Talk Elections

Uh.

So ugly.... and yet Obama does better in the general election. lol @ dumb Democrats.

Get to 60%, Hillary!

GO HILL!!

Is Pennsylvania a closed primary? It better be...

Yep

Obama can't win Pennsylvania. It's just one of the states that Clinton is favored in. He should downplay it and focus chiefly on winning Indiana and North Carolina two weeks later.

You can't downplay a big state which will be the focus of the country for six weeks.

If Clinton can do it for 11 states in a row offering many more delegates than Pennsylvania, I'm sure Obama can.

Again, this is six weeks of focusing on just one state and a big state, at that. It's hard to ignore.

Yes, it's much different than winning caucuses and little states with high black populations in which you automatically win 90% of the demographic. It is like trying to ignore Texas and Ohio because it looks like they'll lose. And Clinton didn't ignore them, losing those 11 straight hurt her. It was beginning to look like she was going to lose Ohio and Texas.

I hope she breaks 60% in Pennsylvania. I know she will in West Virginia and Kentucky.

60% isn't going to happen, he would need to get at least 70% of the white vote (including Asians & Hispanics) to achieve that and likely in the 72-73% range.   With suburban Philly in the mix no way can she get that amount of the white vote.  Central & western PA?  Very possible.  Northeast PA?  maybe.  The state as a whole once you take suburban Philly into the mix?  No.

True. Obama is always over polled, though. He could do worse than 36%!

That's an untrue statement, but whatever. Believe whatever you need to.

Lets at least be somewhat reasonable here.   Clinton will no doubt win the white vote and by a large margin, but  she would need to win it by more than she did in Mississippi, something along the lines of 75-77% of the white vote with Asians & Hispanics by the same amount too.  Sure.......   

So many variables at play Smash. Something like 45% of all Blacks in the state live in the city of Philadelphia. A city where every major public official is supporting Hillary and a city where they very much practice "machine" politics. What's black turnout going to be like?

Secondly, how many Independents and Republicans will switch registrations and who will they vote for? Will Rush lead his crusade for Hillary? Will Barack have enough sway to get people to realize they need to change their registrations in ten days? Are the lions share of those Southeast PA'ers even registered Democratic seeing how on the local level the Republicans still have power in Bucks, Chesco, Montco, etc?

60% is a big margin, but I wouldn't dismiss it as an impossibility.

With the exception of Chaka Fattah (who has proven himself to be a joke in citywide politics at least) and black ward leaders. But it is worth noting that Hillary has many black leaders on her side as well as some black ward leaders.

58-42 is my prediction.

The Republicans here need to be rooting for an Obama nomination. McCain will have a much easier time defeating him.

Who cares? McCain will take care of both. By the time this mess is over...the Democratic Party will be toast for November.

lol. Fattah finished 4th in a Democratic Mayoral Primary, as a sitting congressman, losing by 21 points to another black candidate? That primary is still hilarious a year later.

Obama can downplay Pennsylvania by just saying to look at the big picture instead of any particular state. He'll still have a large lead in overall delegates. After Hillary wins Pennsylvania it'll just be a few days of positive news media for her and then everyone will look toward NC and IN. And "momentum" has largely been nonexistant this election, if Hillary can survive 11 straight landslides and then still go on to do well on March 4 Obama can certainly survive one loss.

The worst part was how Fattah was crowned Mayor months before the primary. He was supposed to be the lone top tier candidate with Nutter, Evans and Knox fighting for the scraps. I always supported Nutter but I didn't really think he had a chance until we got much closer to the primary. I expected Nutter to come in maybe second to last. Then Brady stepped in and we crowned him Mayor. Then he fell flat on his face. Fattah and Brady proved themselves to be the two biggest jokes in that race. It is still hilarious a year later. The two heavyweights battling for third place. Brady eventually got it...by less than a hundred votes.

And all of this is funny because they lost to Michael Nutter, the reformer, in a city still run by the machine. Amazing. That's the first (and so far only) election result I really was thrilled with.

If he could bring the margin down to 6-8% in the next 6 weeks, I´d be delighted.

Nonetheless, in a strange anomaly, there´s a GE pattern right now that favors Obama in PA. In the latest Rasmussen and Strategic Vision polls he does better against McCain despite trailing by 20% in the primary. Could it be that Obama supporters are still more reluctant to vote for Hillary in the General than the other way round ?

BRTD, at which point during this cycle have we gone 42 days between races? How exactly does Obama campaign his ass off for six weeks in PA (as he has too) and then say, "nah, it doesn't matter". You don't think people will hear about "PA, PA, PA" on the tube for six weeks and look for the result, seeing that Clinton won a pretty big win in the only state up for grabs?

Sure, political junkies know that she's looking at like a 75 delegate gap at best at the end of the day, but do the folks?

Ancedotal evidence only...

my friend's mom has switched from R to D in order to vote for Obama...

My mom plans on doing the same before the 24th.

For what its worth.

Probably not, but most of them have already voted and the superdelegates will know.

It's also something the media will have to mention, even if it's just somewhere in the second paragraph of the front page article.

The exact numbers of this poll are:

Clinton - 56%
Obama - 38%
Undecided - 6%

So, it´s 18 - not 20 ... :P

Exactly, my two sisters have suddenly gone crazy for Hillary...but both of them loath Obama and would almost certainly vote for McCain if Hillary loses the Democratic nod. They asked me, "I don't understand...if Hillary won Ohio and Texas...and she's gonna win Pennsylvania...how can he lead?"

Again, around my neck of the woods...McCain would have a better shot against Obama than Hillary. The older anti-Obama people are starting to talk about his lack of experience against McCain....and I bet that some of them defect to McCain if Obama is the Democratic nominee.

All things considered, Republicans might not be in all that bad of shape.

I would agree that 60% is Clinton's ceiling.  I think the key will be what happens in SE Pennsylvania.  This will be the one part of the state which is truly contested due to the large number of upscale liberals and African-Americans in the area.  It is Obama favored territory but the Rendell/Nutter Machine will be running for Clinton and SE Pennsylvania is their power base. 

The rest of the state is Clinton blowout territory.  She will be trying to increase turnout. 

I doubt PA can be downplayed given just how critical it is for Democrats in any close general election. Obama needs to work PA and if he can't win it (and given its demographics, that is unlikely) he should aim to run Clinton close as he can

Once all is done and dusted, including any 'deal' on MI and FL, if Obama wins the most pledged delegates, but Clinton the popular vote, there will be something of a 'legitimacy' issue facing superdelegates. The closer he runs Clinton in PA, the less jittery they are likely to be about his prospects come November though he should perform better than her among Independents and cross-over Republicans to offset any drift on the part of Clinton exclusives to McCain

Furthermore, if Clinton wins PA by 20 points, she gets big momentum moving forward into IN and NC

Dave

Even with the Phily political machine and black leaders in Philly supporting Hillary I don't see it helping her much.  While not the same thing entirely Stephanie Tubbs- Jones is very popular in Cleveland and her district, very strong Clinton supporter, and Obama put up massive numbers in the district.  In regards to SE PA and registration.   Statewide the Dems have seen an increase in an enrollment by over 65,000, 21 times the GOP new enrollment.  With the largest gains in Delaware. MontCo & Chester, thats very likely to continue through the registration deadline.  The suburban Phill vote will make up a higher % of the Democratic Primary vote than they have in the past.

Clinton will win something like 55-44, I'd guess.

And the mayor supported Obama.

As to enrollment increases, I posted about this in the other thread. All parties posted something like a 76,000 voter increase total; if the Democrats are actually registering indies/Republicans, the Indies and Republicans must be registering similar numbers of brand new voters, and that goes against the common sense of new registrations benefitting Democrats due to youth and first time voters.

55-44 sounds about right.

Its probably a combination of the two.  If you were to suggest it was all new voters it would come out to about a 21-1 advantage in new voters for the Dems.  Younger and new voters are breaking strongly to the Dems, but not at a 21-1 ratio.

its approx 75,000  and out of the 75,000 voters added, if you were to assume the breakout was 60% Dem, 25% Ind, 15% GOP.  You would have an increase of Democrats by over 45,000.  Indy's of a little under 19,000 and Republicans by over 11,000.  That still leaves 20,000 who have recently switched to the Dems from either GOP or Indy, and a breakout of newly registered of 4-1 Dem over GOP is likely a tad high, probably closer to 5-2 or 3-1

So 20,000 voters will make this tidal wave of difference? When they split 50-50 in Ohio?

I was just using that as an example.  No way of knowing exactly how many were completley new and how many simply changed.  That number will be higher by the time the deadline is complete.  They may have split 50-50 in Ohio, but considering the largest portion of this gain occurred in SEPA, it is likely to favor Obama.  On top of that the majority of newly registered voters are very likely to favor Obama as well as the majority of those are younger voters. 

One thing to look at on who these new voters would help is where in the state they are coming from, MontCo, Delaware and Chester is where the Dems have seen their biggest gains, the increases we have seen so far is going to continue through the registration deadline and that obviously helps Obama.

Thats not to suggest that Clinton isn't the favorite, she obviously is and a very strong one at that.  However, it makes it really hard for Clinton to do better in PA than she did in Ohio. 

Smash,

If you read my earlier post, I provided some ancedotal evidence about people switching to vote for Obama...

I only mention it to caution you to potentially dampen the number of new democrats in SE PA...some of these people, including potentially my mom (which reminds me, I have to help her switch before the 24th), are really Obamacans.

Granted, I'm just stating that these new Dem voters regardless if they are completley new, Republicans who finally gave up on the GOP, or Obomacans.  These new Democratic voters are likely to go towards Obama, and as a result will make it virtually impossible for Clinton to crack the 60% barrier against Obama, and make it really hard for her to really do any better in PA than she did in Ohio.  The white collar white vote in the Dem Primary is going to make up a larger % of the Dem Primary vote than it has in the past in PA and larger than it was in Ohio.

It will be a really interesting test of Obama's campaign's skills. Shoud they ignore Pennsylvania, lose really badly and spin it away? Or contest it and risk still losing by a large margin? It'll be interesting to see whether he can escape intact from it. They kind of botched Texas and Ohio, imo.

Well...its official, she's switched on the state site, and mailed in her signed change to the county seat.  We're trying to convince my dad to do the same.  I think my line will be, don't worry, some one from the house will remain a Republican, me.

Funny thing, just as she sealed the envelope for the post, the Republican Party, I think National Committee, called to ask her...and she told them she's switching for this primary only because 1) she likes Barack, and 2) hates Hillary and that she'd be switching back before November, the GOP phone operator laughed and put her on speaker for the office.

Solid strategy, downplaying the state that is actually going to matter in the general, in favor of those that aren't.

I've never understood this argument.  We have two options to use as a guideline for General performance:

1. A closed Democratic primary, where Clinton leads
2. Polls specific to the General Election, where Obama performs modestly better.

Why so readily #1 over #2?

Because it benefits Hillary, duh. Honestly I had never even heard the "primary performance = general election performance" argument until this election, basically because it's a creation of Hillary's campaign?


Escape "intact"?

You act as if a loss in Pennsylvania can forever destroy his campaign. It's just one state, he still has the massive delegate lead and still will after Pennsylvania, and one loss is going to be nothing compared to what Hillary went through in February after Super Tuesday.

My prediction:

PENNSYLVANIA DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY -
54% Clinton
45% Obama

If you don't challenge in a state at all, people will feel "written off" which doesn't kill you right away, but it can have an effect on enthusiasm, especially when it comes to people who actually perform the ground level functions, such as volunteers and fundraisers.

I doubt Obama is hurting much for organizational structure in Pennsylvania.  Is he?

I haven't seen it...yet. I doubt they'll make much of an effort in my immediate area anyway. Either way, it will be nothing compared to Hillary's organization in the city.

Well, if he handles it badly enough it could. I don't think it will come to that though. It's true that he has a huge delegate lead. If he can handle the situation the nomination remains his to lose. I still think Obama is the clera favourite to be the nominee. But Pennsylvania remains a big obstacle. It's an important test because if he can escape intact from Pennsylvania he probably has the nomination wrapped up.