9.3 =! double digits

Hillary won by double digits? Really?

*UPDATE: I just checked the numbers at both sites and the final margins are virtually unchanged: CNN -- 9.29%, PA State Election Authority -- 9.11%*

From CNN, here are 99% (rounded) of the total votes cast in PA's primary:

HRC 54.6504%
Barack 45.3496%

margin: 9.3008%

From PA's state election authority, here are 99.51% of the total votes cast in PA's primary:

HRC 54.5732%
Barack 45.4268%

margin: 9.1464%

In the final count, she'll have, at most, 9.3% more of the vote than Obama, since the remaining precincts are all in Philadelphia, a strongly-Obama area. I have lost all faith in the news media in general. Look at how stupid they look before and after the primary results came in, with their breathless declarations of arbitrary "must win" margins for HRC and how things supposedly will or will not change after the results.

What kills me (and others too) is how Hillary is equivocating that her win in a Democratic primary means that Barack can't win over McCain in the general election. Thankfully, the NYT has a piece explaining the fallacy of this logic today. Here's what John Aravosis said:

On its face you go, wow, he's right. I mean, if Obama can't win Pennsylvania then we're screwed in the fall - that's a lot of electoral votes for McCain. The only problem in Wolfson's logic, and he knows it, is that while Obama is expected to lose Pennsylvania to Hillary in the Democratic primary next Tuesday, that has nothing to do with the results of Obama vs. McCain in the general election. Yes, Hillary's people are lying to you, yet again. Let me walk you through the logic with an example.

1. I have a choice between brownies and cookies for dessert.
2. I choose brownies.

Wolfson is trying to tell me that this means I hate cookies, that I'll never choose cookies in the future, and even if I have a choice between cookies and broccoli for dessert in the fall, I'll choose broccoli then because I didn't choose cookies today.

You see, Wolfson is making a common error that's understandable coming from the Hillary campaign. Most Democrats are not going to help John McCain become president out of spite simply because Hillary didn't win the Democratic nomination. In the real world, Democrats support their party and their nominee - they don't take their toys and go home just because their first choice in the primary didn't win.

Very good point. Just because you like X over Y doesn't mean you won't pick Y over Z. How stupid are people?

*UPDATE: There's an article in the NJ on this issue -- read it here:

Q: Thank you for joining us. Let's talk a little bit about what seems to be "Topic A" among Democrats, and that is Barack Obama's electability. It is the thing that many Democrats are talking about -- journalists as well. Obviously, concerns have been raised, strong concerns, because for the second time in a row in a big state, he's lost with whites, blue-collar voters, Catholics and, of course, those older voters as well. But with respect to the base of the party -- the white blue-collar Catholic in a certain sense -- why shouldn't the Democrats be worried about this?

[David Plouffe, Barack Obama's campaign manager] ...We're happy to have a conversation about electability. I'd start with this, which is, if you look, we've had 46 contests now and Barack Obama has shown real appeal in all segments of the electorate. And I do think if you look at some of the voters that are voting for Senator [Hillary Rodham] Clinton, you know our favorable/unfavorable, our internal traits are very strong, and it would be like suggesting somehow all the Democrats voting for us wouldn't vote for her if she were the nominee. The lion's share of Democrats are going to be supporting the Democratic nominee.

The real question is, who can appeal to independents against a candidate like John McCain whose got unique appeal for a Republican candidate against independents. Who can bring out younger voters? Who can create a favorable turnout dynamic? This doesn't have to be a radical exercise. Let's look at where the general election matchups stand now. In Oregon, in Washington, in New Mexico, in Nevada, in Wisconsin, in Iowa, in Minnesota, in New Hampshire, in Maine, in any number of states that we either have to win or we have to put in play -- Virginia, North Carolina -- we are performing more strongly than Senator Clinton. So I think that there is a lot of navel-gazing about this going on. I think if you look at what the election is likely to be with only a Democratic nominee, a Republican nominee -- McCain adopting all of the Bush policies -- the Democratic Party voters are going to vote in huge numbers for the Democratic nominee. The question is, who can turn out more of them, and who can do best amongst independents and moderate Republicans, and we think undeniably that's Senator Obama.

Q: Well, you've talked here about why he is electable. Obviously, the Clinton campaign and Clinton herself are making strong arguments about why he is not electable, pointing to this base question that I just asked you, pointing to the fact that she's done better in the big states. What kinds of arguments are you going to be making to superdelegates about her electability?

Plouffe: Well, let me just on the big state question -- you know, they point to California, New York, Massachusetts. We are going to carry those states comfortably. Yes, she did win Ohio and Pennsylvania in the primary. If you look at polling matchups of McCain versus Obama and Clinton in Pennsylvania, we perform roughly equal. We've won a lot of big battleground states -- Colorado, Wisconsin, Washington state, Iowa, Virginia. North Carolina, by the way, is going to be a big battleground state in 12 days, so I guess by their definition they need to win there. So this is kind of a ridiculous argument that, you know, they are trying to latch on to.

I mean, I think her electability issues are the following: she's got a high unfavorable rating. It would be the highest unfavorable rating for any presidential nominee in recent history. Fairly or not, the majority of voters don't trust Senator Clinton. Those two points are related, obviously: her unfavorable rating, and the sense that voters do not find her honest or trustworthy. And I do think she has limited appeal with independent voters. A Democratic nominee has to be competitive with independent voters. Ideally you'd win them. John McCain has unique appeal with independent voters. Senator Clinton has difficulty matching up with him with independent voters. She's got less appeal to Republicans, and I also think she's not going to create the kind of turnout that we will in the African-American community and with all voters under 40.

So I think she's got real limited range here, and we think that we will be just as strong as she will be in the core battleground states like Pennsylvania, like Ohio. But the question is, in Iowa, in Wisconsin, in New Mexico, in Nevada -- these are states that have always been very close, that a Democratic nominee has to carry. And we're doing much better than she is against John McCain.