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[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by SlaveNoMore
If I read that article correctly, its not "vote for" as the 50% barometer - rather, its "approval rating"

The article is here. The second, third and fourth paragraphs say:

• Almost all poll reporting focuses on the “spread,” that is, the difference in the percentage supporting Bush and John Kerry. If we take an average of the most recent ABC/Washington Post, CBS/New York Times, and NBC/Wall Street Journal surveys, it shows Bush with 49 percent and Kerry with 44 percent among registered voters. Such survey results are invariably reduced to the shorthand “Bush up 5,” which sounds like a comfortable lead.
  
  However, in incumbent elections, the incumbent’s percentage of the vote is a far better indicator of the state of the race than the spread. In fact, the percentage of the vote an incumbent president receives in surveys is an extraordinarily accurate predictor of the percentage he will receive on election day -- even though the survey results also include a pool of undecided voters. Hence the 50-percent rule: An incumbent who fails to poll above 50 percent is in grave jeopardy of losing his job.
  
  But is it really possible for Kerry to close a 5-point gap, absent some fundamental change in voter preference? To find historical precedent, we must reach back in history all the way to 1996, the most recent incumbent presidential election. Bill Clinton averaged 51 percent in the final polls but received 49 percent on election day, while Bob Dole averaged 37 percent but received 41 percent -- a net shift of 6 points. Not only can Kerry close such a gap, it is extremely likely that he will.

I haven't trolled for other pollsters who agree or disagree with this, but the numerical support in the article seems fairly convincing. OTOH, four (elections with incumbent presidents) is not a huge sample size. (The article is a week old, so the reference to the most recent poll is not right any more.)