A new poll of New Hampshire registered voters shows Hillary Clinton widening her lead over Barack Obama in the Democratic primary and Mitt Romney locked in a geographic duel with Rudy Giuliani on the Republican side.
N.H. DEMS
Hillary Clinton 41%
Barack Obama 20%
John Edwards 11%
Notes: Clinton's lead here HAS to be inflated, doesn't it? Even if she wins New Hampshire, there's no way she'll beat him by 20 points, will she? I just don't buy it --- yet. Plus, as you astute political observers know, the results in Iowa help transform the numbers in New Hampshire. That's why Obama benefits from the most amount of days between Iowa and New Hampshire if he does well there . . . so he can build momentum. Clinton wants a quick turnaround to stifle any bounce Obama could get from an early upset win. Agreed?
N.H. REPUBLICANS
Mitt Romney 26%
Rudy Giuliani 20%
John McCain 17%
Fred Thompson 10%
Notes: Romney's geographic edge has been dwindling here as of late, and Giuliani hasn't even gone up with ads yet. So this race remains competitive. A must-win for Romney, but also crucial for Giuliani, because he's assumed to do poorly in Iowa. The most eye-popping thing for me on the Republican side is that John McCain (who many have already written off for dead) is still competitive here. The conventional wisdom is that McCain won't pull off the independents in the Granite State this time because of his hawkish war position and because of Barack Obama. Is McCain set up to surprise us all here?
The poll surveyed 1,512 registered New Hampshire voters and has a margin of error of 5 percentage points for the results for Democrats and 5.5 percentage points for Republicans.
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