Very Far From Over

Posted by on . 18 comments.

I sat down to slice and dice some numbers relating to last night’s results, and I came up with a very surprising conclusion. I think Hillary Clinton may have gained much more than is immediately obvious. All the analysis I have seen (in the last few days and this morning) focuses on the pledged delegate count. And thereby misses a potentially important angle.

Clinton may have put herself in position to win the popular vote even if Obama continues to lead in pledged delegates. And that has the potential to totally change the dynamic of the whole “how should the superdelegates vote” debate. It may give Clinton a realistic hope of capturing the nomination, which I really didn’t think she had yesterday morning.

After last night’s results, one of the narratives today is going to be how the number of delegates you win can have little relation to the popular vote. Indeed, Clinton may actually end up not winning more delegates than Obama from yesterday’s voting, despite having won the popular vote.

So the natural question at this point is: Obama leads in terms of pledged delegates, but how does the popular vote look?

According to RealClearPolitics, Obama led Clinton 10,453,417 to 9,541,671 going into yesterday’s primaries. (That’s not counting Florida and Michigan). Yesterday, Clinton beat Obama 2,822,226 to 2,493,198. Obama now leads 12,946,615 to 12,363,897.

In terms of delegates, Obama started with a 1193-1038 lead. RealClearPolitics shows Clinton picking up 21 net delegates at this point (168 to 147), but I’m pretty sure that doesn’t include the Texas caucuses yet, where Obama is expected to win some back. The current totals stand at 1340 versus 1206.

In terms of the numbers going into yesterday’s voting, Obama’s popular vote lead of 911,746 was 4.6% of the total popular vote. His pledged delegate lead of 155 was 6.9% of the total pledged delegates. So there is a reasonable difference between the popular vote lead and the delegate lead.

Of course, as long as Obama leads both, there isn’t much to complain about. But that popular vote lead is more precarious than it may appear at first blush. Yesterday’s results were enough to cut Obama’s popular vote lead in half; it now stands at 2.3%. And if Clinton manages to overtake Obama in the popular vote, a godawful amount of nastiness is going to break out. Especially when it comes to the crunch issue: who the superdelegates should support.

So stay tuned. This isn’t over yet by a long shot.

(This post was revised at 6:52 am, by adding the first two paragraphs.)

Comments

  1. cam says:
    March 5, 2008 at 6:58 am

    Obama leads in terms of pledged delegates

    Obama is not the inevitable nominee due to pledged delegates. Go see this post by Jerome Armstrong at MyDD: Neither Clinton nor Obama has enough delegates to win the nomination.

    The superdelegates will decide this contest and the delegates aren’t the be all and end all since Clinton owns the big states (CA, NY, NJ, MA, MI, FL, OH), proving herself to be the stronger GE candidate.

    Jerome also reported that Obama won just 5 counties in Ohio last night. You can’t win in the general with just 5 counties in Ohio.

    Remember those 50 superdelegates Tom Brokaw said were about to break for Obama? I bet they’re not returning his phone calls this morning.

  2. cam says:
    March 5, 2008 at 7:05 am

    (This is a repost because for some reason it didn’t show up the first time.)

    Indeed, Clinton may actually end up not winning more delegates than Obama from yesterday’s voting, despite having won the popular vote.

    Neither of them has enough delegates to win the nomination. Jerome Armstrong at MyDD has mapped it out here.

    Obama leads in terms of pledged delegates

    It’s not going to come down to the pledged delegates but the superdelegates. Clinton owns the big states (CA, NY, NJ, TX, OH, MA, FL, MI), proving herself to be the stronger GE candidate.

    Jerome also reported that Obama won just 5 counties in Ohio. You can’t win the general with just 5 counties in Ohio.

  3. sarabeth says:
    March 5, 2008 at 7:37 am

    Go see this post by Jerome Armstrong at MyDD: Neither Clinton nor Obama has enough delegates to win the nomination.

    The superdelegates will decide this contest…

    That won’t do at all. Go see this post by me instead (which was also written well before Jerome’s).

    Jerome also reported that Obama won just 5 counties in Ohio last night. You can’t win in the general with just 5 counties in Ohio.

    That’s totally spurious. How many counties he won against Clinton says diddly squat about how many he would win against McCain.

  4. Rob McGarrah says:
    March 5, 2008 at 7:49 am

    Barack and Hillary need to get together for the good of the country and decide which one of them will head the ticket for 2008. We have no time to lose and the White House will be our gain!

  5. sarabeth says:
    March 5, 2008 at 7:55 am

    At this point, Rob, I think they are two immovable objects, and nary an irresistible force in sight.

  6. cam says:
    March 5, 2008 at 10:39 am

    That won’t do at all.

    I saw that post and commented on it. IIRC, I supported the basic thesis: Hillary should not drop out.

    That doesn’t change the fact that neither Hillary Clinton nor Barack Obama will win enough pledged delegates to clinch the nomination.

    That’s totally spurious. How many counties he won against Clinton says diddly squat about how many he would win against McCain.

    Oh but it does. Outside help and all the money in the world didn’t get it done for Obama. He had unions and outside expenditure groups, and he outspent Clinton about 3 (or 4) to 1. And he got creamed.

  7. matt says:
    March 5, 2008 at 11:07 am

    >And he got creamed.

    it’s going to be tough for obama to explain what happened in ohio. that was a pretty serious rebuke.

  8. sarabeth says:
    March 5, 2008 at 11:26 am

    I saw that post and commented on it. IIRC, I supported the basic thesis: Hillary should not drop out.

    That doesn’t change the fact that neither Hillary Clinton nor Barack Obama will win enough pledged delegates to clinch the nomination.

    ???? Nobody’s disputing or denying that. The reason I brought up this post here was that I had started with precisely this fact: that neither of them can clinch it without the superdelegates. (A post sometimes contains more than what you take away as the basic thesis.)

    Oh but it does.

    That’s ridiculous. Because Democrats overwhelmingly picked Clinton to Obama, therefore Clinton would also get creamed by McCain in Ohio?

    Yes, Obama lost badly to Clinton in the Democratic primary. No, that doesn’t mean he would lose Ohio to McCain, badly or otherwise.

  9. Joanna Barksdale says:
    March 5, 2008 at 6:55 pm

    I reject this analysis on a few bases. The ratio of popular vote to pledged delegates is irrelevant if the premise is that both are needed for an incontrovertible win.

    Unless you buy into the Clinton claim that caucuses are meaningless, the margins have meaning: margins in caucuses reflect popular support. Not in terms of raw numbers, but in terms of enthusiasm. Intensity of support matters, because turnout, not registration, is what determines the outcome on election day. That is a metric that super-delegates will value. While winning a caucus may not add much to your total in the popular vote, caucus wins by large margins show mobilization and organizational strength as well as voter enthusiasm.

    Moreover, some states are of larger population that others. But just as we have a Senate that has Senators allocated on an equal basis to offset the proportional reward of Representatives in the House, we have delegate allocations systems that grant more delegates to large states, but not one delegate per every voter who arrives at the polls, because then large states would render the votes of smaller states irrelevant, and the nomination process would not take into consideration the voices of party members across the nation. The goal is to assemble a coalition around the nation by garnering a simply majority of delegates, not simply to win the biggest states and claim larger populations should outweigh smaller populations. That defeats the point of having a delegate system that calibrates the vote weights, much as making the Senate proportional would skew Congress toward the power of big states, rendering small states powerless and defeating the point of having a United States. So arguing pure population makes no sense. Again, the way to fairly evaluate this is the ratio of the popular vote in each state on a state by state basis. So Clinton’s 10-point margin is impressive and deserves credit. But it shouldn’t outweigh Obama’s 17-point margin in Wisconsin simply because Ohio has a larger population. The balance for that is the fact that Ohio has more delegates because of its larger population. Counting Ohio’s population separate from the delegates awarded distorts the balance already made and is a self-serving attempt to erase the value of Obama’s margins in smaller states. To claim this isn’t simply cooking the books is a lie.

    To see why, let’s pretend that Ohio was unusually large and that Clinton won 17 million voters there and 10 net delegates. Then let’s pretend that Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Guam, North Carolina, Indiana, West Virginia, Oregon, Kentucky, Montana, South Dakota, and Puerto Rico all were primaries with 2 million voters in them sum total and Obama won them all 52%-48%, netting 12 delegates. Your argument is that Clinton’s 17 million voters beat Obama’s 11 victories in a row that put him in the delegate lead simply because Clinton happened to win in one larger state. You can say “Caucuses are undemocratic,” but my point is that your argument works in principle against primaries in states with lower populations. It’s simply a disenfranchising argument designed to rewrite the balance set by the DNC in having primaries and caucuses that award delegates to show a variety of metrics. Reducing it to the popular vote just rewards whoever won the biggest states. That’s changing the rules after the fact. That’s cheating. If the party wanted a pure national primary, they’d just have one election day on which everyone in the party votes. That didn’t happen.

  10. sarabeth says:
    March 5, 2008 at 9:40 pm

    I reject this analysis on a few bases. The ratio of popular vote to pledged delegates is irrelevant if the premise is that both are needed for an incontrovertible win.

    That may be your premise; it certainly isn’t mine.

    Your argument is that Clinton’s 17 million voters beat Obama’s 11 victories in a row that put him in the delegate lead simply because Clinton happened to win in one larger state.

    Nonsense! I did not suggest any such thing.

    What I’m saying is very simple:
    1) Both the pledged delegate counts and popular vote totals are meaningful and relevant. (I’m not saying either one trumps the other.)
    2) This is going to come down to the superdelegates.
    3) It’s a given that Obama will win the pledged delegate count. If Clinton wins the aggregate popular vote, that gives her a leg to stand on in the battle for superdelegates. That battle will get much more complicated/interesting/unpredictable.

  11. cam says:
    March 6, 2008 at 5:35 am

    It’s a given that Obama will win the pledged delegate count.

    That may be a given but it’s not a given that Obama deserves the support of the so-called “super delegates” and should win the nomination on that basis. He still has to convince your party that you are the best nominee and Obama hasn’t made that case.

  12. sarabeth says:
    March 6, 2008 at 6:19 am

    … but it’s not a given that Obama deserves the support of the so-called “super delegates” and should win the nomination on that basis.

    Nobody around here has ever suggested that. Stick to things we say, or that someone has brought up in a previous comment.

  13. cam says:
    March 6, 2008 at 9:20 am

    Nobody around here has ever suggested that.

    I didn’t say you did. How about it’s also not a given? Better?

    Check my IP. I’ve been reading this site for a long time and only recently decided to start commenting. Watch who you tell to step up and fuck off.

  14. jamie beth says:
    March 6, 2008 at 9:30 am

    oh cam, either you haven’t been reading that long or you have poor reading comprehension if you think a comment like that is going to get you anywhere.

    Matt and SB ask a lot more from their readers than most blogs and if you think longevity will get you anywhere, you haven’t been paying attention!

  15. cam says:
    March 6, 2008 at 9:52 am

    oh cam, either you haven’t been reading that long or you have poor reading comprehension if you think a comment like that is going to get you anywhere.

    oh jamie beth, was I addressing you?

    Matt and SB ask a lot more from their readers than most blogs and if you think longevity will get you anywhere, you haven’t been paying attention!

    I wasn’t demanding consideration based on longevity. I guess your reading comprehension isn’t so hot either.

  16. matt says:
    March 6, 2008 at 10:12 am

    >I wasn’t demanding consideration based on longevity. I guess your reading comprehension isn’t so hot either.

    why else would you bring it up?

    look, that post wasn’t especially directed at you (i don’t peg you as an obama fluffer), but i’m not sure why you seem to be stepping into the group of people to which it was directed.

  17. sarabeth says:
    March 6, 2008 at 10:13 am

    Watch who you tell to step up and fuck off.

    Or you’ll do what exactly?

    (Did someone just get up the wrong side of the bed today?)

  18. Dave K says:
    March 6, 2008 at 11:46 am

    Joanna said: “Unless you buy into the Clinton claim that caucuses are meaningless, the margins have meaning: margins in caucuses reflect popular support. Not in terms of raw numbers, but in terms of enthusiasm. Intensity of support matters, because turnout, not registration, is what determines the outcome on election day.”

    I actually think it’s a good argument to make. For example, to make the point irt the caucus vs. primary difference in TX, the Hillary camp could say: “We won the primary and congratulations to Obama for his victory in the caucus. He does do well in caucuses but when it comes to the general election IT’S NOT A CAUCUS. We need a candidate that can bring home the big states and that’s who I am”

    Then the Dem party needs to have their back room meeting to convince the two of them that a Clinton/Obama ticket is in the best interest of the party for the nexrt “16yrs”… I’m actually a bit vested (selfishly) in the hope for this to go to the Nat’l convention because I’m a Dem delegate and I think I can make it all the way to Denver. My next caucus is April 5th. On a less selfish tone I hope they resolve it by the end of April.

    I had actually been hoping she would acknowledge the possibility that she would take Obama as a running mate many months ago because some Dem’s are voting for Oabma because they don’t want to lose his charismatic abilities. At our first WA caucus that very point was raised by Obama supporters. If Hillary had stated (prior to our caucus) that she would take him as her running mate many of those Obama supporters admitted they would have caucused for her. Thankfully, I do believe we are on course for a Clinton/Obama ticket, it’s just a matter of time. Hopefully…