Tornado Alley (PROG)

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Battleground snapshot, 8 days out

The latest numbers, from TPM's polling composites:

State Obama Romney Margin Change from 10/24

National 47.4 47.9 -0.5 -0.5
Colorado 48 46.2 1.8 1.9
Florida 48.5 48.8 -0.3 0.1
Iowa 49.2 46.9 2.3 1.4
New Hampshire 48.4 46.1 2.3 1.3
Nevada 50.5 47.3 3.2 -0.7
North Carolina 45.9 48.4 -2.5 -0.3
Ohio 49.5 48.1 1.4 -1.2
Virginia 48.6 46.6 2.0 2.2
Wisconsin 48.9 46.7 2.2 -0.6

Compared to last Wednesday, President Barack Obama has retaken the lead in Colorado and Virginia. Florida remains the flip of a GOTV operation, and North Carolina remains Mitt Romney's best bet.

The official composite includes all the crap GOP pollsters, like Rasmussen et al. For fun, I decided to check what would happen if I excluded Rasmussen in some of these states.

In North Carolina, that 2.5-point deficit would be 1.2 points.

In Ohio, that 1.4-point lead would be a 3-point Obama lead, 50-47.

In Wisconsin, that 2.2 lead would be a 3.2-point Obama lead, 48.7-45.5.

So Ras is single-handedly worth 1-2 points in the composite for Romney.

Today's numbers bring back something we had discussed extensively prior to the first debate—Romney's likability ceiling. Obama is at 48 percent or better in every state except for North Carolina. Romney is at 48 percent or better in just three of these nine states. Look at how that compares to Romney's level of support back on 10/19, the strongest Romney day in these snapshots:

Romney support

State 10/29 10/19 Dif
US 47.9 48.3 -0.4
CO 46.2 47.1 -0.9
FL 48.8 50.9 -2.1
IA 46.9 45.2 1.7
NH 46.1 48.5 -2.4
NV 47.3 44.3 3.0
NC 48.4 49.5 -1.1
OH 48.1 46.4 1.7
VA 46.6 50.2 -3.6
WI 46.7 46 0.7

Even with Rasmussen and the baby Rasmussens like Gravis propping up his numbers, Romney is down in half of these states. Given that he's losing in most of them, he needs his level of support to rise in all of them.

Now here are Obama's numbers:

Obama support

State 10/29 10/19 Dif
US 47.4 47.2 0.2
CO 48 47.5 0.5
FL 48.5 45.9 2.6
IA 49.2 49.4 -0.2
NH 48.4 47.5 0.9
NV 50.5 49.5 1.0
NC 45.9 46.3 -0.4
OH 49.5 47 2.5
VA 48.6 47.2 1.4
WI 48.9 50.8 -1.9

Average all those numbers out, and Romney has declined 0.33 points the last 10 days, while Obama has gained 0.71.

The campaign will now be on hold over the next several days as national polling grinds to a halt and the eastern battlegrounds focus on riding out Sandy. Given the trends in this race, it's not a good turn of events for Republicans pretending to have any shot at the White House.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/10/29/1152168/-Battleground-snapshot-8-days-out