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New poll numbers show rising negative marks for Hillary Clinton as her campaign turns increasingly to desperate tactics against Barack Obama in the attempt to salvage its hopes for the Democratic presidential nomination. A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll released today shows that 48% of Americans now give Clinton a negative rating while only 37% rate her positively, the worst showing for Clinton in this poll in seven years, and a contrast to marks of 49% positive and 32% negative for Obama (see also CNN, "Clinton's Negatives Reach New High"). While these numbers show a clear decline in favorability for Clinton, they show little or no change for Obama, suggesting that the recent Jeremiah Wright controversy has impacted Obama far less than many had predicted. For Clinton, meanwhile, the WSJ/NBC poll shows that even among women Clinton is now viewed negatively (44%) more than positively (42%), an "ominous sign" for a Clinton campaign heavily dependent on women voters. Clinton's lead among white voters overall has also shrunk from 12 percentage points to 8 since early March, another bad sign for Clinton and further evidence that the Wright controversy has had little if any lasting ill effect on Obama. As WSJ observes, "the negativity of the Obama-Clinton contest seems to be hurting Sen. Clinton more," noting that 52% of respondents said Clinton "doesn't have the background or values they identify with" in comparison to 39% for Obama.

A new California poll also released today shows declining support for Clinton in the nation's largest state, severely weakening Clinton's own "big state" argument for winning the nomination as well as Clinton backer Evan Bayh's suggestion this week that the nominee should be selected using the number of electoral votes the candidates have "acquired." While Clinton won the Super Tuesday primary in California by an 11-point margin, today's numbers show that California Democrats, unaffiliated voters, and voters overall now have a more favorable view of Obama than of Clinton. While Obama scored a 78% favorability rating to Clinton's 74% among Democrats in California, he scored even greater margins over Clinton among unaffiiated California voters (57% to 35%) and California voters overall (60% to 45%). These numbers suggest that if the primary were held today the result might be somewhat different from that of Super Tuesday, and that in the general election Obama is more likely than Clinton to beat the Republican for California's 55 electoral votes.



As ABC News suggests, factors contributing to Clinton's decline following her short-lived March 4 "comeback" may include the perception that she is dishonest, heightened recently by her exaggerated claims of dangers she faced in Bosnia as First Lady. Even before the flap over Clinton's exaggerated Bosnia recollections, as ABC observes, poll numbers released March 16 showed that only 44% Americans considered her "honest and trustworthy," compared to 63% for Obama. The release of Clinton's White House schedule on March 19, which likewise contradicted claims made by Clinton regarding her years as First Lady, may also have contributed to her recent decline in favorability. Far from the full disclosure demanded by the Obama campaign and others, Clinton's schedule seems only to have raised the volume on calls for disclosure of more White House papers, the Clinton tax returns, and list of donors to the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock. As the revelation of further facts collides with the fictions put out by the Clinton campaign, her favorability ratings seem likely to continue dropping.