Politico: Obama is winning, therefore, Obama is losing

See this right here? This is why I don't bother reading Politico.

In the two months since Barack Obama captured the Democratic nomination, he has hit a ceiling in public opinion polling, proving unable to make significant gains with any segment of the national electorate.

While Obama still leads in most matchups with John McCain, the Illinois senator’s apparent stall in the polls is a sobering reminder to Democrats intoxicated with his campaign’s promises to expand the electoral map beyond the boundaries that have constrained other recent party nominees.

GAAAAHHHHHH. Three things.

1. Only in DC journalism does it make sense to write an article claiming that, because Barack Obama has a narrow but significant lead, Barack Obama is clearly in trouble. This is like a sportswriter saying that the Bruins are obviously screwed because they keep winning games by just two goals.

2. It's not surprising that the polls haven't moved this summer -- it's the summer. Nobody pays attention to politics in the summer, except high-information voters (basically all of whom have already made up their minds). What would be strange is if the polls were moving. Gallup's Frank Newport seems to agree, in this delightfully loopy (and obviously truncated) quote from the article:
   

   “What’s remarkable this summer is the stability of this race,” Gallup’s director Frank Newport said. “In a broad sense, it is similar to previous elections.”

   (Sidenote: why do reporters always quote pollsters to make them sound like Zen masters? Take this, also from the article: "ABC News Polling Director Gary Langer asked, “If everything is so good for Barack Obama, why isn’t everything so good for Barack Obama?”" I really don't think that sentence means anything at all.)

3. Obama's promise to "expand the electoral map" would naturally expand it beyond pollsters' likely-voter screens, so we really can't ascertain whether that strategy is working by looking at national polls. We won't know that until election day.

It really saddens me that people spend their time reading this bullshit. WHEN will the elite media learn the basics of polling? WHEN?