Pollster.com

Not good news for McCain..within the MOE

here is Rasmussen previous poll for Indy
8/19-21/08 500 LV 49M 43O

I am convinced now

Geez, and it's Rasmussen. IN is definitely a toss-up now. I really didn't expect that.

Not a good week for McCain...but still no time to get cocky for Obama

Woah! Thought Indian might be close but no chance of flipping. Now, not so sure. McCain better get his act together.

Well there goes Rasmussen from Boomshak's list of acceptable pollsters... that list is getting short indeed.

[just kidding w/ you...]

Good news.

But I don't buy the new SUSA poll on Florida.

That's a big MOE for Ras. But I have to agree, something's happening here.

I can not imagine in my brightest hours, that BO flips IN or MO. For goodness sake I don't think even Bubba flipped IN.

With ground game, and being such a smaller population, a few thousand votes in a single district could flip this? Not likely - but its like playing the lottery, its fun to day dream for a little while.

It is instructive to realize that Obama is spending $200K in the state on advertising while McCain is spending nothing. If these polls continue like this, McCain will probably be forced to spend some effort on protecting Indiana.

Though I still doubt it will go Obama's way in the end I think you will see it moved to toss up on both 538 and Rasmussen later today as it was here yesterday.

SUSA - Florida
McCain 51
Obama 45

AA Support for Obama 77% ...:-S
Latino Vote 36% ?!?!?!

Can this be real!?

So weird...

But clearly, with the other polls considered, there is movement towards Obama in Indiana.

Barack Obama can win Indiana! Indiana voters, get out and vote for Barack Obama and Joe Biden!

McCain and Palin have no plan for the economy, and no plan to end this war in Iraq that costs our country 10 billion dollars a month. Iraq has a huge budget surplus while we have huge budget and trade deficits. Enough is enough. McCain and Palin are the same as Bush and Cheney. Our country can't afford 4 more years of Bush and Cheney.

VOTE FOR BARACK OBAMA AND LETS GET A DEMOCRAT WIN IN NOVEMBER!

Indiana is close but Mccain is still ahead

Mccain/pallin have some work to do in Indiana

Rasmussen narrative:

"Parts of northwestern Indiana are effectively suburbs of Chicago, Obama’s home base. During the Indiana Primary, strong turnout in this region almost enabled Obama to pull off an upset victory. Four years ago, John Kerry racked up a 23-percentage point margin over George Bush in Lake County, the state’s most northwestern county. Strong turnout in that region could have an impact on the fall election as well."

But not all is doom and gloom for McCain--

"McCain is viewed favorably by 61% of Indiana voters, down four points from a month ago. Obama earns positive reviews from 54%, up two points.

Obama is supported by 92% of Democrats, McCain by 85% of Republicans. The two candidates are even among unaffiliated voters."

500,000 new voters, Chicago media market, and Obama's endless cash/supporters.

John Kerry you suck because you got trounced in this state. Hillary as the nominee would get beat by double-digits in this state.

Indiana is battle royale.

Get ready folks for an election day landslide.

Whether Obama wins IN or not, it's a great preview of what's to come. Watch the closer blue states shore up and Colorado, IA, and NM pull away from McCain. It could be OVER.

Obama's constant ad barrage in the state compared to $0 ad spending for Mccain so far might be taking a toll here--especially if Ras of all pollsters says it is tightening.

GOTV - Obama wins on this LV poll! That is almost a certainty.

Never underestimate the ability of Lake County to "deliver the votes" for Obama.

Well now. Rasmussen polls are largely the reason why so many midwest Kerry states are yellow in this site, with their 2 and 3% Obama leads. Boomshak deified Rasmussen for these polls, while boasting about the invulnerability of Indiana. Now the god Rasmussen has deemed Indiana a 2% state. Will Boomshak be talking about that state being weak for McCain now, or will he turn on his god like a riot tearing down a stone idol?

Before boomshack says it :

It is obvious that Rassmussen is another left-leaning liberal pollster ... we should disregard these numbers !!!

LOL

If McCain and Palin have to campaign in Indiana with 45 days to go until the election... then the election may already be over.

"Obama enjoyed one of his widest advantages over McCain of recent weeks in Thursday night's interviewing." - Gallup Daily Tracker 49-44

Okay, putting aside being Republican or Democrat, I just want to speak logically for a moment.

We live in a country of 303 million people or so (per Census estimations for 2008). According to the Census, there were 126 million people that voted in the 2004 election (just 42% of the total population). This is an extremely close election year and with some of the economic distress and the war in Iraq being issues at the forefront, I think it's safe to assume the voter turnout will be at least what we had in 2004 and probably much higher. We have all of these national polls conducted and everyone gets all worked up over them. How big is the sampling really? There is no possible way any of these polls can come close to reaching the numbers of people that are going to vote. Even with a fairly large sampling, the results are always going to be closer to a guess than a projection.

All these polls are doing is giving something for political anaylsts and bloggers to argue about and fill time while we wait for election day. You just cannot base the result of an election off of these polls. Look how much the electoral map here on pollster has fluctuated in the last three days. Look, I think it's nice to look at the maps and the polls and feel like there is some yardstick by which to measure my candidate's chances, but the truth is we aren't going to know anything until the votes are counted. Come election day the citizens of this country will decided which direction they want this country to go and make their choice and all these polls will have been useless.

Sincerely,
Just An Opinion

UH OH! GALLOP UP ANOTHER POINT FOR OBAMA!

Gallup Daily tracking just came out, 49/44 Obama lead, +1 margin from yesterday. Gallup notes that last night was the strongest polling for Obama in weeks.

Rasmussen is still showed it tied today, but I suspect that Rasmussen will show a shift for Obama next week after they do their party id re-weighting on Sunday to adjust for the Obama surge (or more likely in my opinion, the end of the Republican convention bounce). Anyone know how they apply party id weights to state polls like this one? Could Indiana really be closer than this poll indicates because of the party weighting to the height of McCain's bounce?

JustAnOpinion you are right and wrong. Gallop has chosen the winner every single election except one since the 1930's. Polls do give us an idea. In '04 Bush had an everage lead of only 2% and won easily. If Obama is up even 3% on average heading into the final day, we will be in great shape.

@JustAnOpinion

We have just had picks and 2 conventions now we are in the settling down period with both bounces flattened out.

Bang MCain/Palin get caled out as Liars and it sticks

Bang bang - The ecomomy tips over in near collapse and The Ruling Party and John McCain say fundamentally sound economy!

What these polls are a fuzzy snap shot of how people would vote today!

Obama needs to put out an add that says McCain doesn't visit Indiana; Hoosiers don't like that..

Recount checker--

Indiana
Colorado
New Hampshire
Virgnia
Ohio
Florida
North Carolina

Get the lawyers ready for these states....

well as a mccain supporter the gallup result is very bad news but we still have time.

tomorrow is another day.
looking forward to the debates.

@JustAnOpinion:

The main reasons why there are polls are really for the campaigns so that they can find out where their weaknesses are and shore them up; find out which states they are solid in so that they don't have to spend their precious resources on a state that's already locked up.

For the rest of us that are sitting on the sidelines, it is more like watching a good sport game that last 60 days. No the polls cannot predict exactly how Americans would vote on election day (that's why there are MOE). But I think one can assume that from a small random sample you can extrapolate what the general population think in general about each candidate. And the assumption becomes more and more valid as the sample size (number of polls) increases. If you take a random sample of people in CA and poll them on who they will vote for and poll after poll after poll indicate that they will vote for obama 55-45 month after month after month, you can reasonably assume that CA will probably go Obama even though the actual vote on election day may be 52-48.

There have now been 6 consecutive polls by 6 different pollsters that have shown one or the other candidate ahead in IN by 2-5 points. Most of these polls have not included the name of Bob Barr in their questioning; the one that did also included the name of Ralph Nader--but Nader is not on the ballot in IN.

While right-leaning Rasmussen's IN poll has a relatively small sample, the fact that it is Rasmussen indicates that an under-sampling of Republicans is unlikely. Note also that the Republican governor has a 16-point lead in his race.

Currently, Obama has two advantages in IN: (1) he has a larger and more active ground game; and (2) he has the airwaves there to himself. See:
http://politicalwire.com/archives/2008/09/17/battleground_not_much_bigger_than_2004.html

Note also that Obama has opened up a 12-point lead in the Midwest in today's Research 2000 poll:
http://www.dailykos.com/dailypoll/2008/09/19

IN undecideds may feel ignored and neglected by McCain, and may break for Obama.

This a LV poll as well, lighter on new registered and younger voters and factoring in GOTV ground game.

On this Poll Obama wins Indiana and if Obama wins Indiana he'll win all the rest of the mid west and Penn - He wins the election.

Waiting for boomshat-on-mom's-new-coat to waddle in, force himself into a boomshat-eating grin, and proclaim this poll to be "excellent news for McCain!"

Wow...unbelievable... add 2% for Rasmussens Bias and we have a tossup... Uh oh McCain you better go to Indiana... Great news.. if McCain has to defend Indiana... less time spent in OH & MN... 50 state strategy beginning to pay-off. Sweeeet!!! If the reputable selzer poll says Obama ahead... this state definitely turns yellow and moves to toss. I wouldnt mind seeing SUSA weigh in

Never underestimate the ability of Lake County to "deliver the votes" for Obama.

That worked really well when Obama barely beat Clinton in the Democratic primary. Oh yeah, that didn't happen and you're an idiot.

Obama can win Indiana. There are about 750,000 people in Lake, Porter, and LaPorte Counties in the northwest corner of the state in the Chicago media market---Obama's own backyard. The economy is collapsing in the state's older industrial towns, Indianapolis is full of the kinds of upscale college-educated voters who went strongly for Obama in the primaries, the big college towns of Bloomington and West Lafayette will deliver whopping pluralities for him, and McCain, who voted against the farm bill and opposes ethanol subsidies, has no grasp on the issues that matter to the rural areas of the Corn Belt. (That's why McCain consistently trails in Iowa as well). With a superior ground game and huge voter turnout, Obama will win Indiana and the electoral college.

Couple points:
1. Obama has had media exposure in IN for many years, and as Michael McDonald pointed out, Obama's spending money on media advertising in IN ($1.5 million till date?), while McCain isn't.
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/9/18/03836/2607/717/602382
(Using numbers from Ambinder and OpenLeft)

2. While I would agree with JustAnOpinion on the validity of *any* poll, I'd argue that state-level polls give much more information than national polls, since the President is elected based on the Electoral College. So don't disregard polls, but don't get complacent either - people still have to vote!
[BTW, early voting has apparently started in some places, such as VA.]

All these posts by non Rasmussen loving posters, but none from Ras-buddy boomshak why?

Now CNN has it within 2 as well. Can we admit it is real yet?

@#$#@$ misread. That was the stupid poll of polls thing. Thought they did work on their own. :P What was I thinking.

Rasmussen has McCain within 4 points of obama in Maine. Wow! I think a commercial fisher woman named Sarah might have something to do with that.

Indiana will be decided in the Southern portion. It's a given that Obama will win the populous "Region" and Indy. He needs to poll around 40% in the South to have a shot.