To Win The Democratic Nomination Outright…
By Justin Gardner | Related entries in 2008 Election, Barack, Hillary, Super Delegates!!!Hillary needs 97% of the remaining pledged delegates. Obama needs 77%.
What this tells us is that both will need the superdelegates to win.
However, we all know that it’ll be hard to make the case that the superdelegates should go against the will of the voters. So what would it take for Hillary to pull into the lead?
Clinton would need to win 59% of the delegates in the remaining 12 contests in order to overtake Sen. Obama’s delegate lead.If the upcoming 611 delegates at stake split 59/41 for Clinton — 360 would go to Clinton and 251 would go to Obama — netting Sen. Clinton 109 delegates. . . which would be enough to overcome Obama’s current 106 delegate lead.
Impossible? No.
Improbable? Quite.
The end of this post? Yes.
This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 5th, 2008 and is filed under 2008 Election, Barack, 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.
March 5th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
Hey look Alan, Justin has the same reading comprehension problem as Adler. What exactly was the “will of the voters” in TX — quick do some math – multiply the vote by .33333 and you should have it. And in Michigan and Florida — not their will, their will doesn’t really count, because we made certain rules and rules count more than the will of the….oh forget it.
Oh, JG, what I am I going to ever do if you die and quit providing me with endless daytime minutes of entertainment?
March 5th, 2008 at 4:42 pm
Fallacy => “it’ll be hard to make the case that the superdelegates should go against the will of the voters”
You assume that pledged delegates fairly represent the will of the voters. The pledged delegates relationship to the will of the voters is tenuous at best. Pledged delegates represent the will of some voters, and they represent the will of some caucus goers who are directly opposite of the will of the voters (like in Texas), and they represent the will of deals cut in caucuses for the second or third choice of the will of voters (maybe), and the pledged delegate as they exist now, deliberately and undemocratically disenfranchise and exclude the will of the voters in two of the biggest most important states in the union.
Other than that, your argument is fine.
Personally, if I was a superdelegate, I would consider it my duty to try and correct the obvious undemocratic nature of the pledged delegates.
March 5th, 2008 at 5:04 pm
Logical => 1,000 people should count more than tens of millions.
I concede. You’re right. Well done.
March 5th, 2008 at 5:22 pm
“The pledged delegates relationship to the will of the voters is tenuous at best.”
So, why do we even have a primary system at all? Are you suggesting (as it appears) that the old smoke-filled-room approach of selecting nominees by party bosses more accurately reflected the “will of the voters”? Because that’s what decision by superdelegates comes down to, now, doesn’t it?
March 5th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
wj,
No I am saying these pledged delegates did not all come from primaries. Many of them came from caucuses. Texas has shown us that a caucus can directly contravene the will of the voters as expressed in a primary.
So – pledged delegates who came from caucuses are fine, but you cannot tell me that they have any greater connection to the “will of the voters” of the states they represent, than do superdelegates. Pledged delegates from caucuses are fine, they have a vote because of the rules of Democratic party selection process, just like superdelegates have a vote because of the rules of the Democratic party selection process. Neither has any knowable connection to the “will of the voters”. My onlyu objection is to this pretense that pledged delegates have some sacrosanct connection to the “will of the voters”
Maybe they should. Fine. Change the rules next time so its all primaries and make sure all states are included. But this group of pledged delegates cannot be stamped with that “will of the voter” label.
March 5th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
C’mon guys, it is what it is…a fairly baroque system. One that makes lots of these fer and agin arguments tenuous. Different superdelegates will come up with different rationales.
We know this delegate score is a rough proxy, but it’s the best one available, especially given that the caucus states don’t have popular vote numbers that are in any way comparable to those of states with conventional voting primaries. The fair-minded among us will admit that it’s a very reasonable assumption that many superdelegates will want to avoid the appearance of acting so as to overturn the established delegate score. Again, that score is probably the best available proxy and almost certainly the one the less wonky gen pub will latch onto.
The superdelegates are roughly split now, give or take, right? So how about we leave aside the debate about what they should do and project the boundaries of the likely outcome space. How much play is there if we assume that the super delegates might find personal rationales leading to a 55-45% split either way?How about 60-40?
That gets at the really relevant question…what percent of superdelegates above 50% would Hillary need to sway if she comes into the convention down by 75-100 delegates? We can talk all night about global theories concerning what the superdelegatesought to do. But the fact is the wobbly ones will have to persuaded one at a time. That means that Hillary’s chances will be slim if she has to turn 3 out of every 5 wobblers. If she only has to turn 1 in 10 or 1 in 15, that’s quite different.
March 5th, 2008 at 7:21 pm
fair enough. (kritter’s argument, not the process.)
March 5th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
This whole Dem primary has been pretty much of an education for me. The whoe caucus/primary/super-delegate matrix seems to me to provide real party flexibility on the national-level. Is it really smart for the Dems Party, as an organization, to hand over complete control to the “will of the people”? The “will of the people” can be manipulated and swade, subject to ideological trends, cults of personality, easily impassioned and inflamed. Isn’t Hillary’s 3:00 am ad proof positive of the public’s vunerability to emotionally abuse. Obviously, the “will of the people” should play a significant part in the process, but so too must party continuity and hierarchy. If it is a party of ideals, principals and vision it can not simply be a vehicle of “the people’s will.” Ironically, Obama supporters are not whining about the super-delegates out of erroneous egualitarianism, but out of hyper-partisan self-interest — simply Declaring the People’s Will reading the tea leaves of a baroque, byzantine primary system. Someone likes to talk about intellectual dishonesty and in my opinion, this is classic example of such.
March 6th, 2008 at 11:58 am
Release your TAX RECORDS Clinton. What are you afraid of ?