Morning Polls: Are Southern states ripe for pick-up?

Two stunning polls out of the South today challenge the conventional wisdom that Democrats should not even try their luck in any states there, especially if Hillary Clinton is their nominee.

First up, a SUSA poll from Virginia:

• Clinton wins all three of her matchups. She beats Giuliani by 6% (50-44), Thompson by 7% (50-43), and Romney by 15 (53-38). That she reaches 50% against all three candidates says a lot about her chances.
• Edwards also wins his three races by similar margins. He beats Giuliani by 5% (48-43), Thompson by 10 (49-39), and Romney by 19 (52-33). As always, there are much less undecideds respondents when the Democratic candidate is not Clinton.
• Obama runs a bit weaker than the other two Democrats. He is basically tied with Giuliani (he leads 46-45) and Thompson (he trails 47-45) but leads against Romney 50-38.

These results also confirm the Rasmussen poll from two weeks ago which also showed Clinton with a slight lead against the major Republican candidates! But even more stunning are numbers released today by Rasmussen from the state of Tennessee, arguably much more Republican than Virginia is today. But Rasmussen shows Clinton in the lead, except against Thompson who is from Tennessee himself.

• Thompson crushes his three rivals by varying margins: He beats Clinton 54-39, he leads John Edwards 56-35, and he destroys Obama by thirty points: 60-30!
• But Clinton has a small edge against Giuliani (46-44) and against Romney (46-40).

Granted, those are insignificant leads that really don't mean much at all. But consider just how Republican Tennessee is. It did not even vote for native son Al Gore in 2000 (who would have won the presidency if only he had carried his homestate). Democrats do not have to win states like Tennessee to get to the White House. In fact, if they get even close to carrying states like Tennessee, odds are they will comfortably win the more important swing states of the Midwest and get a large electoral college lead!

Further, such polls undermine the conventional argument that Clinton cannot win the South or the Midwest. She is criticized as being so polarizing that she could easily win the blue states but fail to make even a dent in red and purple states. Edwards often makes the argument that he would put all those states in play, forcing the Republicans to play defense on their own turn, and Obama has also argued that he would make the South competitive. Whatever the merits of these respective arguments (and there is some evidence that Edwards can make the Midwest more competitive than usual), polls like these ones show that Clinton can stay competitive in very red states -- even crossing 50% in Virginia against all GOP candidates!