Primary Thread 3: Race to Denver

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Oerdin
I was watching Obama's speech in Virgina earlier and I really like his plan for a $4000 credit each year to every college student in exchange for national service. Working in retirement homes, working in Veteran's homes, teaching English to young people and immigrants.

How does he plan on paying for it? How does he plan on stopping $4000 tuition increases?

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
How does he plan on paying for it? How does he plan on stopping $4000 tuition increases?

Ending the war would go a long way towards paying for it.

[DinoDoc]

I'm sorry. I didn't mean to give the impression that I was in anyway interested in what you had to say by responding to a post made by Oerdin, Kid.

[Bosh]

Hillary about the Michigan primary, back before she thought she might actually need those delegates:

"Well, you know, It's clear, this election they're having is not going to count for anything"

http://www.jabberwonk.com/flinker.cfm?cliid=zydzt

[Ramo]

What would count as significant?

I just told you what was significant. Taking account MI and FL. If you allocate FL and MI delegates (giving Obama the none of the above vote from MI) double it, you get a little over a 100 delegate margin...

which Clinton might lead given that many of Obama's victories come from caucauses were less than 50,000 people voted

Excluding MI and FL, Obama should be narrowly ahead in the popular vote (IIRC, Clinton won Super Tuesday by 0.4%).

Obama has won races in a lot of states that won't go democrat in November no matter what (Wyoming, Alaska, Utah).

How does that matter, exactly? There are Dems in these states as well; why should their opinions be dismissed? He also won swing states (CO, IA, MO, MN) and blue states (CT, DE, WA). The "Obama can only win in red states" meme boils down to that he lost CA. Which he did, but I have no idea why that's so meaningful...

I think it a bit hypocritical of any candidate to tell superdelegates that they should vote the intent of the voters, but do so while demanding that primary voters in two states critical to any democratic victory in November (Michigan and Florida) be excluded.

I think it's much more hypocritical of any candidate to tell voters that they collectively matter as much as much as the vice chair of the local Dem Party, and at the same time decry the terrible disenfranchisement of FL and MI, which broke the rules, and was a situation that all candidates at least implicitly agreed to originally (they signed a pledge not to campaign, etc.). If Clinton wanted FL and MI to matter when the rules of the game were being established, she should've simply said so. That would've forced Obama and Edwards to follow suit, then the DNC, and we wouldn't be in this mess.

[Ramo]

And once more, I believe that MI and FL will and should have representation. There are a few scenarios to get there, and I spelled out one of them above.

[Ramo]

BTW, here are leaked Obama camp's projections from a couple days ago:



Now, this is such a conservative projection that it would suggest an attempt at playing the expectations game. He predicted a 33 delegate advantage yesterday, and actually got 48. The polls are showing a 15%+ victory in VA, an even bigger one in MD, and DC ought to be a near shut-out (it's also worth pointing out that Obama has on average outperformed the polls thus far). But it's a first order estimate for how the contest will go down. If the rest of the predictions are similarly conservative, we're looking at a very solid delegate lead from Obama by mid-March, and a possible victory in TX.

[Admiral]

I'll be interested to see if Clinton wins Maine, as expected, or if Obama pulls out another caucus win.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by DinoDoc
I'm sorry. I didn't mean to give the impression that I was in anyway interested in what you had to say by responding to a post made by Oerdin, Kid.

Don't worry your pretty little face about it hun.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Ramo
BTW, here are leaked Obama camp's projections from a couple days ago:



Now, this is such a conservative projection that it would suggest an attempt at playing the expectations game. He predicted a 33 delegate advantage yesterday, and actually got 48. The polls are showing a 15%+ victory in VA, an even bigger one in MD, and DC ought to be a near shut-out (it's also worth pointing out that Obama has on average outperformed the polls thus far). But it's a first order estimate for how the contest will go down. If the rest of the predictions are similarly conservative, we're looking at a very solid delegate lead from Obama by mid-March, and a possible victory in TX.

I actually disagree that its a conservative projection, at least as far as delegate count goes. It shows Hillary winning the big three we've been talking about -- OH, TX, and PA -- but only eking out 22 more delegates than Obama in those 3 contests combined; it then shows him clawing back more than half that gain by getting 13 more delegates than she does in NC, the last biggish state left. In other words, it projects that winning the 3 biggest states left will not even get Hillary out of the hole she's curently in, let alone give her any forward momentum. That might be true, but I'd hardly call it conservative.

[Ramo]

The conservatism has to do with the forseeable contests. The LA margin was 22% instead of 10%; the NE margin was 36% instead of 20%; the VI margin was 80% instead of 20%; the WA margin was 37% instead of 20% (and that is pretty much reflected in the delegate breakdown). The ME results aren't completely out yet, but they look like Obama is up by 15%, instead of down 2%. The DC projection is pretty much the definition of conservative; I'd be shocked if the margin is less than 30%. The polls in VA show Obama up by at least 15% instead of 2%, and the polls in MD show Obama up by at least 20% instead of 9%. I have basically no idea what will happen in OH or TX (and a close race leaning Clinton looks sound), but as I wrote my assumption was that the projections after Tuesday are as conservative as ones until Tuesday.

Incidentally, Clinton just fired her campaign manager.

[Zkribbler]

Originally posted by Ramo
...Incidentally, Clinton just fired her campaign manager.

Wasn't the campaign manager already working for free because Clinton could no longer afford to pay?

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Ramo
Incidentally, Clinton just fired her campaign manager.

Link?

[Ramo]

The only odd thing about the projection is that it shows Obama winning IN and losing OH. If the nomination were to still be competitive in May, IN is solid Clinton territory (since it's OH with fewer black and educated people).

[Ramo]

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/10/clinton-campaign-manager-is-out/?hp