Leaving Delegates on the Table: Why Clinton Might Lose

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by psericks, Wed Feb 13, 2008 at 06:05:13 PM EST

One unusual aspect of Super Tuesday that seems to have gone unnoticed is that despite the national popular vote splitting so evenly at 48%-48%, very few of the state primaries and caucuses were actually all that close at all.

Of 22 Democratic primaries and caucuses, only six were decided by a margin of ten points or less, and only three were actually close, coming within a margin of five points or less. Why? Because most of these states simply weren't even contested. The Clinton campaign had television ads running in only half the February 5th states, and there were numerous states in which they didn't bother to run an active field campaign.

The Clinton campaign made clear that it planned to win Super Tuesday based on a tight four-state strategy, focusing on California, New York, New Jersey, and Arkansas, which, they frequently cited, made up 40% of the delegates assigned --- a strange strategy in a system that isn't winner-take-all. Clinton's name recognition and her general support level across the country would have to hold her up in the vast swaths of the country that she had already conceded.

This strategy of focusing hard on winning the biggest states turned out to be one of this campaign season's great blunders, and it is one that the Clinton campaign seems to make repeatedly. The Obama campaign has repeatedly found ways to get ahead in the delegate count, out-organizing rural areas of Nevada to win an extra delegate while the Clinton campaign won Clark County, and then repeating that success to run a field campaign across 22 states that kept the delegate count close in states Clinton won and racked up the delegates in states Clinton did not bother to contest.

more...
http://www.mydd.com/story/2008/2/13/18513/4342