There's more good polling data for Barack Obama and his supporters today. A new Quinnipiac/Wall Street Journal/Washington Post poll shows the presumptive Democratic nominee leading Republican John McCain in Wisconsin, Colorado, Minnesota and Michigan. Obama holds a 17-point (54 percent to 37 percent) advantage over his rival in Minnesota and a 5-point (49 percent to 44 percent) lead in Colorado. Colorado went to President Bush in 2004, while all three of the Midwestern states went to John Kerry.
The poll finds Obama doing even better among independents in all four states. Minnesota's independents favor Obama over McCain 54 to 33. Obama also has double-digit leads among independents in Colorado and Wisconsin.
This comes the same week as a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll that offered up even more bad news for McCain. That poll -- released Tuesday -- showed Obama leading McCain 49 percent to 37 percent nationally. Obama's lead expanded to 15 points when Libertarian Party presidential nominee Bob Barr and independent candidate Ralph Nader were included as choices given to respondents.
Peter A. Brown, the assistant director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute, had some words of caution for Obama and his supporters, though. Of the new Quinnipiac poll, Brown said, "Sen. Obama should not be picking out the drapes for the Oval Office just yet. His lead nationally, and double digits in some key states, is not hugely different from where Sen. John Kerry stood four years ago at this point in the campaign."
Another interesting tidbit comes from the Quinnipiac poll in Minnesota, where the state's governor, Tim Pawlenty, has been mentioned as a leading candidate to be McCain's running mate. The poll had some bad news for Pawlenty. At the moment, if Pawlenty is McCain's running mate, then the two will actually have less chance of winning Minnesota than McCain would have without him. Twenty-three percent of Minnesotans said they would be less likely to vote for McCain if Pawlenty was on the ticket, while only 18 percent said they'd be more likely to vote for McCain in that situation. Fifty-six percent said it wouldn't affect their vote.
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