Yes, Pennsylvania is Winnable

Little follow-up on the ugly stats coming out of Pennsylvania from PPP and other pollsters, where Obama is performing worse here than in Ohio. Western Pennsylvania has trended red for some time now, with nearly the entire Pittsburgh metro area going for McCain in 2008. Obama of course beat him by over 10 points, but that was thanks to a massive, massive rack up not in Philly (where he only added another 30,000 votes over Kerry in the grand scheme of things), but the Philly suburbs.

Here is a pretty straightforward visual on how you win PA, either narrowly or comfortably:

Current polling reflects the Corbett map in terms of western PA (HillaryDems down to just 70% support, meaning the Pittsburgh area goes red comfortably), and the Toomey map in terms of eastern PA. Romney is currently edging Obama in the groups populating the Philly Suburbs, Bachmann trails here but not as badly as McCain.

You flip three counties- Northampton, Lehigh, Bucks- and you win the election, even if Obama churns out voter after voter in Philly. He is not going to improve on his 2008 turnout in this state with his approval rating swinging 20 points away from where it was at that time. Factoid about the pull of the big cities- total turnout in Pittsburgh and Philadelphia in 2008- at the peak of Obamamania- was 1,372,000 votes. That's with ACORN and all their ilk. Sounds massive, until you realize nearly six million votes were cast in the state. The core areas of fraud aren't large enough to help him- a la Madison and Milwaukee for the Democrats in 2010, or Detroit in 2010, or, well, Philly and Pitt in 2010.

Eeyores whine and whine, much like they did about Wisconsin in mid-2010. We just can't flip it. Fools gold. But for the first time in a while, we have seen a consistent red trend in polling here. If a state is trending one way, keep pushing it on the local level. We have a legitimate shot of making Pennsylvania a Republican state for the first time since I was watching Fraggle Rock. Don't screw it up.

posted by CAC at 04:34 PM

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