Do The Math Now, Democrats -- Waiting Until McCain Reclaims The Middle Is Too Late
We've heard it said that "All politics is local." This means that solving problems of real people back home marks the difference between a good politician and a putz. That's true once in office, but while you're still a candidate all politics is -- believe it -- arithmetic.
The direct popular vote of the people does not decide the presidency. The "Electoral College" does, and both Obama and Clinton supporters better make the case for winning it now. The rules of engagement are easy:
The general election, in truth, is a series of 50 separate contests (and Washington D.C.). The number of electoral votes in each state is simply the total of how many congressional districts they've got plus their two U.S. senators. California, the big kahuna, has 55 electoral votes (53 plus 2); low-population states with only one congressional district, like Vermont or Wyoming, have just 3 electoral votes. States decide how to award them. In 48 states, if you lead in their popular vote you get all their electoral votes, winner-take-all. Only Maine and Nebraska do it differently. It takes 270 to become el presidente.
That's the game.
Most states won't be "in play" on election day. Nobody will sweat New York, so that's 31 electoral votes to the Democrat. Ditto California, probably. Ruby red Texas hasn't gone blue since Jimmy Carter in '76, so we can put its 34 votes in the John McCain column. Dozens of states today fit this pre-cast mold.
Victory, therefore, comes down to about 20 so-called "swing states" that can go either way. New Mexico has swung in recent presidential elections, but has just 5 votes. The winner will need plenty of these smaller electoral states in their tote bag, but obviously the swing states that matter most are the ones with lots of electoral votes because the only goal is to get to 270.
Let's take four of the biggest and always crucial swingers: Florida (27), Pennsylvania (21), Ohio (20) and Michigan (17). A Democrat can't lose three of these four and expect to host a housewarming in the nation's capital next January 20.
Across the country, a record 27 million Democrats have participated so far, and Obama and Clinton are currently separated by a stunning 2%, 700,000 votes. The method of dividing pledged delegates from each state gives him a lead of around 160, but neither candidate can get to the required total of 2,024 before the convention. In fact, she'd have the lead in pledged delegates if it were winner-take-all like November. With such a tight race, what have Democratic voters in these four important states said about this?
Clinton won the popular vote in Florida by 300,000 votes and Ohio by 237,000. Of the two other states, she won Michigan without Obama's name on the ballot, and Pennsylvania doesn't vote until April 22. She expects to win it by 200,000 or more. We'll see.
Results from Michigan and Florida (almost 10% of America's Democrats) were tossed out because their legislatures scheduled primaries on unapproved dates, and Obama's team has aggressively resisted do-overs. Interestingly, the national Republicans punished their state parties for this crime by docking only half the delegates, and McCain, Giuliani et al competed and moved on with no lingering mess, killing off Rudy in the process.
Why Howard Dean and the DNC behaved like an overly stern school teacher is one of life's mysteries, but there are more pressing questions.
Will Obama be able to "broaden the map" in November by putting some states in play that are usually Republican? If so, which ones, and what's their electoral total? If he succeeds in doing so while simultaneously losing some big electoral swing states, like Pennsylvania, does this get him to the needed 270?
The Keystone State squarely frames the issue: It re-elected Bill Clinton by 10% in '96, went for Gore by 5% four years later, and Kerry by only 1.5% in '04. See the pattern? If Obama does poorly there among Democrats in the spring primary, are its 21 electoral votes open to McCain's appeal next fall? Ohio? Florida?
Do most Clinton supporters return in November if she's not on the ballot? Sure, as do most Obama supporters if he's not. Most people everywhere vote for their party nominee in November regardless of whom they supported in the primaries, or else the other side would surely win.
Of course, there will be some disaffected Democrats, regardless of who loses the nomination. It's a mistake, but maybe they'll stay home, or maybe they'll be attracted to McCain if he turns back to the middle and reclaims his maverick persona. He'd gladly jettison religious Right voters if it means adding working class moderates and independents. Hell, the religious Right never liked him anyway, and their concerns (abortion, gay marriage, etc.) are off the table these days.
Long about September, he might even see a quicker way out of Iraq than his "100 year" plan.
Democrats need to consider the electoral map, and sooner rather than later. "Let's wait and see how it looks after Labor Day" won't cut it. We can't allow a third Bush term in McCain. Too much is at stake, from the economy to war and peace to Supreme Court appointments.
Here's the list of the states and their electoral votes, from Project VoteSmart. Grab your calculator, Democrats, and get busy!
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Here is the Mathematics:
Given: Number of Remaining "ELECTED" Delegates = 566
and Obama "ELECTED" Delegates = 1415 and Clinton "ELECTED" Delegates = 1251 (According to RCP)
Then, Difference in "ELECTED" Delegates = 164
Let O = Obama and C = Clinton
To Compute Number of "ELECTED" Delegates Hillary needs to win Solve for O or C::
Substitute O+164 for C
O + (O+164) = 566
2O + 164 = 566
2O = 566 - 164
O = 402/2
O = 201
Substituting
201 + C = 566
C = 566 -201
C = 355 = Clintons Share of Remaining "ELECTED" Delegates To Win The Nomination
You Got That Jackson!!!!
How 'bout let's use english to get at the real meaning of the race at this point in time.
There are 408 delegates remaining to be won from the upcoming primaries.
Approximately 258 superdelegates remain uncommitted.
Hillary has the support of about 1500 pledged and superdelegates right now.
She needs an another 525 ‘votes’ to win the nomination.
Neither the remaining pledged delegates nor the remaining uncommitted superdelegates are enough alone to put Hillary over the top to that magic number, 2,025, so she needs some portion of both.
For the sake of simplicity, let’s assume hypothetically that ALL the uncommitted superdelegates decide to swing to support Hillary en masse. Before another primary contest, that would give her 1758 ‘votes,’ meaning she’d need only to gather 267 pledged delegates from the upcoming contests.
267 out of the remaining 408 pledged delegates equals approximately 65%.
Hillary has won exactly one contest with greater than 60% of the vote to date, and that was Arkansas.
Hillary has also consistently carried the rural areas that tend to assign lower delegation per capita than urban areas, so she'd need a higher return than 65% to win 65% of the delegates remaining.
An analysis of Obama’s campaign given the same criteria produced a requirement of carrying off 31% of the pledged delegates in the remaining contests, margins well within all of his past primary performances.
Winning the nomination, therefore, is Hillary's "fairy tale."
The point of my post was she needed to at least get even in "ELECTED" Delegates which as you post is not very palusible (you said "fairy Tale". It's okay to refer to Obama's candidancy as a fairy tale. It's sexist or mysoginistic to do so for Hillary so I did not go there.). Mr. Willaims is trucking Clinton Talking Points under the guise of trying to present a reasonable argument for both candidates. I do think I am correct on the remaining number of pledged delegates. But I agree with your point.
HuffPost's Pick
if one compares the democratic turnout to the republican turnouts (prior to the republicans deciding on McCain) it is clear that the usual percentages of D's to R's are not what we will be looking at in the fall ACROSS THE BOARD. Think about how many more dems went to the pols in a red state like Iowa than Republicans. Many states will be in play (we hope) no matter who the democratic nominee is both because of general resentment of the republican party, poor conservative opinion of John McCain, and Underfunding of the R's(don't you think the money tells us that even big business knows that the dems are going to win this year?). It is ridiculous to think that somehow Pa. is going to vote for a republican in the fall, every national election for the past 8 years has gone demmocratic except for Arlen Specter who is hardly a right winger. If we get a fair election, and the 2 candidates don't tear each other apart, we will win.
Finally, open your eyes and realize that the only thing that can energize the republicans is not McCain, not racial bigotry, but (unfairly or not) their hatred of the Clintons after 16 years of right wing propoganda. If you want to really look at the swing states, try that on for size.
we tried the "most electable" guy last time, and lost. this time, lets just vote for the best guy (or gal).
We cannot gauge any of this with any accuracy this far from the general election. There is simply no way to predict at this stage. You may remember that not so long ago the general was predicted to be between Hillary and Rudy. This should remind us all not to trust these kinds of static scenarios.
What we have here is a failure to communicate. Had someone only communicated that the Clintons would be allowed to change the definition of winning at whim, perhaps Obama's team would instead have crafted a strategy to win the big states, older women, primaries only --- or whatever the metric is that the Clinton team currently is offering up (because it seems like you guys change the measurement every day depending on what gives you the best chance to steal the nomination for your candidate). However, not realizing that it was Clinton herself and not the party that would be setting the criteria for a win, Obama and his staff set out to win the nomination based what had been established to select the winner -- you know win more delegates than the other candidates. So quit trying to rewrite rules and definitions to make a winner out of the clear loser; give the guy his nomination (once the primaries and caucuses have been completed), and lets ride the horse selected by the voters to victory in November rather than devoting more of our time and energy in this ridiculous effort to turn wrong into right and up into down.
Pennsylvania and Michigan are electoral teases. It always looks like they're about to cross over to the red, but they never do.
Actually, given the state of the economy, and the terrible loss of jobs in both states, I think the Democratic Party has a solid chance of winning both places--but not without an Obama/Clinton, or Clinton/Almost Anyone ticket. I don't believe Senator Obama will carry either without her, and Florida will almost certainly go to Senator McCain, especially with Senator Obama on top of the ticket. Having Senator Clinton on the ticket would at least make Florida a possibility--but, if their delegates aren't seated, the state is gone, period. But, the Democrats should carry Ohio pretty easily.
"Across the country, a record 27 million Democrats have participated so far, and Obama and Clinton are currently separated by a stunning 1%, 700,000 votes."
Since when is 700,000 1% of 27 million?
Minordomo, what is your point? Don't you realize by now that Clinton's supporters require that you don't do the math or anything else that pulls back the curtain and exposes how shady, unprincipled, and fantasy-based their arguments are?
Well, it isn't 1%. It's actually 2.5 percent. I meant to type 2% instead of 1%. It's a typo, and I've corrected. Thanks!! (We all need editors!)
I love the subtle and quintesintial Clinton line...wel
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The reasoning here is based on assertions and assumptions, not on the best information available.
The answers to the underlying questions raised (Will Clinton or Obama be the stronger candidate in the general election? With what combination of states would each be most likely to win?) can be best considered with the sort of information nicely laid out at electoral-
There is still room for change, but the current reality is a far cry from the inaccurate picture Mr. Willams paints.
The best thing Barack Obama can have right now is low expectations for the General Election. Anybody else remember what the soothsayers in the media thought about his prospects for the Democratic primary last summer? Lets put it this way: which horse are you gonna bet on? The one that's always gaining ground or the one that's slowly falling back?
The best thing Barack Obama can have right now is low expectations for the General Election.
I do not understand
which horse are you gonna bet on? The one that's always gaining ground or the one that's slowly falling back?
Care to elucidate?
The only thing we know about the election in the fall is that we don't know anything about it. In this crazy, unpredictable year, Obama could win Arizona and McCain could win Illinois-- or Al Gore could beat the third-party ticket of Clinton-Lieberman. Wild hypothetical scenarios are in vogue, and the Clinton campaign has given us plenty of them-- what if we only count big states that aren't caucuses? She wins!
However, judging from what we've seen so far, one campaign has displayed a quickness on its feet, an ability to make up a deficit in the polls with amazing speed, to bring in new voters and raise tons of money. The Bob Barr campaign? No-- the Barack Obama campaign. While the Clinton campaign and the McCain campaign are lurching along like claymation dinosaurs-- firing Mark Penn two months late, stumbling and bumbling through speeches even with a Teleprompter present-- the Obama campaign has been agile, flexible, accurate as a Kansas Jayhawk hitting a three-pointer with two seconds left in regulation.
If old-style politics worked, Obama would have been 2007's feel-good story. So-- while McCain is apologizing for yet another GOP 527 on Rev. Wright, and wondering what GNP means, Obama will be talking about the economy and getting out of Iraq.
Ms Salem:
"Obama could win Arizona"??????? I am sorry. WHAT????!!!!
I hope I missed your point or need new glasses or something, but if the Obama supporters out there truly believe this or similar scenarios, then we are all up the proverbial creek.
may the heavens help us.
mmh
Sorry-- it was a joke to illustrate how wacky this election year is. Nader could win Nevada!
Yea, yea ...
This sounds like a Clinton spin.
And so?
What a bizarre blog. The initial premise is that Democrats need to recognize the reality that, like it or not, popular vote DOES NOT MATTER in the general election - electoral college votes do, and that Democrats should start dealing with and accepting that reality. Okay, I'm with you on that - nothing like Bush v. Gore to make that clear. But then, you leap to the polar opposite conclusion for the primary - that we should, in this primary, be paying attention to the popular vote or the electoral college (or bra size or melanin or states with beaches...
First off, Obama didn't "plan a strategy to get more delegates.
Perhaps in LaLaLand, strategy is not part of campaigning and no doubt, Penn and Wolfson would also have high-paying jobs as consultants there, too. But in real life, a campaign involves (or should) a strategy to "win". And what defines a win? In a primary it is enough delegates. In the general election, the electoral college. Obama's wins didn't just fall from the sky. I think part of the reason Clinton supporters are so dismayed is that they fail to realize that her ground game was so lacking. Instead of attributing her failures to anything internal (or, God forbid, a lacking on the part of her as a candidate), they see this as external forces conspiring against her. Failing to recognize the brilliance of Obama's strategy is just putting blinders on your eyes. Ditto for failing to realize how flawed her "big state" strategy was. Gulliani gets it.
http://www
Good grief. Why do you assume that Obama would cry that caucuses were unfair? go on, tell me any other democratic nomination runner who EVER claimed this before Clinton. She is a sore loser and she is only crying this b/c she failed to plan and organize and didn't realize she might have to campaign past feb.
I automatically discount as irrelevant misinformed garbage, any article that claims Clinton "won" FL and MI. You cannot win an invalid contest, and only people trying to spin "popular vote" or "big state" math do it.
don't forget that delegates are not the same as electoral votes...es
This is a good account of the current Clinton spin. But it is far from clear that votes in the democratic primary are indicative in this way of general election results. And the democratic party does a lot of damage to itself in the long run if it acts as if only 4 states matter. This is the Mark Penn/Karl Rove 51% solution that leads to a very petty politics.
Given that the climate seems right for sweeping change in Washington on important issues like health care, it is hard to imagine a worse climate for running in ways that leave almost the entire congress with no reason to work with the president. There is no indication yet that this is a year for the democrats to run as cowards. And the ability of the candidates to attract independents and moderate republicans is one that cannot be clearly settled from the primaries. The fact that Clinton runs strongest in closed primaries does not bode well for her chances in the general election when Independents and Republicans make up a bigger part of the electorate.
i am getting so damned tired of everyone being defensive. let everyone vote. i have friends in oregon who are so thrilled at the prospect of actually mattering for once.
let everyone's vote count for a fabulous change and quit demanding people drop out.
it is truly amazing to me the way these two dem camps have skewed things, moreso than ever in this primary. if youre an obama supporter, clinton is the devil and her people are all liars and anything anyone might say in her defense is solely because you support her and the same if youre a clinton supporter. the talking heads should just shut the f up and let this primary play out and we all need to quit sniping at each other.
mr williams makes good points. however, if you support sen obama, you think he is skewing towards clinton. why cant they just be good points? sheeeesh.
you people are scaring me.
MMH
I have decided that this season of insanity has been very good. There is a lot of truth to the Republican complaint that Democrats are insanely critical.
We've sure seen it with the Hillary-Hating crowd.
And it really has made me rethink my Democratic Party membership. I'm not too keen on belonging to any group that insane and that rigid.
So I'm becoming Independent. Regardless of who wins.
I'm not joining this type of hate-mongering group. The Democrats have made me feel ashamed of my life-long affiliation. I'm not at all pleased with the leadership, either, which has been dishonest and misinformed people about how the party rules work. I wouldn't care if they come out and say clearly they are endorsing Obama. Then their "interpretation" is in context. But Pelosi really has lost my support with her manipulative manner in this race. No more Pelosi. We don't need sidewinders. We need some honest leadership.
I am not sure the Democratic party should be in power It's hard to imagine ever thinking that....bu
So......I'
HuffPost's Pick
No problem about your putting this in response to me. The reason I believe this is skewing towards Clinton is because a) it is rather irrelevant how other systems of counting votes would turn the election. Both candidates knew the system behind the actual election. b) This happens to be the latest talking points from the Clinton campaign as to why their votes should count more. In fact after responding to it I noticed that there is a separate post which was put on Huffpost before this one was, answering this one.
I do not consider this a question of evil. But the fact that Clinton supporters keep taking Clinton campaign arguments, however silly, and putting them out under their own names has been something that has reflected on the petty political nature of the campaign. The kind of politics which does not let supporters make arguments for themselves because it is off message is the kind of politics which is not going to get anything big done if it were to win.
The strongest argument that Clinton has going for her is that this kind of small minded politics is the only way for a democrat to win. If I thought that was true, I would reluctantly support her. But with an unpopular war and poor economy, I don't really believe that is true. And I am not convinced that Clinton's negatives are not more of a danger than Obama's inexperience and blackness.
It's because you PEOPLE want to change the Flipping rules at the end of the game. These rules for delegate allocation were in place in 2004 and at least 2000. Now we want new rules since these don't suit our fancy or because Oops we screwed up and did not compete in all contests. You want to accuse Obama supporters of being mean and being disenfranchisers or whatever when the fact is Obama and his strategist looked at a plausible way to nomination and maintained focused throughout the campaign. Sorry there are no Mulligans. Game is Over on June 3rd. Deal with it.
sorry, lon, that wasnt meant to be posted as a direct reply to you.
mmh
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