The Delegate Race: Is Obama There Yet?

Editor's Note: The following comes to us from University of Georgia political science professor, Paul Gurian.

In her 2000 article "The End Game in Post-Reform Presidential Nominations", Barbara Norrander evaluated several indicators of when a nomination campaign is effectively over, specifically, when the frontrunner's last remaining opponent would drop out of the race. Two of these indicators are especially relevant at this point in time: the "gain-deficit ratio" (Collat, Kelley and Rogowski, 1981) and the "bandwagon curve" (Straffin, 1977).
These formulas are not precise predictors of when a candidate will drop out -- that is a decision made by the candidate and her staff. However they do indicate when conditions are such that the frontrunner's nomination seems inevitable -- conditions that figure into the opponent's decision-making.

Before the Indiana and North Carolina primaries, Obama needed 273 delegates to achieve a majority. To exceed the gain-deficit ratio threshold of .36, he needed to win 98.3 delegates. On Tuesday he won approximately 97 or 98 pledged delegates (estimates vary from 95-100). However, he also won about 10 super-delegates the next day. Whether the super-delegates are counted as part of the same "event" or not, Obama is very close to, or just above the threshold. (These numbers change if one assumes that the Michigan and Florida delegates will be seated.)

The Straffin formula suggests that Obama is still just shy of the "bandwagon" threshold. Considering the delegates won by each candidate, the current delegate margin (Obama's delegate total divided by Clinton's) is 1.09, not quite enough to exceed the current threshold of 1.14 (see below).

Although it is still possible for Clinton to win the nomination, there is an emerging consensus among reporters and politicians that the race is over. This perception coincides with the two mathematical indicators: it's not over yet, but it's very close.


Calculations:
BO 1854; HRC 1696 (as of 5/9)
total BO+HRC = 3550
total all dels = 4049
BO+HRC/totalDels = 0.876759693752
4.596 - 7.28 + 3.824 = 1.14
BO/HRC = 1.09

--posted by Paul-Henri Gurian (Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Georgia)


Related: (from fivethirtyeight.com...)

Everything you always wanted to know about Obama's pledged delegate clinching scenarios

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ABC News: Obama Now Leads in Superdelegates

With an additional switch this morning (Rep. Donald Payne, NJ) and a new endorsement (Rep. Peter DeFazio, OR), Obama now leads Clinton 267-266 among the superdelegates.


(via Daily Kos)

Paul has mentioned this several times in our discussion group meetings, but I'll reiterate the point here. It has seemed like only a matter of time before this happened. A new leader in the count has emerged and Clinton has one less thing to lean on in making an argument to the other uncommitted superdelegates.

Obama's Slide Revisited

Last week's post examining Obama's position in the electoral college in the post-Wright, post-"bitter" political environment sought to demonstrate that while, Obama had gotten some flak over both issues, he had only really lost ground in a handful of highly competitive swing states. Those changes were seemingly small, but in a closely contested race, that often means the difference between winning and losing a state. And Obama was on the wrong side of several of those states, falling 80 electoral votes behind John McCain in the electoral college projections.

Comparing the newly weighted maps to the original starting point at the end of March is like comparing apples to oranges to some extent, though. Those original maps didn't weight the more recent polls any more heavily than the older ones, so it isn't a true comparison. What happens to those March maps when the original data set is weighted to discount older polls is vastly different depending on which Democrat is considered the nominee. The Obama-McCain outcome was exactly the same: Obama 273-McCain 265. In the Clinton-McCain scenario, Clinton's deficit was larger than it had been in the original, unweighted projection. Instead of trailing by 90 electoral votes, she was down 325-213 to McCain.
All the weighting does is confirm what is already known: Obama was enjoying his highest point during the tail end of February and into March. Clinton, on the other hand, was on the opposite end of the spectrum during that period; enduring the Obama streak of victories. What has happened over the six weeks since is the interesting part, though. Clinton has taken a 112 electoral vote deficit and reduced it to 16 while Obama's 8 electoral vote advantage has disappeared and been replaced by a 44 electoral vote loss to McCain. [It was worse last week--80 electoral votes--at the height of Jeremiah Wright's second act. Of course, that may be mere coincidence.]
Overall, both the Democrats were down on average relative to McCain over this period (For comparison see Wednesday's maps.). But Clinton was up enough where it counted and down in places where she was already down to affect a positive change in her electoral vote total. The former first lady lost just 0.32 points on average to McCain but brought both Florida and Pennsylvania into her column to actually draw closer to the Arizona senator. She faltered in 18 states' poll averages but gained in 12 others. The new maps below depict the changes in these averages from the end of March until now.The picture is slightly different for Obama. He fell in the poll averages by an average 1.48 point to McCain. He, too, was down in some states where he already lagged behind McCain but his gains mostly came from blue states. Six of the 9 states where he gained were states where he was leading the presumptive Republican nominee already. He did gain in both Pennsylvania and Ohio, but not enough to swing the vitally important states in the blue. Obama differs from Clinton in that he lost ground in over twice as many states as he gained. Where Clinton saw two states turn blue and lost none, Obama lost three (Colorado, New Hampshire and Virginia) without gaining any.
What does all this mean? Well, the fact that both Democrats lost ground on average to McCain could indicate that the divisiveness of the battle for the Democratic nomination brought both candidates down. On the flip side, the argument could be made that those aren't losses for the Democrats as much as they are indicative of John McCain reaping the fruits of his labors in trying to shore up the conservative base of the Republican Party. Also, the fact that Obama lost more ground to McCain relative to Clinton could mean that the increased scrutiny after his string of victories and subsequent losses to Clinton in Ohio and Pennsylvania brought him back down to earth after his late February high.

After the events of Tuesday night, it will be interesting to see if Clinton falls in these polls averages and whether the inevitability of Obama's nomination gives him any boost.



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Unpledged Add-On Delegates

Well, we can thank the lengthy and competitive race for the Democratic nomination for bringing to light any number of rules and political players during this current nomination season. I mean, who among you was talking about the primary/caucus in Texas in 2004? Did Al Gore even care that there were superdelegates in 2000? And what about the timing of nominating contests? That never warranted any discussion before this year. Well, I suppose that has been discussed some (here and elsewhere).

As we glance forward at the race post-North Carolina/Indiana there are a couple of related questions that come readily to mind: 1) What are the numbers? and 2) Is it over? I'll leave the latter to the pundits and Hillary Clinton. The former, however, has been covered and seems to point toward the affirmative on the latter (See, the pundits are already at work.). If you are Hillary Clinton and her campaign, though, you are trying to find a way to cobble together an unlikely coalition of delegates to somehow pull this thing out. We all know the math on the pledged delegates and the superdelegates, but what about these mysterious unpledged, add-on delegates? Could this potentially be a hidden bastion of support that Clinton could use to get her close enough to Obama's tally; close enough that legitimately begin making the electability arguments again?

Possibly, but it's doubtful. There are only 76 add-ons (81 if you count Florida and Michigan's) and this group insn't going to act anymore monolitically than any other group of Democratic delegates. In fact, Obama already has a lead among those add-ons that have been selected. Most are selected at state conventions (others by committees of state party leaders) to represent their states as unpledged delegates to the national convention. Only a hanful have been chosen thus far but more will follow as the process transitions into the state convention phase for both caucus states and primary states.

Want more? If the link to 2008 Democratic Convention Watch isn't enough, NPR ran a story on the add-ons just last week as well.


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Kansas is Back in for 2012! But for How Long?

For a state that has rarely been relevant in terms of the presidential nomination process, Kansas sure has haggled an awful lot over the last couple of years trying to become so for either 2008 or 2012. The trials and tribulations of the Kansas legislature during the 2007 and 2008 legislative sessions have been well documented in this space (click on the "Kansas" label at the conclusion of the post for a fuller picture) and haven't been disappointing lately. After the House kicked a photo ID requirement/presidential primary combination bill back into conference last week, the plan for a 2012 presidential primary in the state looked to be left for dead. But yesterday, lost in all the hustle and bustle of North Carolina and Indiana, the Kansas legislature passed a compromise bill through both chambers. The bill now is just a governor's (Democratic Governor Kathleen Sebelius) signature away from making Kansas the first state to frontload its presidential nominating contest for 2012. Of course, the primary (or any future primaries beyond 2012) would have to be included in the budget by the legislature at that time.

Also with the date of the contest set for the first Saturday in February, Kansas could be in violation of national party rules if that first Saturday is before the first Tuesday in the month. [They're already excited at the notion of losing all their delegates in 2012 in Kansas.] This assumes, of course, that national parties maintain the same rules for 2012 that they had in 2008. As we've seen, the RNC has already been talking about reforms for the 2012 primary calendar. So, you're on notice Kansas.


...that is if the governor doesn't veto the bill.


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The new week brought few changes in terms of new state head-to-head polls, but the data being utilized is more robust now with the addition of data from Pollster.com, which in some states, added up to three new polls. Once again, this week we will be using a weighted average of the polls (from both Real Clear Politics and Pollster.com), giving the more recent polls greater value than the polls from earlier in the primary season.

With a loss in North Carolina and a "worse than expected" showing in Indiana, the Clinton campaign is up against it mathematically in both the delegate count and the overall popular vote tally. The addition of the weighted average last week gave her an advantage (albeit slight) over Obama (relative to McCain) in the electoral college for the first time since FHQ began mapping the potential fall match ups at the end of March. Does that edge continue this week and can her campaign continue to make the electability argument in the post-NC/IN primary environment if it does? The morning after in the press seems to be leaning in an "Is it over?" direction. And as I said in the comments to yesterday's post, those arguments are fine when you're winning. When you come out worse for the wear, however, it just seems like sour grapes (and that includes the Florida and Michigan delegates issue.).

To the maps!
For Clinton, the big news is that Florida gives her a fraction of a point's lead over McCain in the Sunshine state. And while that doesn't put her over the top in terms of the electoral college, it does get her closer to McCain than she has been in these scenarios over the last month. The kicker is that she wins Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio, but still loses in the electoral college by 16 electoral votes. Losing Washington and Oregon to McCain (vs. the Bush/Kerry outcome in those states in 2004) mean the difference between winning and losing the White House.
On the Obama side of the ledger, the big "get" this week is Michigan. The Great Lakes state swings into the Obama column, but only gets him to within 44 electoral votes of McCain. That's an improvement over the 80 vote deficit from a week ago, but certainly much worse than the virtual tie that had been demonstrated (in the weeks prior to adding the weighted poll average) between Obama and McCain. The striking thing is that Clinton does much better in the swing states. That's largely because of her positions in the big three (Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio). She carries a 24 electoral vote advantage over McCain out of 13 toss up states. Obama, on the other hand, leading the electoral vote count in states that aren't toss ups, lags way behind McCain in their 14 toss up states to the tune of 77 electoral votes.
The catch is that Clinton, for her part, is more competitive than Obama relative to McCain in only 14 states. However, when those 14 states include Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio, that group packs a pretty good punch. The argument could be made that while Obama is more competitive in more states, he is more competitive in red states he won't carry in November anyway. What Obama does bring to the table, as FHQ has shown with these maps, are states that aren't typically Democratic. And that while Clinton fares better in the big three, the McCain margins are slight (though they have increased for Clinton with the addition of the weighted poll averages). All that means is that a Democrat, whoever he or she may be, will be competitive in those states in the fall. Pennsylvania, for instance, has flip-flopped between McCain and Obama since the end of March.
As the campaign for the Democratic nomination moves forward after North Carolina and Indiana, the big question is how those results will affect Hillary Clinton. It is likely that she could see a dip in the polls that will come out in the next week. If those numbers don't go down, however, she may have weathered the storm and could once again focus on making the electability argument. That argument will be made in the interim anyway, but the key will be how receptive voters and the press are to hearing that message in the face of "defeats" in North Carolina and Indiana (Even though Indiana was seen as the last competitive state between Obama and Clinton, the poll numbers trended her way in the week before the contest and raised the expectations. Instead of being interpreted as a win in a competitive state, the Indiana results are being read as a defeat given her standing in the most recent polls in the state.). West Virginia and Kentucky are up next and both fit into the demographics that suit Clinton. But the delegate deficit is staring down on Clinton's face and neither state will offer her much relief.

***Please see the side bar for links to past electoral college comparisons.***

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Identity Politics (Brazile v. Begala)

For many of the last several UGA campaign discussion group sessions, identity politics has been one of the key buzzwords when the topic has been the Democratic race. Strategists Paul Begala and Donna Brazile (see below) pretty much summed up the potential difficulties the Democrats face once a nominee is chosen and begins campaigning for the general election. Is it really "blacks and eggheads" vs. blue collar workers? As long as this race for the Democratic nomination continues it is. The big question: Will a continued Clinton/Obama battle drive these factions further into their respective corners, making it harder to bring the two back together in the fall?






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Primary Day, Part XVI (The IN & NC Edition)

That's right. This is the sixteenth primary or caucus day of 2008 presidential primary season. And it may be the last, best chance for Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama to make a statement in terms of delegates before this phase of the process concludes on June 3. Of the 492 delegates from the remaining contests, today's contests in Indiana and North Carolina account for nearly half (44%). A split (Indiana to Clinton, North Carolina to Obama) or a sweep of today's two contests by Obama really tightens the screws on Clinton in the delegate count. Once the committed superdelegates from final states are removed from that remaining total there are only 245 delegates available following Indiana and North Carolina. If the current delegate margin holds through today's primaries, for Clinton to make up the 135 delegate deficit she would then have to win almost 78% (190 of 245) of those delegates just to tie Obama in the delegate count. And with just six contests left, that's a steep climb, even with half or two-thirds of them being closed to independents and/or Republicans, respectively. That even accounts for the contests in friendly territory coming up in West Virginia and Kentucky.

Having said that, what will everyone be looking for tonight? There are plenty or scorecards already out there for tonight's returns and most of them cover the bases. Here, though, are a few links that may be of interest to the loyal readers of FHQ:

fivethirtyeight.com: This site popped up in the comments section of my first electoral college map post and is a great resource. On their frontpage today (linked above), they have predictions for North Carolina and Indiana. But the gadget that is getting the most buzz around the web is the North Carolina outcome predictor that allows you to manipulate the white/black vote percentages for both Clinton and Obama and the percentage of the Democratic electorate that is black to see how each affects the results in the state.

Social Science Statistics Blog: I posted a link to this blog in the comments to the R&B Committee post below, but the rest of the site is worth checking out as well. Both the regression analysis here and the analysis on fivethirtyeight have Obama winning by double digits in the Tar Heel state. SSS also shows a six point Clinton win in Indiana.

Finally, Arnie Fleischmann here at UGA, passed along to me this New York Times story this morning dealing with the concerns those running for down-ballot races in states that hold their state and local primaries concurrently with their presidential primaries. See, there is an advantage to having those two sets of primaries split and then frontloading the presidential primary. Sure, turnout would be increased in a competitive environment like 2008, but at what cost? Apparently, a lack of attention to those running down-ballot.

And on that rather apropos note, back to the dissertation.


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The Rules and Bylaws Committee vs. The Credentials Committee

Let's assume for a moment that Clinton and Obama split Indiana and North Carolina, respectively, tomorrow. That outcome is the status quo outcome in the race for the Democratic nomination. Obama is "supposed" to win North Carolina, and the way polls are trending in Indiana, Clinton is "supposed" to win there. We've argued in campaign discussion group here at UGA that this race will continue until one candidate wins somewhere where they aren't "supposed" to win. If the above scenario plays out tomorrow (and remember few things have gone as expected during the 2008 cycle, though predicting the outcomes has become easier as certain demographic groups have line up behind each of the candidates), then that's two fewer contests that can decide the outcome; leaving only six contests (WV, KY, OR, PR, SD and MT) between Wednesday and the end of the primary phase of the election year 2008. And what that means is that the two most-often mentioned contests of this cycle will once again be thrust back into the spotlight.

What will the Democrats do with Florida and Michigan and their delegates? That is the question. If neither Clinton nor Obama wins one on their rival's turf, then the DNC's decision on Florida and Michigan's delegates becomes crucial to deciding the margins in both the delegate and popular vote counts. And that decision comes down to something of a battle between the Rules and Bylaws Committee and the Credentials Committee.

Who are the members of these committees and who/what do they support? As of now, the Rules and Bylaws Committee has jurisdiction over this issue. The folks on that committee appear to favor Clinton over Obama (in terms of superdelegates supporting each). And while that potentially bodes well for Clinton, the members of the committee have several other things to consider outside of their own personal preferences.

• First of all, as Thomas Edsall mentions in his Huffington Post piece, the Rules and Bylaws Committee members would have to deal with the perception that they have overturned the will of the people if they were to rule that Florida and Michigan should be counted.

• Secondly, they have to deal with the inevitable challenge of the decision by the Obama campaign to the Credentials Committee.
  

• Finally, and perhaps this should be first, the members of the R&B would have to confront the idea of going back on a penalty that they initiated.

Yes, it was the Rules and Bylaws Committee that levied the "lose all your delegates" penalty against both Florida and Michigan in the first place. Something tells me that the members of the committee may not be interested in completely emasculating the national party when it comes to the matter of the timing of future delegate selection events. If they reverse their own decision from last August, then they risk the DNC losing what little power it does have to deal with the frontloading of presidential primaries and caucuses. This consideration, and this one alone, is why I keep arguing that the DNC will go back to the original penalty (half the delegates from each state) and justify the move by saying that the complete stripping of delegates was too severe a penalty. This is the least talked about aspect of this decision but it may be the most important when it comes to the perceived strength of the DNC in relation to both the candidates and the state parties, but also in relation to its counterpart on the Republican side, the RNC.

[Of course, nothing regarding Florida or Michigan will be decided without intense consultation between the two candidates and the party. Obama won't budge if the plan means he loses the delegate or popular vote lead. And Clinton won't move from her position that they should be counted in some way. If there is a way to avoid this being a zero-sum game, neither the party nor the candidates have come up with it yet.]

What happens if we run the gauntlet on this decision, though? ...if the Rules and Bylaws Committee opts to count Florida and Michigan and as a result hands the nomination over to Clinton, for the time being? Well, if the R&B fails to act prior to the end of June, the jurisdiction on the matter goes over to the Credentials Committee anyway. But let's assume that R&B does, in fact, act to fully include Florida and Michigan. The decision on the nomination then goes from one committee to the next. And the Credentials Committee seems to lean in Obama's direction (based on the results of the 2008 primaries and caucuses so far and the Dean 25--those members appointed by the current DNC chair, Howard Dean.).

Does the appeal then reverse the reversal? Possibly. But that probably wouldn't be the final word. That's right, the floor fight we all envisioned last year as the least likely contingency plan for the nomination decision, could come to pass. And in that event, all the divisiveness, doomsday scenarios laid out by Howard Dean, Joe Andrew and some of the other party elites would come into play. All the while John McCain gets to practice saying his name with President in front of it.

It should be an interesting and well-covered meeting of the R&B on May 31.

...if Indiana and North Carolina go the way of the current polls.


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