New PA Poll Really Bad News For McCain

There's a new poll out of Pennsylvanian today that shows Obama ahead of McCain by 8 points. That's actually closer than many other polls have shown recently. So the question is, "Is McCain closing in Pennsylvania?" Actually, a close look at this poll suggests that McCain is actually toast in Pennsylvania.

First, there's the demographic make-up of the poll. Only 8% of the respondents were African-American, only 6% were aged 18-29, and only 18% were aged 30-44. Now, in 2004, the Pennsylvania electorate was 13% African American, 21% were under 29 years old, and 28% were 30 to 44 years old. So this sample was both much much older than the PA electorate and much whiter. Does anyone think that this year African-American and younger voters will turnout in lower numbers this year than four years ago?

Second, even though the sample is skewed towards demographic groups that lean McCain, he's still behind by a statistically significant margin. Furthermore, McCain's favorability rating is only 44% in this poll, and has only a +4 net favorability (Obama's is 52%, +18). What does that mean? It means like even in an older, whiter version of Pennsylvania, McCain is not so popular.

The bottom line is that McCain is in a deep hole in Pennsylvania. This doesn't mean that the media won't keep pretending that Pennsylvania's a battleground, because they will. It's important for the media that Pennsylvania be considered "close," because without PA, McCain has an extraordinarily narrow path to the White House.

Anyway, sorry to keep harping on the Keystone state.