The reasons why the polls matter, is because of the nature of the mainstream media coverage of the"horse race" aspect of the presidential race. Now that we are nearing the finish (thank god) of this election, the Washington punditry is already attempting to declare Kerry dead in the water (if they accept the Gallup results) or dead in the water unless Nader pulls out (if they accept everybody else's poll results).

I do think it is significant that even in the polls showing a statistical tie, that Bush seems to still have the edge over Kerry in some important questions (notably on Iraq now because the Reps have managed to convince enough gullible Americans that the war on Iraq is the war on terrorism), and because Kerry has lost so much ground on the economy, an area where he was far ahead of Bush last spring.

The Bushites are now busy lowering everybody's expectations of how he'll do in the debates. But I swear to god, is John Kerry TRYING to lose this election? It seems his campaign can do nothing right, because Kerry, the messenger, is awful.