West Virginia: recap

The final tally was 67-26, with 7 percent going to John Edwards. As far as the video, note that HRC doesn’t start asking for money until about 2:30 into the video. Notice how she repeats some of the usual canards. Oh, she has “won” the swing states? Yeah, like Colorado, Washington, Missouri, Wisconsin, Virginia and Georgia….oh wait, Obama won those states.

Oh yes, Obama (and Edwards) took their names off of the Michigan ballots because they were requested to do so; Clinton did not. Now she claims it as a “win”.

Hey, let’s throw out some sports metaphors:

1. “Michigan and Florida should count”. Ok, this is a bit like saying that exhibition games should be counted in the standings after the fact!

2. “Obama dominated caucus states, which are disproportionally weighed toward party activists”.
Ok, this is a bit like criticizing a team for knowing the rules and doing well within them.

3. “Clinton would be ahead under Republican rules”. Well, this is false and well, this is like whining that a NBA team that lost a game “would have won” had, say, the 3 point shot rule not been in effect. Campaigns, like sports teams, plan their strategies and field their team so as to win within the current rules.

So, this means that Obama has a “white voter” problem?

No, not really; I present the following:

This map shows where HRC got 65% of the vote or more (by country) and note the huge swath that is Appalachia. BHO just doesn’t do well in that region.

Other quips:

Is appealing to an educated voter bad? An amusing column by Robert J. Elisberg. He claims that Hillary Clinton thinks so.

How close is this race, really? Consider the figures:

The math against Clinton is powerful. Obama led in delegates with 1,875, now just 150 short of the 2,025 needed to clinch the nomination. Clinton had 1,712 — 313 short.

With fewer than 400 delegates left — 189 to be awarded in primaries remaining after Tuesday and the rest uncommitted superdelegates — it’s possible that Obama could clinch the nomination when primary voting ends on June 3.

All it would take is for him to split delegates in the remaining five primaries evenly and take only one out of three remaining superdelegates.

Note: Clinton is expected to do well in Kentucky (Appalachia) though Obama should pick up some votes in Louisville. Obama should do well in Oregon (where he is way ahead) as well as in Montana and South Dakota. Puerto Rico should go to Clinton.

So what is HRC thinking? More and more, people are making the argument that she is trying to damage Obama so she can run against McCain in 2012.

I really don’t buy that argument. Why? Well, if McCain does indeed beat Obama, just what makes her think that she’ll be the nominee in 2012? She started with a lead in money, superdelegates, big donors, party support and about a 20-30 point lead in the polls, and then she went on to squander that. THIS is supposed to convince people that she should be the nominee in 2012? I don’t think so.

And, there is one very harsh reality. Those who are voting for her now are primarily the white elderly (women) and the white uneducated voters. The sad fact is that many of the current elderly people simply won’t be around in 2012, the proportion of uneducated voters will be somewhat smaller in 2012 (more people going to college) and the proportion of white voters will also be smaller. Her demographic base would have shrunk a bit by then.

So my take is that she is staying in because she knows that this is her shot. Note that she is making Huckabee like references to miracles.