John Kerry Leads George Bush 49-47 percent of nation-wide LV’s, according to a Democracy Corps Poll conducted 10/20-21. The Poll also found that Kerry leads Bush 52-45 percent of LV’s in Battleground states and has a 50-41 percent lead among Independent LV’s.

John Kerry leads George Bush 48-46 percent of Pennsylvania RV’s, according to a Morning Call/Muhlenberg College Poll conducted 10/17-22. This makes 10 straight Pennsylvania Polls showing Kerry leading.

John Kerry Leads George Bush 52-39 percent of American college students, with 1 percent for Nader and 8 percent undecided, according to a Harvard University Institute of Politics Poll conducted 10/7-13. The poll also found that Kerry leads among college student LV’s in 14 swing states by 55-38 percent.

The Washington Post had a good front-page article today, “A Fading ‘Nader Factor’?”. The article points out, as I have repeatedly, that Nader’s vote is likely to be a lot smaller than last time and, hence, less dangerous to the Democrats.
But the article also provides empirical backing for the idea that the Nader will not only be smaller, but also less likely to hurt the Democratic candidate than last time. Here’s an excerpt from the article:

A survey conducted this month for the Democratic National Committee by pollster Stanley Greenberg showed Nader averaging 1.5 percent of the vote in a dozen battleground states where his name appears on the ballot, compared with about 3 percent in the summer. It also showed that most of the support Nader lost had shifted to Kerry and indicated that his remaining backers would be as likely to vote for Bush as for the Massachusetts Democrat, if Nader were not running.

And it’s not just Greenberg who says this:

Frank Newport, editor in chief of the Gallup Poll, said his research has shown for months that when Nader is removed from poll questionnaires, the margin separating the two major candidates is unaltered.

So one less problem to worry about. Let’s concentrate on what’s really important: mobilization, mobilization, mobilization.

Those who believe inequality is a “serious problem” in America prefer John Kerry over George Bush 57.3 percent to 23.7 percent of respondents, according to a Campbell Institute on Citizenship and Inequality Poll conducted 10/9-19. Those who want government to do more to reduce inequality prefer Kerry over Bush 49.6 percent to 32.6 percent.

The new Ohio University/Scripps Survey Research Center poll, conducted October 17-21, gives Kerry a 6 point lead among registered voters (49-43). And see Chris Bowers over at MyDD for a roundup of all the recent Ohio polls and just how good they make Kerry’s situation look in Ohio.
So: both Pennsylvania and Ohio are looking good for Kerry. And if that conventional wisdom is correct that the victor in the 2004 election will be the candidate that carries 2 of 3 key big states (Ohio, Pennsylvania and Florida), he’s therefore looking very good overall.

Paul Krugman’s important column in The New York Times today leads with this:

If the election were held today and the votes were counted fairly, Senator John Kerry would probably win. But the votes won’t be counted fairly, and the disenfranchisement of minority voters may determine the outcome.
Recent national poll results range from a three-percentage-point Kerry lead in the A.P.-Ipsos poll released yesterday to an eight-point Bush lead in the Gallup poll. But if you line up the polls released this week from the most to the least favorable to President Bush, the polls in the middle show a tie at about 47 percent.
This is bad news for Mr. Bush because undecided voters usually break against the incumbent – not always, but we’re talking about probabilities. Those middle-of-the-road polls also show Mr. Bush with job approval around 47 percent, putting him very much in the danger zone.
Electoral College projections based on state polls also show a dead heat. Projections assuming that undecided voters will break for the challenger in typical proportions give Mr. Kerry more than 300 electoral votes.

But he goes on to point out that this picture is not the one you would get from watching cable news, where polls of Gallup and Fox News set the frame for the state of the horse race. And he specifically cites the data reported on DR and other blogs exposing the bias of Gallup’s likely voter samples against minority and young voters.
As Krugman emphasizes, this distorted view of the state of the campaign not only misleads voters and the public, it potentially can be used to cover up actual disenfranchisement of minority and young voters on election day. Perhaps Krugman’s column will finally help get “the Gallup problem” the attention it so richly deserves.

John Kerry leads George Bush 47-41 percent among Pennsylvania RV’s, according to a Quinnipiac University Poll conducted 10/16-20.

Kerry leads Bush, 50-45, among RVs in a 2-way matchup in Gallup’s new Ohio poll. (Oddly, their 3-way RV matchup gives Kerry a slightly larger lead, 50-44.) Their LV matchup, which should be viewed with skepticism, is better for Bush, but even there Kerry leads by a point.
Gallup has also released three other state polls recently (all figures 2-way RV matchups): Oregon (52-45 Kerry); Colorado (49-48 Bush); and Wisconsin (51-45 Bush).

Poll results in the battleground states have generally been good for Kerry lately, especially in the most important of these states.
In that light, it’s interesting to note that four recently-released national polls give Kerry leads of 6-7 points in the battleground states overall. In 2000, these states broke evenly between Gore and Bush, so a 6-7 point Kerry lead, if real, would be quite significant.
Here are the polls and the numbers:
Marist (10/17-19): 50-43
Pew (10/15-19): 49-43
NBC/WSJ (10/16-18): 49-43
Harris (10/14-17): 51-44
If this pattern coninues, Bush will be in big trouble come November 2.