Gallup today put out a very helpful article comparing polling numbers in July to outcomes in November, further breaking down the data by focusing on what they define as "competitive" races. These data points should breed further caution into any Dems who are feeling triumphal as of late. Especially to us younger folks there are some pretty surprising figures; Jimmy Carter for example had a 33 point lead in July of 1976 against Gerald Ford but ended up winning by only two points at the end of the day. More recently John Kerry around this time had a seven point lead over George W. Bush in the polls.
What does this all mean for Barack and John? Who knows! There are a lot of dynamics working in this campaign that will be hard to predict ranging from the fact that we haven't had an African-American candidate before to figuring out whether we're at a 1968-esque re-aligning election in which one political order (the Nixon-Reagan-Bush one) will give way to a resurgent liberalism (a topic I'll try to have thoughts on before November).
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