But, of course, elections are not won in the popular vote: they're won in the electoral college.  In the end, the national polls don't matter nearly as much as the state polls.  By that metric, Obama is doing very well:  Pollster.com shows us winning 260 EVs with 99 tossups mostly leaning our way; Nate Silver, meanwhile, has Obama projected to win 310.6 EVs as things currently stand.

Of course, the priority of state polls over national ones is old hat to political junkies like us.  And yet, especially when it comes to 24-hour media cycles, convention bounces and debates, there is a tendency to place special emphasis on national trackers--especially since it can be difficult to get quick daily snapshots of changes within any given state's polling.  This is always something of a mistake (though we don't have much else to go on, so it's what we do).  But looking at national trackers to estimate the McCain bounce from the GOP convention is more ill-advised than usual.

The Republicans had the opportunity to attempt to use their convention to appeal to moderates and independents.  Getting Western moderates and Hillary voters into McCain's camp was supposed to be one of the biggest draws of the Sarah Palin pick.  Instead, with the exception of some elements of John McCain's speech (in which he still neglected to talk about the issues appealing to moderates), the entire GOP convention was tailored toward motivating their own base.

As Margie Omero says over at Pollster.com:

As we continue to discuss the Palin Effect, more data have emerged.  An ABC News poll released today shows that partisanship, as opposed to gender, is a far greater predictor than of attitudes toward Governor Palin.

Across nearly every dimension, Republicans have rallied behind McCain's VP pick, with Democrats and independents more ambivalent.  A full 80% of Republicans say the pick makes them more confident in McCain, compared to 59% of Democrats feeling less confident (independents are more divided, 44% more confident, 37% less confident).

And charges that the press have treated Palin unfairly resonate with Republicans more than they resonate with women.  More than half (57%) of Republicans say she has been treated unfairly, with less than half as many Democrats (27%) agreeing.  The difference between men (55% treated fairly) and women (46%) is smaller, with women more likely to be undecided than men.

When we ask the ultimate question--how does each candidate's VP pick affect one's vote--we see Palin moving the Republican base, but not others.

Moving the base more squarely into McCain's camp will surely drive the national tracking polls upward in his favor.  <u>But it won't necessarily do so in the states John McCain needs to win.</u>  Remember where the Christianist, hyper-conservative anti-Obama base largely lives: Appalachia, the deep South, and much of the upper Mountain West.  These states are already heavily in the bag for McCain: 15 points in Tennessee; 21 points in Nebraska; an insane 40 points in Utah; 15 points in Louisiana.  The list goes on and on.

This is where the Palin base largely resides.  Yes, there will be shifts in a few of the swing states with evangelical populations (for instance, the entire Focus on the Family crowd in Colorado Springs will be more mobilized now, making Obama's and Udall's roads more difficult there; Ohio could also be a problem given the presence of the religious right there), but by and large McCain's post-convention bump is likely to come from states that are already his.

The Democratic Convention, by constrast, did not throw red meat to its base but rather hit at issues that resonate across the entire electorate.

So when we examine the GOP bounce over the coming days, let us examine closely not what it is, but where it is.  That will be the biggest indicator of the convention's success--or, more likely, lack thereof.