A McClatchy-Marist poll shows Sen. Patty Murray (aka “The Queen of Pork“) with a one point lead over Dino Rossi — 48 to 47 percent among likely voters:

“This is indeed a cliffhanger, any way you carve up the numbers,” said Lee Miringoff, the director of the Marist Institute for Public Opinion in Poughkeepsie, N.Y., which conducted the survey. “The road to a Republican majority in the Senate could go through Washington state.”

The result is in line with other recent polls that have Murray leading slightly, but within the margin of error. According to the poll, Murray leads 47 to 42 percent among registered voters, but this is unlikely to reflect the true state of the race, given the lack of voter enthusiasm among Democrats. President Obama won 58 percent of the vote in Washington state two years ago, but currently has an approval rating of just 48 percent among likely voters (which is still several points higher than in other parts of the country).

Each candidate is winning his/her party, but independents support Rossi by a 57-36 percent margin. Of the voters polled, 32 percent said they were Democrats, 21 percent said Republicans, and 47 percent said they were independents. It’s all going to come down to who shows up to vote — figuratively speaking of course, because most of the state votes by mail.

Washington state has a history of close races, and there is every indication that this one could keep us in suspense all night on Nov. 2, or perhaps much, much, longer:

If the Washington state race is as close as the poll shows, the outcome could take days or weeks to determine. Rossi lost his first race for governor by 133 votes. It took 58 days to determine a winner, and then a court case challenging the outcome stretched into early June of the following year.