Poll results (for what they're worth)

The latest Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll has Democrat Barack Obama slightly widening his lead over Republican John McCain as a result of last Thursday's debate and surrounding events. The latest poll has Obama holding a 49-44 percent edge, which moves him out of the poll's 4 percent margin of error. His advantage the week before was 48-45 percent.

Other interesting results of the poll:
--46 percent who watched the debate said Obama came across as "more presidential" as compared to 33 percent for McCain
--43 percent said Obama had more "honesty and integrity" than his opponent, while 34 percent said that of McCain. The week before that category split with each candidate receiving 40 percent.
--46 percent said McCain's move to temporarily suspend his campaign last week was an example of "playing politics," while 36 percent said he was "acting for the good of the country."
--As for the debate itself, 34 percent called it a tie, 33 percent though Obama won and 29 percent thought McCain won.
--12 percent more of the respondents thought Obama would do a better job of handling the current financial crisis than thought McCain could.
--51 percent said Obama cared more "about people like you," while only 27 percent said the same about McCain.
--69 percent said they were confident, after the debate, that Obama could deal wisely with an international crisis, eight points higher than the week before. 76 percent said they were confident McCain could deal wisely with an international crisis, down three points from the week before.
--McCain has a 13 point edge over Obama on the question of which candidate would achieve success in Iraq, but that's down four percentage points from the week before.