The Fall Continues -- Another New PA Poll Shows Clinton Collapsing & Obama Surging
Posted by Ashish on 04.07.2008
Hard to ignore the trend now...
Following another weekend of mostly bad news that revolved around two more incidents of people questioning her stories and the resignation of her chief strategist Mark Penn, Monday kicks off with...well, more bad news.
ARG has their new poll of Pennsylvania out, conducted on April 5th and 6th and making it the latest poll done of the state, and the news is stunning. Barack Obama 45%, Hillary Clinton 45. Last week, Clinton led 51% to 39%. That means that ARG has her falling six points and Obama moving up six points in ONE WEEK. The poll is also right in line with three other polls from last week that have the race as a virtual tie. Clinton led by 20+ points in PA just a few weeks ago and it now appears that lead is all but gone.
As I stated last week, her collapse in the state is happening due to a few reasons, I suspect. One, the media is now reporting that Clinton has virtually no chance of winning, and that results in many of her supporters becoming demoralized and thus they begin to tell pollsters that they no longer plan to go and vote (and thus they are not factored in polls). Two, her credibility is being destroyed by all the stories of her being caught exaggerating or making up stories, first with Bosnia, then with the healthcare story that was exposed a few days ago, then with her claim that she opposed the War in Iraq before Obama did in the Senate, only to have that proven wrong. Third, she is running out of money as I wrote about a few days ago and therefore can't do much to counter all the ads Obama is running in the state.
And the most troubling news for her is that two weeks remain until voting day. If Obama is going to maintain a 5-to-1 spending advantage over her for those two weeks, it's hard to see her stop this trend and regain a big lead. Because remember, she doesn't just need to win, she needs to win by 10+ points. Obama has already stated that he will view any loss of less than 10 points in PA as a victory. We saw Obama get to this point, a virtual tie after being down 20+ points, in both Texas and Ohio, but he didn't have the time to close the deal. Now, he has caught up to Clinton and still has plenty of time left to campaign in the state, run his ads, etc. The big question is whether he goes for the kill in PA, a state that very few still expect him to win, or continue to share his time between PA, NC, and IN. I suspect he'll wait to see how his numbers look next week before deciding whether to spend all his time the week before PA voting in the state or to shift focus to NC and IN.
But the main point to take away from this poll is the race in PA is very close now, and that by itself makes the entire state a loss for Clinton already unless she turns things around. She has to win big, and what looked like a likely 10+ point win for her a few weeks ago now doesn't seem so likely.
The trend is certainly surprising, because our media are not showing anything negative about Hillary. May be they underestimated the intelligence of their viewers?
I do expect HRC to throw another kitchen sink as the PA primaries get closer. It worked for her before, so I think she will do it again, with even more intensity this time.
Posted By: Guest (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 03:08 AM
This is an ARG poll...they are documented as being the worst polling outfit so far this primary season.
Posted By: ARG (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 03:35 AM
The polls said Hillary and Obama were tied in California, but Hillary won by a huge margin. The same can be said about Ohio, too. Don't forget New Hampshire. The polls got it wrong there, too.
Posted By: goldenstate (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 04:23 AM
Hillary should have thrown in towel before PA. A defeat there after the initial big lead with the support by the Governor and Mayor of Philly is humiliating. However, if she loses in PA and continues her campaign, then she would need psychological examination- I don't mean to be rude, but it wouldn't make sense to a six year old
Posted By: akrob (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 06:45 AM
For the person who reminds us of how wrong the polls in New Hampshire.. That was two months ago and in general since then 9 out of 10 polls have been spot on for the subsequent primaries. Every single poll in PA shows an Obama surge. Whether she beats him here by 5 or 10, it's over for her. She has run a slipshod and nasty campaign, and can't manager her workers or money. Time for her to drop out.
Posted By: Sally (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 09:31 AM
"I'm in it to win it" and bless her heart for the effort. She's entitled to run as long as she would like, but it's time for Hillary to wake up and smell the coffee. Even with the help of her charismatic husband, her campaign is in trouble.
The campaign should get with Barack, see if he's willing to have her on the ticket as Veep, ad if not, then head back to Chappiqua, kick her feet up and sip a glass of fine win until the Senate reconvenes. Save some dignity, and REALLY help the party as the junior Senator from NY.
We absolutely must defeat John McCain in November. And, should BHO's campaign say, "no" to HRC as VP, then Hillary has an excellent future in the Senate, if she so chooses.
But let's put an end to the pain and suffering she must be going through. After PA, throw in the towel and start working to help elect Barack Obama --the US, no the entire world, needs a Statesman as President and Barack Obama is that Statesman.
John McCain doesn't hold a candle to Barack Obama. 341-197 is PresidentElect.org prediction on the electoral result. Not a mandate, but certainly a clear majority for Barack Obama.
Tip your hat, Hillary, and start to work for the good of the party.
Posted By: Guest (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 09:40 AM
One of the best-kept secrets in the corporate press (until VERY recently) is that Hillary Clinton has been out of this race for two months, now--absolutely no chance of a real victory. She stayed in it to bleed off enough delegates to prevent a clear Obama win in the hopes of stealing the nomination using the superdelegates.
Obama already has the majority of states (and he'll add more before it's over), he's going to have the popular vote, and he's going to have the delegate lead. Hillary is only a competitor--and this has also been the case for a long time--because of substantial Republican "support" (read: sabotage) which won't be there in the general. She gets it in the primaries only because Republicans are utterly desperate, at this point, to run against her, whom they'd easily defeat, rather than against Obama (nearly 1/3 of Clinton's supporters have already told Gallup they'd be voting Repub if Obama became the Demo nominee).
Clinton has sort of made Pennsylvania her campaign's version of Custer's last stand. She's managed to blow a 20+ point lead, there, and all she can do is exactly what she's been doing for two months, now: Throw mud at the parties' eventual nominee on behalf of the McCain campaign.
Posted By: classicliberal2 (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 11:04 AM
The writing has been on the wall for sometime now, and Hillary could have appeared more dignified, perhaps classy, had she curtailed her campaign prior to the desperation.
She has taken this boat to the edge of the fall without serious thoughts of the consequences. Her credibility has been shot by her repeated attempts to project a more grandiose self-image, only to be later ridiculed when the truth immerged. She has set a new societal low for former first ladies by her guttural behavior. Had she withdrawn following the gushing about being honored to be debating Obama, there might have been a chance for a unity ticket, instead we had the hysterics only days later with her “Shame on you Barack Obama” blast. The facts are that Obama played by the rules laid down prior to the contest, and no amount of fudging of the results that allows the Clintons to steal the nomination will result in success against McCain. The people who have been galvanized by the Hope and Change message will simply become demoralized and my bet is that they will stay away from the polls in November, should Hillary get the nod.
Posted By: Emilio Sanchez (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 11:11 AM
Please remember New Hampshire! NH may now regret voting for Hillary now that they know she lied to them when she assured them that Michigan will not count. When they see her lies on sniper fire, on health care and that her universal helath care [lan does not cover her own campaign staff whose medical insurance she did not pay for a few months. Perhaps New Hampshire pledged delegates would like to shift their pledgeto Senator Obama? But until and unless Hillary officially drops out of the race, she will be turning even more negative as she grows more desperate. Forget the Party, the nation. What more respect for her competitor, Senator Obama, whom she views as only so much road kill for the Clinton dynasty to chomp on, together with the younger Party voters .Watch your back, Senator Obama!
Posted By: guest (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 11:33 AM
The number of early ballots accounted for the discrepancy in California as Obama's numbers were increasing quickly right up until the last day, but millions of ballots had already been cast.
As for NH I believe that vote to have been tampered with when viewing the polling vs. actual county by county and seeing that the discrepancies only occured on untrackable diebold machines. I'm not saying Clinton did it, perhaps the Republicans chose to tamper them to get a candidate they were prepared to run against.
Hell Clinton would have lost the Texas primary were not not for Rush Limbaugh urging Republicans to vote for her.
Based on the Slate delegate Calculator giving Hillary a chance if she wins by a 10-20% margin is still bunk. I think she needs to win by 20-25% to really have a chance.
Obama has a 164 pledged delegate lead on Clinton... 10% will net Clinton 16. 20% will net Clinton 32. 30% will net Clinton 48. So even with a 30% win in PA Clinton will still be behind by 116 pledged delegates with 87% of the total already committed.
Posted By: pdxgeek (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 11:44 AM
Oh, so sorry Hillary. Stick a fork in her big fat you-know-what. She's done. And, for the sake of the party and this country, thank you god.
Posted By: Jeffp (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 12:21 PM
Hillary Clinton accepts campaign contributions (bribes?) from wealthy Chinese interests, while the Chinese grind up the bones of the Tibetan people. This traitor to the US and civil rights will go down like the Titanic.
Posted By: Lee Passman (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 02:10 PM
Penn has not exactly "resigned". He will remain as pollster and advisor to her campaign. He just won't be as visible.
The Clinton campaign had to get him out of sight for now. His presence became too toxic.
Posted By: serena1313 (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 04:44 PM
These are astute comments.
I think the revelation that the Clintons made $109 million since 2000 also hurt her prospects. It shocked me, and I don't shock easily.
The latest Gallup poll shows Obama's lead opening up: 52% to 43%.
Posted By: Jed Rothwell (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 05:09 PM
goldenstate wrote:
"The polls said Hillary and Obama were tied in California, but Hillary won by a
huge margin. . ."
Polls are complicated and must be interpreted carefully. The polls in California showed that Obama and Clinton were close on election day, but California allows early voting -- earlier than most states. Many votes were cast in the weeks leading up to election day when Clinton was more popular. Some of the Clinton supporters probably changed their minds after casting early votes.
Polls tend to be inaccurate in a complicated election such as this one, especially when groups of people who do not often vote turn out in large numbers.
Posted By: Jed Rothwell (Guest) on April 07, 2008 at 05:33 PM
I really hope that Barack wins PA. Then Hillary will get out, (if she's smart). The media pressure on her to leave if she loses PA will be very intense.
Posted By: Belle (Guest) on April 08, 2008 at 05:31 AM
"Based on the Slate delegate Calculator giving Hillary a chance if she wins by a 10-20% margin is still bunk. I think she needs to win by 20-25% to really have
a chance."
She doesn't have any chance, no matter what margin by which she wins in PA (and it now looks like she may lose there, anyway). The corporate press loves the horse-race, and won't tell people this, but the concrete, nowhere-to-run fact is that she has been out of this race for two months, now. She has no chance of winning on delegates, no chance of winning the popular vote, and no chance of winning a majority of states (because Obama has already won over half of them, and will win more).
Posted By: classicliberal2 (Guest) on April 08, 2008 at 01:06 PM
"Give it a break. You complained about the media supposedly being biased against
Obama, yet you're blindly cheerleading for him now."
Only if pointing out VERY obvious facts about the other campaign can be marked down to "cheerleading." The truth is that Hillary Clinton is still in this race only because the press has acted as her enabler throughout the process. The reason she felt so comfortable so brazenly lying about things like that USO trip is because she was confident the press would follow the pattern it has throughout this entire campaign, and just let her get away with it.
The state of Ohio probably turned on her allegation that Obama had been telling the Canadians to disregard Obama's public anti-NAFTA rhetoric, but it turned out that not only had Obama's campaign actually been telling the Candians exactly what the candidate was saying in public, it was HER campaign who had gone to the Canadians and told them to ignore what she said on the campaign trail. She was still using that line against Obama more than a week after all of this had come out, and, again, this is because she was absolutely confident the press would refuse to tell the public the real story. And she was right. Only now has it finally blown up in her face, and in this case, it's mostly due to people on the internet dragging the story to light, rather than those in the corporate press.
Posted By: classicliberal2 (Guest) on April 08, 2008 at 05:33 PM
Shortly after the Mississippi and Wyoming primaries the polls showed that BO was trailing HRC in PA by 20 percentage points. I said then that Pennsylvanians are shrewd, intelligent, and educated, and that, despite HRC's being a master liar, Pennsylvanians will figure her out. If HRC loses PA, she will have lost her support amongst the older people. Some older Pennsylvanians may not be very educated, but having lived among them for some years, I have found them not only to be highly intelligent but fair minded as well. As HRC's lies spread among their midst, it wouldn't surprise me at all if they send her message that she should remember for the rest of her life. One of the most admirable thing about older Pennsylvanians is how they sacrifice to make sure that their children get the best education they can. Congratulations to all of you Pennsylvanians for your remarkable progress in realizing the truth that we are all brothers and sisters; that we are all traveling in a vessel we call the body, but the greater reality is that we are all spirits meandering towards the path of enligtenment.
Greetings from St. Louis and may God bless you all and the beautiful state of PA.
Carlos Jean-Gilles
Saint Louis, MO
Posted By: Carlos Jean-Gilles (Guest) on April 09, 2008 at 06:08 PM
STAY CURRENT