You realize that neither one of those things are in his platform, right?  He says reduce spending "responsibly", which in other words means "I have no intention of reducing spending significantly at all".  Balancing the budget to Obama literally means "Raise taxes on the wealthy and do nothing else to raise revenue" ...and even then, if all those people paid Clinton-era income tax, we'd be less than 2% closer to actually balancing the budget than we are today.

No they almost all show him rising. I would get proof, but it is hardly worth my time. except this: "For both the swing state polls and the national polls to be right, something else has to give to make the math work. If Mr. Obama is performing well in swing states, but is only tied in the popular vote nationally, that means he must be underperforming in noncompetitive states." Nate Silver

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/10/31/oct-30-what-state-polls-suggest-about-the-national-popular-vote/

Which more or less does seem to be the case when looking at the non competitive state poll numbers.

Obama oddly seems to be underperforming in democratic strongholds, and in Republican strongholds, but overperforming in swing states...

(aka the only states that matter.)

Likely it's due to the Rightwing strongholds seeing him as a socialist due to Obamacare and Illegal immigration

while the Democratic strongholds are disheartened by his neoconservative tendencies, including but not limited to, drone kill lists, pot dispensery raids, NDAA, Fiza reauthorization and Guantanomo still open.

That and the fact that a lot of democratic states have been hit kinda hard in the GFC so there has likely been some liberal migration to battleground states.

How bout just keeping his promise from 4 years ago and ending the bloody war?

I cannot speak for most of the country concerning shifts in Swing state votes. As far as the West is concerned, there is continual rise in the Hispanic/Latino population as I am sure most are aware of. Many of these people are not known to respond to polls as they are not done in Spanish which is the language of choice for much of the demographic. This easily can be seen in New Mexico which has largely shifted to a liberal state rather quickly since it was mostly Republican since 2004. 2012's supports in New Mexico have shown that support for democrats has risen substantially since 2008, much like the Hispanic population has risen all over the country. This has had an affect on the entire Nation it would seem, that it has in my opinion. There is no other demographic rising as fast and it is historically almost as liberal a population as Blacks. This is probably not the only answer, but there is a substantial decline in White voters as the population also declines. Of course, White males are the most likely to vote Republican. I can very much say the reason Colorado is so close is because of the gigantic military presence which causes the state to have the highest male population in the country. There are obviously many variables though I do not see how people can argue against a shift in the vote due to rise of Latinos in the population. As far as I am concerned, it should be trend that continues. I am sure you are aware of most of this though I kind just have to lay it out as it does seem like it will have a large impact on the eventual outcome, and have a much larger affect in the future..

Yes, Obama has not been as liberal as his voting showed before he was elected President. It is certain that he is a pragmatist and his life story has always shown he does listen to those that disagree with him personally.

The first thing I'd want a re-elected President Obama to do would be to step down as president along with Biden.

The thing is... even if this was the case, it wouldn't explain why Obama would be underperforming compaired to previous democrats in democratic strongholds though...

Also, while democrats lead greatly in hispanic self identification... that doesn't seem to matieralize as much voting wise...

it seems like Independents and even self identifying democrats tend to lean into republicans when it comes to voting... putting it more like a 65-45 split... when based on identification numbers you'd think its more like a   75-25 split if generous to republicans.

Really I think it's mostly because "Republican"  is more or less a bad word.  You might vote for a Republican, or even consistantly republican... but you'd hate to be labeled one.

Hispanics are a lot like African Americans in that they hold a significant number of conservative views, but in general vote democrat because well... Republicans are politically stupid, and keep catering to conservative whtie base that isn't going to ever abandon them anyway.  I mean it's worth noting most Hispanic people are Catholics... sure from a more liberal vein of catholicism, but still, marketidly conservative compaired to your average US voter.

George W. Bush made strides to breach the gap and turn Histpanics into a Republican voting block... but well... he was George W Bush.  So the "Pro Histpanic" wing of the Republican party lost favor after that.

We only have a couple days left to wait but I'm not convinced Obama will be re-elected ...

This election is looking to come down to (possibly less than) 1% of voters in a handful of states; and with how close it is voter turn out and errors in polling methodology could lead to people being surprised by the outcome on Tuesday. At the moment I wouldn't be surprised if there are multiple states which are so close that they need re-counts and there are multiple lawsuits trying to determine who wins in these states leading to the president not being determined for weeks/months after the election.

I am not attempting to answer why his support has dropped in traditionally blue states here. This would clearly be partly due to to dissatisfaction
with his  performance as President especially in regards to military actions. There is certainly a shift in voting as people do not vote for their  party all the time and many states do seem to have a lot of votes leaning Republican. Though this is not true of all all states and so it varies.

My point really was to point out that A there is a substantial change in how  the West has voted and it does parallel the a shift in the population. I was also pointing out that the Hispanic vote might be very different than polls due to things like certain demographics not reporting in polls. For example, Colorado was showing slightly ahead for Obama in 2008 until the final vote which ended in a substantially large victory for Obama.

The other demographic that seems to be suffering lose in the population is from the younger voters aged 18-28. The enthusiasm for Obama that was present in 2008 is clearly not as large as it was in 2008. Though Obama has suffered in all demographics overall which explains the shift in many states.

Yes, I agree that the older Hispanic voter is conservative in many ways regarding traditional house hold values partly because they tend to be Catholic. I am some what aware of this due to my grandmothers family that gives me a partial understanding of the traditions.

Republican does seem like a dirty word to many though with good reason, and judging by many conservative posters the word Democrat is clearly a dirty word to them. Hence, we have heavy polarization and a very sensitive subject.

I want him to fight harder for what he believes in, and sell it to the American people in a more effective manner than he did before.

A specific policy? Work towards reducing the debt and deficit in a balanced manner.

Oh and try and pass the American Jobs Act.