According to Mark Penn's latest memo, polling data shows that his boss, Hillary Clinton, can win the presidency. Given the dire state of the Republican party, that's certainly right, but we should still mock his strained attempts to spin Hillary's icky polling data into a positive case.
The only head-to-head Hillary-versus-a-Republican polls that Penn includes come from this Newsweek story, which has Hillary beating McCain by 7 and Giuliani by 1. It allows Penn to say, "Hillary Clinton is the only Democrat who beats John McCain and Rudy Giuliani in the latest Newsweek poll." That's not as exciting as it seems, because that Newsweek poll included only one other Democrat -- Barack Obama. And depending on what time of day Penn released his memo, it might not even be true. Just today, Newsweek came out with another poll showing Hillary leading McCain 48-47 and trailing Giuliani by the same score. But there is one Democrat who beats both McCain and Giuliani -- John Edwards, who leads McCain 48-43 and leads Giuliani 48-45. This is consistent with past polling data -- when you do a collection of head-to-head polls, Edwards usually outperforms everyone else against Republicans.
