CQ predicts Pennsylvania will give Hillary virtually no bump in delegates

Congressional Quarterly has just released an analysis predicting that Hillary will only win 3 delegates more than Obama in the Pennsylvania primary next week. We'll be watching carefully to see which reporters try to spin Hillary's victory next week - a 20-poin victory that the polls have predicted for 12 months now - as a "stunning upset" that "changes everything." We'll be memorializing those "journalists" by name on election day, next Tuesday.

Current delegate tally
Obama: 1,632
Clinton: 1,489

Pennsylvania may give Hillary a 3 delegate bump. That's a 0.2% increase in her number of delegates, meaning that rather than losing to Obama by 143 delegates, she'll be losing to Obama by 140. Yep, it's going to change EVERYTHING. Stay tuned.

And for the Hillary spinmeisters out there, here are the actual polls from PA over the past 18 months.



Note that up until just recently, Hillary had a nearly 20 point lead. If she wins by 20 points, then she meets expectations, she doesn't beat them. We already know that Hillary is going to win PA, that is the conventional wisdom and has been the conventional wisdom since the beginning of 2007. Meeting that conventional wisdom is certainly a "win" for Hillary, but winning a state you're supposed to win does not an "upset" make. The only "news" that may come from next Tuesday is whether Obama beats expectations by cutting into Hillary's 20 point lead that she held for a year. The other real "news" is how Hillary has squandered her lead in PA over the past three to four months. Look at those polls. It's a disaster for her. And more recently, not only has Obama been catching up to her, but her numbers are dropping. Again, hanging on by the skin of your teeth is not an upset.