Rasmussen Pennsylvania Poll: Hillary 47%, Barack 44%

[Pablo Sanchez]

I'm just waiting for the massive "HILLARY WINS!" headlines that will appear even if it is only 51 - 49%, lauding how this is her "massive comeback" which makes her "poised to gain the nomination".

I read it as more likely for us to see a narrative like "with no clear decision in Pennsylvania the race goes on" completely without regard to the results. LBJ "won" New Hampshire in 1968 but it was still a defeat. Clinton winning Pennsylvania by anything less than 20 points is pretty much a loss, because polling shows Obama taking Indiana by 5-10, and he'll curbstomp her in North Carolina--NC is polling at a 15-20 margin. Even if he does lose PA by 10 percent or more, he's going to make everything back and more on May 6. Nothing has changed since weeks back, he's still got a mathematical lock on a strong majority of pledged delegates, and Hillary's only hope is to somehow pull a Hubert Humphrey and wrangle the nomination on the floor of the convention, completely against the stated will of the Democratic Party voters.

Logically speaking the Democratic Primary was decided months ago when Obama laid down the righteous stomping that is still keeping him too far ahead for Clinton to possibly catch up, but Hillary's desperate flailing for relevancy is sweet news for the media, because they can have their cute little horse race narrative, and kiss their best pal John McCain's ass without too much fear of getting called on it.

[Anguirus]

And here I thought the last Dixiecrats got a clue when Strom Thurmond died.

[Ariphaos]

LAst Rasmussen poll has Obama down by five

With 9% undecided... However, it seems that the under 30 segment is only getting an 11% weighting. If there's a larger than expected youth turnout it may swing Obama's way, though that may be overhopeful.

[CmdrWilkens]

Public Policy Polling has him up 3% with 10% undecided and everyone else seems to have Clinton up 5% so it will be close it looks like.

[Jadeite]

I found this over on SA:

Huge Surge of Registration for Obama

If you look at a map of the Democratic voter registration surge (by zip code) in the five county Philadelphia region, an important pattern emerges. It will help if you know the region and the city. In Philly, registration is through the roof in University City and the rest of West Philly. This is Obama's strongest area (District 2, Chaka Fattah) in the state. Registration is also extremely high in the North (the blackest area of Philly) and in the Center City, Society Hill, Queens Village area (District 2, Bob Brady) that is socially liberal and filled with urban professionals and artists (the Creative Class). By contrast, registration is low in the Northeast, Fishtown, and deep South Philly (white ethnics, most opposed to Obama).
The same pattern holds in Bucks County, where heavily black Morrisville saw a huge spike, in Montgomery County, where heavily black Norristown and Conshohocken saw a huge spike, in Delaware County, where heavily black Chester and Darby saw a huge spike, and Chester Country, where heavily black Coatsville and West Chester saw a huge spike. Overall, the heaviest registration has come from college towns/areas, black neighborhoods, and the Creative Class neighborhoods of Philadelphia.

This portends a very high differential turnout of Obama voters to Clinton voters in the five county area. It also portends an historically unprecedented differential turnout of the black/creative class vote over the white ethnic vote.

I'm not a polling expert, but I do know that pollsters are not free just to pull turnout models out of thin air. If the percentage of the Democratic vote that was black in 2004-2006 was say 17%, the pollsters are not going to postulate that it will be 25% this year. Likewise, if the Philly region represented say 33% of the statewide vote in recent election, then the pollsters will not stray too far from that precedent.

If you are polling the whole state using just 700-1000 voters, you have to get the regional turnout numbers right, you have to get the differential race, age, and gender numbers right. If you don't, your poll is going to be off.

On the eve of the South Carolina primary the polls predicted the following result:

Obama: 43.1%
Clinton: 28.5%
Edwards: 17.0%

The actual result?

Obama: 55%
Clinton: 27%
Edwards: 18.0%

Two out of three ain't bad. They nailed the vote for Clinton and Edwards, but they dramatically underestimated Obama's vote. Looking at the voter registration numbers in the Philly area, I think there is a real chance that the pollsters are about to be proven wrong about this race.

Here is one sign that backs up my suspicions.

"A recent Keystone Poll of Pennsylvania voters, conducted by Franklin and Marshall College, found that 62 percent of Democrats who registered statewide within the last three months planned to vote for Obama."

They might be weighting their polls using anachronistic turnout models. If so, look for Obama to dramatically outperform the polls, just as he did in South Carolina.