Perhaps a misleading title, but it remains more succinct than its competitor, ‘The remoulding of a hodge-podge of I-don’t-know-whats' as a way of describing the Clinton campaign's shifting tactics and reason for being.
In 2007 Hillary Clinton was seen as the inevitable candidate for the Democratic Presidential nominee. Throughout this year her fundraising amazed, her machine impressed, and she presented as a less polarising figure than she had previously. She accepted DNC rules, made a pledge for a clean campaign, and even found cause to claim that any one of her, Barack Obama or John Edwards would be a worthy Democratic nominee.
She had a slight blip with a third place at the first contest in Iowa, but got back on board with a win in New Hampshire. After these contests the outsider candidates quickly dropped off the pack, and then, on 30 January when John Edwards left, Hillary Clinton had a lone rival. She was still expected to romp home, blasting Obama away on Super Tuesday with her advanced organisation and contacts, before coasting with the momentum befitting a President in waiting. But it didn’t quite turn out like that. Not only did Clinton not finish Obama off on Super Tuesday, she actually lost the vote and delegate count to him that day. She was officially behind in pledged delegates, and her overall lead remained only due to her ability to aggressively sign up superdelegates before the nominating process had really gotten going.
Clinton was no longer inevitable, and the campaign wasn't happy. They needed another yardstick with which to position their candidate. So we heard from various sources that the fact that superdelegates favoured her should be the main factor under consideration. Those in the know knew that she was the powerful and worthy candidate, able to beat the Republicans in November, and they were making their voices heard. But unfortunately, that one did last. Supers began to flood to Obama as he won contest after contest, and Clinton's lead in this category went from commanding to shaky. At the time of writing, the super count was 246 to 213 in Clinton’s favour, down from a lead of over one-hundred on Super Tuesday, and narrowing fast. Further, the only sub-grouping still favouring Clinton overall were DNC appointees – that is non-elected figures – with House members, Senators, Governors and all people answerable to the public moving to Obama. When these numbers tightened, Clinton needed to change tack.
So then we heard that in fact the popular vote was what counted. Florida and Michigan needed to be reinstated now (and counted for Hillary) even though Obama was not on the ballot in Michigan, and was at an obvious disadvantage as the unknown candidate in Florida given the no campaigning pledge – a pledge which Hillary’s ‘victory’ ceremony and presence in the State on the day of the vote came close to breaking. Obama was being anti-democratic, we heard, in not abiding by Hillary’s opportunistic change of heart, and this was proof that he was not ready. The people would not accept this! But unfortunately, a bit of number crunching showed Obama still leading by at least 100,000 votes even with the worst case scenario of Clintonite gerrymandering factored in. The team would need something else.
So we heard that Clinton is the only one that can win the big states! California, New York…but then it was pointed out that these states were solidly blue and could be counted in the Democratic column no matter who was the nominee. Well what about white, working-class states?...but then Obama contested one vigorously and won Wisconsin. But what about the Hispanic vote and Texas!...but then Obama picked up the endorsements of Bill Richardson, Ted Kennedy, and contrary to misguided reporting, won the vote and the delegate count in Texas. This one didn’t fly.
Then we had the ‘electoral-math’ argument. Evan Bayh and other Clinton supporters argued that if you look at the states where Clinton will win in November, it is clear she will win the election. Whereas if you look at the states that Obama will win, it is clear that he won’t. I can only hope that the humour of making an electability argument, whilst losing an election, was not lost on the team behind this one. ‘Cos it’s worth a chuckle. When Clinton's approval ratings and poll numbers dived further, this argument sank along with them.
And all the while in the background we have seen underhanded attempts to weaken Clinton's opponents (who, according to her campaign, seem to be Obama and the Democratic Party). We have had racial sniping going on - Bill Clinton sent a couple of shots across the bow with his ‘fairytale’ and ‘Jesse Jackson’ comments, dismissing Obama’s run as a marginal exercise, and Geraldine Ferraro told us how lucky Obama was to be a black man in the U.S. Clinton and Harold Ickes whispered in private, to superdelegates, that the Republicans just won’t let the race thing go (with straight faces no less) so she remained, they argued, the obvious choice. The fact that Obama has won the states with the higest percentage of white voters, as well as the highest percentage of black voters has not been able to intrude on this false reality or the gutter tactics employed. Then there were statements about the worthiness of John 'ready to be Commander in Chief' McCain as opposed to the neophyte Obama, rearguard actions directed at the party - from threats made to Howard Dean and Nancy Pelosi, to offensive slurs at Bill Richardson, there have been lies uncovered and dismissed (where to start with that one), and ‘misreadings’ (to go with the ‘misspeaking’ no doubt) of the meaning of pledged delegates (yes they really are 'pledged').
And now Clinton's money has run out, her campaign is being run by buffoons like Mark Penn, and the circle of argument is about to close - we are back onto superdelegates. Clinton must know she has lost the delegate race and popular vote, and, even with a losing campaign distinguished by its schmuckery, she seems to believe that the remaining superdelegates are going to overwhelmingly lock in behind her because she is the superior candidate.
Ain’t gonna happen.
Wednesday, April 2, 2008
Sunday, March 30, 2008
Hillary's bluff is being called
Further to the last post about delegate numbers, it looks like another swathe of supers is about to fall to Obama. This from the Wall Street Journal :
Who would have guessed that sending intimidatory letters to the Democratic leadership and threatening to tear the party in two unless she got her own way would have elicited such a response?
"Slowly but steadily, a string of Democratic Party figures is taking Barack Obama's side in the presidential nominating race and raising the pressure on Hillary Clinton to give up.
Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota is expected to endorse Sen. Obama Monday, according to a Democrat familiar with her plans. Meanwhile, North Carolina's seven Democratic House members are poised to endorse Sen. Obama as a group -- just one has so far -- before that state's May 6 primary, several Democrats say.
Who would have guessed that sending intimidatory letters to the Democratic leadership and threatening to tear the party in two unless she got her own way would have elicited such a response?
The Maths of the Democratic Primary Race
Some old news for my opening gambit. If you've been following numbers elsewhere, sorry bout the rehash, I'm just giving myself a jumping off point.
.
The politics surrounding the Clinton steamroller are powerful. They have created the impression that we spectators are viewing a real contest, and a close one at that. This is a testament to the ability of the Clinton campaign to maintain that black really is white. The 'close race' narrative they are pushing is up there with her sniper fire story, (recently exposed as a baldfaced lie) as far as its proximity to reality is concerned.
Seemingly forgotten in all the talk of race, character and scandal is that this is a democratic process and at the end of it all, numbers are what matter, not whether Hillary thinks she deserves the Presidency or is well placed to win a General, or Bill thinks that Obama is indulging in a fairytale. The candidate who wins the most votes is the Democratic Party's nominee for President. At this stage Obama has a lead of between 120 and 139 delegates, depending on which major source estimate you prefer. This includes a lead a pledged delegate lead of between 155 (NBC) and 171 (CNN). The overall delegate tallies, according to CNN, are Obama 1625, Clinton 1486. Given that a candidate needs 2024 delegate votes to win the nomination, to have such a lead at this stage of the race means that Obama is basically insurmountable.
Forty-four states and territories have voted, and ten are yet to do so - we are in the endgame. The remaining races are in Pennsylvania, Guam, North Carolina, Indiana, West Virginia, Kentuckey, Oregon, Puerto Rico, Montana and South Dakota. There are 566 pledged delegates to be had across these contests. If Clinton won 55% of all remaining delegates (keeping in mind she has won about 45% to date - which includes big victories in New York, California and Arkansas - and is behind in the polls in half of these states), the tallies will be Obama 1870 to Clinton 1797. These estimates are being extremely generous to Clinton, unless the race drastically shifts off the trajectory it has been solidly following for months now.
Assuming no more make pledges either way until this time, there will then be 380 unaligned Superdelegates, the party officials who make up about 20% of the total voting numbers, who will push a candidate over the line. To get to 2024 votes, Clinton needs 227 of these, or 60%. Given that Superdelegates have moved to Obama at a rate of about 3 to 1 since Super Tuesday this seems pretty unlikely as well. So for Hillary to sneak home by one delegate, she needs to outpoll Obama by double digit margins across all of the remaining states (including states like North Carolina where Obama is currently leading by 13) then arrest her collapsing support amongst the Supers and get them to overturn the sizable delegate lead that Obama is constantly building (Texas just awarded him a further 9 at the end of the Caucus process yesterday, making him the winner in a state that Clinton had claimed as part of her 'comeback'). In short, it ain't gonna happen. If you want to make some free money, put a bet on Obama to be the Democratic nominee while the markets remain open.
.
The politics surrounding the Clinton steamroller are powerful. They have created the impression that we spectators are viewing a real contest, and a close one at that. This is a testament to the ability of the Clinton campaign to maintain that black really is white. The 'close race' narrative they are pushing is up there with her sniper fire story, (recently exposed as a baldfaced lie) as far as its proximity to reality is concerned.
Seemingly forgotten in all the talk of race, character and scandal is that this is a democratic process and at the end of it all, numbers are what matter, not whether Hillary thinks she deserves the Presidency or is well placed to win a General, or Bill thinks that Obama is indulging in a fairytale. The candidate who wins the most votes is the Democratic Party's nominee for President. At this stage Obama has a lead of between 120 and 139 delegates, depending on which major source estimate you prefer. This includes a lead a pledged delegate lead of between 155 (NBC) and 171 (CNN). The overall delegate tallies, according to CNN, are Obama 1625, Clinton 1486. Given that a candidate needs 2024 delegate votes to win the nomination, to have such a lead at this stage of the race means that Obama is basically insurmountable.
Forty-four states and territories have voted, and ten are yet to do so - we are in the endgame. The remaining races are in Pennsylvania, Guam, North Carolina, Indiana, West Virginia, Kentuckey, Oregon, Puerto Rico, Montana and South Dakota. There are 566 pledged delegates to be had across these contests. If Clinton won 55% of all remaining delegates (keeping in mind she has won about 45% to date - which includes big victories in New York, California and Arkansas - and is behind in the polls in half of these states), the tallies will be Obama 1870 to Clinton 1797. These estimates are being extremely generous to Clinton, unless the race drastically shifts off the trajectory it has been solidly following for months now.
Assuming no more make pledges either way until this time, there will then be 380 unaligned Superdelegates, the party officials who make up about 20% of the total voting numbers, who will push a candidate over the line. To get to 2024 votes, Clinton needs 227 of these, or 60%. Given that Superdelegates have moved to Obama at a rate of about 3 to 1 since Super Tuesday this seems pretty unlikely as well. So for Hillary to sneak home by one delegate, she needs to outpoll Obama by double digit margins across all of the remaining states (including states like North Carolina where Obama is currently leading by 13) then arrest her collapsing support amongst the Supers and get them to overturn the sizable delegate lead that Obama is constantly building (Texas just awarded him a further 9 at the end of the Caucus process yesterday, making him the winner in a state that Clinton had claimed as part of her 'comeback'). In short, it ain't gonna happen. If you want to make some free money, put a bet on Obama to be the Democratic nominee while the markets remain open.
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