Hillary Can’t Beat Math
In the aftermath of her long-expected victories in Texas and Ohio, many of Hillary Clinton’s supporters are reveling in long-awaited cheering sessions and drawing convoluted scenarios for her nomination. Unfortunately for them, however, Clinton remains behind the eight-ball on the only metric that matters — delegate count. And she can’t beat math. There are few opportunities available for Clinton to make up the 100-vote lead that Obama holds among elected delegates.
The scenarios that Clinton needs to come to fruition in order to trump the elected delegate math are fraught with difficulty and disadvantage.
SCENARIO ONE: The superdelegates to the rescue. Clinton’s primary campaign strategist Mark Penn has long signaled an attempt to strong-arm so-called “super-delegates” into the Clinton camp with a classic Clintonian back-room maneuver. The trouble is that such an effort would almost certainly backfire. Super-delegates are comprised of elected officials who are unlikely to want to be seen caving in to an open and ham-handed effort to force them to defy the will of many of their own constituents simply to serve the interests of a Clinton family dynasty of which many in the party are weary. The most likely breakdown of remaining super-delegates is about 50/50, with little potential for Clinton to make up 100+ votes. Clinton’s earlier advantage among superdelegates has already shrunk dramatically and any reversal will be insufficient to make up the margin against Obama. In fact, there are rumors that the Clinton campaign is already attempting to desperately stem a tide going against them among superdelegates. Even if successful, such an effort indicates that there is not in fact a rich pool of superdelegates just waiting to flow towards Hillary Clinton.
SCENARIO TWO: John Edwards to the rescue. Both Obama and Clinton have strongly courted John Edwards’ endorsement and there have been persistent rumors that one or both campaigns have dangled the promise of another vice-presidential nomination for Edwards. The problems, however, are that Edwards only has 26 pledged delegates to offer and that a trade for his endorsement could likely backfire. Even if Edwards were to accept another consolation prize VP nomination, such a payoff would be seen by many in and out of the party as corrupt dealing. Furthermore, Edwards’ tired class warfare memes might damage the Clinton campaign by undermining one of Clinton’s only bases of appeal to moderates — her claim of relative policymaking centrism.
SCENARIO THREE: Remaining primaries to the rescue. Clinton’s campaign has repeatedly indicated that they feel Texas and Ohio are merely the beginning of a run through the later primaries, especially Pennsylvania. What they try desperately to obscure, however, is that many of those primaries are in southern states where Obama is likely to be very strong. Furthermore, the long-running Clinton campaign strategy of demeaning all states with fewer than 15 electoral votes as insignificant and unimportant weakens her ability to run close in those campaigns even if she were to reverse her previous course and start to seriously contest them. And unless there is a unprecedented meltdown in the Obama campaign, the sole “significant” state remaining — Pennsylvania — is unlikely to generate a large enough margin of victory for Clinton to overcome the lead that Obama already has, let alone the modest padding he will add in the “insignificant” states in between.
SCENARIO FOUR: Dirty tricks to the rescue. If there is anything that the Clintons are known for, it is hardball politics, matched with a nearly boundless ability to claim to be the one aggrieved. Hillary Clinton has repeatedly played the “victim card” with one hand while, with the other, mounting coded and uncoded attacks instructing voters on why they should vote against her opponent. The negative strategy is widely seen as paying off in Ohio and Texas, making it likely that Clinton will escalate the tone and volume of anti-Obama attacks even further while downplaying talk about her own thin record of achievement and experience. The problem here is that such a strategy damages Clinton nearly as much as Obama. Already unusually high for a major-party candidate at this stage of a presidential election, Hillary Clinton’s negative perceptual ratings among voters will only escalate if she continues to reinforce her image as a dirty fighter who will do or say anything to win power and, even better, to personally punish anyone who opposed her. And to the extent that Clinton continues to receive votes from some voters with explicitly racist justifications, she risks alienating one of the party’s most loyal constituencies and dividing the party ala 1968. If successful, such a strategy would produce potentially crippling disadvantages for Clinton in the general election. And if unsuccessful, such a strategy may amount to “scorched earth” by providing the McCain campaign with massive amounts of ready-made grist for use against Obama. Either by being seen as an unacceptably vicious candidate or the person who killed the party in trying to become the candidate, Clinton loses.
SCENARIO FIVE: Florida and Michigan to the rescue. By breaking her promises not to compete in Florida and Michigan, Hillary Clinton built a back-up pool of unauthorized delegates. Her campaign, again speaking through hard-line strategist Mark Penn, has already telegraphed an intention to try to force the credentialing of those delegates at the convention in order to put Clinton over the top. Such an effort is unlikely to help Clinton in the long term, however. First, Obama’s lead among already credentialed delegates might well be sufficient to block such a move on the convention floor. Second, even if successful, such a maneuver would highlight Hillary Clinton as blatantly dishonest. A large part of the party would feel that she had only won by pure cheating. Such a party would be unlikely to unite behind Clinton. This scenario is the only one that has a reasonable potential to play out differently if, as both campaigns have suggested, Florida and Michigan are allowed to redo their premature primary voting.
Intellectual honesty requires acknowledging that Clinton’s campaign victories of March 4 allow her to remain in the race as a credible candidate, probably right up to the convention. But the same intellectual honesty should motivate her supporters as well as dedicated Obama opponents to acknowledge that she is still, as the poker players say, “drawing thin“, with only long-shot prospects for actually obtaining the nomination in a state fit for a viable general election campaign.
She can’t beat math except you give five ways to do it? Of course none of them are easy but Obama can’t beat math either. Neither of them are going to get enough delegates to win. So for both of them it will come down to certain scenarios. Obama needs to win more of the poplar vote because if Clinton can win the overall poplar vote why shouldn’t the superdelegates go to her since she has won all the big states.
I guess I don’t get Obama fans anointing of the Saint. He can’t win legit at this point either. Here is Obama’s scenario to beat math:
Superdelegates: Obama needs them to go to his side by using his better poll numbers against McCain, winning more states and if he gets the poplar vote. He can convince them that he is the better candidate.
Primaries: He needs to win primaries or at least keep the delegate count close but he just lost 3 of 4 including two large states. Will the momentum stay with Clinton and increase or go back to Obama? He also needs to win more states and the poplar vote.
John Edwards: He needs to make sure Edwards doesn’t go Clinton and would help him if he sided with Obama.
Dirty Politics: Eventually he has to fight back on this, some are saying this is what lost him Texas and made Clinton win Ohio by larger numbers.
Florida/Michigan: He needs to prevent Clinton from getting this in at the full delegate numbers because I don’t think Obama can win either of these states.
Obama does have the upper hand and at this point is playing more of a prevent defense but that’s only because he feels that he can win in OT (superdelegates).
Hillary wins in traditional Democratic states, whoever wins the primary will carry these states. Even a dead candidate, or one with a dead bimbo in their bed, would win in NY and Mass. Slightly off topic, but Obama’s appeal is his chances to win independent states in the general election - Virginia, North Carolina, Colorado or Missouri. A Billary end around would guarantee the Democrats losing those states due to non-core Democratic voters staying home or voting for McCain.
I woke up this morning to see a fellow Highbrid Nation writer reporting that <a href="http://highbridnation.com/2008/03/05/clinton-wins-super-tuesday-2-why-it-was-not-the-delegates-but-her-speech-that-was-telling/">Hillary has won the Ohio and Texas primaries and how this is getting bad</a>. And like him I feel like this battle between Obama and Hillary has went on too long and now they are in danger of hurting the party by allowing McCain to take shots at them while they are dealing with each other. Howard Dean should step in and say “Look, Obama is going to be the canidate and Hillary you can be his running mate if you choose”…I know I know that would never happen but a guy can dream right?
Rudi, both can say they can win battleground states. Hillary could win Ohio, Arkansas, New Mexico and Florida. Probably only get 2/4 but I see the same with the four you listed for Obama. Plus if it’s as Michael Reynolds says that it’s about the economy than Hillary is better than both McCain and Obama. She keeps winning in states where that’s the biggest issue.
Bob - You miss the point I made about Billary stealing the primary in backroom dealings at the convention. If Billary steals the convention, forget about the Obama new demographics voters coming out and voting in November. If either wins a non-contested convention, then battleground states are in play.
Any democratic candidate will win the "big" democratic states in November. What we need is swing states, and to turn red states blue. (OH and TX btw are both RED and there is no indication that Hillary can turn either because she doesn’t win over Republicans or independents). In November, Obama will not be splitting the vote with someone of his same ideological stances -and dems will not be split. The people will gladly choose to stop the war over war; healthcare over none; a healthy economy over bushonomics.
Lastly, if superdelegates push for Obama that is different from Hillary. He has the popular vote and pledged delegate vote, thus, their CONSTITUENCIES, in his corner. All she has are her own thin arguments. She has won less states, less pledged delegates and is not the popular winner. But she wants us to believe that she has won the important states as if the November contest is the same as now. Wake up, people. You are buying spin. Why do you think she’s vying for a VP spot? It isn’t going to happen for her. She can dig into Rezko, then Hsu will be a target, and her tax returns and Bill’s Dubai and China money.
The cult of Obama is hilarious here. If she wins the big states and has the poplar vote (which is key and it doesn’t look like it will happen), than why shouldn’t she get the nomination? Because he won more small little states, most of which aren’t going blue in Nov?
So tell me Bob, Clinton went into last night trailing by 150 pledged delegates. After winning, as you say, 3 of 4 including 2 large states, she reduced that deficit by . . . 4 delegates net. Now this certainly represents a momentum change. But it’s a change from going down-hill rapidly to holding even. How can it possibly be characterized as gaining great momentum for herself? (Except by the cult of Clinton, I suppose.)
Didn’t say it was great momentum or any delegate momentum except for headlines (which is important) but it certainly means doesn’t mean the Obama has this in the bag. I thought they were still sorting out the number of delegates. And you didn’t factor superdelegates, something every Obama fan loves to forget.
Also I can’t stand Hillary but I can see that Saint Obama doesn’t have it sealed.
You mean Scenario One that I wrote about for a full paragraph?
Maybe if you are going to arrogantly strut in here and throw around insults about everyone that you disagree with, you should bother to read the actual posts first.
Actually Jason maybe before insulting me you might want to know that my comment wasn’t directed towards you. And I might add that your increasingly defensive. My comment was to WJ who didn’t add superdelegates to the totals making it closer than the number they claim.
But feel free to throw your moderating weight around and insult me. Hope it makes you feel better.
Hillary knows Obama will not have her in his cabinet if he were to win.
However, if she now declares that as a president she will:
1. Have Obama as a VP
2. Have Edwards as an Attorney general
3. Have Bill as the ambassador to the UN
She will win because Obama can’t offer any better.
Bob, here is your quote:
That doesn’t give you any room to later claim you were only directing your snotty crack at only ONE person.
And, BTW, I called you out on what you said, I didn’t “throw [my] moderating weight around”. If I had, you wouldn’t be able to comment here any more.
Actually, Jason, there’s a little bit of wiggle room there for Bob because every Obama supporter isn’t necessarily a fan. I’d say that the choice of that word was probably deliberate, to imply that his statement applied to a certain kind of Obama supporter which is a subgroup of all of the voters who support him.
Of course I don’t mean all Obama supporters and yes I was directing talking to WJ or the group of supporters that are the kind that "faint" at rallies.
Jason, you make fun of Ron Paul fans all the time yet I assume you don’t think every single one of them doesn’t have good reasons or uncritical views of him. Why get defensive about Obama supporters?
And I apologize for the snarkiness I just don’t like being called arrogant when I wasn’t being arrogant. A little snotty yes, but wouldn’t you say the same about your Voldemort responses?
Bob, if I had ever said that "every" Voldemort fan was the same, then you might have a point.
But even then, you would still just be playing "gotcha" and changing the subject.
Bottom line: Your characterization of "every Obama fan" was inaccurate and insulting. You CHOSE to use the word “every”. Once you were called on it, you should just back off of it instead of trying to defend the indefensible.
P.S. Christine, that is just spin. There is no evidence that Bob was distinguishing between “fan” and “supporter” in his sweeping insult about “every Obama fan”.
Well, Jason, I disagree that it’s ‘just spin’ because although ‘fan’ and ’supporter’ can be synonyms, there’s definitely a different connotation in the word fan that would fit with the particular group of Obama’s supporters that Bob was characterizing in that comment.
And sheesh- aren’t you the one who always tells commenters that they shouldn’t ascribe motives to other commenters or blog authors, and that only the person who originally made a statement should be considered the authority on what he/she meant? Then why is it when Bob clarifies: "Of course I don’t mean all Obama supporters" you still choose to assume that he did mean it in the way that offends you?
Well, back at you, Christine. I believe that you have counseled others against using words like "every" when criticizing those they disagree with. Yet, you give Bob not only a pass, but an assist on this one.
So, we can keep going round and round on "playing gotcha", since one can always claim to see hypocrisy on the other side when doing so helps them shield their own side by changing the subject. Or we can concede that Bob’s sweeping comment was unwise and insulting, just as it would have been taken if it had been directed at "every" McCain fan, "every" fundamentalist Christian, or "every" liberal.
Put it this way: Even if I had done it myself in the past, would that make it right? If not, then what is the relevance?
Jason, I agree, I have said that it’s not good form to use "every" or as I usually put it, to paint with a broad brush. The reason I see a difference here is because Bob used "every" to qualify a specific group, not the whole group of Obama supporters. Given that and the fact that he was responding to a specific commenter, I inferred that he didn’t mean it in the broader context, and he’s since confirmed that. So overall, I’d say he used a medium sized brush and was a bit sloppy with it, but he didn’t appear to me to be intentionally grabbing for the big fat brush in order to insult people who didn’t deserve to be lumped into the group that he was criticizing.
As to relevance of "you do it too", the only relevance in bringing up things like that is to suggest that people should always examine (and re-examine) their own biases and inconsistencies. Often I find that if someone does criticize me in that manner, at a time when I feel that I’m on the receiving end of an insulting double standard, I can more clearly understand the complaint because I’ve just experienced how it feels to be on the other side of it.