Discounting that one weird Gallup Poll from last week, John McCain has not had a lead in any non-tracking poll since May 16th. 

You would think that a candidate unable to overtake his opponent for nearly three consecutive months would be a big story, but you’d also think that Miller Lite couldn’t both taste great and be less filling.  And you’d be right.

Also note that in non-tracking polls, Obama’s averaging around a 6-point lead since the beginning of August.

Polls at this point, of course, are largely meaningless, but you’d think that, given the utter fixation on Obama’s “staganation” at a healthy lead and the apparent lack of effect of McCain’s game-changing ads, there’d be some coverage to that effect.  Ooh, never mind, Sanjay Gupta is interviewing Matthew McConaughey about his baby!

Except for the polls showing him gaining, Obama is losing.  Also notice that the latter poll comes from Zogby, who in a race between candidate A and candidate B shows a surprising strength for Eddie Murphy.

To show you how ridiculous polling is, just scroll down Survey USA’s front page.  They’re polling so many different ticket matchups (including, but not limited to, people who’ve outright said they don’t want the position and people who can’t possibly have any effect on anyone’s perception of the race) that the results are meaningless, the equivalent of a bullshit session in college that involutarily wastes several thousand people’s time rather than just your far-too-patient roommate’s.

Polls right now don’t mean anything.  It’s not only a low-information time, but tickets aren’t set, conventions haven’t happened, debates haven’t taken place, ground games haven’t ramped up.  But if you want to, go ahead and freak out over McCain/Bloomberg vs. Obama/Webb. 

Why would you even ask if a black guy saying he’s black is racist?