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All Hail The Super Delegates!!!

By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Democrats, Hillary, Super Delegates!!!

Chris Bowers does the math and it’s not pretty…

From this point, quick math shows that after Super Tuesday, only 1,428 pledged delegates will still be available. Now, here is where the problem shows up. According to current polling averages, the largest possible victory for either candidate on Super Tuesday will be Clinton 889 pledged delegates, to 799 pledged delegates for Obama. (In all likelihood, the winning margin will be lower than this, but using these numbers helps emphasize the seriousness of the situation.) As such, the largest possible pledged delegate margin Clinton can have after Super Tuesday is 937 to 862. (While it is possible Obama will lead in pledged delegates after Super Tuesday, it does not currently seem possible for Obama to have a larger lead than 75).

[...] That leaves Clinton 1,088 pledged delegates from clinching the nomination, with only 1,428 pledged delegates remaining. Thus, in order to win the nomination without the aid of super delegates, in her best-case scenario after Super Tuesday, Clinton would need to win 76.2% of all remaining pledged delegates. Given our proportional delegate system, there is simply no way that is going to happen unless Obama drops out.

Bowers suggests some solutions, but ultimately lands on the idea that the superdelegates should get behind whoever has more pledged delegates. This makes the most sense to me.

However, if it doesn’t shake out that way, do Dems really think that having party insiders pick the nominee is a good idea? I’m sure some would love to have that much power, but the voters would revolt.

In any event, see you at the convention folks!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 5th, 2008 and is filed under 2008 Election, Barack, Democrats, Hillary, Super Delegates!!!. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

3 Responses to “All Hail The Super Delegates!!!”

mw Says:
February 5th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
“Bowers suggests some solutions, but ultimately lands on the idea that the superdelegates should get behind whoever has more pledged delegates. This makes the most sense to me.” - JG

I think this is naive. If the Democratic party power brokers wanted it to go this way, there would be no Super Delegates. Super Delegates were created, specifically to subvert the outcome of the primaries and caucuses, if the party insiders felt that the “great unwashed” were making a bad decision.
From MSNBC:

“Before 1972, party elders, such as Chicago Mayor Richard Daley and Charlie Buckley, the boss of The Bronx who helped John Kennedy clinch the 1960 nomination, wielded inordinate power. But in early 1970’s, the party’s rules were reformed to open the process to grass-roots activists, women, and ethnic minorities. Sen. George McGovern, the leading anti-Vietnam war liberal, won the 1972 nomination. McGovern turned out to be a disaster as a presidential candidate, winning only one state and the District of Columbia. So without reverting to the days of party bosses like Buckley, the Democrats decided to guarantee that elected officials would have a bigger voice in the nomination… There were, Mayer says, two motives in giving elected officials a big voice in the nomination. “One was not to get (ideologically) extreme candidates; the other was to avoid the Jimmy Carter phenomenon — where you had a guy who was not very experienced and not very well regarded by most of his fellow governors, but nevertheless managed to win the party’s nomination,” Mayer said. “

Now does that sound like either of the leading Dem candidates?

Super Delegates probably owe a lot to Bill Clinton. If it si close, and they can use an excuse like the unseated Michigan and Florida delegates to justify a Clinton plurality - I think the push it to Clinton, and perhaps force the choice of Barack VP.
abrisaham Says:
February 6th, 2008 at 7:34 am
the other was to avoid the Jimmy Carter phenomenon

This is why Barak Obama should have to be worried.

The trend was for the solid democratic base to go for Hillary. The gop, not so traditional democratic states went for Obama.

So in the end if we head to the convention with the super delegates wanting to insure a victory they have to look at these types of results.

Anger tradtional democrats or reward the newer democrat who has shown up for Obama. Tough decisions indeed and Im sure they will get it wrong.
SilverSeraphim Says:
February 6th, 2008 at 1:11 pm
It’s an insult to my intelligence and my right to vote if party insiders disregard my choice “for my own good”. We are seeing the largest turnout of Democratic voters in years precisly because they want Obama. If the party takes note of that and nominates Obama they could sustain enough momentum to put him in the White House. But how many people would come out to vote if they feel their opinion is just going to be disregarded?

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