AP Poll: It's a Dead Heat

Not all the polls are going in Barack Obama's favor. An AP-GfK survey says John McCain has closed the gap with Obama after the last debate by gaining voters among whites and those earning less than $50,000. The poll has the race at 44%-43% in favor of Obama, a statistical tie indicating that the "Joe the plumber" analogy resonated. The same poll placed Obama 7 points ahead of McCain three weeks ago, the AP reports.

Since then, McCain has improved his rating for handling the economy and the financial crisis. McCain also has pounced on Obama's comment that spreading wealth around is "good for everybody." He unveiled a new ad today that features "Joe the plumbers" and a man who asks skeptically, "Obama wants my sweat to pay for his trillion dollars in new spending?"
(More Election 2008 stories.)