Jon Ralston On The Delegate Situation In Nevada

He writes:

"I'll try to simplify - the 25 national convention delegates will be apportioned later. What networks and wire services are doing is extrapolating to national convention if all remains the same. Obama did very well outside Clark County and delegates are apportioned by congressional district - hence the delegate advantage. But this is all about perception now and Clinton will use the win going into SC and Super Tuesday. She also will try to energize Hispanics against Obama by using that Unite HERE Spanish-language ad that ran at the end. Clinton won Nevada, and Obama's claim of an advantage of one among delegates that amount to a tiny fraction of delegates will only matter at a brokered convention."

Comments

Marc, you might want to consider that voter suppression by the Clintons could become the dominant story line out of Nevada, based on accounts like these:

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/19/162953/644/790/439573

If there is video of these irregularities, and it is you-tubed, it could change the dynamics of the nevada aftermath to something very different than hair splitting over popular votes, delegate counts, etc.

At the very least, Hillary's "victory" gets an asterisk.

No bounce going forward.

No momentum.

This is going to be a delegate marathon not a sprint of spin.

Posted by RKA | January 19, 2008 8:39 PM

What will be remembered is Obama the cry baby; what a sour loser!

Posted by jack | January 19, 2008 8:39 PM

Marc,

I think it is important to keep in mind that there are three numbers here:

1) state delegate count: Hillary wins

2) national delegate count: Obama wins

3) caucus popular vote: ????

I see a lot of media reports conflating #1 and #3.

We don't yet know the caucus popular vote, but this post suggests that Obama might have won that too.

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/19/16644/2673/804/439559

Again, I don;t know if that is true, but say Obama wins 2 and 3, and HIllary wins only 1, then I think the media need to consider re-writing their headline.

I wonder if and when 3 will be released.

Posted by RKA | January 19, 2008 8:57 PM

RKA - You're beat as soon as you use dKos to validate your point. No one takes that group of deluded fanatics seriously.

Posted by robert ethan | January 19, 2008 9:18 PM

I'm just wondering when the media is going to pick up on Bill Clinton's complaints about the outsized value of the 9 at large caucus locations. It was my understanding that Bill felt that these had 5 times the delegate impact. If you factor that in and the fact that Clinton carried the vote here - doesn't that dramatically narrow the margins by which she "wins" statewide. I mean, shouldn't we divide those delegates by 5 to get the real results????

Seriously - if Bill Clinton is such an authority on these things - is claiming voter intimidation, etc... these numbers should be crunched. I would like to know what happens to the overall numbers if you take the amount of county delegates she won and divide them by 5.

Posted by MGL | January 19, 2008 9:18 PM

Hillary won. Flat out. She had the same percentage of support that Mitt Romney did on the R side. No one is questioning who won the state for the Reps.

She also won a lot more than the state of Nevada. Her victory brings Michigan into the perceptual mix as a result of being bookended by New Hampshire and Nevada. "Three in a row, baby, three in a row!". It also isolates South Carolina as a "black state". An Obama win there will come with an asterisk attached, from a perceptual point of view.

The third factor is that Nevada makes John Edwards a non factor in the race by virtue of his miniscule support. That helps Hillary tremendously in South Carolina where the voting figures to play out along racial lines. If Obama wins in S.C. it will not be by much, and will be directly attributable to the black vote. Finally it diminishes the effect of an Edwards endorsement of Obama.

Edwards went from potential "Kingmaker" as Bovine Ben Smith was wont to tout, to a wrinkled "Court Jester" with a tired, painted on, clown's smile.

Posted by robert ethan | January 19, 2008 9:29 PM

Here is another good analysis of the Nevada results as a split decision, not a HIllary victor

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion?bid=15&pid=272940

It may be true that we'll never know the popular vote, but the point then is that the media is being incorrest when they say Hillary won the popular vote and obama won the delegate count. That is the headline right now on Halperin's The Page. It is more accurate to say that Hillary won the state delegate count and Obama won the national delegate count and that we don't know the popular vote because it is not released.

That would be a more fair represtentation of the results and I think that without knowing the popular vote count, I think it is hard to say who really "won" nevada. it all comes down to which number you think is most important. I think the media people need to really think about their headlines on this one and keep in mind that we do not know that Hillary won the popular vote...all we know is that she won the state delegate count and Obama won the national delegate count....neither number represents real people, but Obama's number has nomination significance whereas HIllary's does not.

Posted by RKA | January 19, 2008 10:10 PM

Robert Ethan aka Mark Penn...put a lid on it. Your drivel is just moronic. So all Southern states are black states?? LMAO Such a disgrace. Well I guess I'll just have to call Nevada a Latino state....actually I'm just going to call HRC's entire campaign the gender "glass ceiling" it's my turn campaign....now that's just inspiring stuff.

Posted by Coltrane | January 19, 2008 10:10 PM

According to Robert Ethan's logic, all states are "female states" because 60%of the vote are females and so HIllary's victories in all states should be similarly dismissed!

What is good for the goose is good for the gander.

Posted by RKA | January 19, 2008 10:27 PM

The objective of the Nevada caucus is to secure the most delegates for the national convention. Accepting even the most generous Clinton spin, we have two possibilities:

a) Obama won.

b) Nobody won yet. We'll find out who got the most delegates in April.

In either case, all the major media stories about a Clinton victory are false. And the state delegate count does not equate to the popular vote. Why so much misinformation?

Posted by southpaw | January 19, 2008 10:38 PM

I've done an analysis in a spreadsheet of the Democratic delegate race that people might find interesting. It's what I believe Obama needs to do to win the nomination, state-by-state, most notably winning California. It's quite a tall order. I'll have the Republican race up tomorrow on my blog.

http://electopundit.blogspot.com/2008/01/democratic-delegate-race.html

Posted by ElectoPundit | January 19, 2008 11:12 PM

THE TWO CLINTONS PLAY DIRTY IN NEVADA

THE PRESS WILL NOT COVER IT.

READ HERE:

http://dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/1/19/162953/644/790/439573

Posted by eorse | January 19, 2008 11:59 PM

As an Obama supporter, I'm a little disappointed in him today.

In Iowa, based on his caucusing totals (including the support of nonviable candidates), Obama won more than 38% of all state delegates in Iowa. Edwards won 30%, while Clinton won 29%.

However, the national delegate numbers from Iowa were Obama 16, Clinton 15, Edwards 14. What's interesting is that the media narrative following Iowa did not really focus on the national delegate numbers, and Obama was declared the overwhelming winner. In my opinion, this was the correct narrative, and I was glad to see Hillary act gracious in defeat. She didn't tout the fact that despite John Edwards' claims of his second place finish, she potentially had more national delegates. I think this was smart because she realized that national delegates can change, and she would look like a sore loser because it was evident that she came in third place. I'm not sure if Iowa's national delegates are binding, but its clear in Nevada that they are non-binding.

So, in Nevada, based on her caucusing totals (including support of non-viable candidates), she received 51% of the state delegates, while Senator Obama received 45% of the state delegates. Now, based on Nevada's unique national delegate formula, Obama did in fact win 13 delegates, while Clinton received 12. However, because these delegates are non-binding, if Clinton wins overwhelmingly on February 5 and beyond, at the Denver Convention, the 13-12 deficit could become something like a 19-6 victory. Some Nevada national delegates would likely defect to Clinton to acknowledge her statewide victory. Likewise, if Obama seizes control of Super Tuesday, the 13-12 margin could climb to 22-3 in his favor, if Hillary tanks or a scandal sinks her candidacy.

I don't think the media will buy Obama's spin in talking about national delegates in an effort to diminish Clinton's win. We should realize this is not smart, because national delegates can change.

In contrast, the closeness of national delegates was a distant afterthought in Iowa. I think we all agree that Hillary would have looked silly if she said, hey wait.. I only lost 16-15-14, instead of 38-30-29.

Hence, I'm a little disappointed in Obama for failing to congratulate Hillary on her popular vote win in an effort to spin the results. Likewise, I thought Bill Clinton appeared slightly out of control today in making questionable allegations about voter suppression in an effort to hedge against the actual results.

Posted by johnkaw | January 20, 2008 1:00 AM

The point about "black" states is that if voters perceive Obama as representing black voters then he is going to suffer backlash further down the line. As far as female voters are concerned, I don't think there is much of a backlash effect. Men are not going to vote against Hillary because their wives voted for her.

As to there being 60% female voters in all states, that is probably close to true. Nation wide it is close to the case. However, nationwide, only about 10% of voters define themselves as "black" by race. If you have to choose between a possible backlash from 40% of the electorate vs. 90% of the electorate, it is an easy choice.

Posted by robert ethan | January 20, 2008 2:28 AM

Robert, you've laid out exactly why the clinton campaign has decided to play race and gender politics. Thanks for confirming what the campaign is plausibly denying. Obama has been doing his best to run as a nonracial candidate, but the clintons have done a pretty good job of getting the media to talk about race as much as possible.

Look, nixonian tactics to divide the races might work in the primary...but there are a lot of dems who are not black who don't like the clintons' race baiting etiher. If it does, however, Hillary will not be able to win a general if blacks stay home, especially against a strong nominee like McCain.

But maybe that's your point, Robert. Given your proclivity for racial politics and racial baiting, I wonder if your attacks on Obama, supposed support for Hillary is just because you want the dems to nominate the weakest person out there for the republicans.

All the arguments you make against Obama with regard to blacks are often made by republicans in coded ways about any democrat, who are painted as wanting quotas, soft on crime, etc.

Why not come out and admit that you are not really a democrat?

Posted by RKA | January 20, 2008 8:42 AM

John Kaw,

Go back and read Hillary's Iowa speech. She did not exact congratulate Obama, as Obama did very clearly to Hillary in his NH speech.

The Clintons have been the masters of blaing the refs and the process, and you think that Obama is ungracious for not conceding a contest in which he won more delegates that actually matter?

Posted by RKA | January 20, 2008 8:45 AM

I am so happy that RKA gets to decide that anyone who doesn't vote for his candidate is not a true democrat: what's next? loyalty oaths.
What if it is Obama's third party independents and clinton haters who are dividing the party?
People like the clintons and people like the obamas and people like the republican candiates who I for one could never vote for.
Obama is a real democrat but so is Clinton and so are most of thier supporters.

Did you read the amazing front page NYTimes article this morning about Obama's 3 young speech writers? He did not write his speech in Iowa. He did not write the phrase, "they said this day would never come" which was selected because it had so many possible and veiled meanings.
Yes everyone has speech writers but not everyone's main distinction is the oratory.
The article makes clear that Obama's is delivered straight off the teleprompter.
His 26 year old speechwriter mainly studies RFK and JFK and more than either, MLK jr. to get ideas. Its a very sweet article. he used to be a Kerry speech writer. went to a tiny school in Worchester. I do think there is something to this transparency But is that his word now or his speechwriters?
RKA: the state is in Hillary's W column, now and forever. You thought this eating crow moment would never come. How do you like them apples?

Posted by Michael C. | January 20, 2008 10:39 AM

the state is in Hillary's W column, now and forever

Until the convention, when the majority of the Nevada delegation votes for Obama.

Posted by awrbb | January 20, 2008 11:46 AM

why are obama supporters siding with Bush in the Bush v. Gore argument?

What happened to good old fashioned democracy? One person = one vote.

Posted by obamahypocrites | January 20, 2008 12:08 PM

Don't accuse others of hypocrisy when you don't know what you're talking about. Obama did not create the caucus rules or the system for apportioning delegates. The state party did. Nor is Obama responsible for the fact that our nominee is chosen by delegates at the convention, as opposed to a popular vote.

You should also be aware that the popular vote totals in Nevada have not been released. All we have are percentages of state delegates. We don't know how many people actually turned up to vote for Clinton or for Obama--or for Edwards, who probably had closer to 10% support, but came out looking worse because he failed to reach the viability threshold in many locations.

As for Gore, he knew perfectly well that the electoral college decides the winner of the general election, and he never tried to argue otherwise.

Posted by awrbb | January 20, 2008 12:29 PM

Obama dirty? Is he lawyered up with regards to the Rezco indictment?

Sun-Times reports Obama is the "unnamed political candidate" in the Rezco indictment.

From the Sun-Times:

"Obama denies knowing Joseph Aramanda -- named as "Individual D" in the indictment, and who received $250,000 in "sham" finder's fees "demanded by Rezko" -- but "Obama's office hired Aramanda's son as an intern in 2005, at Rezko's urging," reports the Sun-Times.

"Rezko is one of Obama's earliest political patrons," and although Obama claims he's only received $60,000 from Rezko's fundraising, the Sun-Times found that "[i]n 13 years in politics, Obama has gotten at least $168,000 in campaign donations from Rezko, his family and business associates."

Rezko is an infamous slumlord, although -- despite having worked on dozens of real estate deals that benefited his client Rezko -- Obama "said he was unaware of problems with the buildings and minimized the legal work he'd done." (So much for the "little people.")

http://www.suntimes.com/news/politics/obama/749138,obama20web.article

Posted by Richard Flatts | January 20, 2008 12:43 PM

According to Bill, the casino delegates COUNT FIVE TIMES MORE...

HRC won the vast majority of the casino delegates.

In Bill's prior reality then, HRC doesn't come close to Obama in delegate count.

So Obama must have won the state, right?

Posted by G Davis | January 20, 2008 3:02 PM

G Davis; did you read the paper this morning?
Did you watch the news? Both side spun and fought and campaigned as they do in every elections cycle. And we all watched the news to see who won the state and they announced it in every town and every state and it counts as a win.
I just watched bill say the most incredibly gracious things to Tom Brokaw on the news.
maybe we are all wasting our time on this blog trying to be right all the time instead of gracious:
I like your candidate a lot but until he beats Hillary Clinton I support my candidate.
Bill said things twice as gracious and generous as weither of us are being here.

Posted by Michael C. | January 20, 2008 6:58 PM