National polls don't matter in presidential primary races -- until they do.
With the race tightening dramatically in Iowa (and her lead eroding in NH and SC), Hillary Clinton's aides have been able to argue that her dominance of the Feb. 5th "national" primary keeps her safe from harm. But the new USA Today/Gallup Poll shows that Hillary is in a nosedive nationally that dates from her disastrous Halloween Eve debate in Philly.
(Rasmussen's daily tracker shows her with a slimmer, 12-point lead as of today.)
Still, there are two rays of hope for Hillaryland amid the obvious gloom of the USA Today poll:
1. The relentless Obama-Edwards attacks have taken their toll on her -- driving her negative rating to 50 percent. But there's some evidence that their negativity may be hurting them and neither seems to have benefited much from her fall: Obama gained a statistically insignificant 2 points since mid-November in the poll; Edwards is mired in the 14-15 percent range.
2. So far, O has succeeded in taking her back down to the level she was at over the summer -- around 40 percent, but hasn't come close to the high-30s he logged over the same period. His conundrum: To rise he needs to keep it hopeful -- to erode her credibility he needs to whack away. How he manages to walk that line could determine the outcome of the race.
-- Glenn Thrush in Des Moines