The Bump

Were all media attention not about to swing to Obama for the next week or so, some might be starting to ask - "where's McCain's lead?" After all, he's been kicking the crap out of Barack for almost a month, yet all he's been able to do is keep it about even. This surprises me - my gut says McCain must have developed an advantage.

Here's where the polls are today.
Gallup - Barack up 1%
Rasmussen - Barack up 1%

Gallup and Rasmussen are both tracking polls that are updated daily, so they're the best barometer of the feeling of voters. Rasmussen surveys likely voters, so their numbers tend to be more stable than Gallup's survey of registered voters.

An LA Times/Bloomberg poll of registered voters 8/15-18 shows a 2% lead for Barack, while a Reuters/Zogby poll of likely voters 8/14-16 gives McCain a 5% lead.

In a sharp turnaround, Republican John McCain has opened a 5-point lead on Democrat Barack Obama in the U.S. presidential race and is seen as a stronger manager of the economy, according to a Reuters/Zogby poll released on Wednesday.

Were there no polls to guide us, I would have guessed that McCain is up 7 to 10 points right now. Is there a McCain effect - people reluctant to admit to pollsters that they are supporting the old white guy?

McCain leads Obama among likely U.S. voters by 46 percent to 41 percent, wiping out Obama's solid 7-point advantage in July and taking his first lead in the monthly Reuters/Zogby poll.

Perhaps Zobgy is using some technique that breaks through the ageism factor in a way that Gallup and Rasmussen haven't discovered, leaving their tallies tainted by age bigotry.

The reversal follows a month of attacks by McCain, who has questioned Obama's experience, criticized his opposition to most new offshore oil drilling and mocked his overseas trip.

The Zogby results are echoed, weekly, by the new Battleground Poll from George Washington University.

Despite a negative political environment for the Republicans, the presidential horserace is within the margin of error (+ 3.1%). With a tight turnout model, McCain currently tops Obama by 1 point (47%-46%).

The Battleground Poll indicates that Barack's key to winning is getting new voters into the polling booths on November 4 - a job that presumably gets harder as he abandons policies that made him look like a change candidate.

Democratic pollster Celinda Lake notes, "Voters are looking for change... This poll also modeled a traditional electorate. However, Obama has the ability to change the electorate. Simulating modest gains in youth turnout takes the ballot to a 2-point advantage for Obama. Changing the face of the electorate is Obama's ace in the hole."

Either way, we can expect an Obama bump as the spotlight swings to Barack for the VP announcement this week and the convention next week.

The (Zogby) poll was taken Thursday through Saturday as Obama wrapped up a weeklong vacation in Hawaii that ceded the political spotlight to McCain, who seized on Russia's invasion of Georgia to emphasize his foreign policy views.