Wednesday, January 09, 2008

When a win is really a tie

By Edward Copeland

Hillary Nothing-But-Ambition Clinton beat Barack Obama in the New Hampshire primary, but lost in most of the media blather is something everyone should remember, particularly after the 2000 general election: popular vote totals don't always mean a win. In fact, Obama and Hillary both got 9 delegates out of New Hampshire:

Hillary Clinton won the popular vote in the New Hampshire Democratic primary. But this is no more relevant to the outcome of the contest than Al Gore taking the national popular vote in the 2000 elections. The Democratic nominee will be decided on the basis of who can claim the most delegates at the national party convention, not by the popular vote. By that measure, primary elections in New Hampshire resulted in a tie between Clinton and Barack Obama.

Clinton's popular-vote margin over Obama was razor-thin -- fewer than 8,000 votes, or 3%, with 96% of precincts reporting. As a result, each will come away from New Hampshire with the pledges of 9 delegates. John Edwards, finishing in a distant third place, will take the remaining 4. A look at the national scorecard finds Obama barely in the lead with 25 delegates to Clinton's 24.

Of course, as has been mentioned in other posts here, this a long process and we've got a long way to go, not even factoring the wishy-washy votes that will be cast by "superdelegates," the modern version of the old smoke-filled backrooms that decided a party's nominee:

There's more. The real winner in New Hampshire can't be declared until you factor in superdelegates. These are party leaders who are allowed to vote at the convention, but may make their own choices at any time, and without regard to the popular vote results. New Hampshire has 8 superdelegates; of these, 2 have declared their support for Clinton, 3 for Obama, and 3 are undeclared. When all of the declared superdelegates in the nation are tallied, Clinton roars into
the lead with 183 total delegates to Obama's 78.


Stay tuned. This ain't over yet.

Labels: , , , ,

Bookmark and Share

4 Comments:

  • Check out http://bradblog.com

    Also, ron paul's people are screaming vote fraud as they found several counties reporting Ron Paul's total's as zero . Bev Harris Investigated and the election official said "oops. Human error"

    I don't think Obama lost at all. I think he won, and won big.

    By Blogger TimothyB, at 10:24 PM  

  • I support HRC but I am prepared for her to lose and I am prepared to support the Dem nominee. I hope you all are open minded enough to do the same if for no other reason than the Supreme Court.

    What is good about NH in my mind is two things: first, it is vindication of HRC in the face of a media onslaught which is ugly, and cruel and unusual punishment. they deserved to be smacked down big time and watching their heads explode was great fun. Second, Obama is untested and has little record and it would have been very bad for him to just waltz to the nomination in my opinion. Now he is in it for the long haul and will have to prove himself, and that is all the better for him if her is the eventual nominee.

    Sign me, a loyal Dem who is not a one issue voter.

    By Blogger Jammer, at 12:39 PM  

  • This isn't about who I support! Did I SAY who I support?

    This is about counting the votes and making sure the American people are not defrauded YET AGAIN by these shysters.

    By Blogger TimothyB, at 12:49 PM  

  • While I'm definitely against Hillary, I do agree that having a harder campaign will be a good thing for both her and Obama ahead of the general election. There's no Republican I would vote for and since I live in one of the reddest of red states, my vote usually doesn't matter here anyway.

    By Blogger Edward Copeland, at 1:51 PM  

Post a Comment

<< Home