The Trib Presents You With Yet Another Partial Picture

Take a look:

A survey conducted for the Trib by Susquehanna Polling & Research finds the Democrat incumbent in a statistical tie with the Republican challenger, 47 percent to 45 percent, with a margin of error of 3.46 percentage points. Like a castle in the sand, Mr. Obama’s “record” — particularly on matters economic — cannot withstand the incoming tide of public opinion as voters post-Labor Day turn their attention to the presidential election. Two national polls also released Sunday mirror the Trib poll results.

So the election in Pennsylvania is close, right?

It's a statistical tie, right?

But then why has the Romney campaign abandoned our lovely state?  From The Times-Tribune of Scranton:

Not so long ago, Pennsylvania stood unquestionably as a swing state, one presidential candidates of both major parties thought they could win.

Democratic candidates knew they had to win the state to get elected. Republican candidates knew that if they won it, they would likely be president.

Maybe Republican nominee Mitt Romney still really believes he can win Pennsylvania, but with the decision by the presidential campaigns and their affiliated super PACs to stop advertising on television in Pennsylvania after Labor Day, the state is President Barack Obama's to lose.

But this should not be news to Scaife's braintrust.  Their own paper reported more or less the same thing just a few day ago:

Two percentage points separate President Obama and Republican nominee Mitt Romney in a state poll conducted for the Tribune-Review, even though the campaigns largely are ignoring Pennsylvania and concentrating on other battlegrounds.

And:

Other recent polls showed a larger margin for Obama, leading some to speculate that Pennsylvania — which hasn’t voted for a GOP presidential candidate since 1988 — no longer is a swing state. Two of those last four polls gave Obama a lead larger than his margin of victory in 2008, when he defeated Sen. John McCain of Arizona by 10 percentage points.

The braintrust didn't tell you that, did they?  It's almost as if they didn't think you needed to know it.

They didn't tell you that, for example, one day before the Susquehanna poll, Republican-friendly Rasmussen released some numbers that show Obama up by 12 points:

President Obama has jumped to a double-digit lead over Mitt Romney in the battleground state of Pennsylvania.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Voters in Pennsylvania shows Obama with 51% of the vote to Romney’s 39%. Three percent (3%) prefer some other candidate in the race, and seven percent (7%) remain undecided.

Now go back and read what the braintrust presented to you and ask yourself this question: What planet do they live on?