March 4 primary discussion and results

[Mlenk]

Someone on CNN was talking earlier about how neither Obama nor Clinton (even if the former wins all the contests overwhelmingly from here on out) will have the necessary delegate count (I forgot the number mentioned) that is necessary to get the Democratic nomination, and that both will have to rely on the superdelegates no matter the outcome of any of the upcoming contests. Anyone here know how true that is or isn't?

[Gaidin]

Someone on CNN was talking earlier about how neither Obama nor Clinton (even if the former wins all the contests overwhelmingly from here on out) will have the necessary delegate count (I forgot the number mentioned) that is necessary to get the Democratic nomination, and that both will have to rely on the superdelegates no matter the outcome of any of the upcoming contests. Anyone here know how true that is or isn't?

MSNBC says the same thing. They're just talking about pledge delegates and not counting any superdelegates yet. I think the math works out that if you're going to win on pledged delegates alone you need about 2/3 of them. Obama has more...but not approaching that many.

[Johonebesus]

The Obama campaign is not being aggressive enough. You can be aggressive but still above the fray; they essentially ceded the media battle to the Clinton camp. Its not like she doesn't have dirt of her own. And the Obama campaign needs to seriously address the Rezko issue and put it out of its misery once and for all.

And I hope they are throwing every single dollar, volunteer and adviser into Mississippi and Wyoming because overwhelming victories there will restore the pre-March 4 delegate count.

That's just not true. I have already read and even heard/seen several Obama supporters explain that this doesn't make any difference for Clinton. It's not Obama's camp failing to get the message out; it's the media failing to report the message. Even Lehrer, considered to be about as objective and reliable as American television news gets, just had a couple of politicians from each camp giving their spin. The two Obama supporters both stated that at this point Obama has basicaly won the primary election, and that Clinton can only win by super delegates rejecting the will of the people, and the Clinton supporters basically just said "nu-uh!" The "journalist" merely asked each one some leading questions and didn't present any actual facts or analysis of his own. He clearly had an agenda, to give both sides the chance to root for their candidate without getting into any real detail. A particularly sad point was when Jesse Jackson stated that the real tragedy was that this dragged out fight was keeping discussion away from important issues like the mortgage crisis or poverty, and the interviewer literally said, "yeah, now over to...," as he just ignored Jackson's statements and gave a Clinton supporter another scripted question.

As others have said, the media is working very hard to prevent people from feeling like Obama has the nomination wrapped up.

And for those who think it is just about creating excitement to sell copies/time: why wasn't the republican race framed as a tough fight that was still up in the air? McCain was the presumptive nominee, even as he just squeaked out victories over Huckabee. The reality was that Obama crushed Clinton again and again, and McCain was running neck-and-neck with Huckabee, yet to watch or read the news you'd think it was the exact opposite.

[Elfdart]

So is your plan to get the other guys to not show up as a part of a concerted effort, or are you just going to not show up?

Nothing like that. It's just that the seven Obama supporters are in the "hell or high water" category while over half the Clinton people were in the "Well, if I'm not too busy" category. I'm going unless something really bad happens (knock on wood). Even then, we have a pair of alternates who said they'll show and if not needed, they can just watch.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

Someone on CNN was talking earlier about how neither Obama nor Clinton (even if the former wins all the contests overwhelmingly from here on out) will have the necessary delegate count (I forgot the number mentioned) that is necessary to get the Democratic nomination, and that both will have to rely on the superdelegates no matter the outcome of any of the upcoming contests. Anyone here know how true that is or isn't?

That's 100% true. Obama doesn't have a runaway lead in pledged delegates. Even if he won every remaining primary by a score of 100 to 0, he'd still need something like 45 superdelegates to secure the nomination. Even if Clinton won every primary remaining with 100% of the vote, she'd need 185 superdelegates to secure the nomination.

The above example is pretty silly. If Obama won every contest from here on out with 20 point margins, he'd still need 289 superdelegates to secure the nomination. Even if he lost every contest from here on out by 20 points, he'd still have more pledged delegates, but he'd need 412 superdelegates to support him for the nomination (interestingly, if Clinton won every primary left by 22% or better, she'd overtake Obama, but she'd need 419 superdelegates for the nomination. Of course, if she won every remaining contest by 22+ percentage-points, this would mean that the Obama campaign has spectacularly imploded.)

There is no realistic combination of primary victories/losses that would allow Clinton to recapture the pledged delegate lead (or for Obama to win on pledged delegates alone) at this point. All she changes is how many superdelegates Obama has to gain the support of to get the nomination, and in most realistic cases, he can get the nomination with the support of less than half of them . . . whereas Clinton would need the support of at least 60% of the superdelegates to secure the nomination.

(Play with the numbers yourself here!)

[Fire Fly]

Since both sides won't have the necessary votes to outright win the delegate count, does anyone foresee a scenario where the superdelegates force Obama to take Clinton as VP to unify the base? Anyone else see the potential poison of an Obama/Clinton ticket? The dream team is more like a nightmare. The rhetoric of both sides will have completely undermined the authenticity of such a ticket and will unify every racist and misogynist around to country to rally behind McCain.

I've heard of growing talks of Gore jumping in to save the party. Does anyone else see this as beneficial or hurtful? Me, I'd be happy with a Gore/Obama ticket.

[Mayabird]

So basically, like Huckabee, Clinton also did not major in math, but she's also the media darling and so can keep clinging to the tatters of sanity without the commentators slowly inching away?

[FSTargetDrone]

Incidentally, the numbers were just released and Obama raised fifty-five million dollars in February.

Mar 6, 2:26 PM EST

AP News Alert

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Democrat Barack Obama raised $55 million in February for his presidential campaign.

[Glocksman]

I was listening to Ed Schultz today and he said that polls indicated Hillary's '3 AM' ad worked in Ohio, along with the reports that one of Obama's advisers told a Canadian diplomat that he really wouldn't renegotiate it.

Never mind the fact that Hillary's 'national security' experience is the same as Obama's and that the Clinton campaign told the Canadians the same thing

OTTAWA — The leak of a confidential diplomatic discussion that rocked the U.S. presidential campaign began with an offhand remark to journalists from the Prime Minister's chief of staff, Ian Brodie.

Prime Minister Stephen Harper vowed yesterday to use whatever investigative means necessary to find the source of leaks that, he said, were "unfair" to U.S. Democratic candidate Barack Obama and may have been illegal — although opposition leaders insisted the Conservatives cannot be trusted to investigate political players on their own team.

But the story that reverberated through the U.S. presidential campaign began as a terse, almost throwaway remark that Mr. Brodie made to journalists from CTV, according to people familiar with the events.

Mr. Brodie, during the media lockup for the Feb. 26 budget, stopped to chat with several journalists, and was surrounded by a group from CTV.
The conversation turned to the pledges to renegotiate the North American free-trade agreement made by the two Democratic contenders, Mr. Obama and New York Senator Hillary Clinton.

Mr. Brodie, apparently seeking to play down the potential impact on Canada, told the reporters the threat was not serious, and that someone from Ms. Clinton's campaign had even contacted Canadian diplomats to tell them not to worry because the NAFTA threats were mostly political posturing.

The Canadian Press cited an unnamed source last night as saying that several people overheard the remark.

The news agency quoted that source as saying that Mr. Brodie said that someone from Ms. Clinton's campaign called and was "telling the embassy to take it with a grain of salt."

The story was followed by CTV's Washington bureau chief, Tom Clark, who reported that the Obama campaign, not the Clinton's, had reassured Canadian diplomats.

Mr. Clark cited unnamed Canadian sources in his initial report.

There was no explanation last night for why Mr. Brodie was said to have referred to the Clinton campaign but the news report was about the Obama campaign. Robert Hurst, president of CTV News, declined to comment.

The Prime Minister's communications director, Sandra Buckler, has said that Mr. Brodie "does not recall" discussing the issue.

On Tuesday, Mr. Harper denied that Mr. Brodie was a source of the leak — but he appeared to be referring to a diplomatic memo that described the key conversation between an adviser to Mr. Obama and Canada's consul-general in Chicago, Georges Rioux.

Although Mr. Harper has for days brushed aside allegations that his government interfered in the U.S. presidential campaign, yesterday he promised to "get to the bottom" of the matter and said laws may have been broken.

"It is not in the interest of the Government of Canada, and the way the leak was executed, Mr. Speaker, was blatantly unfair to Senator Obama and his campaign," the Prime Minister said in the Commons.

"We will make sure that every legal and every investigative technique necessary is undertaken to find out who exactly is behind this."

But opposition politicians accused Mr. Harper of hiding behind artful denials — ignoring the verbal leak, while denying that the diplomatic memo came from his top aide.

However, Mr. Harper did not appear to be distinguishing between the two leaks yesterday.

Yesterday, he said he had asked the top civil servant, Clerk of the Privy Council Kevin Lynch, to call in an internal security team, with the help of Foreign Affairs.

Members of the opposition asserted that an internal inquiry is unlikely to look seriously at Mr. Harper's own high-level political aides and appointees, such as Mr. Brodie, or Michael Wilson, Canada's ambassador to Washington.

NDP Leader Jack Layton said it is time to call in the RCMP.

The first leak sparked stories that Mr. Obama had privately delivered a message through an aide to Canadian diplomats that the stand against NAFTA was more political posturing than a real policy plan.

The Clinton campaign seized on the stories to argue that Mr. Obama was making promises that he did not mean. The Obama campaign sputtered after this and other attacks on his experience and integrity.

Days later, the leak of the internal Canadian diplomatic note revealed that Mr. Obama's adviser, Austan Goolsbee, spoke to Mr. Rioux on Feb. 8.

In a summary of the meeting written by Canadian diplomat Joseph de Mora, Mr. Goolsbee was described as indicating that Mr. Obama's NAFTA stand "should be viewed as more about political positioning than a clear articulation of policy plans." Mr. Goolsbee denied using those terms.

Mr. Clark of CTV says he called Mr. Wilson for reaction.

The next day, the embassy and Mr. Obama's campaign denied the story. Since Mr. de Mora's memo was leaked to The Associated Press, the Canadian embassy in Washington won't respond to questions about "NAFTA-gate," as the issue has been dubbed.

It'll be interesting to see how Obama's responds to the change in momentum.

[Glocksman]

Ghetto edit: 'it' being the NAFTA agreement.

[HemlockGrey]

So basically, like Huckabee, Clinton also did not major in math, but she's also the media darling and so can keep clinging to the tatters of sanity without the commentators slowly inching away?

Well, it's different, because Huckabee had absolutely no chance whatsoever of winning short of divine intervention. If she gets lucky and plays really dirty, Clinton might barely eke out the win. And considering she's just said John McCain is more qualified than Obama to be President, she's absolutely willing to play dirty.