CA should be one of our biggies but clearly it isnt based on pop vote.

now, anything pre debate 3 is just anecdotal.

Romney is only 14pts behind in CA? and 8pts in MN? Romney landslide is coming!!!

it's a fact that in many blue states (NY is an exception) Obama is winning but not winning as big as he did in 2008. This is why the popular vote is close. Of course the electoral vote is what counts and in the swing states Obama does have the advantage. Missouri is another example. It went very narrowly (by less than 1%) for McCain in 2008--recent polling indicates (by PPP) that Obama is down by 14 this time.

Polls showed Democratic Senator Boxer struggling against Fiorina, and Governor Brown even or behind Meg Whitman - the end result? A Democratic BLOWOUT.

We'll see how these polls hold up after the elections. My guess is, President Obama is more likely 18-20 points ahead, but pollsters don't poll Mexican-Americans who prefer to speak Spanish.

I don't see the enthusiasm gap corporate media and others see. I live here and from the information I'm getting from our 47-member strong group, everyone is highly enthusiastic about voting for President Obama - especially the Latino community. I guess the decision to halt all persecutions of Dream-children here has helped in that regard.

our statewide totals will be higher.

Although Mexican-Americans are NOT monolithic when it comes to politics, and they really do dislike unauthorized immigration as much as many Anglo-Americans, they feel they're under attack by the Republican Party that doesn't see the difference between an American-born Latino and an undocumented one. They particularly hate SB1070 that Romney has been quoted as saying, "it is the blueprint for the rest of the country".

Since the SB1070 decision that President Obama has won in SCOTUS, his lead among Latinos has exploded.
http://www.latinodecisions.com/blog/2012/07/18/after-sb1070-decision-obama-widens-lead-over-romney/

From that piece, this is very important to remember:

But when Fiorina and Whitman imploded, the later polls showed Boxer and Brown winning.

Anyway, I'm hoping Obama's California numbers will be higher than this because it would help the popular vote.

As I told a friend who voted for Obama in California yesterday, your vote DOES matter even if you're in a safe blue state because it all goes toward the popular vote and it's important that Obama do as well in that as possible in order to prevent a narrative after the election that Romney won the popular vote and is the real winner etc. etc.

plus the fact that Romney is significantly stronger in Republican strongholds than McCain was, means that Obama must be very strong in the swing states given the national polling situation.

It's impossible to find a Romney bumpersticker unless you go to rural areas (or mega-wealthy areas).

we're seeing some reason for the polling split between the popular vote and electoral vote for the reasons you stated. But there's one more component. It's clear that there has been erosion of support for Obama among many white voters (especially white males). This poll and several others have indicated that. But that erosion isn't equal everywhere - due to the auto bailout, for example, OH is in much better state. And the ads that Obama blanketed in the mid west showing Romney to be a nasty corporate raider were effective in defining him early on in that part of the country. And Obama's advantage with Latinos will likely have him winning NV and possibly CO. VA and NC have also seen demographic changes.

Considering the money advantage Romney has had, Obama has done remarkably well in identifying states that he has had to defend, and spending money in those states accordingly. I think a split between the PV and EC is more likely this time than even '00. But we all know the PV means nothing. And for those mentioning mandates, since when have republicans ever cared about such a thing when a Dem was in charge? They impeached Clinton over a BJ for God's sake and have refused to work with Obama in good faith on any issue of major significance, whether it was the stimulus, health care, taxes, or the budget.

Let them howl.

...it probably KILLED them to begrudgingly note that the President is currently leading by 14 pts.

And guess what? The President will probably win by a margin close to that of 2008.

Kerry won California by 9.95% in 2004. Obama is out-polling him there by four points. It's not a huge margin, but it's significant enough when you realize four points would have been 450,000 more votes added to the popular vote, while Bush would've lost 542,000 votes ... for a net gain of nearly a million votes for Kerry. The margin between Kerry & Bush in the '04 popular vote was just over 3 million people. Had Kerry won California by 14, that advantage shrinks to about 2 million. Not considerable, but if you factor in Obama's stronger numbers in Minnesota, New Mexico, Colorado, Nevada, Virginia, North Carolina, Ohio and Florida ... it shows why the gap in the national polls and the state polls makes no sense.

So, while Obama isn't out-polling his numbers in '08, he's still out-polling Kerry, who lost the popular vote by a narrow margin ... while also losing almost every swing state (and many Obama currently leads).

was registered voters, and showed the President up by 19 points. From the OP article:

I've seen polls showing Obama as low as (+12) in California. I would have thought Obama would be at (+20) in California.

Obama has numbers in New York right now that are comparable to 2008, so why would he be down in California?