Like Catching A Hail Mary Pass on the 3 Yard Line

In the past three days, no fewer than four polls have shown Barack Obama with a lead of fewer than 6 points. The daily PA tracking polling has also shown a decline in the margin between Obama and McCain and today had Obama leading by eight points. As you, of course, already know, I believe that polls (especially averaged together) are accurate. Therefore, I cannot help but come to the conclusion that John McCain's efforts in Pennsylvania are paying dividends. Where he was 10 or 11 points behind a week ago, he is now only 6 or 7 points behind.




Before talking about this more, I want to point out that I think this is really good evidence for the idea that campaigning matters. Spending time and resources in a state has a real, measurable impact.

Anyway, there are a few things to take away from these new polls. First off, it should be noted that Obama is still ahead, and he is still ahead by a margin much greater than those by which Kerry ever lead.

Second, looking at the bottom graph, you can see that most of the narrowing in the margin has come from McCain's support rising and very little comes from Obama's support dropping. This is unsurprising. As I wrote in my last post about Pennsylvania, there was never a realistic chance that McCain would only win 40% in this state. His numbers were low because a lot of the "undecideds" were actually Republicans. With his recent blitz of the state, he has been able to remind a lot of these people of their original inclinations. As I've written before, party identification is essentially the strongest predictor of voter preferences. It looks to me like the Pennsylvania Republicans are coming home.

The final important takeaway from these new polls is that, despite the narrowing, Obama still breaks 50%. McCain can win every undecided left and still lose if Obama stays above 50.

There will likely be a few more polls out of the Keystone state before Tuesday, so be on the lookout to see:

1) How much more ground McCain can make-up and;
2) If Obama stays over the magic line