Obama’s convention bounce takes shape

ST. PAUL – Sen. Barack Obama’s nationally televised speech to the Democratic National Convention appears to have won him a six-point bounce in the polls.

The Real Clear Politics average of polls from Aug. 29 to Sept. 1 gives the Illinois senator a 6.4 percent lead over his opponent, Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). That polling was done after Obama’s Aug. 28 speech at a Denver football field, attended by more than 80,000 and watched by around 40 million people.

{mosads}Obama had only a 1.7 percentage point lead over McCain in the same average of polls on Aug. 26, the second day of the Democratic convention.

The polling was done over a busy period in politics that included McCain’s surprising vice presidential pick, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R). McCain’s announcement was intended to blunt any bounce won by Obama from the convention.

McCain also hopes the GOP convention that began Monday will give him a bounce in the polls and stop Obama from gaining any momentum.

That hope got off to an inauspicious start as media attention focused on a hurricane approaching the Gulf Coast, and most events at the convention were canceled on its first day. It’s also unclear what impact there will be on the GOP ticket from news that Palin’s unmarried 17-year-old daughter is pregnant.

Obama is up by eight points in an Aug. 29-31 CBS News poll of registered voters, and by nine points in a poll of registered voters over the same time period by Diageo/Hotline. This was the first time CBS included the names of the vice presidential candidates in its questions.

Another poll, this one by Gallup Tracking, shows Obama up by eight points, while a poll by Rasmussen Tracking shows Obama up by six points.
 
One national poll still found Obama and McCain in a dead heat in the days after the Democratic convention: an Aug. 29-31 CNN poll that found Obama had only a one-point lead.

The poll also asked voters what they thought of the two tickets and found that four in 10 Americans were not familiar with Palin. Men had a slightly more favorable opinion of her; 41 percent viewed her favorably, compared to 36 percent of women.