|
I'm reacting to Carville on MSNBC saying that Mississippi and Wyoming were EXPECTED victories for Obama, so they aren't nearly as important as Hillary Clinton winning Ohio and Texas last week.
That would make sense if she was in a contest where the winner of each state takes all, or if the LAST voting date was the most important...but all this talk of "momentum" and "grabbing the spotlight" doesn't mean much when you look at the cold hard mathematics of choosing a nominee.
Hillary won Texas and Ohio as she usually wins--by around 10 percentage points or less, 15 max. (I will give her that Ohio's margin of difference was larger than many of her other victories have been.) This means, of course, that Obama gets quite a few delegates at the same time that she gets hers. In fact, the Texas primary was so close, and the Caucus now such a sure thing, that TX may ultimately come out as an overall win for Obama. Hillary likes to practically sit out contests she thinks she can't win, saving her money and energy for the states that "matter," as we've so often heard.
But at any rate, Obama wins by big margins so often that an abundance of +20% wins DOES matter, even when it's in small pop. states such as Mississippi and Wyoming. When you put them altogether, a lot of "small state" blowouts beat a couple "large state" modest victories, which is why last week barely made a dent in Obama's numbers in the long run--he continues to battle her opposition, even when it seems obvious that he'll lose, like in Ohio. Remember the HUGE lead she had in the polls? It's a wonder he was able to decrease his loss as much as he did. But it's no wonder his campaign is confident he'll eventually end up with the most pledged delegates. His strategy just plain works better--keep it as close possible in Hillary's strongholds, then TROUNCE her in her weak spots. And from my (admittedly biased) perspective, this is the strategy we need in the GE against McCain, NOT Team Hillary's.
So right now Hillary is playing the media at the same time that she's claiming they hate her--keep the talking heads buzzing about her come-from-behind victories as much as possible, even if the actual mathematical gains aren't so enormous. She and her spokespeople are playing to people's emotions--"HOW can you NOT declare me the winner? The people of Ohio have spoken! The people of New Hampshire have spoken! They kept me in the race! They're UNITED behind me!" But the fact is, the people living in these states are still pretty excited about Obama too. And at the end of the day, if she still trails Obama in delegates (which is more than likely), all the upsets, comebacks, headlines and yes, moral outrage and righteous anger in the world won't change the fact that her numbers for President simply don't add up to Obama's.
|
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
