From the Economist's poll of 1,000 People:

Obama continues to tell us how many Republicans support him, but the numbers continue to disagree. In a head to head race, McCain gets 16% of the Dem vote and Obama gets only 6% of the GOP vote. For those who care, McCain is leading 45-42.

60% think Obama "says what he thinks people want to hear" as opposed to 40% "says what he believes. For Clinton, the numbers are 70/30. McCain is the only one better than 50/50. 57% think he "says what he believes".

33% have a "very unfavorable view" of Obama, including 29% of independents. 16% "somewhat unfavorable".

Clinton's numbers are much worse, obviously.

McCain is viewed "very unfavorably" by only 19%, and 17% of independents.

There is more, those are just some that caught my eye.

http://www.economist.com/media/pdf/econ21april2008_tabs.pdf

L.A. Times article today says both Clinton and Obama fair "very well" against McCain in spite of the protracted battle. It's expected that the eventual candidate will clarify votes and make gains, not the opposite... but you never know.

There are some trouble trend numbers out there for Obama, but nothing fatal. It's what campaigns are for.

McCain's also got a ceiling of about 45% support right now that is troubling his campaign. No matter how much the Democrats beat each other up, he doesn't seem to benefit any. You see movement for the two Democratic candidates, but they don't really change in head-to-heads versus McCain.

But this is all so preliminary. As long as the Democrats don't drag this past June they should be okay.

They should just be glad that the next primaries are only 2 weeks away and they dont have as much time to jam their feet into their mouths.

Toop, I agree. The growing consensus among superdelegates is that the leader after the last primary is the winner. That's six weeks away... and it can't get here soon enough.

I'm waiting to find out one more horrible but ultimately inconsequential thing about each before then (!).

quote:

Demonizing McCain!!

Or worse (and easier), connecting him to Bush.