Obama leads in NBC/WSJ poll: A new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll shows Obama leading Romney 48 percent to 44 percent.

The poll shows voters continue to process negative information about Romney, with 44 percent saying what they’ve heard in recent weeks has made them feel more negative toward Romney, as opposed to 32 percent who said it has made them feel more positive. Overall, Romney’s favorable/unfavorable split is 38/44.

On the congressional ballot, voters say they would prefer Democrats to control Congress by a 47 percent to 42 percent margin. That’s up from a one-point Democratic advantage last month. The GOP brand remains significantly worse than the Democratic brand.



But, it's not all bad for Romney...



Swing state polls are swinging — ever so slightly — toward Mitt Romney.

Romney, who has generally performed better in national polls than in swing state polls, has seen that disparity begin to disappear. And in fact, recent polls in several swing states show Romney asserting a lead or closing the gap in a way he hadn’t before.

Today’s trio of swing state polls from Quinnipiac University, CBS News and the New York Times are the latest to show a little movement toward Romney.


Remember: these are the states that will decide the presidency. National polls are fun/important and worth keeping an eye on, but as November approaches, the battle in this handful of states is what really matters.

Romney still trails in more swing state polls than he leads in, and a USA Today/Gallup poll released this week showed his performance in swing states (trailing President Obama 47 percent to 44 percent) continues to lag behind his performance elsewhere (ahead 47 percent to 45 percent)

But as Nate Silver pointed out Wednesday, it’s not nearly as lopsided as it used to be. Silver notes that, in June and July, Obama led in in about four times as many swing state polls as Romney did.

That had Democrats claiming that their attacks on Romney’s tenure at Bain Capital was working. After all, they argued, the swing states are the places where those ads are running.

If that was the case, then it appears the GOP’s ramped-up advertising — or maybe the bad economic news or Paul Ryan’s selection as Romney’s running mate — has brought things back near even. And while the Obama campaign has spent heavily early on, Republicans are expected to significantly outspend Democrats down the stretch.

n the end, it’s not surprising to see the swing states begin to reflect the national race a little more. We live in a highly polarized country, where half of people are very much on one side and half are on the other. Swing states are supposed to reflect the national mood.

There’s no big sea change in these polls — most changes are within the margin of error — and every poll is a snapshot in time.

But the preponderance of evidence — to borrow a legal term — suggests a race that is getting more competitive in the states that will decide the next president.