I think Obama's sitting pretty in Oregon.

  Kentucky and Puerto Rico are Clinton's last hurrah.

  How ironic...she'll claim the popular vote victory (a lie, but still) based on her margin in a territory that can't vote in the general election.

  Oh well...two more weeks and we'll have a nominee and this ridiculous logic from her and her more hardcore supporters will be over.

The only trial heat polls that matter are Obama vs. McCain.  Hillary will drop out in a month, maybe less.  Yes she and Obama both fare similarly in a lot of states and neither clearly outperforms the other right now in trial heat polling vs. McCain.  Hillary does better in some states and Obama in others; Hillary does better in some national polls and Obama in others.  But none of that matters.  Obama is the nominee, and all that awaits are the last few primaries followed by Hillary conceding.

primary. Senator Clinton will win Kentucky by a nice margin and the opposite will hold for Oregon.

Early voting accounts for a lot in Oregon and it's a mail-in vote state. SUSA shows a 48-45% draw in early voting but SUSA has struggled and most polls show a 15-20 point lead in Obama's favor.

And Oregon and Washington may warm up to Senator Clinton, just as Michigan has for Senator Obama, where he now carries the state and Senator Clinton doesn't.

Polls are, as always, meaningless, except when you need to push a point.

I can show Colorado, New Mexico and Nevada polls that show Senator Obama carrying the state easily enough.

Kansas really isn't in play unless he picks up Governor Sebelius. And I don't expect the electoral maps to make a great deal until we get closer to the convention.

These polls aren't that interesting, IMHO. I'd like to see pollsters doing surveys of Ohio, Florida and Pennsylvania more often. In all honesty, who the hell cares who Kansas will vote for? I'd have half a mind to reject their electoral votes if we did win them.

One thing to remember is that the Republicans have been focusing all of their attention on Obama lately and have taken it easy on Clinton to extend the race.  

More of this? Polls, polls, polls.

Can't wait until this is over.

and continue to show HRC's strength in areas where Obama is relatively weak.  I don't know how the dems can ignore these polls and EV calculations as they think strategically as to what is the best way to defeat McCain.

I'll be interested to see if the landscape changes again with HRC's expected wins, and the apparent closeness of Oregon--single digits.

I also wonder what effect the "mission accomplished" statement will ahve on this. Will voters care?  Will voters be offended?

thanks for the insight and information.

WA could be evidence of the solidifying of the democratic base.  WA is kind of the reverse of MA where Obama was doing horribly but now he is starting to perform as a democrat should in that state.

AR is a home state for Hillary, and has a bunch of the Ozarks in it which are demographically similar to Appalachia (where she outperforms most democrats).

KS is probably seeing an effect due to Rev. Wright/Bitter.  They are out of the corn belt so McCain runs there fine compared to in IA/IN/MN/IL where McCain runs really poorly due to his opposition of ethanol.

As far as Oregon goes, Hillary recovering in a match up vs McCain doesn't mean that voters preferences between her an Obama have changed, it is probably just that more people are having ratings preferences of BO>HC>JM compared to BO>JM>HC.

In truth, I think we're both overstating Democratic vulnerability in blue states and their ability to win red states.  

Obama could help to dramatically increase black turnout in the South.  I don't know that he would win any of those states, but it could be very helpful to Dems in local/state races.  

I think Clinton carrying Arkansas would be no big surprise.

But if you look at the frontpaged maps, you see Hillary and Obama both losing Michigan and Wisconsin.  And I just don't see that happening.  

Don't like the conventional wisdom?  Just wait five minutes and it'll change.

Seriously, it has been impossible to get a handle on any of this stuff this year.

A few months ago when the heat was on Clinton, Obama was doing overwhelmingly better in GE polls.

Now that the heat's on Obama, they are trading leads in different states, even though Obama still does better against McCain nationally.

Make Clinton the nominee, and watch her numbers drop again.

Overall, it says to me that Obama is the better nominee, and he will be the nominee, so lets' quit the hand wringing over polls.

Looks like Hillary's on the move. Great News. Only one slight monkey wrench in the works. She Lost!

diebold

Can you expand on it some? Why is it meaningful how Clinton polls?

The percentage of voters in the state that support or oppose the gas tax holiday is a good way to measure how Obama will perform in the state.  In Arkansas, over 50% support the measure while under 40% oppose it.  Any state with this type of disparity is probably one with which Obama doesn't have any chance of winning in November, if he is the nominee.

However, over 50% oppose the gas tax holiday in Washington state, while opposition is under 40%.  McCain would have no chance against Obama in states with this disparity.

Interestingly, 50% of Alaskans oppose the gas tax holiday, but Obama is down nine to McCain in today's poll.  You would think Obama would perform better but I guess that's the problem with a state that is dominated by Republicans; Obama is beating McCain among independents in Alaska.  Keep an eye on this state if Bob Barr/Ron Paul campaign out there.

I think the second biggest electability argument in Hillary's favor (besides the Ohio, Florida, PA argument) is that even in states where Obama is stronger than her (e.g. Washington, Oregon, Minnesota), she would still win those states against McCain.  In other words, Obama doesn't get extra points for defeating McCain by ten points, while she would only defeat McCain by three points.

She is even competitive in Iowa with McCain now (down only three according to Rasmussen).  The only state that I can think of where she has absolutely no chance but Obama would have a chance is Colorado; however, the converse applies for West Virginia and Arkansas (Kentucky is still a longshot for her in my opinion) and she's probably a surer bet for winning WV and AR than Obama is for winning CO.

was never in trouble in WA state. I don't care what anyone says, Obama and Clinton both would do just fine in WA state.

There is NO WAY the majority, here in my state, would ever vote for mccain.

The west coast is BLUE. Period.

Kansas has split electoral votes.  It is possible to win a few there.  In fact, Kerry almost won a couple there... they were thinking about sending him out to campaign there near the end...

Yes, exactly.

Who wants to bet that if we get the crosstabs the difference, once again, will come down to one thing: the number of Clinton supporters who are telling pollsters they won't vote for Obama in the general?  "Make me the nominee or I'll jump!"