Warning: Messy math ahead.
I think the pundits skipped lightly over Wyoming and Mississippi mainly because those states were/are unlikely to change the status quo: ie, Obama leading Clinton by well over 100 pledged delegates. Pennsylvania is her next best chance to catch up. Not that she will.
What I find curious is why people aren’t marveling over how accurate the Obama camp’s early February projections have been. That document probably wasn’t leaked in order to manage expectations, people said then—why, it has him winning every February post-Super Tuesday contest save Maine. (He ended up winning those caucuses too.) But if people had taken those projections seriously, they wouldn’t have been surprised that he lost Ohio resoundingly and Texas by a hair. The projections didn’t seem to take the Texas two-step caucus advantage into account, but the primary vote margin was spot on: O 47, C 51.
A Daily Kos diarist has broken down the Obama campaign’s projected and actual delegate counts for the contests up to Wyoming:
Louisiana Projected: 31 / Actual: 34 / Difference: +3
Nebraska Projected: 15 / Actual: 16 / Difference: +1
Virgin Islands Projected: 2 / Actual: 3 / Difference: +1
Washington Projected: 49 / Actual: 52 / Difference: +3
Maine Projected: 10 / Actual: 15 / Difference: +5
Dems Abroad Projected: 5 / Actual: 6 / Difference: +1
D.C Projected: 9 / Actual: 12 / Difference: +3
Maryland Projected: 37 / Actual: 42 / Difference: +5
Virginia Projected: 43 / Actual: 54 / Difference: +11
Hawaii Projected: 11 / Actual: 14 / Difference: +3
Wisconsin Projected: 40 / Actual: 42 / Difference: +2
Ohio Projected: 68 / Actual: 66 / Difference: -2
Rhode Island Projected: 8 / Actual: 8 / Difference: 0
Texas Projected: 92 / Actual: 98 / Difference: +6
Vermont Projected: 9 / Actual: 9 / Difference: 0
Wyoming was projected at 7 delegates, and the actual count is 7. Pretty creepy.
So what’s Obama going to lose in the coming weeks?
According to the memo, we can look forward to Clinton wins in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Puerto Rico—a conservative but reasonable assessment. Accordingly, from tomorrow through June 7, we can expect Obama to win approximately 303 additional pledged delegates. Clinton should win approximately 296. Which changes absolutely nothing.
It’s about the superdelegates, stupid. The media ought to be very, very careful about which Clinton narratives they repeat (big states! Obama has to prove himself in Pennsylvania! pledged delegates can actually change their votes!) and which Obama narratives they mimic (more pledged delegates! more states! popular vote!).
Let’s say the projections hold—and Michigan and Florida are not seated. Obama will have 1,379+303 pledged delegates at the convention, for a total of 1,682. Clinton will have 1,526. You need 2,025 to get the nomination, so Obama will need 343 superdelegates, and Clinton will need 499. (Currently they have 210 and 245, respectively, so Obama needs 133 more and Clinton needs 254 more.) There are 795 superdelegates total, so let’s see… Obama needs 39% of the remaining superdelegates and Clinton needs 75% of the remaining superdelegates to clinch the nomination.
No wonder Clinton’s fighting so scrappy for Florida and Michigan.
Also...
COLUMBUS, Miss — Sen. Barack Obama delivered an animated rebuke today of suggestions from the Clintons in recent days that he could run as her vice president.
“Now first of all with all due respect, with all due respect,” he said here during a town hall meeting. “I won twice as many states as Sen. Clinton. I won more of the popular vote than Sen. Clinton. I have more delegates than Sen. Clinton. So I don’t’ know how someone in second place can offer the vice presidency to someone in first place. If I was in second place I could understand but I am in first place right now.
He referenced comments from Bill Clinton in 1992 that his “most important criteria” for vice president was that person must be ready to be commander in chief.
“They have been spending the last two or three weeks” arguing that he is not ready to be commander in chief, Obama said.
“I don’t understand. If I am not ready, why do you think I would be such a great vice president?” Obama asked the crowd, which gave him a standing ovation during his defense. “I don’t understand.”
“You can’t say he is not ready on day one, then you want him to be your vice president,” Obama continued. “I just want everybody to absolutely clear: I am not running for vice president. I am running to be president of the United States of America.”
Please, for the love of our future children, care about this election enough to be informed voters.
No comments:
Post a Comment