HRC Campaign: Obama Is Frontrunner

Hillary Clinton's campaign concedes that Barack Obama is the party's frontrunner.

In a conference call with reporters late this morning, senior adviser Harold Ickes gave a lecture on delegate mathmetmatics from the Clinton perspective, acknowledging that Clinton trails Obama by (at least) 75 delegates. Clinton would do well in many of the remaining sixteen delegate selection contests, Ickes said, but "both candidates will need a number of automatic delegates to clinch the nomination." Ickes argued that since Obama would need nearly as many superdelegates to win the nomination as Clinton does now, it's disingenous for him to argue that the nomination ought to be decided by the pledged delegate count alone.

Apropos of not much, Ickes added "We think Mr. Obama is the frontrunner."

Unstated was the expectation that Clinton's victories in the future should be interpreted through that lens.

Comments

Seems relatively uncontroversial given the results of the last 3 weeks.

Posted by dry_fish | February 20, 2008 12:27 PM

"We think Mr. Obama is the frontrunner."

This just in from the Department of the Incredibly Obvious.

Posted by SDinIA | February 20, 2008 12:28 PM

Don't worry, Harold. The super-delegates (er, sorry, automatic delegates) will be jumping ship en masse to Obama to put a stop to any perceived fracture in the Democratic Party. So no worries about a fight at the convention, looks like things should be wrapped up before then.

Posted by Craig | February 20, 2008 12:30 PM

Does this new ""automatic delegate" term mean that the Clinton campaign doesn't want to call them "super delegates" anymore because automatic makes it seem like the ones already committed to Clinton are automatically going to the convention for her and the remaining ones will automatically end up voting for her because that is what they automatically must do instead of doing so as a result of immense pressure and on their own whim?

Posted by Evan | February 20, 2008 12:43 PM

Must sting to be the frontrunner for three years only to give that up at the last minute.

Posted by Jack | February 20, 2008 12:49 PM

Ickes argued that since Obama would need nearly as many superdelegates to win the nomination as Clinton does now, it's disingenous for him to argue that the nomination ought to be decided by the pledged delegate count alone.

Well, someone's being disingenuous there, but I'm not sure it's Obama.

Posted by Jeff Larson | February 20, 2008 12:56 PM

funny. this lead read like a headline from The Onion. Totally deadpan.

Posted by latina for obama | February 20, 2008 1:06 PM

I hope the media calls them on this "automatic delegate" moniker every time they use it. The whole delegate fiasco is confusing enough without having voters think the superdelegates are now somehow magically and "automatically" allotted.

Posted by Amy | February 20, 2008 1:07 PM

Automatic For The Delegate. Meaning that the Clinton camp will soon be Out Of Time.

Posted by pseudonymous in nc | February 20, 2008 1:57 PM

It would be funny if it weren't so sad that the Clinton team still thinks there is a point to them playing the expectations game. Living in Hillaryland must be a surreal experience about now.

Posted by J.B. | February 20, 2008 2:25 PM

I'm really concerned that if Clinton wins Ohio, Texas, and Penn, but is still behind in pledged delegats, there is going to be in extremely devisive split in the party.

Hillary will argue that she should get the nomination becasue she won most of the big states, and most of the major swing states. Obama will argue that he should get the nomination because more people voted for him and he earned more pledged delegates.

Obama really won't be able to back down from his possition, it would seem crazy to say that despite the fact that he won more votes that he should be the nominie. And if Hillary won't back down from her possition the party is going to split down the middle.

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