Mother Jones: After Super Tuesday Losses, Bernie Sanders Is in a Whole Lot of Trouble
For months, Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign has counted on a big performance on Super Tuesday, when delegates were up for grabs in 11 nominating contests. After it racked up a big win in New Hampshire and came away with virtual ties in Iowa and Nevada—and lost disastrously in South Carolina—the senator from Vermont was quick to point out that on March 1, voters "will pick 10 times more pledged delegates on one day than were selected in the four early states so far in this campaign." And on March 1, his campaign got shellacked.
In five southern states, where African American voters made up a large portion of the electorate, Hillary Clinton left Sanders in the dust. Three days after conceding the South Carolina primary by 48 points, he lost by overwhelming margins in Alabama, Georgia, Tennessee, Virginia, and Arkansas. In Texas, where the majority of Democrats are non-white and 252 delegates were at stake, he lost by more than 30 points. Sanders banked heavily on strong performances in Massachusetts, Minnesota, Colorado, and Oklahoma, and was counting on winning at least three of them. (He'd left South Carolina behind last week to campaign with Iron Range workers in Bob Dylan's hometown of Hibbing, Minnesota.) He did win three, along with his home state of Vermont, where just 26 delegates were at stake. But a loss in Massachusetts was a setback, and the enormous margins down South set him way back in the delegate count.
Tuesday's results put Sanders in a difficult position as the campaign shifts into high gear this month, because they challenge the underlying theory of how he can win. The premise of his underdog campaign was that that he could score a few early victories and build momentum for states down the road. Once voters in those states saw that he was the real deal, the thinking went, they'd give his candidacy a second look. Those early victories were essential to expanding his coalition, and to a lesser degree, to convincing at-large super-delegates to join his side. To put it bluntly: If Sanders can't win a white liberal state like Massachusetts, there aren't too many other states he can.
Things will get worse for Sanders before they gets better. Because of the way the primary map is drawn, Clinton's best states—basically, southern states with high African American populations—will all have voted by the middle of March. After Kansas, Nebraska, and Louisiana vote on Saturday (where the prospects are good, good, and very bad for Sanders, respectively), he'll hit a brutal two-week stretch in which 980 delegates will be awarded in Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Florida, Illinois, Missouri, North Carolina, and Ohio. Clinton is the clear favorite in almost all of those states.
http://m.motherjones.com/politics/2016/03/bernie-sanders-super-tuesday-what-next
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The maths are not on Bernie's side. His only mathematical path to the nomination is as frail as a thread, and even then, he'd have to have BLOWOUT wins (not just squeakers) in order to even come close. It's just not going to happen.
Even though it's not technically "over-over" ... this thing is all but over. It's just not going to happen for Bernie. Bernie will not be the nominee.
