D Primary Open Thread: Hillary Leads Pledged Delegate Totals
Or She Would if Democrat's Used a Winner-Take-All System
By Adam C Posted in 2008 — Comments (17) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
According to a Rasmussen Report, Sen. Clinton would lead 1427-1260 in pledged delegates if Democrats used a winner take all. Most of that lead comes from her "win" in Texas where she lost in net pledged delegates because of the convoluted system.
Since Sen. Clinton trails in the overall popular vote (including FL and MI or not), this winner-take-all lead would be a big problem for Democrats so it's a good thing they did not use that system. However, if she can take a popular vote lead (which the God-among-men of analysts Michael Barone thinks is possible) then she has a strong argument.
It also shows something that political scientists have grappled with: the fact that there is no perfect way to aggregate a group of individual preferences into a communal decision. The system chosen matters. There isn't a right or wrong system, but they create different incentives and promote different strategies.
If the system was winner-take-all, the PA and NC outcomes would pretty much seal the race for one of the candidates. But the proportional system means that neither can pull away far enough to deliver a knock blow to the other candidate.
Consider this an Open Thread on the Democratic Primary.
« Dueling June Obama fundraising claims? — Comments (2) | Heckling? I don't think so. — Comments (4) »
D Primary Open Thread: Hillary Leads Pledged Delegate Totals 17 Comments (0 topical, 17 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
regardless of popular vote or pledged vote totals. The D party leadership knows that the party will not exist in a meaningful form without continued 90% support from the African American community. The D leadership will not risk undermining this support by picking Hillary over Obama.
Maybe if Obama has a total collapse between now and June he'll lose, but if I was part of the D party leadership, I would rather lose this one election in 2008 than risk tanking the relationship with the most key demographic group for the party.
....and it is the thrust of the article that I linked to above. I highly recommend reading it - it's excellent.
“.....women and minorities hardest hit”
That is a great article. I wish you would write a blog about it so I could recommend it.
And I have to excerpt this one paragraph both for its overall point and its dead-on description of Hillary:
And so it is over... but not quite. Clinton, the politically undead, staggers on, the wooden speeches, the flat, grating voice, the forced humor, generating a mixture of pity, awe and vague nausea, as she vainly struggles against a foe she can neither name nor engage: her Party's devil's bargain with American blacks, a bargain that promises, in exchange for nearly all black votes all the time, fealty to certain imperatives, be it a continuation of social policies that are poisonous to blacks and the nation, silence and denial in the face of widespread destructive behavior patterns at the root of much of the black American dilemma, obsequious veneration of hate mongering, racial arsonist black "leaders", or, as in the case of Obama, the nomination of dangerously untested, thinly-resumed candidates who may be deeply flawed and unelectable. For forty years this has been the bargain and it must hold now.
The greatest part about all of this (for an amused Republican bystander) is the fact that African American support basically saved Bill's presidency after the Monica scandal. Now that same African American consituency will deny the more qualified Hillary her shot at the White House. It really is amazing.
The democrats have bungled themselves into a heck of a quandary. Unfortunately - for them - their contest has devolved into the racial v. sex v. class struggle based on their pandering to different constituencies. Someone's going to be "dissed." It looks, with the pressure evident on superdelegates to swing to Obama, that the democrats are making a somewhat conscious decision to "diss" the white woman vote, the white blue collar vote, & the Jewish vote.
now they can sleep in it. Statistics have shown that if only males could vote, Republicans would win every time. So if a few of the soccer moms sit out, it can only help our side.
___________________________________________________________
Molon Labe!
unless visiting socialist nations for the next week counts.
At any rate, I say so long, farewell, auf wiedersehn to you!
Hubby, the heathens and I are heading to the Meditterranean Sea.
Genoa, Naples, Palermo, Tunis, mallorca, Barcelona, Marseille, OH MY!!!
Have a great week and keep the trolls in check!
It really proves their worst conspirators correct that the Dems really do throw it away every time they have a chance to win it.
That said, I'm still in a cold sweat that Obama could be elected President. (Logically, he should be easily beatable. But I said the same thing about Clinton in 1992, so I don't trust that Obama won't end up winning this thing.)
I still have a really bad feeling about this whole thing...
Obama could win - the election hasn't occurred. I hope & pray that McCain & his team will take the gloves off & hit Obama (if he is the nominee) incessantly on his glaring vulnerabilities.
Who'd have EVER thought Hillary would win all the big states (except Ill.), yet lose this thing?
Obama gamed the system by going after red state caucuses, catching Clinton totally off guard.
the left would take such joy at crushing their only successful presidential family since the Kennedys? It goes to show how vile the hard left is, they are eating their own now just as an appetizer. If we do not come to together stronger to fight, they will take power faster than the National Socialists did in Weimar Germany.
___________________________________________________________
Molon Labe!
...is to win the popular vote, which she easily can if she wins 4 of the last 5 primaries (a 10 pt win in PA will make up 400,000 votes on Obama alone). At the same time, Clintonistas like Harold Ickes, Lanny Davis, and even Der Schlickmeister himself will make direct appeals to superdelegates that Obama cannot win a general election due to race, Rev Wright, and a host of other things that have yet to come out (i.e. William Ayers, Tony Rezko, etc).
Based on this article at The American Thinker, I think it's still very likely that the superdelegates will not deny Obama the nomination because of race and political correctness - they simply cannot afford to deny their most loyal constituency their candidate, even it looks like he'll lose in November. That being said, Hillary will have a strong case if she can finish strong in the remaining primaries.
“.....women and minorities hardest hit”