It only gets worse. A "virtual tie" in Texas, and big Clinton wins in Ohio and Pennsylvania, would leave Obama with a small lead in both delegates and a toss up in the popular vote. That would impact the superdelegates . . . and bring back the Florida / Michigan debacle to the front burner for months.

Posted at February 14, 2008 12:20 PM in response to Poll: Hillary Holds Big Leads In Ohio And Pennsylvania

To quote Will Rogers - "I don't belong to an organized political party -- I'm a Democrat."

There are three possible scenarios here - unfortunately one of them may, and the other will, lead to the election of President McCain.

First, if Obama wins either Ohio or Texas, it is all over, even for Clinton. She will concede.

However, let's suppose, as it will likely be, that Clinton wins, but not by a "blow-out", so that she ends up with fewer elected delegates than Obama. If it then goes to the convention, and Hillary wins through the superdelegate vote, it will be very hard to appease the Obama supporters, and it is likely they will desert the Democratic party.

Worst, if Hillary needs to pull in the Florida and Michigan phoney primaries to win, she will guarantee that a good number of Democrats either stay home or even vote for McCain (I'd rather have a right winger with integrity than a left winger with none).

Posted at February 14, 2008 8:02 AM in response to Hillary Camp: No One Is Winning This Race Without Super-Delegates

The Democratic nightmare - when all the votes (elected and superdelegate) are in, the winner without FL and MI would be Obama, but with them would be Hillary. Whatever the convention would decide would probably elect President McCain.

So, this has to be dealt with now. Why not have the DNC give FL and MI the following choices:

1. Run a new primary / caucus.

2. Have the delegates divided by the national popular vote.

Posted at February 14, 2008 7:51 AM in response to Every Vote Counts

The applicable phrase: "Too big to fail."

If an individual (other than a multi-billionaire)makes bad financial choices - bankruptcy.

If a small business does the same - bankruptcy.

If Citigroup, Merrill Lynch, etc. do the same - bailout. "We can't allow them to take down the entire system." So, if you are big enough you can play the game - if investments work out, I keep everything; if they don't, the taxpayers make me whole.

Posted at February 14, 2008 7:47 AM in response to Do You Want to Pay Higher Taxes to Keep the Wall Street Bankers Rich?

Unless there is a real break one way or another among the superdelegates, the issue will come down to MI and FL. The Clinton strategy will be to keep this boiling away until it is too late to hold a do-over primary, and then argue that the only "fair" thing to do is to seat both delegations.

Posted at February 13, 2008 5:07 PM in response to Of Insurmountable Leads

The Clinton strategy (take no prisoners) -

Get enough votes in Texas and Ohio to make it clear that Obama cannot win on elected delegates

Call in every marker to hold onto the superdelegates

Go 24/7 with the argument that not to seat Michigan and Florida will be to "disenfranchise" voters. With the NAACP on her side, it would be hard for Obama not to give in, unless he could convice these states to hold new primaries

Go to the convention floor and put the argument that if Hillary is not nominated, the Clintons will destroy the Democratic party.

Posted at February 13, 2008 5:00 PM in response to Carville: If Hillary Loses Either Texas Or Ohio, "This Thing Is Done"

Hillary (OK, Bill) was in the 20th Century problem business. Were it not for the Clinton scandals, W would never had made it to be President.

No thanks - we already saw the Bush-Clinton-Bush movie - and the next sequel has been cancelled.

Posted at February 13, 2008 3:20 PM in response to Mark Penn's New Message: Hillary Is In "21st Century Solutions Business"

Don't count on an Iraq peace dividend.

Probably between 50% and 75% of all equipment sent to Iraq will be deemed irreparable, and the rest will need major overhauls. It will cost $$$ to rebuild the Army, and to fix the mess we are in. Add the costs of Afghanistan, and you probably don't have anything to spend.

What is needed, instead, is a new budgeting concept. Only government insists on having a consolidated budget, so that borrowing for current spending is treated the same as borrowing for capital improvements. Why not simply do what any private corporation would do: offset the debt (the amount borrowed) with the asset (the new road). Total effect on the federal budget - zero. As the bonds get paid off, that is an expense item, but the asset remains.

Posted at February 13, 2008 3:16 PM in response to Finally! A Serious Proposal on Infrastructure

Don't believe any polls, especially national ones.

Simply stated, to win the general election you do not need to win the popular vote nation wide. You simply have to win (by one vote each) the states with a majority of the electoral college.

Just ask President Gore!

Posted at February 13, 2008 12:36 PM in response to Rasmussen: Obama Leads Hillary By Five Nationally

McCain will run a two level attack on Obama. The "official" campaign will be on a high policy level designed to attract independents: McCain was right (so far) on the surge, McCain stands for tax cuts (now), McCain has experience, etc. (There will, of course, be the usual surrogate pandering to the right wing - abortion, gay marriage, etc., but not directly from McCain.)

The "unofficial" campaign will have "unaffiliated grass root" attacks on race, religion (both Obama's church and his being a supposed crypto-Muslim), liberalism, etc.

But, there is a way to fight back, and Obama started last night. Everything will be the "Bush-McCain" policies (tax cuts, the war, etc.).

Posted at February 13, 2008 12:33 PM in response to The Attack Takes Shape