraska poll, from Wiese Research Associates for the Omaha World-Herald, put Mr. Romney 14 points ahead among likely voters statewide. Nebraska, however, awards three of its five electoral votes by Congressional district; Mr. Obama narrowly won the vote of the Nebraska’s Second Congressional District, which is largely coterminous with the city of Omaha, in 2008. The Wiese Research Associates poll showed a tied race in the Second District, suggesting that such an outcome is possible again this year.
The FiveThirtyEight forecast, which accounts for district-level polls in Nebraska and in Maine (the other state which splits its electoral votes in this way), is more skeptical about this possibility. It gives Mr. Obama a 20 percent chance of winning the district (although that’s up from about a 10 percent chance before the poll came out). ...538