Obama leading in polls; McCain supporters hopeful
Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama has the edge in politcal polls with five days before the presidential election.
A Reuters/C-SPAN/Zogby poll listed Obama leading Republican presidential candidate John McCain by 50 percent to 43 percent late afternoon Thursday.
Based on these numbers, Obama has enough electoral votes at 306 to win the election, according to a rolling average of polls by Real Clear Politics, a non-partisan polling company. The minimum number of electoral votes needed to win is 270.
Karl Bouwhuis, president of College Democrats, is happy with Obama's performance in the polls.
"The states where the polls are close are traditionally conservative or have been battleground states in the past," the Lowell senior said.
Obama leads in places where a Democratic presidential candidate has not won in a while.
According to Real Clear Politics, Obama has a 3.3 percent lead in North Carolina and a 7.2 percent lead in Virginia. The pollster's margin of error is plus or minus 4.1 percent.
As a result, the Democrats will not sit back in the campaign's final days.
"We're going to keep on working like we're two points behind," said Matt Sous, president of Students for Barack Obama and Freeland senior.
Results can very from poll to poll and McCain still has a shot if he can campaign hard in the coming days.
"If he just keeps talking about his platform and stuff, I think he can really pull it out," said St. Louis senior Jerrod Crispin.
Crispin said the races are close enough in the big states like Florida and Ohio for McCain to make a comeback. The Arizona senator is down .3 percent in Florida, a battleground state.
"I've never really liked polls personally," Livonia senior Brian Lefler said.
Lefler thinks polls encourage people to go along with the majority. He has already sent in his absentee ballot last week and said he voted for McCain.
Sous believes even if the economy recovers or stabilizes, Obama holds the advantage because this election is about more than just about the economy. He believes Obama has shown better judgment throughout the campaign.
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