Obama v. Clinton (Pennsylvania)
Among likely Pennsylvania Democratic primary voters, Obama trails by 13 and has slightly higher unfav ratings (27 to Clinton’s 22). To address Noam Scheiber’s point about a different Pennsylvania poll, it seems that there is a sizeable number (30%) of white Democrats who are unlikely or very unlikely to vote for Obama against McCain in the general. According to Rasmussen, even 8% of black Democrats are unlikely or very unlikely to vote for Obama against McCain. 17% of white Democrats and 23% of black Democrats are unlikely or very unlikely to vote for Clinton against McCain. Obama’s unfavs among white Democrats are 33%, which is comparable to Clinton’s unfavs among black Democrats (30%). Overall, 78% of respondents say they are somewhat or very likely to vote for Clinton against McCain, and just 71% say the same about Obama. 18% are unlikely/very unlikely to vote for Clinton, while 26% say the same about Obama.
As the general election polling from Pennsylvania makes clear, Obama does as well as he does in the match-up with McCain because he draws enough Republican and independent support to offset the Democratic defections that he would likely suffer. Clinton draws fewer non-Democrats, but retains enough Democrats to do slightly better against McCain than Obama according to current preferences.
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I would say that these numbers are actually very good news for Obama. First, he’s down by double digits against Hllary in PA, and yet even with here against McCain. This means that plenty to of Dems who prefer Hillary in the dem primary will come around to Obama for the general. And this in the face of withering attacks by the leading Democrat in his own party, which he has withstood without going negative himself (certainly not in a comparable fashion to Hillary).
Second, the fact that while currently losing 30% of dems to McCain in a head to head matchup, he still come close to even, suggests that Obama has huge prospects to advance his numbers in the fall. It will be far, far, easier to recapture those democratic votes than it will be for McCain to capture more independents. I’m guessing a lot of those dems are Hillary enthusiasts who are simply registering their current pro-Hillary, anti-Obama bias in the midst of the primary fight. When the primary is over, most of these Dems will come back to the Dem side for the general, as long as Obama simply does his standard campaign that appeals to Dems on all the issues. McCain is so far away from almost all Dem positions that it will be impossible for him to retain that 30% through November. Instead, we will see a gradual reclaiming of most of those voters by Obama. So this suggests that Obama’s numbers will rise steadily once Hillary is out of the race. The only thing that could change this is if Hillary continues her denoucing of Obama for months on end, all the way through the convention. If Obama has only two months to reverse these trends, yes, he could be in real trouble.