The interesting thing is that overall, they are close and within the margin of error.

I almost wish Obama could win the elctoral college and lose the popular vote; and then maybe we'd have a good movement to get rid of it, since it would have made two elections in a short period of time where the will of the people was not followed.

That's the national polls. I pay much more attention to the state polling for obvious reasons. I think the electoral picture is shaping up to be a lot less close (I won't use the L-word just yet) than what anyone would have thought just six months ago.

Since last update:

All moves are towards Obama:

Iowa moves from weak Dem to strong Dem
South Dakota moves from strong GOP to barely GOP
Minnesota moves from weak Dem to strong Dem

What's next? Idaho, Arizona, and Kansas becoming competitive?!

Idaho won't be competitive. The only place he'll win there is Moscow. SD isn't shocking, though.

SC is down to 6.

But when a batch of polls all show one candidate ahead, even if most of them are within the margin of error, the likelihood of him behind becomes smaller very quickly (the same assertion the Electoral-vote article made today, although his math is a little off there).

NC is getting closer too.

Actually with today's map, North Carolina moved from barely GOP to weak GOP.

I was actually comparing the latest poll to the previous one from the same polling source (SurveyUSA). The signal is more relevant that way since different sources have different methods.

Ah, true. Electoral College just uses whatever the most recent poll is.

And with today's map (7/18), North Carolina moves back from weak GOP to barely GOP.

Also, Nevada moves from weak GOP to weak DEM, putting another state in Obama's column

Oregon moves from barely DEM to weak DEM.

... once more, all moves toward Obama.

I didn't get why Oregon would ever be barely Dem. I would think Obama would win that mostly liberal state easily.

I often wondered that myself.

Pollster's average has 10.1 points ahead

http://www.pollster.com/08-OR-Pres-GE-MvO.php

It will most likely fall in line with Washington/California as being a "strong" Obama win.

It doesn't really take a genius to figure that out. Many of these polls have a large number of undecideds it kind of throws off the accuracy of the polls if you just look at McCains and Obamas numbers.
Oregon for example is 46% Obama 37% McCain leaving 17% for another candidate or undecided. Indiana on the other hand is 48% Obama and 47% McCain only leaving 5% in play. Come the election you really should expect to see Oregon goto Obama 58% to 42%

So why doesn't that same effect show up in other heaviuly blue states, then? If your theory were correct, we'd expect to see the same thing in Washington or Massachusetts or New York, but we don't.

Both NY and Washington have fewer undecideds as well as Massachusetts. It could be that Oregon voters aren't as excited over Obama outside of the core base of democrats in Oregon but at the same time neither is the republican base except for though those who only vote dem or rep are saying they will vote for Obama or McCain. Oregon has a fairly conservative eastern side of the state.
Essentially the larger the undedicated portion of the poll the less the poll will reflect election results.

Ok that makes sense. I think Obama should win Oregon pretty easily at least as well as Gore and Kerry won it.

Yeah, Oregon population dynamics are interesting. The urban West is highly liberal, but the much more rural East/Central are is quite conservative. It's a West Coast conservatism, though - much less of a social conservatism that you'd see in the Sunbelt.

On July 19th, two moves away from Obama toward McCain:

Alaska moves from barely GOP to strong GOP.
Virginia moves from barely DEM to tied.

He needs Virgina to win imo...

He doesn't NEED it to win (if he wins all the blue states in the above map, he's got it easily), but if he gets Virginia, he's pretty much guaranteed a win.

The polls will close up and the "white people say they will vote for a black guy" effect will kick in...

It won't be that big of an effect. With a few exceptions, the polls were fairly accurate during the primaries.