The new Primary Thread

[Dinner]

A nice compromise between getting rid of the disfunctional electoral college and going to a strictly 50% + 1 vote wins system would be to force every state to award electors based upon percentages of the popular vote. Legally, the constitution doesn't allow the feds to compel states to do this but if the Congress tied getting Federal education & transportation funds then I suspect states would grudgingly change to avoid losing 50% of their budget.

Sadly, that would mean Congressmen would have to vote for the best interests of the country instead of their political party, ergo, it won't happen.

[Imran Siddiqui]

So... um... what about that debate last night (sorry, trying to get this back on topic a bit... futile, I know )?

[Dinner]

http://www.usaelectionpolls.com/2008/super-duper-tuesday-polls.html

Latest polling information for Super Tuesday states as of today.

Republican race: Mike Huckabee is ahead in Arkansas. Mitt Romney in Mass, Colorado, and Utah with McCain winning in all other states. California has McCain two points ahead of Romney. It appears McCain really has the nomination wrapped up unless Romney can find a way to get a higher turnout of his supporters.

Democratic Race: Strong Hillary leads in California, New York, Mass, Minnesota, Tenn, New Jersey, Arizona, OK, Utah, Missouri, Arkansas, and Delaware. Hillary has a weak lead in Minnesota. Obama has strong leads in Georgia and Illinois. Obama has weak leads (less the 10%) in Alabama, Colorado, and Idaho.

Conn is a tie and New Mexico goes strongly for Richardson.

It appears it will be a Hillary vs McCain election which is just about the only combination Republicans stand a chance of winning. Congratulations Democratic Party insiders you are managing to put at risk yet another election which should be a slam dunk.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Obama vs. McCain is close as well... basically, McCain gives the Republicans a shot at winning. Amazingly they decided that the guy who sometimes takes moderate positions was someone they could live with.

[Dinner]

About the only way I can see Hillary winning by more then 1%-5% of the vote is if she makes Obama the VP candidate but I don't see that happening given how she's attacked the hell out of Obama in such an underhanded way (playing the race card, starting a whisper campaign that Obama is a Muslim, etc).

[Imran Siddiqui]

This is what I'm talking about when I speak of the "canonization" of Obama. I mean, for God's sake... if he can't beat Clinton in the primaries, why in the Hell is he this supercandidate that can roll McCain?!

After all, McCain is very popular with the indeps as well, and it isn't like Clinton didn't do a great job pulling those voters to her in NY.

[Dinner]

Not trying to cannonize the man just hate Hillary.

Theoretical Presidential polls as of a week ago:

http://www.pollingreport.com/wh08gen.htm

McCain beats Hillary 46% to 44% though that is very close and in the margin of error. All other Republicans lose by a large margin.

Obama ties McCain 44% each and beats all other Republicans.

I guess really they're a dead heat with Hillary just a nose behind 9 months out. Either way this election will be extremely tight and Democrats have a horrible history of losing tight races.

[Imran Siddiqui]

McCain beats Hillary 46% to 44% though that is very close and in the margin of error. All other Republicans lose by a large margin.

Obama ties McCain 44% each and beats all other Republicans.

I guess really they're a dead heat with Hillary just a nose behind 9 months out. Either way this election will be extremely tight and Democrats have a horrible history of losing tight races.

\

Exactly my point. Clinton and Obama are both basically tied with McCain, so I don't know where this talk of the Clinton vs. McCain being the Repubs' dream matchup came from... aside from the Obama backers.

If McCain wins, either Clinton or Obama will have their hands tied the entire way through (unless McCain does something utterly retarded).

[Dinner]

These polls are all two weeks old around the time of the Hillary crying stunt but they all show Hillary increasing her lead over Obama. It will be interesting to see what's happened over the last two weeks and what effect, if any, Edwards dropping out and endorsing Obama will have.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/democratic_presidential_nomination-191.html

That's still a huge amount of ground to make up with less then a week to go until Super Tuesday. Either Obama takes the gloves off and does something major in the next 5 days or his goose is cooked.

Republican polls all show healthy gains by McCain as off two weeks ago. Romney must also make a big move this week or he loses.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/us/republican_presidential_nomination-192.html

[Imran Siddiqui]

From what I've read, the CNN poll right after last night's debates, showed undecideds going 60-40 for Clinton. Obama had closed a bit of the space between himself and Clinton, but the debate may have created a slight bit more of a wedge.

Edwards dropping out and endorsing Obama will have

Uh.... Edwards didn't endorse anyone.

[Dinner]

Anyone have a link to that debate? I'd like to see it.

[DinoDoc]

It will be interesting to see what's happened over the last two weeks and what effect, if any, Edwards dropping out and endorsing Obama will have.

AFAIK, Edwards hasn't endorsed anyone yet. Where did you get that info?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Anyone have a link to that debate? I'd like to see it.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/01/31/dem.debate.transcript/index.html

[Dinner]

The scuttle butt is that Edwards will endorse Obama or at least make a deal for the convention if Obama can get close to Hillary's delegate count. That doesn't seem likely to happen though.

http://hotlineblog.nationaljournal.com/archives/2008/01/an_edwards_endo.html

I guess I was thinking about Kerry's endorsement of Obama instead of his old VP candidate Edwards.

[MarkG]

Theoretical Presidential polls as of a week ago:
http://www.pollingreport.com/wh08gen.htm

arent 500-1000 people to small a sample for such a large population?

we have that kind of samples in greece with 10 mil people...