Hyperventilation about Pennsylvania

Rasmussen has a new poll out this morning on Pennsylvania that shows the state growing tighter:

Obama 51
McCain 47

A few points:

1. Today's Pennsylvania Trackers sees the race this way:

Obama 52
McCain 44

2. Pennsylvania polls in 2004 showed Kerry taking Pennsylvania by 0.9 in the Real Clear Politics final average. He actually won the state by three. The RCP average right now is Obama +8.5. The Pollster.com trend analysis is Obama 51.7, McCain 42.9. Last night on CNN, a reporter following the McCain campaign observed that McCain's internal polling showed him down by five points in the Keystone State.

3. Nate puts this all in perspective:

Suppose that Barack Obama were to concede Pennsylvania's electoral votes. Literally, concede them. Throw 'em back, like a Chase Utley home run at a Cubs' game. How often would he still win the election? ...89.0% of the time, according to our most recent run of simulations, along with another 2.4% of outcomes that ended in ties.