The final Dispatch Poll shows the Illinois Democrat with a 6-point lead in Ohio, virtually identical to the 7-point advantage he held a month ago. The survey is one of many in key states across America that indicate Obama is headed toward a win Tuesday that might not be close, although Republican John McCain is furiously trying to mount one more comeback and prove the pollsters wrong.

Ohioans also appear poised to elect Democrat Richard Cordray as attorney general, defeat yet another attempt to bring casino gambling to the state, and uphold tighter regulations on payday lending.

The winner of the last Dispatch Poll before a presidential election has carried the state every time in modern Ohio history, although the final survey was a dead heat four years ago between Sen. John Kerry and President Bush, who won by 2.1 percentage points.

If Obama's lead of 52 percent to 46 percent in the new poll holds, he would become the first Democrat to win more than 50 percent of the Ohio vote since Lyndon B. Johnson did in 1964.

The survey shows he has sprinted to a 14-point lead among those who already have cast a ballot under Ohio's new early-voting law, and he is up by a ratio of almost 3-to-1 with voters who registered for the first time this year. Such voters now make up about 10 percent of the electorate.

One poll participant in the former category is Erin McGuire, 26, an educator from Columbus.

"Barack Obama is a breath of fresh air. He is not all style and no substance. In his time in the public arena, he has demonstrated a keen intellect and firm grasp of national and international issues," she said.

"While I respect John McCain's service to our country, I do not like how his campaign has lurched from issue to issue. The steadiness I admire in Obama is sorely missing in McCain. I have trouble seeing him as a true maverick when he has played to the interests of his base so strongly."

A key to Obama's success is the large margins he rolls up among women and voters 34 or younger. In his bid to become the nation's first black president, he's winning support from 90 percent of African-Americans. McCain is ahead among whites 51 percent to 47 percent.

Even though Obama has set all-time highs for money raised, TV ads run, campaign staffers hired and probably paper clips used, the turnout Tuesday will determine who wins. The Dispatch Poll, like most surveys this year, shows more self-identified Democrats than at any time in the recent past. If they or Obama's other core supporters -- women, blacks and young voters -- don't show up at the polls, McCain conceivably still could pull it off.

The five other presidential candidates on Ohio's ballot combined for 2 percent in the poll, with about half that total going to independent Ralph Nader.

Respondent Ann Williams, 61, who is self-employed and a volunteer, noted that former Secretary of State Colin Powell called Obama a "transformational figure."

"Barack Obama has the brains, temperament, spine, ideas, judgment that will help pull our country together and restore our image in the world," the Cincinnati resident said.

Wade Schuler, a Coshocton retiree, said Obama "seems to relate better to the problems not just of the middle class but of all of America. With his advisers he has developed plans that will change the downward spiral of the American economy and policies of fear of the last eight years and hopefully lead us into an era not only of change but hope."

But McCain will get the vote of Pete Thompson, 40, an accountant/business broker from Powell.

"John McCain has the most experience, and he will keep my taxes the same," he said of the Arizona Republican. "I do not trust Barack Obama. He has not provided everything about his background including work experience, school transcripts, birth certificate, etc."

Deborah Wissner, 55, a Lutheran parish pastor from Cuyahoga Falls, said McCain is the best candidate.

"I trust his judgment in foreign affairs," she said. "I respect his record of fiscal restraint in governing. I prefer his economic policies to those of his opponent. I believe him to be a man of character who understands America's heritage of freedom and what must be done to preserve it for generations to come."

Cordray, currently the state treasurer, has held a double-digit lead since the first Dispatch Poll this past summer over former U.S. Attorney Mike Crites and an independent candidate.

The results for the casino issue represent a reversal from a month ago, when the issue was passing by 9 points. But state Issue 6 apparently is sinking after a $50 million-plus onslaught of advertising, much of it bankrolled by an out-of-state casino owner against the proposal that would allow Ohio's first casino to be built near I-71, about halfway between Columbus and Cincinnati.

Shannon Freel, 27, a New Albany real-estate agent, sounds one of the key themes in the campaign against the proposed constitutional amendment: "It has a loophole that could eventually allow the owner to not pay taxes There are other ways to create jobs."

But Arthur Markham, 77, a retiree from Lithopolis, sounds one of the proponents' key points when he says, "People in Ohio are going to gamble, and they should not go to another state and pay taxes to that state."

If the outcome follows the poll results on the payday-loan referendum -- widely regarded as the most confusing issue on the statewide ballot -- new regulations enacted by the legislature earlier this year would remain in place. Among the provisos: capping the short-term loans at a 28 percent annual percentage rate. If the measure is defeated, payday lenders could continue charging 391 percent.

The mail survey of 2,164 likely Ohio voters was conducted Oct. 22 through Friday, with a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 2 percentage points.

drowland@dispatch.com