We choose our nominee based on the popular vote?  Funny, i thought we used delegates.

Do you know what a margin of error is? Do you know how to read polls? Do you know how valuable polls 6 months before an election are?

If you answered yes to any of those questions, you should delete this diary out of respect for your own honesty.

If you answered no to all those questions you should delete this diary because you are manifestly unqualified to comment on polling.

   is a MOE poll. Hillary doesn't lead outside the margin of error, and neither does McCain.

  If polls are the holy grail that you clearly believe they are, then explain to us why Bill Clinton was polling behind Bush AND Perot in 1992 in June, yet somehow managed to overcome that and win the election.

  Hmm... the polls were wrong? THe polls weren't accurate. I know it might take several Kool-Aids to wash down that common sense logic, Steve, but it must be done.

http://media.gallup.com/poll/graphs/2008 0525DailyUpdateGraph1_dfgty.gif

Obama is up in Gallup by 5 over Clinton
Rasmussen doesn't track the dem primary any more as they think it is over.
As ofr Newsweek I didn't see anything about the dem primary from them.

Please clarify your diary some.

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.ht ml?res=9E0CE2D7143AF93AA25755C0A96495826 0

Four polls taken by Gallup since May 18 have shown no significant fluctuations, measuring Mr. Perot's support at 34 to 39 percent, President Bush's at 31 to 35 percent and Mr. Clinton's at 24 to 25 percent.

thanks, whichever MyDDer I ganked this from yesterday :)

I distinctly remember about a week or two ago somebody posting a Gallup poll showing Obama virtually tied with Clinton and losing to McCain. And then two days later Obama blasted up to a huge lead. The reason: one day polling noise.  There was nothing newsworthy the day the polls tightened - certainly nothing that would help Clinton.

The same is happening here. It's Memorial Day Weekend. Stand-alone pollsters never poll on Memorial Day weekend because so many people are out of town. Gallup's tracker just goes every day so it doesn't care about the holiday.

Watch this poll on Wednesday and Thursday and you'll have a better indication if Obama has hit some sort of rough patch.

"Yet the newest national tracking poll by Gallup, Rasmussen and Newsweek, shows that Clinton . . . is also ahead of Obama in two of those three polls."

What are you talking about?  Clinton is behind Obama in all of the recent polls.  Here are the ones currently listed on Real clear Politics:

Gallup Tracking 05/22 - 05/24 Obama +5.0
Rasmussen Tracking 05/22 - 05/25 Obama +6.0
Newsweek 05/21 - 05/22 Obama +8.0
Reuters/Zogby 05/15 - 05/18 Obama +26.0
Quinnipiac 05/08 - 05/12 Obama +4.0
ABC News/Wash Post 05/08 - 05/11 Obama +12.0

I thought the poll was going to show Democratic primary voters choosing Clinton over Obama as well as GE votes of Clinton over McCain. Well, it does show Clinton over McCain but it doesn't show Clinton over Obama in the primary. This title is misleading.

The OP decided to use a misleading title or they could have made a argument on the McCain vs. Obama/ McCain vs. Clinton race.

Now they rightfully get tagged as being dishonest...too bad.

What's this then?

And, just curious, what real significance do you think general election match-ups have when the nomination is not yet resolved?

The gallup poll showing Clinton up 5 on McCain while Obama is down 2 is a poll of registered voters, not likely voters.  When you look at polls of likely voters, Obama is doing better against McCain than Clinton.

Why the difference?  Likely voters are those most likely to be following the primaries more closely and therefore are more familiar with the candidates.  

Registered voters, on the other hand, could include voters who, at this point, still don't know much about Obama and therefore they are being heavily influenced by name recognition.  

This all should change when Obama wraps up the nomination, and you should also see a big spike for Obama after the democratic convention.  

The Superdelegates should choose based on who won the popular votes.

Jerome has done a good job documenting who has won the popular votes.  So he will let us all know who won the popular vote on June 4.

It's still close, go out and phone bank.

its a tracking poll.  Should I write a diary when the next tracking polls hows Obama up?

the democrats are too FUCKING DUMB to see it.

So long as 2/3rds of Clinton's supporters are telling pollsters they'll vote for McCain or stay home, the head-to-heads which show her having any advantage over Obama are meaningless.  First, there is very strong reason to believe that once Obama gets the nomination these numbers will go down (and if this is cut in half, btw, his numbers will go up +5).  Second, if Clinton actually got the nomination at this point who doubts her numbers would go down? (and it would be a similar issue, really, this wouldn't have anything to do with indies or Republicans but Dems threatening to bolt the party).

Lastly, why should the Democratic party rally around a candidate whose supporters, essentially, are making a threat?  This hasn't happened sincc the days of George Wallace.  And those who claim Clinton is getting consistent bad press, btw, might ponder just how little attention the national media has given to this phenomenon.