Welcome to the US Election 2012 round-up and with 35 days to go until polling day, there is a sudden lull in events. That isn’t because everyone just got bored of 24-hour-a-day politics – although perhaps we shouldn’t rule that out – but because tomorrow is the first presidential debate.

Say what you will about the US general election system, but it consistently throws up contests between two men whose camps are certain that the debate will change everything in favour of their guy (or, very occasionally, gal). Many US papers have pointed out in their Tuesday editions that there is little evidence that debates do actually make a difference, but to campaign teams that spend millions on advice, polls and statistical microscopy, that doesn’t seem to make a penny’s worth of difference to the amount of effort they put in.

So, today, neither candidate is on the road, but locked away with advisers, preparing their devastating one-liners and their most sincere looks into camera. Meanwhile, as Politico’s campaign calendar reveals, the vice-presidential candidates are in swing states, with Vice President Joe Biden in North Carolina and Paul Ryan, the man picked by Mitt Romney to oust Mr Biden, in Iowa.

With the RealClearPolitics.com poll average showing President Barack Obama’s lead slipping slightly to 3.5 points across all 50 states, the New York Times’ specialist polling site FiveThirtyEight says it has run computer simulations which have in some models shown a statistical tie in the electoral college vote is possible at 269 for each candidate — but fortunately it is only a 0.6 per cent probability.

Those stories not concentrating on the debates look at the state of that race in the so-called battleground states. The National Journal has done some interesting burrowing on where the Democrats are having success: Read more