Things must be worse than we thought for Rep. Joe Sestak. He’s been slipping badly in public polls, which show Pat Toomey with a large one-digit lead. So Sestak rushes forth with an internal poll to show he’s only two behind. Umm, not good. Even MSNBC’s political crew must acknowledge:

Now, it’s never a good thing when a party’s own poll has its candidate trailing — even within the margin of error — as this poll finds. But Democrats want to show the race is in play for them. Still, the party has to be a little nervous about the prospect of losing both the Senate and gubernatorial races in this state two years before the 2012 presidential election. Also keep this in mind about Pennsylvania: It will always be one of the Democrats more winnable Senate races. Translation: The party won’t be writing off Joe Sestak but propping him up, which is likely going to be a necessity is going to hurt another Democrat in another state. (See Carnahan, Robin? Or Ellsworth, Brad)?

Perhaps, or maybe this is an admission that even Democratic strategists can’t come up with a poll that shows Sestak ahead. Frankly, it tells informed donors and activists that the public polling is probably dead on.