Advantage Obama?
A major development late in the night turned Super Tuesday 2008 into a near-perfect tie between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. But the advantage going forward may lie with the insurgent.
Just minutes after Hillary Clinton was declared the winner in California, a powerful symbolic victory for her, media outlets reversed field and declared Missouri—which had been trending toward Hillary all night—for Barack Obama. And with that, Obama laid claim to a large state that had been expected in the run-up to Super Tuesday to fall into his opponent's column—something he had failed to do in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Arizona and California.
Both candidates can point to numerous achievements for the day.
Hillary won the big states on both coasts, racking up victories in Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York and California. But she also proved viability in the South (with wins in Tennessee, Oklahoma and Arkansas) and in the West (with Arizona and, potentially, New Mexico).
Obama can boast of winning the most states and—according to NBC's estimate, at least—probably the most delegates (by a microscopic margin). He can point to a victory in Hillary's backyard (Connecticut) and to a string of triumphs in Republican states (Alaska, Idaho, Kansas, North Dakota and Utah), along with two big wins in the South (Alabama and Georgia), one in the upper Midwest (Minnesota) and Colorado, too. Missouri, a quintessential general election swing state that had favored Hillary right up until the polls opened, represents his marquee victory for the day.
Moreover, Obama can also make the case that California would have been much closer if it hadn't been for that state's liberal early voting procedures, which resulted in half of all primary ballots being cast well before Super Tuesday—back when Hillary's lead in the state was commanding.
The results themselves represent a draw, mostly because (besides Obama's win in Missouri) neither candidate scored a dramatic victory on what had been perceived as the other's turf. Obama had held out hope for an upset win in New Jersey, Massachusetts or California and had been encouraged by late polling surges in all three, but fell short in each of them. (Connecticut is not considered an upset because of the state's history of favoring insurgents and because polls had been dead even there well in advance of Super Tuesday.)
Similarly, Hillary had hoped to pick off some of the small red states Obama had targeted or to win an extra Southern states (Alabama), but she failed as well. In the end, the psychological benefit Hillary received from winning California, the biggest state of the day, was off-set by Obama's last-minute surprise win in Missouri.
It will take some time to determine the delegate distribution from California and New Mexico (where results were only starting to come in at midnight), but NBC News estimated that Obama would likely reap at least four more delegates than Clinton for the day—a tiny but significant victory on a day when more than 1,600 pledge delegates were at stake.
The Super Tuesday dead heat may work to Obama's advantage in the long-run because of where the race heads next: a primary in Louisiana this Saturday and caucuses in Nebraska and Washington, all states that are on paper conducive to Obama. And next Tuesday brings primaries in Virginia, Maryland and the District of Columbia. In Maryland, Obama could benefit from that state's large black population (28 percent—the most in the North). In Virginia, he enjoys the backing of the state's Democratic governor, Tim Kaine, and a natural constituency with the affluent Democrats in the northern part of the state. And he should have no trouble winning D.C. Hawaii (Obama's native state) and Wisconsin (where progressives always do well) then vote on February 19.
In other words, the draw to which Obama battled Hillary on Super Tuesday may actually give him the credibility he needs to make some major scores in the coming weeks on what for him is very favorable turf. By only gaining a tie tonight, Hillary will struggle to gain the kind of momentum she'll need to offset Obama's advantages in the next wave of states.
The ball is now in Obama's court. He can build a clear—but hardly insurmountable—advantage in the coming weeks, one that might prompt risk-averse super delegates to decide that he might be the "safe" pick after all.
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Worst plagarists in the world: Maria Shriver and Barack Obama:
"You must be the change you want to see in the world."
Mahatma Gandhi
I cannot believe anyone with any religious convictions whatsoever voting for a person like Obama, whose allegiance - even to his own religion, Islam - is wishywashy at best. Nor can I understand anyone, who calls himself/herself an 'American' voting for someone, who appears to have a stronger allegiance to Kenya than he does to the United States. This presidential race goes far beyond the issue of Black and White. It has to do with unquestioned loyalty to the United States of America and its ideals as opposed to a large question mark. Unfortunately, however, a number of Americans fail to see beyond pigmentation. They say they want ‘change’ - and that is their primary motivation. To them, 'change' means a different skin color. What a shallow reason for choosing someone, who could one day determine the future of us all! If I recall correctly, the citizens of countless other countries once said they wanted the same thing. Those countries are now dictatorships.
Please, please, please tell me you are not serious about the Obama/ Islam tie. You seem like an otherwise intelligent and respectful human being, with a better than average command of the English language (especially for the internet). How are people continually being sucked into the ridiculous notion that Obama is a closet Muslim? Not that it should make a difference, but he is a well-documented Christian and as spoken, with characteristic eloquence, about his personal faith. This rumor of Obama's being a Muslim gives even radical conspiracy theorists a bad name. It's not even something that's up for debate. Stop spreading the lie!
This is Obama mudslingling.
First of all, I think a lot of peoples' religious convictions are all petered out after seven long, long years of such fine, upstanding, heterosexual, moral, God-loving, Christians in the Republican Party.
I'd sure hate to think what the nation would be like if these fine, upstanding folks in the Bush theocracy hadn't been Christians. What a terrible thought.
Loyalty to America? How about loyalty to special interests. Loyalty to oil companies was much more important than the air we breathe. Loyalty to George, and to George Washington. Yes, the George Washington on a dollar bill. Lots of dollars bills. Lots! Lots! Lots!
Tim Russert said this morning on Morning Joe that the other delegates at the convention may walk out if they try to seat the Michigan/Florida delegates. This is wrong. Why won't the commentators give us the delegate count with these delegates counted? Because Clinton won them! If Obama had won these 2 states, people would be wanting to count them. I hope that the leaders of the Michigan/Florida delegations have the backbone to tell Howard Dean and the other states, "Unless you seat and count our people, we are asking all Democrat voters in Michigan and Florida to boycott the November election!" We can then see the Democrats throwing another election away. I am sick and tired of the media telling me who to vote for. Black people can flock to Obama and it's good but if we vote for a white woman, we are being rasist. Pat Buchanan even said on Hardball that Bill Clinton had said nothing wrong about Obama.
Geoff, you don't seem that inteligent. Obama's father and step father were muslim. No lie, just the truth. Sorry to get sucked into the notion that he has muslim ties. Oh by the way, his middle name is HUSSIEN!! Dunsky...
um, to the hillary supporter who posted about michigan and florida...let me get this straight: even though all the democrats agreed that mich and fl wouldn't be seated, they now should be, because hillary won them?...i agree that it's BS that the people in these states didn't have their voices heard, but the state parties couldn't have waited until february 5th?...the party told them not to move it up to that date, they didn't listen, and there were penalties...if you're going to do anything, and i admit this isn't realistic, give florida and a michigan a redo sometime in march or april, where everyone's vote will count...but you can't count results that all the democrats vowed to ignore and that kept thousands of people home from the polls...and you can't say this is a proposal that favors obama, b/c hillary would likely win florida
"Geoff, you don't seem that inteligent. Obama's father and step father were muslim. No lie, just the truth. Sorry to get sucked into the notion that he has muslim ties. Oh by the way, his middle name is HUSSIEN!! Dunsky..."
Wow, you just presented an open and shut case. You've convinced me that Obama is a crypto-Islamist because his father and step father were muslim. You forget though that he only saw his father once after he was a toddler. He was raised by his agnostic mother. And his step father was a non-practicing muslim in a majority muslim nation. He just kind of went with the flow for political reasons, but wasn't devout. Obama attended a secular school while in Indonesia, not a madrassa. Oh, and his middle name is Hussein, that's sooo telling!!! I'm jewish, so by your logic if I chose to give my son the middle name of "James" (a common christian name) then if my son grows up to be a presidential candidate, your sad spawn will call him a crypto-christian? Your argument strains credibility.
If you want to base your specious claims on Obama's family, why don't you focus on the family members who raised him and were integral in his upbringing and world view: his mother and his maternal grandparents (white, middle americans!!) Anyone who believes Obama is a muslim, despite ample evidence to the contrary, is a sad representative of the human race.
to the person who is complaining about michigan and florida:
you have GOT to be kidding me! first of all, obama and edwards weren't even ON the ballot so for hillary to basically get half the delegates while obama gets zero is ridiculous. simply ridiculous.
and 2nd of all, nobody even campaigned in florida and so many of them just sent in early ballots. why don't you take a look at where obama campaigned as a standard for whether campaigning matters. and why don't you look at the super tuesday results where clinton was basically supposed to glide to victory in every single state by 20-30 points until obama started to campaign in them. and for hillary to go to florida to "declare victory" is the biggest sham i've ever seen.
give me a break.
I quote from the "writers" above:
"Geoff, you don't seem that inteligent. Obama's father and step father were muslim. No lie, just the truth. Sorry to get sucked into the notion that he has muslim ties. Oh by the way, his middle name is HUSSIEN!! Dunsky..."
"I cannot believe anyone with any religious convictions whatsoever voting for a person like Obama, whose allegiance - even to his own religion, Islam - is wishywashy at best. ... They say they want ‘change’ - and that is their primary motivation. To them, 'change' means a different skin color. What a shallow reason for choosing someone, who could one day determine the future of us all! If I recall correctly, the citizens of countless other countries once said they wanted the same thing. Those countries are now dictatorships."
Wow- I mean I really wanted to put some ellipses in here because I didnt want to repeat such bigoted ignorant comments. Such ignorance is the thing that Obama and Clinton's campaigns are both fighting to change, and as Obama and his wife have both stated, they do not want people to nominate him or elect him simply because he is black. Frankly, he represents what most of us are in this country, a mix. Not just one thing, but many many things that contribute to who we are. To try to classify him as Muslim simply because some members of his family, with whom he may have had little contact, is ludicrous. Instead of judging him for these things, (for his middle name being Hussein making our judgment just as shallow as voting for him for his skin color), perhaps we should discuss the platform he is running on, and determine whether that makes him a good candidate or not. Such gross misinformation is truly inexcusable.
I'm a Michigan voter and a Democrat and I don't think the Michigan delegates should be seated and I will still vote in November.
Clinton-lovers will try to GAME the system and spread disinformation any way they can going forward, as they already have to no avail. Turn the page.
Justin,
If you go to Wikipedia and check, you can see that both Clinton and Obama had people "informally" campaigning in Florida. Check the fladems website and you will also find that more people voted in the Democratic primary than had ever voted before. It would have been impossible to change the date of the primary with the Republicans controling the Florida legislature. Also all of the Democratic candidates were on the ballot. Go ahead and support Obama and lose in November. We went through this already in TN with Harold Ford Jr. whom was a lot better candidate than Obama. The Republican machine smeared him in the general election.
Barack Obama08!Stop your mudslinging.Obama is a Christian.
Please be objective and honest in your posts.
"Go ahead and support Obama and lose in November."
Obama will present a clear choice against McCain, but McCain will trump Hillary on all of her proclaimed assets including experience in DC and war-mongering. If we are really unlucky and Hillary is elected President, the same pressures that made her enthusiastic about the Iraq war will lead her to have war with Iran. That is something we definitely cannot afford.
First, lets note that the article on which all of you are commenting is about the upcoming primaries and who has the advantage and momentum (the conclusion is Obama, if you hadn't noticed), not about religious affiliation. Therefore, I wonder if the person who began this string of comments by bringing up the false muslim claim simply looks for any article mentioning Barack Obama in order to spread false hate mongering.
Folks, please take note: Barack Obama is the only candidate on both sides of the aisle who chose Christianity as an adult and became baptized, over 20 years ago. Since that time, he has been a practicing Christian in the same church. Moreover, if you pay any attention to his message of compassion for the poor and underprivileged, inclusion of all despite race and background (remember the song you sang in Sunday school that goes "Jesus loves the little children, all the children of the world"), his belief in community organizing and giving to others, this is the Christian message!!! Finally, in a country where religion and government are supposed to be separated, this shouldn't matter, but since some are focusing on it, lets set the record straight.
Moving on, as for Florida and Michigan: first, I find it despicable that Hillary Clinton would pledge not to campaign in MI and FL because of their violations of the party's rules, and then try to claim their votes. It is political gamesmanship and desperation, and says something about her character. (Also, please note that she did not claim to care about the alleged disenfranchisement of the people in MI and FL until she lost Iowa and South Carolina.) Second, only Hillary was on the ballot in MI. Period. The others were on the ballot in FL but the voters clearly did not understand what was happening in their state, because thousands showed up in FL yesterday to vote in the democratic primary! (Its on the news today for those who did not know this.) Clearly, this shows a voting disaster that was either botched or orchestrated by FL (sound familiar?). Finally, no one campaigned in FL, not even Hillary. A few enterprising regular folks went out on their own to support their candidate, which is democracy in action. However, in a democratic race where an up and coming senator is running against the wife of a former president with 15 years of name recognition, campaigning by the actual candidates is crucial to giving voters knowledge of the new candidate, and a real choice.
Please, friends, voters, use your intelligence, read the papers, visit the websites of the candidates, obtain some real knowledge, then do your duty and vote with conscience!
Mr. Obama has and will win because he has run his race with talent, skill and GRACE. The Nation is maturing beyond the ideological WARFARE of the 1990s and understand we must have a strategic plan for the 21st Century and re-embrace our place in the world after this dark night. How ironic the States who gave us the Bush nightmare, are self-correcting and voting for Barack. And, the Clinton Machine has a strong grip on the States where favors and lobbyists for special interests want to continue distracting voters (Latinos?) with foolish class/race baiting. Americans, PLEASE REMEMBER THE POLITICIANS WHO DID NOT GET ON BOARD and they can take their place in the past, cronyism universe of the private sector their next election cycle...one by one.
His father was an atheist. His stepfather was not at all religious. Even if neither of these things were true, it would not make him a Muslim. He is a member of the Trinity United Church of Christ. Stop getting your education from chain emails. Tell me, how much money did you send that poor exiled prince in Nigeria? Oh, and you spelled 'intelligent' wrong.
Obama has achieved some impressive results in energizing politics across the board. All to the good. But too many people seem to go beyond sane enthusiasm. There are a lot of factors that, without denying the successes and assets Obama brings to the campaign, nevertheless mitigate the picture of a TSUNAMI of Obama support.
l. As Chris Matthews (EW!) noted about McCain, Obama (as well as McCain in his winning states) made many of his gains in states that typically go Republican. Apart from the good feeling of seeing a movement grow, just from the perspective of winning the presidential election of 2008, how important is it that Obama carried Idaho, Kansas and Alaska? About the same importance of McCain's victories in New York, California and Illinois, right? Senator Clinton won the states that form the backbone of a Democratic victory in November.
2. Not to deny the significance of Obama's ability to draw in and fire up young people, ages 18-30. This is a tremendous accomplishment in building a Democratic consensus, but there's another cohort as large or larger that seemingly matters to no one in the netroots. Working women, especially single mothers, have flocked to the Clinton campaign. It's a similar phenomenon, first-time voters joining the Democratic consensus, only the age range covers thirty years, not ten, so the cohort is potentially larger and likely to be more influential, since their interests are more uniform. I have read a zillion or so blogs exulting over Obama's hold on young, educated, "creative class" voters, but I have to dig hard to learn more about working class women of all ethnic persuasions coming out in strength for Clinton.
3. Finally, we should not have to be reminded that the labor unions, environmentalists, feminists, senior citizens, Latinos and old-line yellow dog Democrats are not chopped liver.
Obama and his partisans should work for and enjoy the successes that are rightfully theirs - without using this success as a cover for Clinton Derangement Syndrome, formerly known as old-fashioned sexism.
Brownell, Senator Clinton won 'blue' states that always vote Democratic in November. In other words, those states will vote for whoever is the Democratic candidate. Very simple.
Can we just say again that if Obama *did* believe in Islam-- which he doesn't-- there wouldn't be anything wrong with that? That plenty of Muslim people in the US are perfectly well qualified for public service?
I am really shocked at the bigotry of that second post.
Obama is a practicing Christian, but it humiliates me as an American to hear my fellow citizens speak/write in such derogatory ways of people of other faiths.
You can tell people that Barack Obama is Christians till you're blue in the face and it wouldn't matter. That has nothing to do with him running for president. What people are looking for is a Bush look a like, because he has a heart and want to change what God said that all people are equal, here comes the Oppresser trying to put a stop to it. I want a president who will be Loyalty to the people not America? America is a country that's makeup with all kind of people. Even though we are different, we're still brother and sister. People that stated that it's not a color thing, you need to stop lying to yourself. Barack already show people he can make a different by raising money in such a short time. The key word is raise not steal or cause war just so they can get it. If people are not smart enough to see a real thing, well don't complain when times are hard. Just keeping voting for the Bush system. One last thing, the Clinton are trying to beat the system by letting his wife run.
Interesting that anyone would mention un-questionable loyalty or allegiances to the United States.! You should strongly put that question to the Clintons! Questions whether their allegiance is for America or the Billions of American money they sent to Israel while in office for 8-years. Then we can have a debate.
The only candidate that has shown allegiances to America and the change that is ahead for America; stood his ground - has been Obama Barack! There are NO LIES coming from his camp!
Speaking of shallow -- it seems to me that most Americans forget the mess the Clintons did! Any votes she earn' is out of shallowness!
Terri Gnazari is the biggest liar in the history of the world
It really amazes me how some people are so smart. Joanna said in her post that she knows that almost 1 million people in Florida went to the polls not knowing what they were doing and the majority voted for Clinton maybe by mistake?
Maybe her or some of the other Obama supporters could tell me how someone could pay 350,000 dollars for a lot and let you use it for your fenced in yard at your home. I don't have friends that good but then again I don't have any that have charges of bribery against them either. This may seem mean but I assure you that it will be asked many times before November by the GOP.
This story is nowhere near bias. It paints out what happened on Super Tuesday. It explains the pros and cons for each candidate. Who are you people saying this story is bias? It simply tells you the real deal.
This story is nowhere near bias. It paints out what happened on Super Tuesday. It explains the pros and cons for each candidate. Who are you people saying this story is bias? It simply tells you the real deal.
Thank you! Finally some sense in this forum. The Clintons need to go on about their business. Obama is our answer to a better future. If it will help the country he will do it. He is an honest genuine man with a dream of helping this country. People need to stop placing a stigma on him because of his color. Hillary cannot defeat John McCain. If she is the nominee, all the sudden the republicans will love McCain again. We better be careful!!!
Obama is not a Muslim, never was a Muslim and cannot be called a Muslim by any stretch of the imagination.
Obama did not go to a Muslim schools when he was younger, and Obama did not swear into office on the Koran. If anyone has told you otherwise, they are all LIES. Stop spreading rumors and lies. I will never, ever, vote republican because of the lies that you guys spread to smear the competition.
Even if Obama were Muslim, that shouldn't rule him out. But he isn't, so stop saying he is you racist, bigoted pricks.
__________________________
info@KatrinaAlliance.org 02/09/08
Re: Terri Gnazari
You sound compromised, misinformed and ignorant...
principles of the United States Constitution.
Grassroots Political Analyst