Is the O-mentum back?

On the Democratic side, a raft of new polls from Super Tuesday primary states came out yesterday, and they indicate that Barack Obama may be narrowing the gap on Hillary Clinton in some key Feb 5 contests. This set of polls — the first to be taken after Obama's landslide victory in last weekend's South Carolina primary (but before John Edwards dropped out of the race) — point to the notion that Obama has once again swung the momentum in his favour.

Nationally, Obama drew from 17 points behind a week ago to a six point deficit yesterday. But as races are decided state-by-state, national results are mainly an indicator of overall trends.

In California, a new Rasmussen poll has Obama within the statistical margin of error. Their new Connecticut poll has the two senators dead even. And in an absolutely dramatic turn, Obama has significantly narrowed Clinton's lead in the senator's home state of New York, where for the first time Obama is within the "margin of undecideds," up to a 12-point deficit from being behind over 20 points in recent polls. Massachusetts has seen a similar trend toward Obama.

Polls have been notoriously inaccurate in some cases during this election cycle (New Hampshire and South Carolina are two egregious examples), but they have generally proved accurate in showing the trend. It's too early to say what effect the Kennedy endorsement and John Edwards' withdrawal will have leading into next Tuesday. And lest we forget, some of the states Obama is "gaining ground" in are states where he was absolutely nowhere a week ago, trailing by 20 points or more.

These polls bear out the return of O-mentum. But will the O-mentum hold through the critical contests next Tuesday? Westmonster's magic 8-ball says "Reply hazy, try again."