Latest Presidential Polls: Obama and Romney Locked at 47 Percent, But Republicans Say Momentum is on Their Side

Impact

On the eve of the third and final presidential debate, this Monday at 9:00 p.m. from Lynn University in Boca Raton, Florida, a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News national poll of likely voters show President Obama and his Republican challenger Mitt Romney running neck and neck at 47% each. 

However, Republicans think the momentum is on their side as with only 14 days until Election Day Romney has cut into the president's lead in a number of levels and demographics, including among female voters who have been consistently considered a key Obama constituency. 

The race shifted as a result of the first two presidential debates where the former governor of Massachusetts effectively (re) introduced himself to the American electorate, and made a compelling case for the urge of jumpstarting the sluggish American economy of the last four years. 

Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) took to Meet the Press this Sunday as the beaming face of an all of a sudden hopeful Republican Party that for the first time in the race rejoices at the possibility that the Romney/Ryan ticket looks like it could pull this thing off. 

"The American people have gotten to see the real Mitt Romney, and what his leadership and vision would do for the country," Rubio said of Mitt Romney's amazing surge. "[And] things are only going to get better as Election Day nears," he added. 

But the Obama campaign is not sitting idly. Obama Senior Adviser David Axelrod also sat on Meet the Press and dismissed the polls that "have been all over the map," while highlighting the advantage he says the Obama/Biden ticket has in early voting. 

"We always knew it was going to be a close race," added Axelrod who also highlighted Obama's "8-point lead" in Iowa as well as Obama's continued lead in Ohio and Florida (though most polls show a tied race, or Romney on the lead, in these swing states). 

And the president himself is hammering his opponent on the stump, calling on Romney's "Romnesia" — a condition the president says makes the Republican "forget" about his previous political positions (a jab at Romney who has been consistently accused by Democrats of being a flip-flopper). 

Obama has also hit Romney on his "binder full of women" gaffe during the second presidential debate, a telling strategy that suggests team Obama might be concerned after all about the slip in support from female voters. 

But Romney is fighting back, hitting the president for "lacking a real plan for the next four years" and characterizing Obama's reelection effort as "the incredibly shrinking campaign." About "Romnesia," Romney said that the president is simply "playing silly word games."