The word count doubled in a few minutes. This is good news.

Much more likely.

I have a friend at work who craps himself if Obama loses a single point in any tracking poll.  Also, if Obama is up in tracking polls but down even one point in a swing state I get to listen to how the sky is falling and we are all doomed.  

I love our side but sometimes we act more like ewoks.

If you're into a musician's musician, female/vocalist/pianist, try some Blossom Dearie.  Heck, just about any of the Verve artists will do, but, Blossom should be on the top of your list.

Maybe "Scherezade", that always works to calm me down after listening to too much Offspring.

For REALz. McCain will not overtake Obama without a Serious Event, and Zogby has consistently been the lowballer for Obama among the polls.

Remember. The race is always going to get closer. But the longer we see McCain floundering in the low 40s, the more likely it is that those 5-10% of undecided voters that just won't support Obama no matter what will mostly just stay home.

Not to mention that there are likely a lot of households where the wife of the household will be voting for Obama but the husband would freak the hell out if he knew. In such cases, there really MIGHT be a reverse Bradley effect.

Why does Battleground have the best reputation? It's made absurd swings over the past few weeks when the race has been pretty stable.

No one poll is going to give a better picture than the overall average.

The last poll you discussed was the older CBS poll showing only a 3 point Obama lead. How do you feel about the new CBS poll showing a 14 point Obama lead?

Zogby went from 2% to 4% to 6% then again to 4%, then 6% and now to again to 4%.  Given all that, it makes no sense to craft this diary.  Are you going to post at all when Zogby moves back up to 6%, then be "scared" again when Zogby shows 4% again?   Besides, are you familiar with MoE and what it actually means?    

the problem is that you wrote a diary that's not a diary. it's a comment. so next time put it in the open thread. blogging 101.

How do they release a poll now when it's just after 5pm in the West.

Zogby did this in the primary too. They had wild swings because they polled when nobody was home.

"How do I feel??? I wish these polls would stay consistent. Either Obama is way ahead, barely ahead, or a bit behind.

3-14 points within a week is crazy. However, I sure hope CBS, ABC, and Newsweek are the polls that are most accurate."

 You get all huffy about a ONE PERCENT noise movement within the margin of error in a DAILY TRACKING POLL?   That is ridiculous.  

As for the spread:

IBD predicts an exact evenly split electorate with the same number of Republicans and Democrats showing up at the polls.  So, they show a 3% race.  

Zogby shows a 6% race (it is really that if you keep your huffing out of simple daily noise) and has the Democrats with a 2% turnout advantage.

Others have higher turnout models showing Democrats more excited than Republicans, so they show the race more lopsided for us.  

Seems consistent with what we are seeing, and it all depends on which turnout theory you want to believe.  I think it is a safe bet that the "even" theory in this anti-GOP does not hold water, is a joke, so IBD is not going to be accurate until they change their weighting to reflect a more realistic party ID split.  Zogby is probably a bit low with their +2% prediction.  In this special year in which the GOP is going to be repudiated in this massive fashion across the board a more realistic party ID weighting would probably be about 4% to 6% pro-Democrats.  So, for my money I think the race is at about between 6% to 8% in favor of Obama at this point. If you believe the turnout will be closer to 2004 splits, then you just go with the IBD or Zogby type polls.   Nothing crazy about the poll spreads in general, it just depends how you believe turnout will be to assess which range makes the most sense for you to believe in.