My general take on the race is that it depends on whether Obama can close either race, NC or IN, by gaining undecided voters. According to Poblano, Obama will defeat Clinton by a 18% margin, 59-41 in NC; and PsiFighter37 that Obama will defeat Clinton by a a 16% margin of victory, 58-42 in NC. How can these, admittedly, Obama supporters come out with such trumped up hope in the face of the credible polls like SUSA showing only a 5% lead by Obama in NC?
Simple, as I said before, they are stuck in believing that the Obama of February still exists; and in fact, they've even got some form of math to back it up. It's true, as Todd pointed out, that the Obama of February, should wipe up in NC in similar numbers that his supporters above believe, but he won't. Why? Because since early in March, Clinton has been turning her ship, and is arguably running a better campaign than Obama has since April, and in the last two weeks that's become more and more obvious to Democrats nationwide. Tomorrow, the damn may break open, but as I said, it depends on the undecideds. Take a look at the three most recent big races:
In Ohio, Obama ended the polls at 43, and got 44; in Texas he ended at 46 and got 47.5; in PA he ended at 43.5 and got 45.5.
For those three states, Obama gained 1 in TX, 1.5 in OH, and 2 in PA.
In contrast, Clinton gained 3.5 in TX, 4 in OH, 6 percent in PA.
That is a consistent 3:1 break of the undecided numbers to Clinton, if you are going to take the most recent contests as a guide. My guess is, that this is at least partly due to the continual under-polling of the gender gap that continues unabated, but its more. Obama had previously closed many states much higher than his closing poll number-- the race has changed.
Is it enough? Yes, most definitely it is for Indiana. Clinton has closed strong there, and a similar margin to Ohio and Pennsylvania seems doable for Clinton. The numbers I have are along the lines of a 54-46 margin for Clinton, which might be upped if Zogby comes out with more favorable numbers for Clinton that up the IN poll of polls numbers.
NC is a different picture. On the one hand, you've got a very high early voting number happening, and multiple sources have said that it is favoring Obama by about a 15% margin. This could be in contrast as to what happened in CA, where according to SUSA, Clinton ran up the numbers by locking in the early voters in high numbers. This would be an irony, because Clinton's state director in NC is Ace Smith, who would be getting beat at his own game if this pans out to be the case. The other thing I've noted is a couple of pollsters (PPP) showing that for those who will vote the day of the election, it is tied between Clinton and Obama. Early voting is sometimes an indicator of a larger trend, but its also sometimes just pockets of voters that are not much bigger than the numbers that vote early. Giving the undecideds at a 3:1 margin for Clinton, it closes it to about a 6 percent race, 53-47. Now, that should be off, and the race should at least, given the demographic favor, close 3:1 to Obama for a 56-44 advantage, but the environment doesn't seem to indicate that will happen (though the early voting points to it being a possibility).
It does seem like a make or break moment, but hasn't it seemed that way for weeks on end too?
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