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Rasmussen: Clinton Ahead By Five In Pennsylvania

By Eric Kleefeld - April 21, 2008, 10:50AM

A new Rasmussen poll of Pennsylvania gives Hillary Clinton a five-point lead going into tomorrow' primary, a potential increase from her lead three days ago:

Clinton 49% (+2)
Obama 44% (+0)

This is the fifth consecutive Rasmussen poll that gives Clinton only a single-digit lead here. At this point, how the seven percent undecideds break will make the difference between a big Clinton victory or perhaps even an Obama upset win.

17 Comments

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I think this is good news, given it's Rasmussen.

Must mean she's really 15 points behind...

Posted by HusseinTenaX
April 21, 2008 10:52 AM | Reply | Permalink

I'm just praying it's a single digit loss. I have no illusions about an upset.

I'm worried about this "street money" issue in Philly as well, because that's where he needs to rack up a huge margin.

Posted by evie
April 21, 2008 10:55 AM | Reply | Permalink

Having lived in Philly, I get the feeling that most likely voters will turn out whether or not the precinct captains get their payoffs.

Posted by Schmedley in reply to a comment from evie
April 21, 2008 11:14 AM | Reply | Permalink

Win For Hillary Is All But Impossible

Posted by Indie Pro
April 21, 2008 10:57 AM | Reply | Permalink

I like it that that is know quantity going in -

I like it a lot.

Posted by HusseinTenaX in reply to a comment from Indie Pro
April 21, 2008 10:58 AM | Reply | Permalink

I think we are in a good position to "beat the spread" here, and come in at less then a 10 point loss.

Considering that Hillary needs to win by 25, and that she started at +20, that's a pretty impressive accomplishment :)

If Clinton doesn't win by 25 points, she has no chance of winning the nomination.

Posted by delmoi
April 21, 2008 10:58 AM | Reply | Permalink

Do you really think that a 20 point win keeps her alive?

Posted by HusseinTenaX in reply to a comment from delmoi
April 21, 2008 10:59 AM | Reply | Permalink

if she wins by over 20 then the media will keep her alive until May 6th.

Posted by Musgrove in reply to a comment from HusseinTenaX
April 21, 2008 11:01 AM | Reply | Permalink

If Clinton wins by 20%, she'll be in about the same position she was in before, she'll need to win all the remaining states by like 18-20% on average.

She basically needs to win all the remaining states by 20%. If she gets less then 20% in PA, that number will go up. If she gets more then 20%, that number will go down.

Posted by delmoi in reply to a comment from HusseinTenaX
April 21, 2008 11:24 AM | Reply | Permalink

I'm seeing it that way too. The polls are aiming for a 5 to 10 win for Hillary, and I'm sure Obama would take that in a heartbeat.

Posted by Doug H in reply to a comment from delmoi
April 21, 2008 11:00 AM | Reply | Permalink

44+49 doesn't equal 100%, so you are missing 7%.

Late breakers go for Hillary, and did in Ohio.

http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/2008/04/obamas-ceiling-in-pa-about-42.php

Posted by observer2
April 21, 2008 11:03 AM | Reply | Permalink

15 pt is likely. Less than 15pt would be good for him. I don't want to see a 20pt win for her.

It coudl be grim. I don't think I want to watch the coverage ....

Posted by observer2
April 21, 2008 11:04 AM | Reply | Permalink

Internals are probably similar to PPP's number's (49/46), becuase here's what Obama said today:

"I think it’s going to be pretty close, we’re campaigning pretty hard."
"I’m predicting it’s going to be close and that we are going to do a lot better than people expect."

http://thepage.time.com/2008/04/21/obama-looks-to-tuesday-i-think-its-going-to-be-pretty-close/

He wouldn't have said that if internals were good.

Posted by thejoshuablog
April 21, 2008 11:07 AM | Reply | Permalink

Rephrase: He wouldn't have said that if the internals WEREN'T good.

Posted by thejoshuablog in reply to a comment from thejoshuablog
April 21, 2008 11:08 AM | Reply | Permalink

All that and that gravatar, too.

;)

Thanks joshuablog.

Posted by HusseinTenaX in reply to a comment from thejoshuablog
April 21, 2008 11:21 AM | Reply | Permalink

From Bloomber:

CLINTON NEEDS PENNSYLVANIA LANDSLIDE
TO CATCH OBAMA:

April 21 (Bloomberg) -- To overtake Barack Obama in the nationwide popular vote, Hillary Clinton needs a bigger win in tomorrow's Pennsylvania primary than she has had in any major contest so far. And that's just for starters.
After more than 40 Democratic primaries and caucuses, Obama, the Illinois senator, leads Clinton by more than 800,000 votes. Even if the New York senator wins by more than 20 percentage points tomorrow -- a landslide few experts expect -- she would still have a hard time catching him.

Clinton needs ``blowout numbers,'' says Peter Fenn, a Democratic consultant who isn't affiliated with either campaign. ``The wheels would have to come off the Obama bus, and the engine would have to blow.''

Posted by thejoshuablog
April 21, 2008 11:09 AM | Reply | Permalink

Absolutely brilliant post at FiveThirtyEight.com today.

It's the turnout, stupid! [UPDATED]
Monday, April 21, 2008

Why have we seen such wildly disparate results in the Pennsylvania polling? It may all have to do -- as it so often does -- with likely voter models. The key to unraveling all of this is the Franklin & Marshall poll, which is the only poll that I am aware of that published separate results for likely and registered voters. In F&M's most recent poll, Clinton led Obama by 10 points among registered voters, but just 6 points among likely voters. In their March poll, Clinton led by 22 points among registered voters, but 16 points among likely voters. So, there's roughly a 5-point gap between the likely voter and registered voter numbers, which is relatively large insofar as these things go.

The post explores the bizarre SUSA outliers, and finds a viable sounding explanation.

SurveyUSA, the pollster that has shown the most favorable results so far for Clinton, is notorious for using a very lax likely voter screen. And we can see this in their Pennsylvania results as well. In its latest survey, SurveyUSA reported that, of the 1401 registered adults that it contacted, 638 (45.5%) were likely to vote in the Democratic primary. For comparison's sake, 50.4% of Pennsylvanians who are registered to vote are registered as Democrats, according to the very latest figures from the PA Secretary of State. So SurveyUSA has 45.5% of registered adults voting ... out of only 50.4% who theoretically could vote, since this is a closed primary. In other words, their model assumes turnout among registered Democrats to be more than 90%! This assumption, taken in a vacuum, is almost certainly wrong. It would imply turnout of about 3.8 million of the state's 4.2 million registered Democrats. For comparison's sake, Ohio had turnout of 2.2 million -- in an election in which independents and Republicans were eligible to vote. For that matter, there were only 2.9 million Kerry voters in Pennsylvania in 2004.

Absolutely essential reading.

Posted by seanh
April 21, 2008 11:37 AM | Reply | Permalink