Men do kegels? Enlighten us, oh sex expert.

Men do kegels every time they ejaculate, and, if they're smart, lots of times in between as well.

Note the dates here. This is still convention bounce. This campaign is just starting.

What Fnarf said. I'm doing mine right now -- McCain way ahead in Ohio! Clench, breathe, release...

Is it too late for O to dump Biden and sign on Hillary?

I really wonder about the polls. Not just this one, but polls in general. Who are they asking? Where are their samples coming from? How are they done? Can't they just ask anyone, and extrapolate their results from that? A quick Google search shows that the Siena Research Institute (which, not being a New Yorker or much of a follower of politics, I'd not heard of) is based in a Catholic university and has been suspected of a conservative bias before. Not that this is the reasoning behind the numbers, but I keep seeing so many polls that it's becoming hard to take them all that seriously anymore. Everyone wants to back up everything with numbers- but where do those numbers come from? Who hands them out?

Aiyee. This election season has made me paranoid about everything. I need to lie down, or something.

Once again, I am not only informed by Slog, but also reminded to do my kegels. Thanks!

A single poll from a week ago by an obscure polling firm showing Obama with a somewhat lower lead than hoped for is supposed to freak me out? Come on, Dan.

I want to see a photo of Dan wearing this t-shirt:

http://mudflats.files.wordpress.com/2008/09/palin-rally-9.jpg

I'm with Abby and have been thinking the same for some time. I don't know how they could be gaming the system but I smell a rat in the current polling. Ain't no fucking way my fellow Americans are that stupid.

I'm not entirely sure that this is a bad thing. Obama did best in the primaries when he was seen as being the plucky underdog. If he can maintain parity with McCain until the debates, hammer into him as hard as possible, and then propel past him, it seems like that would be a better strategy than fighting the Palin lovefest when it's at its strongest and continuously expending resources to maintain a lead.

I hope.

Everyone wants to back up everything with numbers- but where do those numbers come from? Who hands them out?

From telephone numbers (usually mostly land lines) randomly selected via various different methods dependent upon the pollster. The results are then sometimes reweighted in some way that the pollster thinks accounts for possible error in the sample.

So yeah, your skepticism is warranted, and it's an inexact science. Plus, under the standard use of margin of error, one in twenty polls will reflect a result outside of it. Look for trends over repeated different polls, and ignore individual ones.

@5: Polls are used to guide public opinion every bit as much as they are used to measure public opinion. Especially in popularity contests like the Presidential race, people are definitely affected by the perception of which candidate is more popular. And for those truly cynical who think elections are fixed, it follows that it would be necessary to generate polls in advance of the election that made the election results seem plausible.

So if there is reason to suspect the authenticity of election results (there is) then it stands to reason that there is just as much (I would suggest even more) reason to suspect poll results.

More importantly, obsessing over the daily numbers is crazy-making. And if they prompt people to give up the fight, then paying attention to them can be enormously counter-productive. And if elections are all just a staged sideshow producing predetermined results, then paying attention to polls is equally counterproductive.

I wuz gone vote fer B. Hussain Obama 'til I saw that photograph uh Sarah killin' up a moose! She's so hot and violent, plus she kin find Russia on a map! Now I know fer sher - McCane is the guy fer me!

Relax your Kegels, folks.
Obama leads in VA

Like Abby, I'm suspicious about polls. And they don't poll to cell phones, right? How accurate are they really anymore? Breathe and deny and don't burn up all your energy in worry.

Put it into performances like on last week's Bill Maher. You were fabulous. And I take the handy youtube link gleefully email wherever I can. You nailed it.

I think it's an outlier. If NY flips on 538, then it's time to freak out:

http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/

You were looking for a "map-changer"? Maybe you got one!

The biosphere is toast, WAMU flu is endemic, and our next POTUS will either be one faith-healer or the other faith-healer.

@5, I question the numbers too. And one of the qualifications for the category of "likely voters" is people who have voted before, so that discounts all those Obama-crazy college students. In this particular election, the polls of registered voters are likely to be more accurate than those of "likely" voters.

I worry about those college students, though. They don't vote. They talk about voting but they never follow through.

Siena? You're freaking over a no name pollster? When PPP, Rasmussen, or someone with some actual experience finds this, then freak out. Until then, chalk it up to noise.

I'm worried, but I'm worried about the Rasmussen Ohio poll.

You forgot to include the prescription. Which Election Anxiety Disorder med do we take for this news?

yeah, this post shocked me.

I haven't seen anything but obama stickers, t shirts posters etc in all store windows, on all people's bags and jackets since long before hillary finally quit. No one even talks about the republican ticket except to marvel at how bizarrely maniacal and unbelievably based on falsehoods the whole thing is.

I think the no-name poll is loaded, definitely. I'd also like to mention that I have a landline in brooklyn, listed under my name, for the last 10 years, and I have never, not once been polled on politics, not even on my answering machine. But hey there are a lot of people here.

Maybe they were polling in albany, not nyc. Luckily, if half the people in the five boroughs vote, it won't make any difference what the people in Albany do.

@22: you're in a bubble. just like seattleites.

The phony polls are set up to convince us that the phony election results are true.

We won't support spine-less NO-Bama and will re-defeat him in November !! Go Hillary 2012 !!

#14 - Thank You!

Go tell McCain. He needs to make a huge media buy in New York, ASAP. Hell, while he's at it he should spend a few million bucks in each of California's media markets as well.

IOW, if this poll gets the bed guys to waste some bucks on the delusion that they might win New York, I'm all for it.

Oh for christ sake!

Here is a poll you guys might like: iVote poll of iPhone users has Obama at 56% and McCain at 31%
Shows where those "non-land line" people are...