NOTE FROM JOHN: To put these polls in context, Joe added a link at the bottom of this post to a Bloomberg News article. The article explains that even if Hillary beats Obama by 25 percentage points in Pennsylvania, she still is unlikely to overtake him in either delegates or the popular vote nationwide:
``I am a big believer that she needs either one, the popular or the delegate count,'' in order to make a case for why she should be the nominee, New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine, a Clinton backer, said in an interview....
To earn that split decision, though, Clinton would need a 25-point victory in Pennsylvania, plus 20-point wins in later contests in West Virginia, Kentucky and Puerto Rico. Even that scenario assumes Clinton, 60, would break even in Indiana, North Carolina, South Dakota, Montana and Oregon -- a prospect that's not at all certain.
Keep these numbers in mind tomorrow night. Hillary needs a 25 point win in Pennsylvania, and even then, she's in trouble. __________
SurveyUSA, which has had a solid track record this year, finds a 6-point lead for Clinton, down from 14 last week:
The survey concluded that Clinton will finish with 50 percent, 6 percentage points ahead of Obama. The margin of sampling error is 3.8 percent.
Looking only at SurveyUSA numbers and ignoring the polls that have been released by 12 competing pollsters in Pennsylvania, Obama gained ground in a week when he was largely on defense and off-message. Last week, SurveyUSA had Clinton ahead by 14 points. Monday, in a poll conducted using the identical methodology, SurveyUSA found Clinton ahead by 6 points.
Of all the polls coming out today, SurveyUSA is the most surprising and shows the biggest movement for Obama.
New York Sen. Hillary Clinton leads Illinois Sen. Barack Obama 51 - 44 percent among Pennsylvania likely Democratic primary voters, compared to 50 - 44 percent last week, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today.
White voters back Sen. Clinton 57 - 38 percent, while blacks back Sen. Obama 84 - 10 percent, the independent Quinnipiac (KWIN uh-pe-ack) University poll finds. A look at other subgroups shows:
* Women back Clinton 57 - 38 percent, while men are for Obama 53 - 42 percent; * White Catholics are for Clinton 66 - 29 percent; * Voters under 45 go with Obama 57 - 41, while older voters back Clinton 54 - 40 percent.
PPP Polling, which has also proven to be pretty accurate this year, has Obama leading Clinton by a 3 point margin:
Barack Obama 49 Hillary Clinton 46
For the fourth week in a row PPP is showing the margin between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama in Pennsylvania to be at three points or less.
With such a close race the final result tomorrow should hinge on turnout. If there is disproportionately high turnout in the Philadelphia metro area, where Obama has a 58-32 lead, he could pull out a victory. Clinton is dominating throughout pretty much the rest of the state.
Regardless of whether Clinton or Obama finally wins this primary, it is almost certain the margin will be so small as to have minimal effect on the delegate count.
There you have it.
Keep in mind, Hillary Clinton was always supposed to win Pennsylvania by a very wide margin. She had been way up in the polls -- and has the Rendell machine working very hard on her behalf. Bloomberg reports Clinton "Needs Record Margins" to even stay in the game:
To overtake Barack Obama in the nationwide popular vote, Hillary Clinton needs a bigger win in tomorrow's Pennsylvania primary than she has had in any major contest so far. And that's just for starters.
