IMO, the REAL laziness of the media was in its singular focus on the “national” poll. Yeah, I get that it is easier to speak about and only requires ~1,000 respondents. But the simple fact is that our election is really 50 separate state elections+DC. But only about a dozen are competitive.
Thus, it doesn’t much matter if California votes for Hillary by 1 point or by 50 points – she’ll still win all of the California electors. But if she is leading by say, 30 points in California, with 13% of the population, that will overweight Calif in the national poll results. Add in the other large blue states…