Those who know me know that I place the most stock in two polling companies, Rasumussen and Gallup. I feel that these are the two most accurate for a number of reasons. The rest of the polls are merely entertainment at best and misleading at worst.
With that said the most important polling to watch are the swing state polling, also referred to battle ground states. They include:
Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin. For a combined total of 146 electoral votes. These are the states that will decide who wins the race.
As of today Mitt Romney has taken a 50-46 lead over Obama in these important swing states.
The article states in part:
[quote]
This marks the first time that Romney has hit the 50% mark in the combined swing states. Obama reached the 50% mark again on Wednesday, but Romney bounced back as responses since Tuesdayâ??s presidential debate entered the mix. Because this survey is conducted on a rolling seven-day basis, just over half the responses in todayâ??s update still come from before that debate. Tomorrowâ??s update will be the first in which the majority of the responses follow the most recent debate.[/quote]
It appears that not only the first debate but the second debate helped Romney as well. There is a possibility that the 5% that he currently has in these states could be increased when the other half of the polling data gained after the second debate is revealed. The first half certainly helped him!
In 2008, Obama won these states by 53% to 46% virtually identical to his national margin.
I’m sure that everyone is aware by now that Gallup has Romney up by 52% to 45% nationally.
Below is a map of what took place during the 2008 Presidential election below. Hold your mouse over a state to see how much the candidate won by. Click on a state to see specifics such as county by county results. This map is odd because if it’s in red that means Obama won it, blue McCain won it. As we all know red is usually republican and blue democrat. Other than that little anomaly you can see clearly where Romney needs to win and how close McCain was to winning some of the swing states (not very in many).