Analysis from Nate Silver of Five Thirty Eight 10/6/12 (mixed review)

[courseofhistory]

If there is any silver lining for Mr. Obama in these data, it may be that polls of registered voters show a weaker trend toward Mr. Romney than polls of likely voters. He still leads Mr. Romney by six points in the version of the Ipsos poll among registered voters, for instance, and the Gallup tracking poll, which is conducted among registered rather than likely voters, has not shown an especially sharp shift toward Mr. Romney so far.

Why is this factor favorable for Mr. Obama? Because likely voter polls can be more sensitive than registered voter polls to temporary swings in voter enthusiasm, which sometimes reverse themselves as there are new developments in the news cycle.

More broadly, although it is clear that Mr. Romney has made gains, it is still too early to tell how long-lasting they might be. Many of the polls that showed the sharpest swing toward Mr. Romney were conducted on Thursday, immediately after the debate and on a very unfavorable day of news coverage for Mr. Obama, and will not yet reflect any change in voter sentiment from Friday morning’s favorable jobs report.

Still, as I wrote yesterday, my guess is that the forecast model is still being somewhat too conservative about accounting for the change in the environment. In a good number of the polls, Mr. Romney has not only improved his own standing but also taken voters away from Mr. Obama’s column, suggesting that he has peeled off some of Mr. Obama’s softer support in addition to gaining ground among undecided voters.

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/06/oct-6-romney-maintains-poll-momentum/#more-35637

[BellaKos]

1. What I don't understand ...

How can polls swing dramatically within a few days? Are people that easily influenced in this country? "Tossed to a fro by every wind of doctrine," so to speak?

[courseofhistory]

2. I think

they can be swayed by soundbites and lies (those who don't follow the elections closely and those people are MANY). The have no reference point unfortunately for Romney's lies and flip flops from the past so they see him one night and think he sounded "presidential". It's terrible that people base their decisions on this sort of shallow thinking and knowledge!

[Mutiny In Heaven]

4. That's why the Obama campaign's adverts have been horrible

You're not going to snare that audience by expecting by calling Romney a liar and only backing it up with on screen text from papers & fact checkers. You have plenty of video straight from the horse's mouth, but they're apparently too scared to use it.

[VirginiaTarheel]

3. That is why we must take every debate very seriously

People are swayed by them