Not all of today’s polls were of the highest caliber, as many Democrats were inclined to remind me on twitter. Certainly, Obama would rather be down in Rasmussen and ARG than CBS/NYT/Quinnipiac, but this argument implies that Obama is faring pretty well in the “good polls” and there isn’t an especially clear “good” versus “bad” poll dynamic, at least not yet. Romney made big gains in Pew Research and Fox News, two solid live interview surveys that call cell phone voters and previously pointed toward a modest or even large Obama lead before the debate. At the state level, the argument is somewhat better with Seltzer, CBS/NYT/Quinnipiac, CNN, and NBC/Marist polls showing Obama with a slight edge in the battlegrounds, but these data aren’t so overwhelmingly positive for the president as to outweigh Pew, Gallup, and Fox, let alone when coupled with SurveyUSA. Perhaps future polls will divide along perceived qualitative lines, but right now the evidence is not especially clear.

The silver lining for Obama supporters? So far, it's just one day of polls showing Romney ahead in the battlegrounds and recent polls from NBC/WSJ/Marist or CBS/NYT/Quinnipiac are hardly outdated. And maybe the best news for the president was by omission: pollsters didn't decide to survey Ohio, Iowa, or Wisconsin; three states sufficient to reelect the president where Obama has led in most post-debate polls. If polls will soon show Romney ahead in those states, they weren't published today.

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