Jim Geraghty notes

Pollster Scott Rasmussen just shared this fascinating observation in an interview: When you average the head-to-head matchups with Hillary Clinton vs. any of the Republicans, she’s always getting 46 to 49 percent against any of them.

The report on the poll can be found here.

Now, some see this as of great significance vis-a-vis Hillary, such as the Influence Peddler who asks Is Hillary a Sure Loser?.

Well, no. There are two key reasons. First, 46%-49% is a winning range. Second, the issues isn’t (as we should all be quite aware of by now) the direct head-to-head vote, but the state-by-state vote. One suspects that the anti-Hillary sentiments are over-represented in Red states and under-represented in Blue states.

I must confess, I am amazed every single electoral cycle as to the way in which “analysts” like to focus on the overall head-to-head numbers while ignoring the state-by-state numbers. I recognize that state-by-state polling doesn’t exist yet, but the lack of data doesn’t justify pretending like available data are sufficient.

The report on the poll highlights the fact that Ron Paul wins 38% against Hillary, which, no doubt, will cause a great deal of joy in the Paulista camps (I can see it now: “See he has 38% support already–just think where he could go if given the chance!”) However, not so fast. First, I would note the title of Rasmussen report (emphasis mine): “Poll Matching Hillary Clinton and Ron Paul Tells A Lot About Clinton, Little About Paul.” Further, the write-up states (emphasis theirs):

Among all voters, Clinton attracts 48% support. Among the voters who have never heard of Ron Paul or don’t know enough to have an opinion, guess what. Clinton attracts the exact same total–48% of the vote. So whether or not people have heard of Ron Paul as the challenger, support for Clinton doesn’t change.

In other words, the name could have been “Ferderico Bocifitania” and the anti-Hillary needle wouldn’t have much budged.

As I said at OTB:

Actually, that shouldn’t be a shock. Surely in a head-to-head poll of Hillary v. Any Republican (Ron Paul, John Smith, whomever) the Rep would get somewhere in the high thirties. Wouldn’t that simply demonstrate the baseline GOP vote?

Nevertheless, I expect somebody, somewhere in the Paulista camp to argue that these numbers show that Paul is a viable candidate.

To which I would reply: yes, like many (most? all?) of the current GOP crop, he is a viable candidate to lose the election in 2008. (I say that as a matter of empirical fact, and not as anything else).