Barack Obama leads John McCain by a 52% to 36% margin in Pew’s latest nationwide survey of 1,325 registered voters. This is the fourth consecutive survey that has found support for the Republican candidate edging down. In contrast, since early October weekly Pew surveys have shown about the same number of respondents saying they back Obama. When the sample is narrowed to those most likely to vote, Obama leads by 53% to 38%.

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From Election Projection

Barack Obama will win this election in a landslide.  He will capture at least 350 electoral votes and win the popular vote by 7% or more.  McCain may benefit from some measure of the Bradley Effect, but that advantage will be overwhelmed by African-American turnout, Palin-induced defections by moderates, and under-funded, unenthusiastic GOP get-out-the-vote efforts.  This week’s update shows Obama with a 375-163 electoral vote edge.  The actual result may be a tad closer, but I’d be less surprised if his victory surpassed even that landslide tally.

By every metric, the Democrat’s presidential campaign looks as if it is headed for the upper deck.

For a political analyst, the normal posture this time of year is much like a baseball umpire’s: hunched over, peering carefully as the ball approaches the plate, watching for whether it breaks left or right, whether it’s coming in high or low. But, these days, we analysts are more like outfielders, watching in awe as a ball seems on a trajectory to not only clear the fence but very likely land in the upper deck.

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The global financial meltdown has caused a dramatic shift in the 2008 presidential race, according to the latest NEWSWEEK poll. With four weeks left in the presidential campaign, Barack Obama now leads John McCain by double digits, 52 percent to 41 percent among registered voters—a marked shift from the last NEWSWEEK poll, conducted one month ago, when the two candidates were tied at 46 percent.

Underlying Obama’s surge in support: An historic boiling over of dissatisfaction with the status quo. An astounding 86 percent of voters now say they are dissatisfied with the way things are going in the United States, while a mere 10 percent say they are satisfied. That’s the highest wrong track/right track ratio ever recorded in the NEWSWEEK poll.

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Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama holds strong leads over his Republican adversary John McCain in two national polls released Tuesday.

A New York Times/CBS News poll had Obama ahead of McCain by 14 points–53 to 39 percent–while a Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll shows Obama ahead by nine points, 50 to 41 percent.

The NYT/CBS poll also shows that McCain’s sharp attacks on Obama seem to have backfired: 21 percent of those surveyed said that their opinion of McCain has dropped in the last weeks, and the top two reasons cited were the McCain attacks on Obama and his choice of Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate.

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 As voters have gotten to know Senator Barack Obama, they have warmed up to him, with more than half, 53 percent, now saying they have a favorable impression of him and 33 percent saying they have an unfavorable view. But as voters have gotten to know Senator John McCain, they have not warmed, with only 36 percent of voters saying they view him favorably while 45 percent view him unfavorably.

Voter preferences in the presidential race continue to be generally auspicious for Barack Obama’s election prospects only three weeks ahead of the eve of Election Day. Obama leads McCain by 10 percentage points, 51% to 41%, among all registered voters, according to Gallup Poll Daily tracking from Oct. 10-12.