Hillary's Upset: One of the Greatest?

[Psychic Octopus]

Ok, I'm sure all of you remember New Hampshire Primary Night, back in 2008. Remember how Obama was leading in all the polls? How he was going to ride this victory to the nomination? Remember when Clinton won? That seems like a huge upset, considering that most pollsters (At least that I recognize) saw Obama winning by a good margin. What do you all think? Was it a huge upset?

[Bo]

Yes. It was the greatest upset in my memory. However, that doesn't mean much since I only started paying attention to politics back in 2004.

[Sasquatch]

Yes, it was pretty shocking. Must polls had Obama riding the Iowa wave and he was up any where between 7-12%. I remember hearing reports that Hillary's campaign was in such bad shape they had to fly people in from New York to fill up the seats at her rallies in New Hampshire.

[J. J.]

Ok, I'm sure all of you remember New Hampshire Primary Night, back in 2008. Remember how Obama was leading in all the polls? How he was going to ride this victory to the nomination? Remember when Clinton won? That seems like a huge upset, considering that most pollsters (At least that I recognize) saw Obama winning by a good margin. What do you all think? Was it a huge upset?

NH is freaky to poll, especially in a primary.  If I had a dollar for every time I saw an upset in a NH primary, I'd order a pizza. 

[MASHED POTATOES. VOTE!]

2000 upset with McCain is more memorable for me

[hcallega]

It would have been more memorable had she won the nomination. My most memorable upset in terms of elections would be Scott Brown, Bob Ehrlich, or Jim Webb winning. But in terms of polling flips hers is one of the biggest.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I don't think you can really grade upsets like that. It was certainly very important though - it was in New Hampshire that the voting patterns that dominated the pretty much all the rest of the primaries became clear. Some details had become apparent in Iowa, that Obama was indeed the candidate for choice for black voters (yes, that was in doubt for quite a while) being the main one, but a lot of the patterns of Iowa weren't reflected elsewhere - and that wasn't just because Iowa doesn't have a secret ballot.

[Nym90]

If this result is considered an "upset" than a Coakley win in MA would've also had to have been considered to be one....both candidates had large leads in the polls at one time but then trailed consistently in all polls immediately prior to the election.

When one thinks of "upsets" in politics, I would think the former attribute would be as important as the latter.