The latest polls show Obama trailing in Pennsylvania by six (Quinnipiac), nine (Rasmussen), and fourteen points (SurveyUSA). That leaves Pollster.com with an average of: Clinton 48.2% Obama 42.5%. Over at CQ Politics their district by district analysis shows Clinton emerging with a net three delegates. She would gain more for winning the popular vote, but they project a small net gain of delegates. It’s hard for me to tell whether Obama is behind by six or behind by fourteen because in this area (the Southeast) he is doing very well. In fact, I project that CQ Politics is wrong about District 1 (South and central Philadelphia; Chester) and District 7 (Suburban Philadelphia — most of Delaware County). I think Obama will get a 5-2 split in the First and win the Seventh, earning him a 4-3 edge. And, while CQ Politics projects a 7-2 split in the Second District, a 8-1 split is not completely out of the question.
On the other hand, CQ Politics projects that Clinton will not reach the 62.5% needed to turn any of the four delegate districts into 3-1 splits in her favor. If she really is ahead statewide by nine-fourteen points, it must be because she is doing significantly better than 62.5% in some of these smaller districts. And not that it matters for the delegate splits, but I believe Obama, not Clinton, will win District 5 (North central — State College) and District Six (Southeast — parts of Berks and Chester counties, Philadelphia suburbs).
My observation on the race is that Obama’s momentum seems to have stalled, but he isn’t weakening. He seems poised to lose by about ten points based on the polls, but he could close it to a deadheat with a good debate performance tomorrow night. I think he will outperform the polls by about three points because of high turnout in the Philly area and a superior groundgame. He could do even better than three points. But unless I see polls consistently showing him within six points, I will not be predicting victory here.
I won’t offer any prediction on the outcome of the PA primary, except this– If Hillary manages even a one-point win, it will be spun by the media as a tremendous victory against all odds, and further evidence that this race needs to go all the way to the convention. You can take that to the bank…
yep. Although there will be a tinge of reality-based commentary mixed in.
6 days to go…an eternity in politics. Clinton needs to win by 20-points and she’ll over-reach by the “bitter” ad…get to crow she’s ahead and Obama can’t win.
Hope these comments by John Baer Philly.com is what will prevail:
I don’t know how clinton gets away with this “friend of the working class” bullshit.
The policies she and her husband championed are fucking RESPONSIBLE for us being in the dire straits we’re in.
Well, it happened in Ohio as well. The Clintons are masters of portraying themselves as something they’re not – just see Bill Clinton’s 1992 campaign, then compare it to how he governed.
looks like only pundits are making a to-do of bitter-gate. (HT; The Daily Dish – Andrew Sullivan)
I read the CQ Politics analysis; it’s way too conservative on its analysis for Clinton in Northeast and Western PA. I don’t think Obama can break 8-1 in CD-2 (that’s 83.3%); if he does, he would probably take the district 9-0.
The only way the CQ analysis is correct is if Obama closes to about 5% of Clinton – which I would love to see but don’t think is realistically possible.
Let’s do an experiment using your analysis and the internals from today’s Quinnipiac Poll:
Let’s split the undecideds evenly and let’s assign all non-blacks to the white category.
That leaves us with:
Blacks: Obama 89-11
Non-Blacks: Clinton 60-40
Then let’s plug the numbers into district 1 and 2.
District 1
Black population: 45.7%
Non black population: 54.3%
Projected numbers:
Obama 62.3%
Clinton 37.7%
District 2
Black population: 61%
Non-black population: 39%
Projected numbers:
Obama: 69.9%
Clinton: 30.1%
However, the white population of both district 1 and 2 is way more pro-Obama than the white population of the state as a whole. District 2 has Penn and Drexel, District 1 has parts of center city.
Obama should do better than these numbers, even assuming there isn’t increased black turnout, which there will be.
It is not hard for me to see Obama getting over 80% in the second and over 70% in the first.
Have we all seen this new web-ad from Obama yet? It’s clever.
As soon as I saw the start of that, I was thinking about her pro-lobbyist remarks last summer…not surprised to see they made it in.
Lookie here: Lanny Davis makes a retraction of sorts.
Lanny Davis’ Op-ed on Rev. Wright gets a real smackdown.
In this case, the animosity is harbored by those who oppose Senator Obama.
I think all will depend on whether Obama manages to turn this nonsense around the way he did with the Wright hysteria. He’ll probably be torn because he’s timid about going all out populist, yet his strongest response to the “elitist” meme would require redefining the term to point at the corporate/government special interests who have done so much to ruin life in rural America. He would contrast the fatcats who contribute to Clinton against the regular folks who make up his bench of small donors. He would explain that he has heard the anger and the hope in rural America and, just as with inner-city people, knows that we need to hear that anger and do what needs to be done to give hope back its power to change this country.
He would have to point out how the Republican Party has consistently betrayed its rural supporters, whether by farm policy that drives out family farms in favor of corporate land grabs, or by failing to assure equal internet access, or by making rural areas dumping grounds for corporate and government polluters, or by sabotaging every effort to wean the country away from petroleum’s energy monopoly. He would have to admit the the Democratic Party has often ignored the concerns of rural citizens for far too long, and that his mission is to heal the phony divide between rural and urban.
He’s turned attack into treasure in the past, so I think if anyone can do it again, it’s him. If he decides to keep on telling the truth instead of backing away, I believe he can still win in PA.
Pundits should shut up…. maybe they will, as the Pope’s plane lands this afternoon. Obama is extending his national lead over Clinton:
(via TPM)
Today’s Gallup Poll: Obama Has His Biggest Lead Yet, No “Small Town” Damage
I have a question about these polls and maybe it has been discussed here before but do people actually call people’s cell phones? I want to think no. This would mean stronger numbers for Obama since most of his young supporters do not use a land line and Hillary’s strong blue hair vote is able to answer these calls.
read here, a roundup of polls. No significant effect the ‘small town’ commentt wotking people understand, are not insulted. only elitist are.
I think some are just starting to develop strategies to contact by cell and a couple are doing so. But it is very difficult to do.
They also massage the data to match what they know to be the demographics of “likely voters” .
In other word if their calls reach X percent of one type of voter, but they know that that type of voter makes up Y percent of the historical voter population, then they adjust their results accordingly.
If younger voters are under-represented in the sample because they are hard to reach by land line, they will be given additional weight than a larger sample of blue-hairs waiting by the phone while watching CSpan.
Where this has been tricky this season is younger voters tend to say one thing and then not bother to vote, so they weren’t given as much extra weight even if the sample size was smaller. In this election season they have been turning out like crazy in ways that still challenges the pollsters
I concur with one of the Kossacks: Obama should bring a milkshake with him to the debate and, whenever Bittergate comes up, sip from it while looking at Hillary the whole time.