October 24, 2008	Friday	Shawwal 24, 1429

NEW YORK, Oct 23: The latest poll figures released on Thursday by Zogby and C-Span revealed that democrat Barack Obama leads his Republican rival John McCain by 12 points in the US presidential race, with crucial independent and women voters increasingly moving to his side.

Senator Obama leads McCain 52 per cent to 40 per cent among likely voters in the latest three-day tracking poll, which had a margin of error of 2.9 points with less than two weeks left in the elections scheduled for Nov 4, said another news report on Thursday.

Obama has made consistent gains over the last four days and has tripled his lead on McCain in the past week of polling.

“Obama’s expansion is really across the board,” pollster John Zogby said.

“It seems to be among almost every demographic group.”

The Illinois senator saw his lead among women — who are expected to play a decisive role in this election — increase to 18 points from 16 points on Wednesday.

And independent voters, who have been the target of intense campaign efforts by both sides, have now swung behind Obama by a 30-point margin, 59 per cent to 29 per cent.

Zogby said McCain, appeared to have lost the traction he won after the third and final presidential debate last week.

“McCain can still try to turn it around, but he has to find focus,” Zogby said, adding that economic issues, which dominated the campaign amid turmoil in the credit, housing and financial markets, still seem to be working in Obama’s favour.

“At some point there are some issues that just overwhelm, and McCain has been particularly weak on the economy,” Zogby said in a statement.

Other recent national polls have given Obama a narrower lead, but Zogby said he was confident in his sampling methods.

The latest poll showed a continued erosion of McCain’s support even among his “base” voters.

While Obama wins the backing of 86 per cent of Democrats, only 81 per cent of Republicans back the Arizona senator.Obama holds a 6-point lead among men, 48 per cent to 42 per cent, while white voters — who had been among McCain’s core support groups — now only back McCain by a 2-point margin.

Independent Ralph Nader and Libertarian Bob Barr held relatively steady at 2 per cent and 1 per cent respectively. Three per scent of voters said they remained undecided, unchanged from Wednesday.

The rolling tracking poll surveyed 1,208 likely voters in the presidential election. In a tracking poll, the most recent day’s results are added while the oldest day’s results are dropped to monitor changing momentum.