Granted, there is a prophet-in-the-wilderness futility built into any effort to rail against the national polls. Virtually everyone connected with politics has a vested interest in hyping their significance. The leading co-conspirators include the front-running campaigns (who love the whiff of victory), political reporters (who crave "objective" data), major media organizations (which ballyhoo their own polls), and political junkies (who pepper their e-mails with overwrought analyses of why some candidate dropped 2 percent in the latest Rasmussen survey). It is easy to dismiss all of this poll-position prattle as a harmless way to while away the days until somebody, somewhere, actually caucuses or votes. But national polls also punish candidates whose strength is in the early states (like John Edwards, Mitt Romney and up-and-coming Mike Huckabee) and contenders who have just not broken through to a cross-country audience. By guiding the press coverage and heavily influencing political donors, these national polls have the capacity to become self-fulfilling prophesies.

Walter Shapiro,Salon

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2007/10/26/polls/print.html

Yesterday's NH poll had Thompson behind Ron Paul!