Handicap Super TuesdayFollow

My sympathies to your family and friends

Clinton blowout. Obama makes noises about continuing, but is out of hte race by Friday.

Nice!

Happy Super Tuesday! It's been super for me so far since I got to sleep in until 6 am.

Super!

Off to vote, kiddies. Don't forget your civic duty!

Don't you have to be registered as a Democrat or Republican to vote in the primaries? So if you're an independent, you esentially can't vote? Or am I way off base...

Hmmm, that's probably why I thought that. My voting esentially began while I was in the military, and I was stationed in Florida. I've no idea how it works in Colorado. I guess I'll have to ask around work and see if anyone knows.

*I just checked. Sure 'nuff, at least in this county, you have to be a registered party member.

Edited, Feb 5th 2008 1:46pm by Kakar

Jophiel's Two-Penny Pro-Obama Analysis and Predictions:

I'm still not sure if the elected delegates will shake out from yesterday as a slim Obama win or a slim Clinton win but obviously neither candidate pulled ahead. Clinton is crowing over her win in Mass. although she won by the same numbers predicted and Obama had shrunk her previous lead down considerably.

If you're so inclined, you can take that same principle across the board. Obama shrunk leads in New Jersey, Missouri (which looks like a tie leaning to Obama) and California. Although the latest polls were showing a slim Obama lead in CA, I don't think anyone thought he's win the state -- even optimistic predictions came with the caveat of a million early votes cast back when Clinton was leading by 35%. What was important was that Obama blunted Clinton's CA win to (currently) 10%, gaining a substantial number of delegates for himself.

Clinton's camp is calling her landslide in Arkansas a "heartland" win despite no one in the country considering Arkansas the "heartland". But they need some counter to Obama's wins in Kansas (to be fair, his birth state), Minnesota, North Dakota and earlier Iowa. Plus Utah and Idaho. Although low delegates, Obama can use them to claim a red-state advantage and they paint a nice portion of the map his color (like those Bush victory maps.. heh)

Clinton's Hispanic bulwark proved a powerful defense in California (where Obama won the white vote), Nevada and Arizona although it's pretty well used up by now. Moving into Louisiana, Maryland, Virginia and DC, African-American votes will play a much greater role than Hispanic (although Flea predicts a VA win for Clinton). Texas comes later and Clinton is 10% up as of Jan 31st but the single state open primary day could give Obama the chance to keep it tight. Mississippi is after Texas (if it gets that far, March 11th) and will probably go as Georgia & Alabama did and Louisiana will.

I think the Southern state advantage can make Obama more viable in the general election. States like New York, New Jersey, Illinois and California are likely to go blue no matter what in the general. Clinton's Hispanics aren't likely to flip Texas or Arizona (and Obama looks like he took New Mexico). On the other hand, the record turnouts in South Carolina and Georgia make me wonder if Obama stands a chance of flipping one or two black-heavy southern states. Maybe I'm discounting the anti-black vote too much there -- I'm just going off of primary turn-outs from the Democratic & Republican sides.

Going forward, I think Obama has the advatage in most states and can slowly paint the map his color. The "one state at a time" system seems to favor him and, when he can concentrate on a single state, you see his numbers rise considerably. He didn't have enough time before Feb 5th to do much more than a holding action but, in single state contests, I think he stands a chance. The DNC is going to want to get this wrapped up as soon as possible and avoid a brawl into late spring or summer. Dragging out the primary means less time for the candidate to campaign for the general (and less time to raise funds). If Obama can color enough of the map in the coming weeks to look like the front-runner, there's a chance the superdelegates will side with him to end the race.

That's my rosy, optimistic view. Counters include the Clinton political connections among superdelegates and Clinton's aggitations to re-seat the FL & MI delegates. but I'm trying to stay on the bright side here.

Edit: I forgot about Oklahoma when mentioning Heartland states. Clinton won Oklahoma hands down

Edited, Feb 6th 2008 9:38am by Jophiel

There'll be tremendous pressure to end it well before then. The last thing the Party wants is a candidate with two months to fundraise and campaign as the general election candidate against McCain who'll have been at it since March.

On the one hand, you can say that this gives Obama the edge because he might be able to compete in the general election in states that traditionally go Republican. On the other hand, you can argue that this gives Clinton the edge, since it means that Obama is only really strong in states that will likely go Republican anyway.

The reality is that Obama is vastly more electable. Primarily because disillusioned blacks and kids aren't going to bother to vote after he gets the nomination stolen from him by superdelegates.

Lol! Oops. My allegory ran over my anecdote! Or something like that... ;)



Um. At the risk of being obvious, those were landslides because California flipped for the Republican party. Take 55 electoral votes from the Dems and give it to the Republicans and any election becomes a landslide for Republicans. Period.



/shrug

It's a primary. The two parties use different mechanisms. Number differences between the parties at this level are meaningless. The more significant number is that in California 43% of registered voters are Democrats, 34% are Republicans, and 23% are "other" (at least according to CNNs page). This means that a Republican who appeals to the middle can most certainly win California, and one who appeals to Latinos even more so. In this context, McCain is the nightmare candidate for Dems to face. Neither Romney nor Huckabee would have had any chance of this, but McCain most certainly does.

Thus, why this becomes a major issue for Dems. McCain is going to be weaker in some of the more traditional "issues" Republican states, but none of that will matter if he does manage to win California. The Dem powers that be will have to figure out to what degree Obama weakens their position in California (if at all), and to what degree he may put some of those other red states into play.

I'm just speculating here, but it's got to be something that's going to influence the decision to some degree. If the Latino vote split between Cliton and Obama in California had been closer, it would be irrelevant, but given the size of the gap, you've got to assume that an Obama ticket will not draw as many Dem Latino voters as a Clinton ticket will. And if you're facing McCain who *will* draw Latinos, that could be a big problem...

There's zero chance California goes red. Michigan maybe. California, no.

Hey gbaji, who's your horse on the pubbie side? If I had to guess, I'd say Huckabee.