At least part of this phenomenon of Obama catching up as the primary approaches can be accounted for by his monetary advantage. Reportedly he sunk $24 million in the failed efforts to win Texas and Ohio; while he didn't win either, he did close up the gaps for his money.

If the PA trend holds, or stabilizes near the current readings (the RCP average has Obama trailing by only 42.2 - 47.6 today), it spells big trouble for Hillary. It won't make a huge difference in the delegate count from PA, and we know she can't catch him in pledged delegates anyway, but the psychological impact would be huge. Her recent momentum will have been dissipated, and super delegates with their moistened fingers in the wind will begin moving even faster to jump on Obama's bandwagon before it leaves them behind.

Of course, the expectations game often works both ways, and the falling margins for Hillary in the polls reduce the expectations for her there, so she no longer needs to bury him, just win by significantly more than the polls predict. She could survive with a 9-point win, perhaps; anything less portends collapse.

Obama is in an excellent position..He wasn't expected to win Pennsylvania now he is getting close to a 50/50 position with all the new registering of Democratic voters in the state..As Jim suggests even if a close loss for him let's say under five points, may be actually be a win for him, given Hillary's expectations going into the primary four weeks ago.

Her recent momentum will have been dissipated,

In reality, Hillary never had any momentum in March. She fell further behind in the delegate race during that month. Obama won more delegates in Texas and more than made up her 9 delegates in Ohio with wins in Mississippi and Wyoming. Plus he scooped up some Edwards delegates from Iowa and has been steadily racking up superdelegates.

She's not quite done yet, but I sense we're getting close.

There are still ten states coming. Michigan and Florida will have to be addressed. Voters have to be recognized and counted. As Roosevelt said so wisely: There are no sacred rules, only sacred principles.
The #1 tenet of democracy is to encourage and recognize the individual vote.
Giving Obama 50% of the votes in Florida and Michigan is not democratic - no matter how you look at it. Obama is going to steal votes from Clinton and the other candidates who stayed on the ballot.
So Mr. Obama, who campaigned in Florida (indeed, he was the only democratic candidate with ads in Florida) is being awarded a lot more than what he got and deserves.
As for Michigan, he was on the ballot at first, then decided to take his name off it but still urged his supporters to vote uncommitted. Well, all the uncommitted votes (his, Edwards's...) were less numerous than Hillary Clinton's votes.
Notice Obama didn't urge his supporters not to vote because it was against the rules -- but to vote uncommitted so he would have a sense of how he fared there. To give him 50% of Michigan votes would be to show the Michigan voters how little they count.
For those who just think Florida and Michigan's votes should not be counted at all, well come November if Mr. Obama is the democratic candidate, a lot of the disenfranchised voters from those states will think "Wait a second, our votes did not count when he needed to crush Mrs. Clinton, but now that he needs to crush Mr. Mc. Cain, he needs them?"
I happen to be one of Hillary's volunteers here in Pennsylvania and there is an excitement, an energy, a feeling of inclusiveness - young and old, females, males, African Americans, Asians, Jews, GLBT, Latinos, Pacific Islanders, Blue Collars, White Collars, Academics... -- that is astonishing.
Obama may have more money but remember Kerry? He had more money poured into his campaign than any other presidential candidate before him.
At the end of the day, the one with the true power was the voter in the booth, and despite the hype (the rallies, the get out the votes frenzy, the bussing, the concerts, the appeals, Bruce Springsteen etc..) Mr. Kerry lost. He got fewer votes than Mr. Gore got in 2000!

Annie Kaplan, Pennsylvania.