Obama Draws Even with McCain in North Carolina

Public Policy Polling has released a new poll of the opinions of North Carolinians about the presidential race. It's good news for the good guys:

Obama 46
McCain 46
Barr 5

The poll had a large sample of 1,060 likely voters. It was conducted September 17 to September 19 and had a standard error of +/-3%.

On September 9, PPP had the race at McCain 48, Obama 44, and Barr 4. PPP notes:

There isn’t much doubt what’s driving this increased level of competitiveness. The numbers of voters in the state listing the economy as their biggest issue has hovered around 50% for most of the year but with the increased turmoil in the last week that number has now jumped to 58%. Barack Obama has a 24 point lead with those voters.

CNN/Time, with a sample of 910 registered voters, saw something similar when they observed the race was McCain 48 and Obama 47, though Elon University, with a much smaller sample of 411 adults (that is, neither necessarily registered or likely voters) saw a much greater divide during the same polling period: McCain 41, Obama 35.