UST gallup Clinton leads Obama

[Amenhotep Bakari-Sellers]

Clinton    45%
Obama    44%

http://www.gallup.com/poll/104488/Gallup-Daily-Tracking-Election-2008.aspx

[Alcon]

Misleading header.

+1 = statistical tie, not a lead

[Eraserhead]

lol Quincy is still around with his misleading thread titles?

[Keystone Phil]

What is misleading? Sure, it's basically a tie but 45 > 44. Surely you guys don't want to CHANGE basic math, right? 

[elcorazon]

i agree with phil.

i'm fed up with the "statistical tie" bull in the media and the silly "keith number" that olbermann created.  the truth is that if a candidate leads by 2 points in a poll with a 3% moe, the poll has him ahead.  he COULD be trailing and the poll knows it, but odds are significant that he is ahead.  Sure, you have to know what you're dealing with, but I'd be more concerned with poll quality than with whether the race is "within the margin of error".  that's more misleading than the polls themselves.

[Alcon]

I'm not complaining that it's untrue, but that it's misleading.  "Clinton with razor thin lead over Obama" would be much better, or "Clinton barely leads Obama" or something.  Just-plain "leads" makes me expect a pretty solid margin, when I'm browsing through poll topics.

[Keystone Phil]

I'm not complaining that it's untrue, but that it's misleading.  "Clinton with razor thin lead over Obama" would be much better, or "Clinton barely leads Obama" or something.  Just-plain "leads" makes me expect a pretty solid margin, when I'm browsing through poll topics.

I don't think that makes it misleading. I think you are just assuming too much. 

[elcorazon]

I'm not complaining that it's untrue, but that it's misleading.  "Clinton with razor thin lead over Obama" would be much better, or "Clinton barely leads Obama" or something.  Just-plain "leads" makes me expect a pretty solid margin, when I'm browsing through poll topics.

still, given the momentum of obama and the fact that polls are starting to give him the lead, the fact that this poll has clinton ahead is notable.

i don't have a problem with the header.  or at least compared to many others, i think it's pretty reasonable.

[Mr. Morden]

Why not name the thread?:

"USAT/Gallup national: Clinton 45%, Obama 44%"

Then it's absolutely clear what the story is.  Or even "USAT/Gallup national: Clinton leads Obama by 1".  If everyone named their threads that way, life would be a lot easier.

[elcorazon]

Why not name the thread?:

"USAT/Gallup national: Clinton 45%, Obama 44%"

Then it's absolutely clear what the story is.  Or even "USAT/Gallup national: Clinton leads Obama by 1".  If everyone named their threads that way, life would be a lot easier.

agreed.

that thread titled "clinton's lead collapsing" is totally misleading (never mind the poor poll it's based on).

[Alcon]

Why not name the thread?:

"USAT/Gallup national: Clinton 45%, Obama 44%"

Then it's absolutely clear what the story is.  Or even "USAT/Gallup national: Clinton leads Obama by 1".  If everyone named their threads that way, life would be a lot easier.

Exactly - thank you.

[Kalimantan]

More to the point, although its close, his support has steadily dropped over the past 4 days. Effects of Michelle Obama's 'first time proud' comment and the plagiarism charge?

[Trilobyte]

Rasmussen's tracking poll also has Clinton inching up in recent days. Today it shows the two within one point of each other, Obama 44 to Clinton 43.

[Verily]

Rasmussen's tracking poll also has Clinton inching up in recent days. Today it shows the two within one point of each other, Obama 44 to Clinton 43.

And Gallup now has Obama ahead by two. All this tells us is that such fluctuations are useless MoE fluff.

[Cubby]

More to the point, although its close, his support has steadily dropped over the past 4 days. Effects of Michelle Obama's 'first time proud' comment and the plagiarism charge?

And where have you seen evidence of this? Thats news to me

[Franzl]

More to the point, although its close, his support has steadily dropped over the past 4 days. Effects of Michelle Obama's 'first time proud' comment and the plagiarism charge?

And where have you seen evidence of this? Thats news to me

neither have I, but some people claimed Clinton was gaining on him in Wisconsin too...

[Kalimantan]

More to the point, although its close, his support has steadily dropped over the past 4 days. Effects of Michelle Obama's 'first time proud' comment and the plagiarism charge?

And where have you seen evidence of this? Thats news to me

Well, the graph here - http://www.gallup.com/poll/104488/Gallup-Daily-Tracking-Election-2008.aspx - shows Obama improving or tieing his numbers from the previous day on 11 out of 12 days from Feb 5th to Feb 17th, to a high of 49%. Over the same period Clinton's number have decreased or tied for 10 of those 12 days to a low of 42%. So I wondered what could be behind the tightening of numbers for the three days since, and lets face it, some of the attacks on Obama have started sticking.

[Trilobyte]

It's about time for an update. Since the last post Clinton has moved ahead in both the Gallup and Rasmussen tracking polls. She had been behind for almost three weeks before the recent gains.

Gallup: Clinton 48-44
Rasmussen: Clinton 48-43

We should see over the coming days whether Clinton gets a bounce from her victories last night.