Pat Dollard | Young Americans

“Three Democrats contacted by FOX News called this a seriously negative development.”

Let us not forget that this began before the conventions, so it’s undismissable as only a convention bounce. Interesting inside details further to the earlier post “McCain Surges Ahead In Four Major Polls”.

Fox News:

WASHINGTON — John McCain bested Barack Obama 50-46 percent among registered voters in the latest USA Today/Gallup poll, jumping 11 points over his previous showing and taking his biggest lead since January.

McCain’s showing is credited in part to a well-received Republican Convention last week fueled largely by the surprise pick of McCain’s vice presidential running mate, Sarah Palin. The numbers out Monday show McCain wiped out a 7-point lead Obama received after the Democratic convention two weeks ago.

In the new poll conducted from Friday to Sunday, McCain also leads Obama 54-44 percent among likely voters. The survey of 1,022 adults, including 959 registered voters, has a margin of error of 3 points.

The numbers are drawing scorn in the Chicago headquarters of Obama for President.

“Up or down, we believe national polls are meaningless,” Obama spokesman Bill Burton told FOX News.

Other Democrats, some of whom support and occassionally advise Obama, and others on the outside view the numbers as a startling reversal of fortune and a sign of potential danger to come.

While it’s true Obama’s campaign has invested little energy in analyzing national polls, it has closely tracked two national numbers: is Obama ahead of McCain on the economy and is he an agent of “change.”

Monday’s USA Today poll shows McCain has closed the week-before advantage on the economy from 19 points in Obama’s favor to just 3 points now.

Three Democrats contacted by FOX News called this a seriously negative development, one they believe the Obama camp must reverse in the coming week.

The Obama camp had no comment on the junior senator from Illinois’ sudden loss of momentum on economic matters and what, if any, changes in strategy it might trigger.

Democrats say they are more enthusiastic than Republicans to vote this year. However, that number had been a 20-point differential with Democratic enthusiasm peaking at 67 percent compared to Republicans at 47 percent. Now, 60 percent of Republicans say they are enthusiastic.

This rise in GOP enthusiasm is again credited to Palin. The Alaska governor’s widely seen speech at the convention was hailed by many conservatives in the party. Palin is scheduled this week to do her first national television interview.

The announcement of her interview caps a weeks of intense press scrutiny of Palin, who has been accused of having little international experience and exaggerating her reformer credentials.

McCain’s campaign has lashed out at coverage of Palin and her family, while Democrats have questioned why the candidate has not been put directly before reporters to answer questions.

McCain campaign manager Rick Davis earlier complained that the media has focused too much on 44-year-old Palin’s personal life. Many of those stories came after McCain’s campaign announced that Palin’s unwed 17-year-old daughter was pregnant.

“Why would we want to throw Sarah Palin into a cycle of piranhas called the news media that have nothing better to ask questions about than her personal life and her children?” Davis said on FOX News. “So until at which point in time we feel like the news media is going to treat her with some level of respect and deference, I think it would be foolhardy to put her out into that kind of environment.”

Palin’s Democratic counterpart, Sen. Joe Biden, a veteran of the Sunday talk show circuit, said she delivered a great speech at the convention, but “her silence on the issues was deafening.”

“She didn’t mention a word about health care, a word about the environment, a word about the middle class. They never parted her lips … so I don’t know where she is on those things.”

The two are scheduled to debate each other on Oct. 2.

McCain adviser Mark Salter said Palin had not been sent out to campaign on her own because McCain enjoyed the excitement she was injecting into his campaign.

“They’re having a good time. We were riding a lot of momentum coming out of the convention. The crowds were large,” said Salter. “The senator himself thought they should continue on for a few days.”