The presidential race is tightening in four key battlegroundstates, where John McCain holds a bigger advantage with white malevoters and Barack Obama keeps his hold on the youth vote, accordingto a Quinnipiac University poll conducted in partnership with TheWall Street Journal and washingtonpost.com. (Read more onthe poll.)
The poll shows Sen. Obama leading slightly in Michigan and bydouble-digits in Wisconsin, but by smaller margins than he didapproximately one month ago. Meanwhile, Sens. Obama and McCain arerunning statistically even in Colorado and Minnesota, states whereSen. Obama held a five-point and seven-point lead, respectively, inJune.
The key emerging issue appears to be energy and within theenergy debate, something is developing that could be verybeneficial to John McCain:
. . . in one respect, the focus of the energy debate could bestarting to shift in favor of Sen. McCain, the presumptiveRepublican nominee. Offshore drilling and drilling in the AlaskanNational Wildlife Refuge appear to be gaining support among voters.While Sen. McCain supports offshore drilling, but not drilling inthe Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge, Sen. Obama supportsneither.
It's time for Senator McCain to come out and state that while inthe past, he opposed drilling in ANWR, the high price of gas hascaused him to change his mind. It is good policy and good politics to do so.
