Thursday brought a fairly sizeable number of state polls, and the balance of them look pretty decent for the president's chances for reelection.
That is especially true, of course, when you factor in the fact that three of the state polls released this time around give Barack Obama modest leads in battleground states, despite the fact that they were conducted by Republican polling firms.
The news is not all good (that Q poll out of Virginia is a bit of a buzzkill), but on balance, I'd rather be the president than Mitt Romney, based off of this data.
On to the numbers:
PRESIDENTIAL GENERAL ELECTION TRIAL HEATS:
NATIONAL (Democracy Corps and Resurgent Republic for NPR): Obama d. Romney (47-45)
NATIONAL (Gallup Tracking): Obama tied with Romney (46-46)
NATIONAL (Rasmussen Tracking): Romney d. Obama (47-46)
NEVADA (Magellan Strategies for AFP): Obama d. Romney (50-46)
NEVADA (We Ask America--R): Obama d. Romney (49-43)
OHIO (Rasmussen): Obama d. Romney (47-45)
VIRGINIA (Quinnipiac): Obama tied with Romney (44-44)
WASHINGTON (SurveyUSA): Obama d. Romney (46-37)
WISCONSIN (We Ask America--R): Obama d. Romney (49-42)
DOWNBALLOT POLLING:
NV-SEN (Magellan Strategies for AFP): Sen. Dean Heller (R) 45, Shelley Berkley (D) 42
NH-GOV--D (Benenson Strategies for Cilley): Jackie Cilley 20, Maggie Hassan 20, Bill Kennedy 10
VA-SEN (Quinnipiac): George Allen (R) 46, Tim Kaine (D) 44
VA-SEN (Rasmussen): Tim Kaine (D) 46, George Allen (R) 45
WA-01 (PPP for Democracy for America): John Koster (R) 48, Darcy Burner (D) 17, Suzan DelBene (D) 13, Steve Hobbs (D) 5, Laura Ruderman (D) 4, Larry Ishmael (I) 1, Darshan Rauniyar (D) 1
WA-01 (Strategies 360): John Koster (R) 36, Darcy Burner (D) 12, Suzan DelBene (D) 11, Steve Hobbs (D) 7, Laura Ruderman (D) 3, Larry Ishmael (I) 2, Darshan Rauniyar (D) 1
WA-GOV (SurveyUSA): Rob McKenna (R) 42, Jay Inslee (D) 41
A few thoughts, as always, await you just past the jump ...
The modest leads for Barack Obama in today's new polls in Nevada and Wisconsin (both states that many pundits have listed as "toss-up" races for November) are even more heartening for Democrats, when you consider the source. Both Nevada polls come from GOP outlets, with one being conducted on behalf of Americans For Prosperity (We Ask America, like PPP, polls races regularly simply for public consumption).
Nate Silver noted in a tweet today that Barack Obama has led in between 80-90 percent of all the individual swing state polls of recent vintage. The point he was trying to make in expressing that statistic: A close race doesn't mean a tied race. It was a point also echoed by other polling experts via Twitter earlier this week: If a bunch of people all have Barack Obama staked to a 1-3 point lead, it is probably inaccurate to refer to the race as a "dead heat." The lead is small, to be sure, but when there is such consensus on a number, it is probably safe to call it "a lead."
These swing state polls would seem to cement that point. As I noted in Sunday Kos very recently, it is hard to think of the race nationally as a coin flip, given the real edge that Barack Obama seems to hold in terms of gaining a path to 270 electoral votes.
This doesn't mean that a lead of 1-3 percent cannot be easily eroded with a competent opposition, of course, especially with over three months still on the clock. But it is not partisan bias, based on the data available, to say that Barack Obama has an edge, if only a small one, in his bid for reelection at present time.
In other polling news ...
- We get two new polls out of the likely competitive open seat in Washington's 1st district, and while I would certainly quibble more than a bit with DFA's characterization of Darcy Burner's 4-point edge over Suzan DelBene for the second spot in the general election as "commanding," the numbers on balance are very similar. John Koster is through to November, in no small part because of his position as the sole Republican. It looks like it is Burner and DelBene with a little bit of a gap over the field for that second slot, with a bit of time still on the clock as we head through the final miles of the primary election season.
- That poll for AFP in Nevada also had a Senate component (which the W.A.A. polls, unfortunately, did not), which showed Republican incumbent Dean Heller up 3 on Democrat Shelley Berkley. That would seem to indicate (especially considering the source) that Berkley is not as doomed by the House ethics investigation in progress as others have alleged. Interestingly, one pundit (Larry Sabato's Crystal Ball) moved Nevada to Lean R today. Given this poll, and its partisan sponsor, that move strikes me as potentially premature.