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Obama leads the day 2-0
Nevada DNC member Yvonne Gates has endorsed Obama
Maine add-on Gwethalyn Phillips has endorsed Obama
The former Clark County Commissioner and member of the national party's Rules Committee told The Associated Press late Saturday that she had been impressed by the Illinois senator's campaign.
"I have been admiring, just from afar, looking at the way they run the campaign. I have been pretty impressed with this operation," she said. "I think he would make a great president."
Delegates ratified the party chairman's nomination of Gwethalyn Phillips of Bangor, a former state party official, as an "unpledged add-on" delegate as specified in party rules. But Maine Democratic Party Executive Director Arden Manning said Phillips was recognized as an active Obama supporter.Phillips, who played a lead role in the Maine presidential campaign of Bill Clinton in 1992, said in a telephone interview she has been involved with the Obama effort this time around, "in Penobscot County in particular."
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25 comments:
Can someone talk about the popular vote? Clinton keeps saying she's won the popular vote but something doesn't add up. Didn't DCW do something like this before? Can it be updated or created?
RealClearPolitics has some decent comparisons of popular vote tallies by various metrics. Prior to today's result, Clinton is only winning the popular vote if you treat Michigan as if none of the "uncommited" votes were for Obama (he withdrew his name from the ballot). I do wish RCP had an entry for counting those votes for Obama, although they do give you the numbers so you can do the math on that yourself.
Basically, even after today's results, any fair way of adding up the popular vote will show Obama with at least a slight lead.
Oh, to be fair, what Clinton usually says is that more people cast votes for her than for any other candidate. Because Obama's name wasn't on the ballot in Michigan, that's true. But it's not what most people would think is meant by "winning the popular vote."
Clinton does claim to have won the popular vote, however there are criteria to her equations.
1. Caucus states that don't have a popular vote don't count in her equation
2. In Michigan where Obama had withdrawn his name from the ballot Clinton counted him with 0 and herself with the full allotment due to voting.
3. She claims 17 million voters voted for her and that they shouldn't be ignored, however just as many voted for Obama and I guess she feels that those 17 million should be ignored (just like all those small states she didn't win).
Sorry if the analysis is slightly biased but I am an independent who is for Obama in '08.
Thralen
The big fuss about the final vote (on Michigan) at the RBC meeting was (at least largely) about the ability to claim the Michigan vote as a legitimate contest, and thus as part of the popular vote. The compromise passed does not explicitly use the primary vote, and thus does not give it legitimacy.
According to CNN this morning, the actual fuzzy math had changed. She is no longer keeping out all of the caucus state (just Maine and Washington). I think that this may change as well as we see the numbers come in from PR today. She was expecting to lead him n popular vote there by about 350,000-450,000 votes, but the turnout was low. Anyway, the new fuzzy math as of this morning stated that she had the popular vote if you don't count any votes for Obama in Michigan and you also cannot count Democrats Abroad, American Samoa, Guam, Maine and Washington and of course the situation with Michigan.
I am an Obama supporter, and I just want to say that although I am thrilled by the decision yesterday and I would have expected every uncommitted to endorse Obama immediately if they had ruled that way, I kind of feel a little funny about them taking the four delegates from her. It is fuzzy, of course, because there were the 30,000 voters who wrote in names and they would have to be some percentage (is it true that they don't even count those votes in the percentage cast, as say "uncommitted" or was I understanding that wrong?) I feel like the people there might feel this was wring and I can't say I wouldn't too if that had happened here, but that is what the state said they wanted, and I imagine that they could better tell the will of their people. As far as Edwards delegates go, none have gone to her so far anyway, so that seems like a silly issue, and we are only talking four delegates, which amount to two really, but I just feel funny about them taking her four delegates.
Hillary Clinton also can claim to have won the popular vote for the most people EVER to vote AGAINST a presidential candidate! LOL
Over 17 million people have said 'no' to HRC.
This race can be called anything people want, but at the end of the day, we don't berate a horse winning the kentucky derby by only a nose, we say it was thrilling and exciting.
Roll on Tuesday. And i'm not talking about deoderant.
@dmx
Your pledged delegate count in the sidebar is off by 1 each from the numbers in table in the PR results post below. Is there an error or have I missed something?
Also Clinton has won more delegates in the primary states than Obama. Who’s decision was it to ignore the caucuses? I don’t think the 4 MI delegates are the reason she will lose. I would have rather seen her get all 73. Obama does not need them and it can be seen by some as running up the score or rubbing her nose in it.
It begins... Now that Hillary has done her speech in PR the Obama campaign is about to open the floodgate!
Hillary will have about a 130,000 vote lead in Puerto Rico, not 350,000 to 450,000. A small percentage of Puerto Rico's electorate voted. Her staying there probably accounted for the lead. So what?
She will not have a lead in the popular vote, if counted accurately and if that is possible to begin with. More votes cast for her? Very, very fuzzy math.
Rules. By Democratic Party rules it is the delegate count that matters, e.g., more votes cast, or whatever, is all smoke.
Either late Tuesday, or early Wednesday, Senator Obama will have the necessary 2118 delegate count to claim that he it the Democratic Party's nominee.
It is over.
Harold Ickes is on Meet The Press...what an ___.
When You look at the add-ons still to be selected, at least 15 of them will be Obama superdelegates, based on his having won the states handily. (I have been very conservative in counting- it could be as many as 18.). Clinton's only hope has been and will be not only that the uncommitted go for her (and based on comments some have made, they are going for Obama), but also that Obama superdelegates and/or pledged delegates switch to her, which is not going to happen.
I do think it has been over for some time, I think the Clinton campaign is delusional, and I think they are duping anyone who is donating money to them.I also think that her continuation in the race since Texas, Ohio has hurt Obama, and, if Obama loses in November, she is at least partially responsible. I would hope when the magic number plus 5 or whatever is reached, that she will give it up!
Let me put it this way. If to make the popular votes argument you need to forget the caucus and banking on a big turnout in PR a place that not even voting in November you already lost!
The only ACCURATE way to count the popular vote is to go by the certified results according to the Secretaries of State.
Clinton leads the popular vote as certified by over 300,000 votes as of today.
Anything else is guesswork, oppinion and partisan bias.
There is only 1 certified popular vote total. Hillary has won it by 300,000.
s.b.--there is a difference between precision and accuracy. Your method is the only way to get a precise number. It is also most certainly not accurate, as in several cases the secretaries of state do not certify results.
I agree that not using the precise number involves guesswork and opinion. The system in place simply does not allow a determination of the popular vote which is both precise and accurate.
As HRC said in her speech today, it is reasonable for superdelegates to choose their vote based on 1) what they perceive the will of the voters in the process to be; 2) electability in the Fall; 3) who would make the best President.
Her own formulation does not suggest that some narrow definition of popular vote is what should be in the superdelegates' minds. They can look at the tallies and decide for themselves whether it is reasonable, for instance, to count Obama as receiving no votes in Michigan or to count Maine as having voted for no one at all. Some superdelegates may decide that Clinton better reflects the will of the voters, but I don't think most will see it that way.
I honestly think that Clinton has laid down a fair set of criteria for the superdelegates to use in their decision, and has then given them her arguments as to why she wins on all three points. That's what she should do. I think the way she has formulated her argument suggests that she will fully endorse the resulting decision as to the nominee.
S.B. - sure, whatever you say. Too bad that just about every online total disagrees with that. Kindly use your expertise to explain this for me then?
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/president/democratic_vote_count.html
Four of six potential totals show her losing, even the two that do don't show a 300,000 gap, 255k is the farthest lead she possibly has and that counts nothing for Obama in MI. AND leaves out these four states: IA, NV, ME, WA
Summary: I think the sources you are quoting leave out a number of states. Just like HRC, they don't have numbers you like OR you'd have to do real math to figure it out so you won't count them.
Thanks... (not)
Thralen
All - DCW is not getting involved in popular vote calculations, and we just removed the one popular vote number we had been carrying.
Popular vote is, for better or worse, a subjective measure at this point, and is one of many metrics the campaigns can use to make their cases to superdelegates, and the superdelegates are free to listen or not listen to those arguments as they see fit.
The only ACCURATE way to determine who the Democratic Party nominee for President is to count the single metric that is used to make that determination, and that is delegates. As Ickes said in January, this is about delegates. That is why, by any ACCURATE tally, Obama WON Nevada, Texas and New Hampshire. Of course, it also means Missouri was a tie!
There are other metrics that you can reel off, like popular vote, "certified" popular vote, states won, big states won, number of electoral votes of states won, national polls versus McCain, electoral maps based on polls versus McCain, national Democratic Party polls, delegates in primary states only, who has the most "momentum" points, votes case in states beginning with the letter "n" and so forth. The POINT of all these metrics is to try to convince superDELEGATES to vote for a certain candidate in Denver and the value of the metrics is based on the degree of success they have in moving the number of the REAL metric that matters, which, again, is DELEGATES.
This is a point largely lost on the national media's rush to "declare a winner" on primary nights. It's a little like keeping the popular vote tally on general election night. It's a metric that can give them something to talk about, but is not worth much more than that. Just ask Al Gore.
It's positively silly to count the popular vote for ANYTHING! We have a system in place, and it's a very good system. We assign delegates to states based on their population and Democratic activity, we allocate delegates to candidates based on how well they do in the popular vote of that particular state, and we allow the states to come up with their own rules regarding whether to have a caucus or primary, whether to have an 'open' primary/caucus or a 'closed' one, whether or not to allow voter registration on voting day, whether to require an ID, and many other issues which each state can decide for itself but which can radically alter the number of "popular votes" that get cast.
Look at the examples of Missouri and Minnesota -- they're both middling big states. Missouri is bigger by about 700,000 , but Minnesota is much more Democratic. They have, and should have, the same number of delegates -- 72 apiece. BUT... 825,050 people voted in Missouri's primary whereas 214,066 people participated in Minnesota's caucus. If we were to consider aggregate popular vote to mean anything we would be asserting that Missouri counts four times as much as Minnesota does. That's absurd!
Fourteen states decided to have caucuses, and Obama took the majority of delegates in every one of those fourteen states (Clinton took the majority of the three delegates chosen in the American Somoa caucus -- that was her only caucus victory). Since they were caucuses, they didn't provide as much of a popular vote plurality as they would have if they had held primaries.
It's crazy to punish Obama because states in the area of the country where he is strongest decide to have caucuses instead of primaries. No one should count popular vote for anything.
kennyb,
Looks like we both came up with ways to make the same argument. Obviously, we're both passionate about it. ;-)
And, of course, Paul, we're both right! ;-)
Interesting.
As far as I know, Obama was the first one to introduce popular vote as a metric in this nominating cycle: as I recall, his rule was that if a candidate had won the most states, the most votes, and the most pledged delegates, than that candidate should be the nominee.
I agree that introducing it as a metric is troubling, for a number of reasons, particularly including those that Paul Bradford brings up.
But both remaining Democratic candidates have endorsed its consideration. And I agree with them.
Suppose that there was an election cycle in which one candidate got 72% of the pledged delegates but only 46% of the popular vote. Further suppose that the system was set up so that there weren't very many superdelegates. The delegates would determine the nominee, of course, but I think a result like that should rightly cause some examination. What's responsible for the big deviation? Is it really how the party wants its system to work?
The numbers I just gave are not hypothetical. I just calculated them--they're for John McCain this cycle. That's right--he's been running essentially unopposed for much of this cycle, and will still end up with less than 50% of the popular vote. In fact, I'm sure there are some Republicans who are thinking about their system-it allowed a candidate despised by much of their base to end up the nominee. If the Republicans had more supers in their system, I wonder what would have happened...
I'm not suggesting that we have popular vote determine the nominee. I'm also not suggesting that DCW should carry an "official" popular vote tally, because there's dozens of variations that could be argued for. But I am asserting that it is a valid metric to examine and try to estimate, because it provides a check on the system.
If one candidate wins slightly more delegates and the other slightly more popular votes, then fine--whatever fine tuning goes into the delegate count is the rules of the game. If one candidate wins the vast majority of delegates and a small majority of the popular vote, also fine--that just means the delegates amplify differences in vote. But if they're way out of whack, that suggests the system must be examined. Maybe there's a good reason, but we should know what that is.
In this case, the results are reassuring. Obama has ended up with a small but significant lead in pledged delegates (call it 3%), and with the popular vote within 1% either way. No indication there of any breakdown in the system that the supers need to come in and remedy.
Apologies for the long-winded post. :)
SarahLawrenceScott wrote:
Suppose that there was an election cycle in which one candidate got 72% of the pledged delegates but only 46% of the popular vote. Further suppose that the system was set up so that there weren't very many superdelegates. The delegates would determine the nominee, of course, but I think a result like that should rightly cause some examination. What's responsible for the big deviation? Is it really how the party wants its system to work?
Well 72% is far from 46%, but I can think of reasons why the party would want the system to work that way. First, the party gives more delegates to Democratic districts then Republican districts. So a candidate who did very well in GOP districts but not in Democratic districts would get a smaller relative % of the delegates. So there's one reason the numbers can diverge.
Two, many states allow independents or even Republicans to vote in Democratic primaries. Is that good? Yes if you want your candidate to have greater appeal to those groups, no if you want your candidate to have greater appeal to Democrats. But this, along with the distribution of delegates, can cause an even greater disparity between the vote and the delegates.
Also, the DNC does not allow winner-take-all elections. This would give more delegates to popular vote winners in each state.
Maybe there should be some bonus for winning a state? Winning a state by 1 vote in most elections is huge. Now, you win a state like Ohio by 8 points and pick up a net of only 7 delegates? (made up numbers). Maybe 10% of the delegates in each state goes to the winner, and then do the rest as now?
Not sure what the answer is. In a close election, all these quirks show up.
First of hopefully many today!
http://www.courant.com/news/politics/hc-apdinardo-0602,0,6998618.story
Connecticut Party Chair Nancy DiNardo
New Obama Endorsements:
NV DNC Yvonne Gates (6/1)
ME Add-on Gwethalyn Phillips (6/1)
VA DNC Jerome Wiley Segovia (6/2)
CT DNC Nancy DiNardo (6/2)
So far, Clinton has 7 MI SDs for 3.5 SD votes. Obama has 11 MI SDs for 5.5 votes.
Thus, the net effect of the RBC decision to halve MI SDs has cost Obama 4 more SD votes than it has cost Clinton.
So much for her claim Obama "stole" 4 of her delegates.
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