Going Back to Cali

The latest Rasmussen poll from California has Barack down by only 3%, with a third of the electorate uncommitted or undecided and the now-absent Edwards at 9%. (Via TPM and Daily Kos.) This is encouraging, but it's worth repeating word-for-word what my wise friend Shankar said in the comments to another polling post yesterday:

The thing about these polls is you really can't get a better sample for Obama than Sunday-Tuesday. It's just difficult to believe that the impact of those three days is sustainable by itself - the South Carolina win, the endless talk about the Clinton's negative tactics and divisiveness, the Kennedys endorsement. The intensity of feeling generated by all that is bound to fade at least a bit. He'll need to work hard to keep up the momentum with a strong debate performance and maybe an Edwards or (unlikely) Richardson endorsement.

As I said just down the page, it really all comes down to the debate: a perceived tie probably leads to a tie or close-enough loss on Super Tuesday, a perceived win revs up the enthusiasm and probably pushes him through to a solid win through increased turnout, and a perceived loss lets all the air out of the tires at the worst possible moment. Tonight is very, very important—to return to a metaphor I've used a few times before, it looks like tonight is the night the universe goes ahead and flips its coin.