May 1, 2008
Smoke Filled Rooms Across The Nation Open Their Windows
For the weeks leading up to the Pennsylvania primary, superdelegate endorsements to senator Obama had been glacial and endorsements to Clinton had been nearly nonexistent. One could expect only 1-2 endorsements per day, and before Pennsylania, 311 supers hadn’t announced their endorsement. Now that the vast majority of voters’ voices have been heard, and every side of every issue has been repeated and debated ad infinitum, the superdelegates are starting to make their voices heard in large numbers. Many of the high profile party elders and strongmen are trying to end this thing now, the only problem is that they seem split down the middle, just like everybody else.
Governor Brad Henry of Oklahoma has endorsed Obama, while governor Easley of North Carolina endorsed Clinton, showing that some supers don’t care what their constituents want, they want their constituents to represent what they want. Representatives, who are typically the most quiet superdelegates, have shown a willingness to announce their preferences recently as well, with Ike Skelton (Missouri) and John Tanner (Tennessee) endorsing Clinton, while David Wu (Oregon), Ben Chandler (Kentucky), Baron Hill (Indiana), and Lois Capps (California) giving their votes to Obama. Senator Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico announced his support of Obama on the 28th, becoming the only senator in the month of April to endorse a candidate. Other major endorsements included two former chairmen of the Democratic party, Paul Kirk and Joe Andrew, endorsing Obama, with the latter switching from initial Clinton endorsement. In addition, a host of add-on superdelegates and DNC members have endorsed since Pennsylvania voted. All in all, since the keystone primary, Obama has received 17 endorsements from unpledged delegates while Clinton has received 11, narrowing the superdelegate race to 265-247 for Clinton, significantly short of the margin of 150 she is expected to need to claim the nomination.
New Round of Polls Show Good News For Clinton, Obama
A new round of Quinnipiac polling shows Clinton doing better than Obama in the key battleground states of Pennsylvania, Florida, and Ohio in a potential matchup against John McCain, with Clinton winning Pennsylvania by 14 (Obama winning by 8), Ohio by 10 (Obama in statistical tie), and Florida by 8 (Obama in statistical tie). The news is not all bad for Obama, however, who, with stronger showings in those states than usual in those polls, moved his chances of being McCain to 49.5%, compared to 46.3% for Clinton, according to fivethirtyeight.com. The reason for this discrepancy is Obama’s superior chances to beat McCain in the swing states of Oregon, Washington, Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado, New Jersey, Michigan, Indiana, Wisconsin, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Maine, and Iowa. If the election were held today, and each candidate won where they were leading, Clinton would lose to John McCain 277-261, while Obama would beat McCain 275-263, though it is important to remember that some of Obama’s win and loss margins in states are much smaller and as such he could lose by 60 electoral votes or win by 60 electoral votes without national support changing more than a percent. As such, it’s safe to say that, despite polls in three of the few battleground states Clinton does better than Obama in showing that she does far better than Obama, they still have roughly the same shot at beating McCain.
And That’s The Muse
