New Poll shows Obama Lead over McCain 8%

With only a few days until the vote, Barack Obama has pulled to an eight point lead over John McCain in a tally of “traditional” likely voters in the latest Gallup daily tracking poll.

The same polling model Tuesday showed McCain within 2 points, his most encouraging news in the poll for a month. The poll now shows Obama leading 51 percent to 43 percent.

The poll would show initial reaction to Obama’s infomercial. The poll’s expanded model showed Obama moving into a nine point lead, 52 percent to 43 percent, among registered voters who told pollsters they intended to vote.

The traditional model considers registered voters who both say they intend to vote and have voted in the past as likely voters.

Now, this is a national poll, not a state by state one, and it’s a poll, and polls are what they are.

But if this is a good reflection of American voters right now, it’s not good news for a McCain camp, which is verging on being out of cash to spend on this campaign. That’s especially true as the Obama camp has seemingly limitless campaign cash.

As always, margin of error on these things is +/- 3 on the traditional, +/-2 on expanded. And while this is the poll we’ve chosen to track for an apples to apples comparison throughout the campaign, it’s only a poll.