WP: Obama Widens Lead in Four Crucial Battleground States

From this morning’s Washington Post, mirroring the findings of polls by other news organizations:

Obama holds double-digit margins over McCain in Minnesota, Michigan and Wisconsin and carries a nine-point advantage over his Republican rival in Colorado, according to polling conducted by Quinnipiac University for washingtonpost.com and the Wall Street Journal.

Obama’s ascendancy in these key states mirrors his growing lead in national polling. The latest Washington Post/ABC News survey put Obama at 53 percent to McCain’s 43 percent, while the daily Gallup tracking poll showed Obama holding a similar lead of 51 percent to 41 percent on Monday.

The latest polling confirms that the financial crisis and stock market crash that has gripped Wall Street and Washington over the past month has increased the importance of economic matters to voters — particularly in the industrial Midwest — and accrued almost exclusively to Obama’s benefit.

Read the entire story. All those states in 2004, Bush defeated Kerr in Colorado, and Kerry won three other tight races. In two states, Colorado and Wisconsin, the winners, Bush and Kerry, respectively, won by razor-thin margins. Quinpac has similar findings, except for larger leads by Obama. Most distressing for Republicans should be that Quinpac has Obama leading in Colorado– a state won by Republicans last time– 52% to 43%. Colorado has been trending more Democratic since the last presidential election, but not to any degree reflected in this particular presidential race.

The one battleground that McCain was doing better in than one might thing, and which has been given little notice, has been Ohio. And of course, Ohio, went for Bush last election– perhaps pointing to a longer term trend than one election result. It should be interesting to watch the next polls out from Ohio, at which time I will try and update.

James Fallows writes that Steve Schmidt has been talking the language of defeat.  

This entry was posted in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink.