As of today Obama enjoys a slight edge but the gap continues to shrink as the momentum of the republican convention draws to a close. These numbers should be looked upon favorably by democrats though, as the talk of the town--'the Palin effect'-- has run its course pushing McCain's numbers only back to where they stood prior to the Dem's convention, effectively making the last two weeks a wash. But as the media begins to dig into Palin and the public at large becomes more educated to her Alaskan misfires, I suspect this bounce to backfire, and we will see Obama's numbers slowly creep back up.
While the polling data isn't where many of us would like it to be, in the end its the most we could have hoped for after what has proven to be a very successful Republican convention.
And the fun doesn't stop there...Taking a further plunge into the prediction madness, its helpful to put a face to what the above numbers mean nationally. Thankfully RCP takes care of this for us as well.