Clinton is Right - today

Hillary Clinton is correct. She does have a better chance of beating John McCain - if the U.S. election where held today.

The polls are still very volatile, and state by state polls even more so. Nevertheless, analysis shows Hillary beating McCain, based on current state polls, while Barak looses. This despite the fact that the same polls show Obama beating McCain by 4.5% in the overall national popular vote, while Clinton barely ekes out a win in the popular vote, at 1%.

That’s because U.S elections are based on electoral votes not popular votes, as Al Gore - and all U.S. citizens - where reminded in 2000. Turns out Obama would be another Gore, winning the popular vote but losing the electoral collage. At least, that is, if the polls are accurate, and the election where held today.

The maps below tell the story.

The one above shows how Clinton does against McCain based on the RCP average poll results as of May 22. Hillary wins the White House by 1 electoral vote. Too close for comfort you say? Well Barack does worse.

The map above shows how Obama does against McCain based on the RCP average poll results as of May 22. McCain wins the White House by 9 electoral vote.

Just to see if the very latest polls changed the picture vis a vis the average of that last 3-4 polls, as shown above, I produced the following two maps based on just the most recent poll available.

and this one

Hillary still wins, and Barak still looses. But the good news for the Democrats is that if the latest polls do show any trend at all, it is that both Democrats are gaining.

At least today.

I did this exercise privately two seeks ago, and Obama and Clinton both won against McCain, and with Obama the slightly stronger candidate.