For all practical purposes, the real general election campaign has not even begun. No one knows what the Republicans are going to be throwing at Obama. About the only thing the current polls might really tell us is that the race is reasonably close so far. Clearly, a distinctly negative turn for either candidate could easily put him well behind the 8 ball in the race.

Obama has had a nearly two month run of press without any really negative content, and with much positive content. He's not exactly putting McCain away, is he?

I won't pretend to know how this race will turn out -- whether Obama can ride the very positive Democratic brand to victory, or the Republicans can marshal an effective negative campaign on Obama's pretty extraordinary vulnerabilities to bring him down, I just can't possibly predict with any confidence.

And the organization on the ground. That will tell the tale. Dem turnout will be massive.

Sure, Obama's going to get trounced in the South. But bottom line is McCain is not going to steal a Kerry state, and it's highly likely Obama turns at least one Bush '04 state.

The overall conditions favor Obama, and I'd say that he is the favorite. However, he will have to work hard for every vote, and his campaign's record since he became the presumptive nominee has not been good.

He has been damaged by his FISA flip-flop, and his move to the centre on one or two things, which opened him up to the flip-flopper attack, which is always very damaging. Especially to a guy who has run in the primary on being a different kind of politician.

Furthermore, McCain has been up in the air with ads more than Obama has, with claims and images that were left largely unchallenged. The retreating Dem response on the Clark broohaha has left McCain virtually untouchable as a "war hero", and leaves his campaign free to play that card whenever they want.

:)

As many of you can attest, some folks have already made up their minds and there is nothing anyone can say or do to change it.  Thankfully there are many undecided voters. So, yes, we can have a Democratic POTUS as well as a Democratic Congress.

As much as I dislike Obama (I am planning on skipping the top of the ticket in my red state, I reject both candidates), I think it would be nearly impossible for him to lose the election. It is a Democrats year, the country is ready to switch parties, and on top of that, Obama's ground game is FAR better than McCain's, FAR better. If Obama loses, it will NOT be because of anything positive about McCain or McCain's campaign, it will be because voters just did not feel like they could connect to/trust Obama. I am sure the McCain campaign will help push those doubts along. The foreign photo ops don't really help, I don't think, they just make him seem more concerned about Europeans than about Americans.

All I can think of is that LV models are sort of wacky and rely a lot more on demographics than on actual poll responses.  For example, old white people tend to show up, so we'll count them all as LVs even though they aren't all that thrilled with McCain.  I guess that could be it.