In America, the convention duel is over and there can now be little doubt that Barack Obama won it. Whereas Mitt Romney saw only a very modest boost in his polling numbers during the Republican convention, Obama has received a much bigger bounce, not only wiping out any advantage Romney gained the previous week, but actually leaving him with a bigger lead than he’d enjoyed before. On both Gallup and Rasmussen’s national tracking polls, he now enjoys a commanding five-point lead. And that could well continue to grow: the Gallup number still includes responses from before the Democratic convention even began. Nate Silver’s forecasting model now gives Obama an 80.7 per cent chance of securing re-election — his highest of the campaign.
And how did Obama achieve this? There was his characteristically excellent speech on Thursday night, but perhaps more important were the support acts: in particular his wife Michelle on Tuesday and Bill Clinton on Wednesday, both of whom received rave reviews.
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