Had a brief chat with Obi-Wan. He’s as surprised as I that we haven’t had any leaks of exit poll data.
He noted what an act of courage it must have been for the Battleground poll to come out with its final numbers today, showing Obama up 1.9 percent. Think about it – you’re a pollster, everyone around you is showing Obama up big, Gallup has him up 10 percent, Zogby’s got him up 11. IBD/TIPP, which had shown it closing this weekend, suddenly showed Obama’s lead growing again and finished with Obama up 7.2, with “other candidates” getting 4.2 percent. Not to accuse anyone of bad faith, but there must be enormous pressure when one chooses to go out on a limb. If you’ve got a few points worth of undecided, the temptation to allocate most of them to the favorite – bringing your results closer to everyone else’s — must be intense.
But Tarrance went with the numbers he saw and put Obama up 1.9. Lake put the margin at 5, still smaller than most of the others.