A Capitolwire Column

Written by: john walber on Apr 25, 2008 7:08 PM EDT

OFF THE FLOOR: PA shows Clinton not trailing Obama in inspiring new voters.

A Capitolwire Column
By Peter L. DeCoursey
Bureau Chief

PHILADELPHIA (April 24) – The most important thing about the Pennsylvania Democratic primary is that the campaign of U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., can no longer claim to be the sole or dominant source of electricity for the Democratic Party here.

This is a big question in the Democratic Party: how much of the emotional high the party is on is attributable mostly or only to Obama? And how much is just the Democrats, voters and pols believing they are destined for a very good year at the polls?

When 700,000 new voters boosted turnout to 2.2 million, nearly 50 percent over the old primary turnout record, and U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., still won by more than 9 percentage points, her claim that voters were just as inspired by her got vital factual backing.

For me, this question was best put a few weeks ago in Rydal, a Philadelphia suburb in a nice section of Montgomery County.

State Rep. Josh Shapiro, D-Philadelphia, was standing in his living room, in front of about 60 undecided voters who were friends of his, or of his wife Lori’s.

Shapiro and U.S. Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., the special guest star brought in for the meeting, were trying to convert these undecided Montgomery County voters to support their candidate, U.S. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.

In words that were more predictive than he now wishes they were, Shapiro told his friends earlier in the party: “As goes Montgomery County, so goes the state on April 22.”

Then, with Kerry at his side, Shapiro told the crowd: “There is one person responsible for bringing 50,000 to 60,000 more Democrats to our party” in Montgomery County since 2004. But a woman shouted into the brief dramatic pause Shapiro took: “Yes, George Bush!”

Shapiro ignored the interjection and said: “And that’s Sen. Obama.”

And two women at the party, after quickly looking to make sure Josh and Lori weren’t around, because they didn’t want to offend their friends and hosts, told me they were voting for Clinton. One of them told me she was voting for Clinton “because it is long past the time we should have had a strong woman president.”

When Montgomery County stunned Shapiro, Gov. Ed Rendell and every other Democratic politics watchers by voting narrowly for Clinton, 77,886 to 75,682, I thought of that lady interrupting Shapiro and the two women, anxious to vote for Clinton but not wanting to insult their friends.

Because the election results showed most of the juice here is about defeating Bush, since Clinton did just fine at attracting the first-vote-in-awhile voters an “Old Politics” candidate like her was supposed to have no ability to lure.

Despite playing a major role in adding more than 300,000 Democrats to the party rolls since January, Obama turned out to be only marginally more attractive to the extra voters than Clinton was.

And high turnout in must-win Montgomery shows this.

Because if there was one county Shapiro and other Obamacrats were sure they would win and knew they had to win, it was Montgomery. Richest county in the state, best-educated county in the state, third-most Democrats in the state.

In fact, Obama strategists were most confident of winning Montgomery and Bucks, both of which they lost, and worried about losing Delaware and Chester counties, both of which they won.

Obama needed to win at least 55 percent of the vote in those four suburban counties to have any shot at holding down Clinton’s margin, and he had to win about 60 percent of the vote there to win the election.

Instead, he lost those four counties by about 12,000 votes, getting only 48 percent there, despite those counties setting turnout records driven by the new Democrats this primary added to their rolls.

Why were the suburban predictions so wrong? Because people assumed that since the state record was 1.5 million voters, those above that line would be three-quarters or more Obama voters.

That is what Shapiro and former 2002 Rendell gubernatorial campaign manager David Sweet believed.

Even Rendell thought that group would split 60-40 Obama. And he was mocked for that prediction, dismissed by Obamacrats who laughed when he argued that “more of those voters than you think … are Republican women switching [party registration] for Hillary.”

As it turned out, the state primary voting record was shattered as 2.2 million people voted, 700,000 more than ever voted in the past.

And Obama got no real edge from those extra voters he was supposed to own, those people who will supposedly stay home if Clinton is the nominee.

Clinton won the state by 9.2 percentage points, a bit higher than the 7-point poll lead she enjoyed.

So the 700,000 extra voters, who broke the state record for primary turnout by nearly 50 percent, voted pretty much like the first 1.5 million.

Rendell said he guessed they broke 45 percent for Clinton, 55 percent for Obama, so that Clinton’s double-digit lead came down to 10 points, the figure Rendell says it will be when the last half-percent of absentee and other votes is counted.

What does that tell us? That in Pennsylvania, at least, about as many voters were excited by Clinton and the prospect of ending the Bush administration as by Obama.

If that is true in other states, she has a good chance to be her party’s nominee, although, remember, we are an ”Old Politics,” “shoe-leather,” “familiarity does not breed contempt” state here. So her appeal to all voters here is higher than in most states.

But still, Clinton and Obama are arguing about who can bring the most to the party in November, and Obama up until Pennsylvania and Ohio, has been able to argue he is the one energizing the party. Now Ohio and Pennsylvania have given Clinton proof that she can get new votes and old votes.

The rest of this story will get written in North Carolina, Indiana, West Virginia and Oregon, where we will see if Clinton can keep splitting the first-time-ever or first-time-in-awhile voters, and keep her campaign alive.

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