I have become convinced of a media conspiracy with involvement of the pollsters to make the election seem closer than it really is. I have seen enough questionable polls and polling methods to conclude that the election is nowhere near as close as the "experts" are saying. A few examples and arguments:

-Most polls poll an even number of democrats and republicans, despite democratic party self identification being about 15 points higher than republican identification.

-Most polls don't include the millions of newly registered voters, which favor obama by more than 2:1

-Most polls don't include cell phone only users, which amounts to about 6-7 million americans

-ABC released a fake poll in July claiming obama was up by only 3 points. It was later discovered that their polling actually found obama was up by 8 points.

-A Newsweek poll in June showed obama up by 15 points nationally. In July they claimed obama's lead dropped to 3 points. However, it was discovered that newsweek drastically changed their methodology to include a far greater number of republicans and probable mccain supporters in the second poll.

-A gallup poll in early August showed McCain up by 4 points. It was later discovered that Gallup actually found obama was up by 4 but gallup inexplicably excluded over 150 obama supporters from the final poll results.

-RCP averages refuse to post any polls that include third party candidates, which usually show obama's support being much higher.

-RCP averages tend to drop the polls that show obama doing really well when obama's average lead gets over 5 points. Also, they tend to never include polls that show obama's lead over McCain being greater than 6 points

-There have been many polls over the summer that the media refuses to talk about which show obama's lead over mccain in double digits.

Media incompetence driven by a single over riding priority.
Bottom line profits via ratings.

"The News" is a for profit industry, and as such, if they don't make money, they quit.
Which means everybody under what ever particular controlling board room, has a vested interest in propelling "the news".

It's not just the polls. "The News" gages basic public sentiment and gives them what they want.
The public wanted to back Bushco? "The News" gave them what they wanted to see, even though they knew there was other news out there that was not pro-Bush.

Right now the people want to see and hear about Obama. So, the media will give them what they want.

The polls are close because that's a battle, a controversy, a nail biter. It's not something the controlling board sat down and wrote out memo's about, but because "the news" is a for profit industry, everybody in that field of work knows what's required of them. If it were the used car sales industry, the same basic rules would, and do apply! Do what you need to do to assist the bottom line, and you get to keep your job, or better, promoted!

I really hope the polls are wrong.

I hear people on the left saying that Obama has it all wrapped up, it's all over but the inauguration, but then I hear people on the right saying the same thing about McCain. I personally don't know any McCain supporters, so I would tend to agree with the idea that Obama is leading by a lot more than the polls suggest, but at the same time maybe that just illustrates how divided our society is.

John Zogby was making the rounds of rightwing talk radio a couple of weeks ago. He was talking about how they manipulate questions in Zogby polls to try to "scientifically" get a "real feel" for where the country is. His example was that they'd ask "Do you believe gays should have the right to get married", then a few questions later they would ask "Do you believe in the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman". If they answered both questions with a yes, then where does Zogby decide to classify them? He didn't elaborate.

He was also saying that he thought that the polls for Obama were more generous than the eventual vote would be because people won't tell someone on the phone that they aren't going to vote for Obama just because he's black but that they will abstain from voting or vote McCain when the time comes.

He also said that they ARE polling people that only have cell phones and in numbers proportional to the percentage of Americans that fall into the cell phone only demographic

Also WTF is the head of a polling firm doing going on right wing talk radio anyway?

It makes me worry that the polling companies are now in bed with the Republicans and they are engineering the polling to show a close election so that when McCain wins by a handful of votes as counted by Diebold machines, nobody will question the outcome as they would if polls were showing Obama ahead by 20 points through the whole campaign and McCain won the election.

I know it rises to the tin-foil hat level or paranoia, but I just don't see how else McCain could be tied with Obama at this point.

1) Most Republicans will never vote for a Democrat as surely as I would never vote for a Republican.
2) Negative ads and outright lies are tried and true Republican tactics that still work.
3) Electing the first African-American is a HUGE mountain to climb.
4) As far as the corporate media and pollsters, they will do absolutely everything that unlimited power and money enables them to do to keep Obama out of the White House. Use your imagination and you still won't have any idea what they're capable of.

I hate to sound like a Republican President on this one, but I don't trust the polling data, I think the bulk of their finances comes from the Republican Party and they and the media are in bed together to keep the Repug's in power and screw with the elections again. I think the poll numbers are being manipulated to show a McSame advantage!

Close polls will help them explain another stolen election.

I think it is a combination of incompetence and manipulation.They aren't actually sure what the numbers mean sometimes so they work it to their advantage (ie ratings).Keep in mind some polls have Nader at 8-10% in some states...not likely even on his best day.

They also tend to pick and choose which poll they report. Sometimes using one aspect from several in the same report.