Pennsylvania Plotting

Political Wire: Gov. Ed Rendell "has sent two separate memos to the Obama campaign in the past five days requesting that the Democratic Presidential candidate -- as well as Hillary and Bill Clinton -- return to campaign in Pennsylvania."

In the meantime, McCain's political director Mike Duhaime lays out the strategy to win Pennsylvania.

He also broke down some number from the '04 race, arguing that since Democrat John Kerry won the state by only 140,000 votes, McCain “needs to flip” only 2,000 votes in each the state’s 67 counties.

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He said the campaign is operating three dozen offices in the state and is making hundreds of thousands of phone calls every week to identify and persuade potential GOP voters. The data mining efforts are aimed at identifying former Hillary Clinton supporters and independents who are prepared to consider McCain’s message. He said the internal data is “trending” in McCain’s direction and is showing “a lot of things” not apparent in the opinion polls.

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Duhaime predicted that McCain would surprise prognosticators even in Philadelphia, a Democratic stronghold where Obama is seen to hold a hammerlock. Kerry won the city by over 400,000 votes four years ago, winning every single ward. Duhaime said Obama won’t be able to repeat that feat, however, and that McCain will garner more votes than Bush did in the city.

For a third party analysis of the situation, and a very detailed one at that, go here.