You think a poll in an electoral college system is an accurate thermometer? What if every solitary respondent in California, NY, Texas and Florida said yea to Dave. Meanwhile 51% of the people in each of the other 46 states are for Pabst. Dave would be leading in the polls huge. On Intrade though Pabst would probably be trading at 80.
even if it were about image i don't see how Mccain produces a better "image" than Obama when you look at a picture of the guy or a pic of him and palin the first thing that come's to mind is "stupid" enless the vast majority of americans are really THAT stupid... then.... gaaaa... loss of words i better move out of this country. Does Canada's harper look stupid? no. does nikolas sarkhozy look stupid, no did putin look stupid, no, they ALL look serious, bush is a joke and so is mccain. obama at least (speaking from a purely IMAGE standpoint) looks serious.
A poll is a thermometer. Again, your faith in the markets is no substitute for sound statistical theory. There's no question that polls can be shoddy and done wrong. However, there is science behind them. The argument you have behind intrade is that it's right because the market is always right. There's no scientific evidence for that whatsoever.
You know little about Intrade. Here's an article I wrote. http://www.tradingmarkets.com/.site/options/how_to/articles/-77425.cfm If CBS let's say releases a poll Thursday saying they have Obama ahead 57-43 what will Obama futures do on Intrade? They'd pop a little bit on the news and then sell off again because consensus would be that the CBS poll is wrong. If the polls in toto were accurate there'd be no deviation between them. Instead there's massive divergence. Betters smooth that out. It's the same in the market. If it's obvious to smart participants that a companies sales are off and the company releases a bullish report what happens. Buyers off the report get stuffed by sellers because the sellers look at the report as old news. Many of these polls are still either pre-Palin as Veep or pre-RNC speech Palin. Old. The market KNOWS that a 56-44 poll for Obama in August is now a 50-50 ish poll. Intrade moves before the poll numbers. Consistently.
That's a great theory and also entirely unproven with not a study behind it. I think you're confusing "beliefs" with "science."
Open your eyes and ears, for ye' shall all bear witness to the nastiest race to ever be held in the history of American Politics. Both sides are going Defcon 1.