The latest poll numbers out of Pennsylvania

The president's statewide approval rating has fallen to 51 percent in Pennsylvania, down nine points from a Quinnipiac poll from August, and down 16 points since April. In fact, Bush's 51 percent approval rating in Pennsylvania is the lowest he's scored in-state in the post-9/11 era.

Quinnipiac also offered hypothetical, general election match-ups for poll respondents. Though Bush led all the major Dem candidates, his margin was far smaller than it was two months ago, and most Dems kept Bush's re-elect numbers below 50 percent.

As usual, Wesley Clark fared the best in a head-to-head match-up with Bush, trailing Bush 48 percent to 43 percent -- a 5 point margin. Lieberman trailed Bush by 6 points, Kerry by 7 points, and Gephardt by 8 points. And, in a sign we've seen a little too often, Dean fared the worst against Bush, trailing by 10 points.

http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/000760.html

For instance in the last poll Dean was 23-points behind Dean now he has cut that to ten-points. Gep was 20-points behind Dean and now he cut that to 8-points. Kerry was 17-points behind and now he is six-points down, and so on. So steady progress by all.

I don't think Dean being down ten-points is that big of a deal, all of them are losing to Bush, some doing a bit better--down five points but the momentum seems to be with the Dems. This from a state which really hasn't gotten a lot of attention yet due to being a late primary.

Another poll for University of NH has Dean doing best against Bush in NH, but not by much. For instance Dean loses 48-38, Kerry loses 49-38, and Clark 49-32. NH has been paying attention, but really the real story there is that in a state where the GOP has a 11-point registration margin over Dems all candidates have Bush under 50%. So we could say that in a state where voters have been paying attention and candidates have been visiting that Dean does best, but I don't think that is really what it should be about. It should be about Dems coming on strong overall.

we can't afford to risk all on the candidate who polls even a percentage point less than our best shot.

Didn't think so.

I'm not switching my support just because a poll indicates another candidate has greater popularity. That is the path of madness. As soon as we have one candidate to put up against Bush, all of this becomes real to Middle America and they will have a tangible person to pick in opposition to Bush. Then we will see the true level of support.

In case you haven't Dean is actually statisticly tied in margin with both Kerry and Gephardt for sure and probably all the rest.