Tag: Primaries

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No Florida Do-Over

That’s a negative, there, ghost rider.

I suppose that, in a state with the electoral history of Florida, messing around with a last-minute, untested mail-in voting system was probably ill-conceived and likely to be dismissed, at best.  Besides, there’s really no fair way to do it, other than what SilentPatriot and others suggest:

Crooks and Liars » Florida House Says “No” to Primary Re-Vote

I thought the mail-in idea was worth considering. Oregon’s similar system is one of the safest and most efficient in the nation. They did have a decade (instead of a few months) to perfect it, though. Dean really needs to start flexing his muscle and enforcing the agreed-upon rules. If the states refuse a re-vote, split them down the middle.

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Crossovers in Mississippi

Josh Marshall points out an interesting exit-poll variance that bears some thought: while Barack has claimed to win the crossover vote in every contest, in the Delta State, Hillary won Republicans three to one.  That’s in a 12% bloc of the total voters in the Dem primary.

So, quick math: out of a hundred percent of the voters, Hillary won 40%.  9 percent of the total vote went for Hillary.  So, only 31% of the voters in the primary were Democrats who voted for Hillary, whereas 57% were Democratic Barack Obama supporters.  That doesn’t play into the “Barack as a Unity Candidate” argument, but certainly it indicates some increasingly mushy support for Hillary among Democrats.

I mean, I find it hard to believe that 12% of the vote was Deep-South Republicans looking specifically to support Hillary Clinton.  But I could be wrong. . .

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Things Just Got Tougher

Of course, I’m not too happy about the results of the primaries last night, though ultimately they don’t change too much.  Obama’s air of invincibility in the media is gone, so the press is going to get a lot uglier, but the delegate count doesn’t change much and Hillary already signaled that she was going to carry on, win lose or draw.

But Obama has two major things stacked against him going forward that he’s going to need to find some creative way to address: first, the invincibility aura that the media insisted on giving him is now gone, which means that the story in the media is going to change for the worse.  Secondly, he’s now got to prove himself to be a fighter in order not to look too beaten up when this thing’s over.  Otherwise, he’s going to look pretty unelectable to the party bosses and may even lose the nomination with a majority of pledged delegates.

Josh Marshall has a great wrapup of the day’s events here.

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Superdelegates can be Contributors, Too?

Buried way down in the bottom of a piece analyzing Hilary Clinton’s strategy against Obama is this little nugget:

For Clinton, Bid Hinges on Texas and Ohio – New York Times

“They are looking way too much at Florida, Michigan and McCain, because all three won’t matter if she doesn’t blow Obama away in Texas and Ohio,” said a Democrat who is both a Clinton superdelegate and major donor, and who spoke on condition of anonymity to offer a candid assessment of campaign strategy. “Obama has momentum that has to be stopped by March 4.”

I don’t think that the role of superdelegates in the convention process are entirely clear to the Democrats, even if it is a Democratic Party invention in the first place. But somehow, based on what the media has been describing the superdelegate role to be, it seems somehow a conflict of interest to have someone be a contributor and also be in the position of potentially deciding the nomination over the heads of voters.

This is not meant as an attack on Hillary: I’m sure that Obama probably has a few people wearing these two hats as well. I’m just saying that the responsibility of being a superdelegate at the convention should probably preclude someone from also contributing to their campaign.

But then, in a season where fractions and surprises dominate the nomination process, every little bit of the process is scrutinized in ways that under normal circumstances probably do not seem all that important. Whether that means that the process needs to be changed to prepare for the next eventuality or not is up for discussion. The caucus process also seems worthy of review, as does the ordering of state primaries.

Will this season’s fractiousness cause Democrats to rethink their nomination process?

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The Obama Factor

btp at RochesterTurning.com has the skinny on Barack Obama’s performance in the New York State primary, including specifics on Monroe County.  Looks like Monroe went for Barack in a big way, though not enough to outweigh the Hillary vote.  Thanks, BTPeeps!

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D&C on the Dem Primary

Of course, if anyone likes to project their opinions on their readers, it’s the D&C.  True to form, the D&C anoints Hillary Clinton as the all-but-decided leader in New York State in this article.  Of course, we all know that “likely voters” is a very subjective term for a season in which we have seen record numbers of Democratic voters, so it’s pointless to put too much thought into polls.

But most distressing of all is this line: “Clinton just beefed up her forces in the state in hopes of securing the 151 delegates up for grabs.”  That makes it seem like the winner of this contest gets all the delegates, and this is simply not true.  To me, that seems like a way to subtly depress the turnout for Obama and Edwards supporters by making it seem like there’s no point in coming out for a guy who’s not going to gain anything for the effort.

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City News Supports Barack – Your Vote Matters!!

City is endorsing Barack Obama for the Democratic ticket for president this year.  The article is a very well thought-out piece that goes into the reasons not to endorse Hillary, Kucinich or Jon Edwards as well as discussing their reasoning for endorsing Barack.  I tend to agree with the article on all points, since of course I endorsed Barack as well.

BTW, for those of you who don’t know and are wondering whether your vote in the primaries will even matter, take heart!  While I would certainly argue that your vote always counts, keep in mind that this is not an Electoral College style vote.  The winner does not take all, rather each candidate gets a proportion.  This article lays out the way it works fairly well, but the point is that the delegates you’re casting votes for are awarded to the candidates proportionately, meaning that if the candidates split the state 33%, 33% and 34%, they each get that many delegates.

More delegates are awarded by the state Dem Party leaders and others by a committee of Democrats.  Those will likely go to Hillary, of course, but that’s not guaranteed.   And a large chunk of delegates are up for grabs by all the candidates.  So, even if your candidate doesn’t “win” the state, they still get a boost going into the Convention that might just push them over the top!