The people have spoken resoundingly, and Barack Obama won the third presidential debate — meaning he has won all of them now. By a 2-to-1 margin or greater in multiple polls, viewers thought Obama bested John McCain. He scored much higher than McCain on both personal attributes (70-22% on likeability, according to CNN) and on the issues (59-35% on the economy, also from CNN). And yet the total and utter disconnect of the punditocracy from voters is astounding. John King of CNN questioned his station’s own poll results on air because he and so many other pundits were convinced that this was McCain’s “strongest performance” to date. Maybe so, but the media norm of faux two-sidedness and trying to keep elections close is getting a little old. I don’t see any other explanation for the fact that Mark Halperin of TIME gave John McCain an A- overall and a B+ on style points.

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Boy, what a difference opinion polls make on morale. John McCain is sliding, and his followers are angry. Now that McCain needs to play catch-up, he’s pulling out the smears and avoiding economic issues. After his running mate said that Obama was “palling around with” former Weathermen militant Bill Ayers, it set a dangerous course for his campaign. With McCain, Palin, all their surrogates, and Fox News now telling conservatives that Obama is a “pal” of Ayers, the recipients are terrified and outraged that their candidate is losing to a terrorist sympathizer. Perhaps that explains this unpleasant moment.

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The indispensable Nate Silver of www.fivethirtyeight.com takes on some questions about recent polls and supposed shifts in voter ID. Since the Republican National Convention, there has been a noticeable bounce in both overall support for John McCain at the nationwide and state level, as well as an increase in voter ID for Republicans. The sudden increase in those identifying themselves as Republicans has led some to doubt the accuracy of recent polls showing a McCain edge. One possible explanation for the spike in GOP responders is simply response bias — a greater willingness at this point to answer polls because they feel more excited about their ticket. In any case, Silver answers some questions about voter ID issues today.

It’s important to remember the unreliability of polling data, especially with so much time left in the campaign. The likelihood is that McCain is, in fact, doing better than two weeks ago. If the election were held today, there’s almost a 50% shot he would win. But with four debates and almost two months of campaigning left, anything can happen. In addition, what the Obama campaign is really looking for is a path to 270 electoral votes, not a lead in the national polls. If Obama can hold on to the states that Kerry won and win any three of the following six: New Mexico, Colorado, Iowa, Virginia, Florida, and Ohio — he will reach the needed 270.