Obama is officially the Front Runner in Iowa

Many of you proabably know of the site Real Clear Politics. What they do is take an average of all the polls in all the races, whether it be national, iowa, NH, Bush's approval rating, etc, and report who is in the lead that way. Though there have been some polls with Obama in the lead, up until today, Clinton has been in the lead in the average. Today, that changed.

With an average o 27.2 percent of the vote, Obama is in first, followed by Clinton with 26.8, and Edwards with 22.6. Obviously these are basically a stastical tie still, but I thought it noteworthy that now they list Obama first, and Clinton Second.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/ia/iowa_democratic_caucus-208.html

i doesn't either.

:rofl:

Realistically, there may only be three weeks left in the campaign for Iowa with the holiday season coming up.

lady has yet to sing.

imho

Definition of Front runner

www.dictionary.com

predictions, and predictions which are hedged by a margin of error. If any of the top three wins, the prediction will "correct."

And if history is any guide, there will be some surprises.

I mean I saw a Krugman column listed as one of the links. Its hard to imagine their info as RW or LW, because all they do is average every poll that comes out. All math, no politics.

Iowa is neither right nor left. It is really in the middle of the country. Just look at a map! :)

I've heard that it is a right-wing site.

What does "officially" mean in your post?

The media says a certain candidate is winning just because of one poll. But then another poll comes out showing they are losing. RCP averages ALL of the polls together. So when you take an average, Obama is ahead. I think saying somebody is in the lead works a lot better when looking at all the polls, not just one or two.

I can't stand the polls. All this effort at predicting who people will vote for is 100% useless. The only count that matters is the one that happens on election day. Why does it matter that 6 months ahead of time, X percentage of folks support Candidate Y? It's stupid and meaningless.

Any time someone calls me to answer questions on the phone, I just make shit up.

Edwards is the top 'second choice' among those polled and that will be critical in the caucus process.

If he is second choice for the OBama or Clinton supporters, than it doesnt matter.

Not sure how a tie is a lead for Obama, but if it makes you feel better, then he's in in the lead.

If this trend continues, obama will be the front runner. I don't see any reason to believe it won't continue. I think what is happening is Hillary was the early front runner mainly due to name recognition. She held a large lead among the minority of activists who were paying attention early. As we get closer to the election, and as the undecideds start to choose sides, her lead is evaporating. Why? Because Hillary is by far the most well known of the candidates and people already have formed an opinion about her. If they had not chosen hillary early on, that means they were having second thoughts about her. Which means that these voters, as they learn more about the other candidates, are ripe for the picking for an alternative to hillary. Hillary has not sealed the deal. Right now it appears that obama is starting to look like the clear alternative to hillary, and if this continues this will help obama even more. This could all snowball quite a bit in the following month.

But in any case, I think obama is in the position all of the candidates wish they were in. On top and going up.

taken last week and avg all the polls that are current then you have HRC still in the lead. Slightly but still leading.

I do thank you
Ben David

You gotta be kidding me?

November 30, 2007
IOWA: OBAMA TRENDING UP

Today's new ARG poll of likely caucus goers in Iowa generally confirms the trend reported by other polls that we see in our Iowa chart. Barack Obama has been rising in recent weeks, while Hillary Clinton's support -- which had been trending upward since the summer -- has mostly leveled off.

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Another lower tech way to try to see trends amidst the noise of differing methods is to do what I call "apples- to-apples" averages of comparable polls. In this case, ARG, Rasmussen and Strategic Vision have all fielded surveys in the last week or so, as well as earlier in the month. Whatever qualms we have about their methodologies, their surveys are done the same way each time and are at least helpful in spotting trends. And while the change is relatively small, they are essentially consistent: All three show small increases for Obama. On average, the three surveys indicate a three point gain for Obama and a one-point drop for Clinton.

http://www.pollster.com/blogs/iowa_obama_trending_up.php

... Day 1 Barack would change the world, before even taking office. Barack could bring such immense change across the world just by his presidency inspiring trust in the world and clear change. The best insurance policy to retalition is the Obama ticket hopefully with the wise selection of Edwaqrds or Kucinich as vice, also Richardson would make an admirable vice in my hum op.

replaced Tweedle Dum. Whoopie! :eyes: