I live in upstate NY and my local paper has a story on the latest Quinnipiac poll numbers for New York State. These numbers confirm what most people said during the primaries about New York being a safe state for Obama in the general election.
A Quinnipiac University poll shows Obama has expanded his lead in New York over McCain to 50 percent to 36 percent.
If you know anything about New York State, you know that the NYC area is heavily democratic and trends more liberal, while Upstate is more conservative in general, except for pockets of progressive cities, college towns, etc. Here's how the race, so far, breaks down between upstate and downstate:
The poll found that Obama and McCain are in a dead heat in Upstate and in the New York City suburbs. Obama, though, overwhelms McCain in heavily Democratic New York City - 65 percent to 25 percent.
So, even in New York State there's room for growth - suburbs of NYC and Upstate. New York State could use better, more progressive dems to counter years of gridlock and cronyism in Albany. Increasing support for Obama could help clean house.
Here's how the NY state GOP are spinning this (try not to laugh too hard):
"Obama's short-term bump in the city is undercut by the fact that he could barely even convince a slim majority of Democrats to support him - losing key states including New York right to the very end of the divisive (Democratic) primaries" said GOP spokesman Mark Walter.
" . . . As New Yorkers learn more about Sen. Obama's inexperience and questionable judgement, John McCain's experience and patriotism make him a clearly better alternative."
They also asked New Yorkers about whether or not Obama should select Hillary Clinton as his VP. Remember, Hillary represents the state of New York in the Senate:
And by a 48-percent-to-42-percent margin, voters said Obama should not pick Clinton as his vice presidential candidate. In Upstate New York, a resounding 52 percent want someone other than Clinton with Obama.
Wow. It's only been a week since she dropped out. I'll let you draw your own conclusions about what this means.