Analyzing the PA Vote: Obama’s Silver Lining in Yesterday’s Defeat

April 23, 2008

While there is no argument regarding who won yesterdays Pennsylvania primary (kudos to Hillary) I think it is always important, regardless of the outcome, to look at the days exit polling, and if possible compare them with data from previous primaries, elections, divides, et cetera. So that’s exactly what was done with the Pennsylvania raw numbers, the electorate who turned out yesterday to cast their ballot for either Clinton or Obama have been opened up, dissected, and the prognosis may surprise you quite a bit. It turns out that while Obama in fact lost the contest by approximately 9% points, he actually made great inroads with the now infamous “blue collar – working class” bloc, the group so many claimed he would in fact all but lose after “bitter-gate.“

While Clinton argues that Obama simply cannot get the votes needed to win a general election (which I find hard to believe since he currently leads her in popular vote by close to half a million), when looking at the exit polling, it’s clear that Obama has been making serious gains the past six weeks, in the coveted Democrat “must have to win” rust belt region of the United States. Look below at the comparison of total numbers Obama achieved in the weeks between the Ohio and Pennsylvania contests, they are remarkable:

As you can clearly see from the chart above (thanks Kos), Senator Barack Obama continues to gain among most of Clinton’s best demographics (older voters, Protestant voters, women, white men, women, etc), he’s still raising more money, leads comfortably in delegates, leads comfortably in the popular vote, leads in states won, leads in the national polls, and does better in the head-to-head match ups against McCain.

So with all this said, combined with an obvious ability to make inroads with middle of the road democrats who would otherwise voted for Hillary, what seems to be the issue, or question per se? What’s the fight over in this one? I think it’s clear that we already have our winner in this bad boy, and personally I have though this thing has been over for a while now. It’s just a shame that Hillary’s ambition will inevitably continue to splinter the party at it’s base.