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COLUMBIA, S.C. -- Barack Obama is angry. Oh, he’s in control, certainly, but you can tell he’s pissed.
After a week of increasingly bitter spats over race and underhanded campaign tactics, Obama’s victory speech sounded his usual themes -- unity, change, past vs. future. But he also went after Hillary Clinton in more aggressive terms than in other speeches.
At first, he could have been speaking about Republicans: “We are up against decades of bitter partisanship that cause politicians to demonize their opponents instead of coming together to make college affordable or energy cleaner.” But then it became increasingly clear to whom he was referring: “It’s the kind of partisanship where you’re not even allowed to say that a Republican had an idea -- even if it’s one you never agreed with.”
It’s one thing to invoke an opponent’s attack in a stump speech. It’s another to broadcast it to the country after delivering the most thorough trouncing of the election season. (Other descriptors overheard in the press section: “stomping,” “burial,” “bludgeoning.”) The point was not just to celebrate his victory, but to remind everyone that he won despite the Clintons’ skeevy tactics.
He also echoed Hillary’s claim that Obama promotes “false hopes.” Obama loves to portray her as a nay-sayer, the well-intentioned but over-the-hill has-been who simply lacks imagination. Tonight, he rooted this criticism in terms of regular people: “I know that when people say we can’t overcome all the big money and influence in Washington, I think of the elderly woman who sent me a contribution the other day -- an envelope that had a money order for $3.01, along with a verse of scripture tucked inside. So don’t tell us change isn’t possible.”
Obama has slammed Hillary before, most notably in Monday’s debate, when he said he was working as a community organizer while she was “sitting on the board of Wal-Mart.” The blow landed, but Hillary’s riposte -- a quip about Obama’s relationship with “slum landlord” Tony Rezko -- landed harder. (Notice how we’ve been reading about Rezko all week long, but not a peep about Wal-Mart.) Even when Obama appeared to score a point, Hillary was one step ahead.
During tonight’s speech, though, there was no Clinton around to interject. It was a reminder of how much better Obama is at speechifying than debating. No ums, no stutters, no lurching starts and stops. If debates had 30-minute time limits instead of 30 seconds, the man would be unstoppable.
At the same time, Obama scored a few tactical points. After declaring that the forces of division are “not the fault of any one campaign”-- translation: They are -- he railed against “the assumption that African-Americans can’t support the white candidate; whites can’t support the African-American candidate; blacks and Latinos can’t come together.” The line wasn’t just a cheesy invocation of unity. It also pre-emptively repudiated the notion that Obama won South Carolina because of blacks alone. That he drew 25 percent of the white vote will make his case fairly easy.
Even more so than usual, the coming days will be a battle of perception. Obama’s camp will argue that South Carolina matters but Florida doesn’t. Clinton’s team will argue the opposite. Obama will suggest that we’re witnessing a battle for delegates, seeing as he has more than anyone. Clinton will suggest it’s actually states that matter. Trench warfare isn’t Obama’s strength. Even when he has fought back against Hillary, it’s been on her turf. But tonight, as over the past several days, he has shown himself willing to engage her -- and able to win.
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If the presidential race were a sitcom, John Edwards would be the next-door neighbor who doesn’t take a hint. Nobody has the stones to tell him to stop stopping by, so he keeps on showing up with giddy smiles, predictable conversation topics, and a burning desire to be liked. Even though the main characters never seem to get annoyed with the neighbor, fans of the show tire of him quickly.
Earlier this week, it looked like Edwards might move out of the neighborhood. But that doesn’t seem to be in the script any longer. Edwards had only one goal coming in to tonight: get a delegate. And that’s pretty much all he did. Edwards didn’t add any momentum to his campaign, nor did he convince anybody else to vote for him after a dramatically short concession speech.
But honestly, it doesn’t matter how many delegates Edwards eventually gets. It just matters that he has some rationale to support his quixotic bid to become president. And as long as he’s still pulling in delegates, he can fight back against anybody that says he’s wasting his time. (Guilty as charged.)
If there’s anything Edwards can be proud of, it’s that he beat everybody else among white men, according to exit polls. Moving forward, Edwards would be wise to try to fill this void between Obama and Clinton, even if it means narrowing the scope of his candidacy. But at this point, his scope is narrow whether he realizes it or not. The only county he won in South Carolina was the one that includes his hometown, Seneca.
Now that we know Edwards is staying in the race, it’s time to play soothsayer for Feb. 5. The main question: Does Edwards siphon more of the white vote from Clinton or the change vote from Obama? Tonight, it was the former, but on Feb. 5 it could be the latter. In states with less of a black population, we could see a repeat of New Hampshire, where Edwards blocked Obama’s win. Either way, the longer Edwards hangs around the neighborhood, the more likely he outstays his welcome.
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COLUMBIA, S.C. -- Didn't make it to Obama's victory speech? No problem! Just grab your ear buds, close your eyes, and tune into the sound of Obama campaigning. A quick glance at the sound engineer's computer reveals the following iTunes playlist compiled for Obama events:
City of Blinding Lights -- U2
Signed, Sealed, Delivered -- Stevie Wonder
Only in America -- Brooks and Dunn
(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher -- Jackie Wilson
I'll Take You There -- The Staples Singers
Move On Up -- Curtis Mayfield
There's Hope -- India Arie
Shining Star -- Earth, Wind, and Fire
Next week: Hillary's playlist!
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As of now, Barack Obama is headed toward a monster win in South Carolina, the likes of which we haven't seen since, uh, 11 days ago. Dozens of news cycles ago, Hillary Clinton beat "uncommitted" in Michigan with 55 percent of the vote and a 15-point margin of victory. But there was a huge caveat: Nobody campaigned there and no delegates were awarded. It was a meaningless victory.
Flashforward to tonight, when Obama currently holds a 17-point lead over Clinton in South Carolina with 54 percent support overall. The victory is real this time, with actual visits from the candidates, actual delegates awarded, and actual names on the ballot. If the current results hold, Obama will have beaten his named opponents by a larger margin than Clinton beat her unnamed foes. This is probably making Obama's people giddy. Now whenever Hillary Clinton brings up a Michigan win (which she's doing more and more often as she tries to seat Michigan delegates), they can remind everybody that her win there wasn't actually that convincing and pales in comparison to Obama's Herculean display down South. Obama, the thinking will go, shows up when the stakes are high, while Clinton shrunk away at the first sign of competition.
Perhaps most importantly, Obama's win tonight moves the campaign from the plurality to the majority. The threshold for an impressive win has jumped from 40 points to 50-plus points, even with three competitors in the race. Winning the plurality of voters is a puny accomplishment—after all, somebody had to do it. This mini-thesis gets blown up if Edwards drops out of the race, but that's looking less likely after he secured some delegates with tonight's respectable showing.
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Hillary Clinton just sent out an e-mail saying she called
Obama to congratulate him on his win. Then this:
“We now turn our attention to the millions of Americans who
will make their voices heard in Florida and
the twenty-two states as well as American
Samoa who will vote on February 5th.”
Clinton has been talking
about Florida
as if it were any other primary. The reason: If people treat Florida
as a real contest—not just a beauty contest—they’ll have to treat her win in Michigan the same way.
It’s a smart move, if only because her declarations that Florida matters are self-fulfilling. If she
says it matters, and convinces people to show up and vote for her, then yes, it does
matter. And what can Obama say to rebut it? He can’t say Florida doesn’t matter. That would violate Rule No. 1 of primary campaigning: Don't insult a state until its primary is over. The best he can do
is emphasize the importance of delegates rather than states -- a flimsy-sounding case now, but one that will sound a lot more cogent if Super Tuesday doesn't produce a clear winner.
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COLUMBIA, S.C. -- The immediate story, it seems, is Obama’s overwhelming 81 percent take among African-Americans, according to exit polls. Even among whites, he took 24 percent—less than both his opponents, but a big jump from Thursday’s McClatchy poll that put his support among whites at 10 percent. (And which has driven much of the hand-flapping over Obama’s supposed unelectability among whites.)
The narrative coming out of the Obama camp is two-fold: One: This isn’t a fluke. Spokesman David Axelrod, at the center of a press horde, argues that Obama can do well nationwide, even among whites. “Did you go to Iowa?” he asks a reporter. “What did you see?” The implicit answer: white people. “Yesterday, you guys said we weren’t gonna make 10 percent. That was the narrative.” And two: This win was hard-fought. Axelrod points out that Sen. Edwards “was a native son in this state. … This was a real butt-kicking, in the old-fashioned parlance.”
The Clinton camp will no doubt argue that Obama sank everything he had into the state. He spent the whole past week here; she hopped around a few Feb. 5 states. Hillary isn’t even in South Carolina tonight; she’s holding an event in Nashville. And, of course, implicit in everything will be the race factor.
But one exit poll result should hearten Obama fans (and, you know, non-racists):
Three in four voters said the country is ready to elect a black president and about as many said that about a woman. Somewhat more Clinton voters said the country is not ready to elect a black than Obama voters said the country wasn't ready to elect a female president.
Granted, many of the people who said America is ready for a black president had just voted for one. Plus, those numbers are likely to be much different in the white south. But given that much of the anxiety about electing a black president has come from the black community itself, these numbers indicate a change in attitude.
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The juicy bits from CNN's exit polls:
- Obama's victory margin over Clinton steadily declines as the voters get older. Obama beats Clinton by 45 percentage points among 18-29 year olds, 2 percentage points among voters 60 and older. Among blacks, though, Obama's numbers hold strong across all ages. Edwards' results get better as the voters get older, as well.
- 14 percent of all voters were nonblack 18-44 year olds; 33 percent were over the age of 45. The younger nonblack voters favored Obama. It seems Clinton continues to have problems connecting with youth, no matter their race.
- Nearly one-fifth of Clinton supporters think Obama is the Democrat who can best beat the Republican nominee. Only 4 percent of Obama voters think Clinton is best able to beat the GOP nominee.
- The male-female ratio in this primary is greater than any other this cycle: 61 percent of females voted, 39 percent of males. Obama led evenly across both sexes.
- Nearly six in 10 voters thought it was important that Bill Clinton was campaigning. Those voters were more likely to support Obama than Clinton.
- Edwards pulled down as much support among the white community as Clinton, and beat her among white males.
Our usual disclaimer applies. These are exit polls, not actual results.
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Wolf Blitzer just went over Mike Gravel's vote tally and nearly cringed as he read that Gravel hadn't received any of the roughly 1,400 votes cast thus far. So, what's our over-under for Gravel for this primary? 500 votes? More importantly, what will his demographic breakdown be? 95 percent white supporters?
UPDATE 10:12 p.m.: Gravel finished behind Joe Biden, Chris Dodd, and Dennis Kucinich, who dropped out of the race earlier this week. The final tally for Gravel: 239 precious votes.
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Within seconds of the polls closing, CNN projected Barack Obama won the South Carolina primaries—a "strong" victory, according to Wolf Blitzer. But this primary, more than most others, isn't about who won overall, but about the candidates' share of support among their core demographics.
The key number, courtesy of MSNBC's exit poll: Obama took home a quarter of the white vote in South Carolina. That's much better than polls were projecting near the tail-end of the campaigning there, and Obama's campaign can save face going forward to whiter states on Feb. 5.
The reason we're talking about this in the first place is because the Clintons racialized this primary. And if exit polls hold true, then they just had a giant egg cracked on their face. By subtly hinting at race in much of their messaging over the last week, they left the door open for Obama to fall flat if he only pulled in one out of every 10 white voters. But tonight Clinton didn't outstrip Obama among white voters by much—about 10 to 15 percentage points in exit polls—which means Obama is vindicated and the media will portray this race as a landslide, not as a landslide in the black community.
Going forward, Obama still has plenty of problems, his lack of support in Latino communities chief among them. But tonight, he finally found a way to do what he couldn't do all week: fight back against the Clintons' racial messaging. After a win in Iowa, one of the whitest early primary states, and a win in South Carolina, the blackest early primary state, perhaps it's time to think that Obama can overcome the Clinton-constructed racial divide.
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By Christopher Beam and Chadwick Matlin
Feb. 5, 2008, aka Super Tuesday, will be utter electoral chaos. On the Democratic side, 22 states hold their primaries, awarding a total of 1,681 pledged delegates, or 52 percent of all those awarded. (“Pledged” delegates don’t include the 796 “superdelegates”—members of Congress and other party leaders—who attend the national convention.) Republicans have 975 pledged delegates at stake—41 percent of the total number—in 21 states. So, with a little more than a week to go before the polls open, the candidates will have to allocate their resources carefully. Here’s a quick primer on what obstacles each candidate faces and how they should spend their time.
Note: Delegate counts below include both pledged delegates and superdelegates.
The Democrats
Unlike the Republicans, the Democratic National Committee awards all delegates on a proportional basis. That means Hillary and Obama are likely to pick up delegates in each of the 22 states. Edwards, meanwhile, is a wild card. He’ll only receive delegates in a state if he clears the 15 percent viability threshold. If that happens, look for the tight race between Hillary and Obama to get even tighter, since they’ll have trouble winning by huge margins. In which case, the contest is likely to extend well beyond Feb. 5.
Hillary Clinton: The proportional-delegate system doesn’t help the national front-runner because she can’t rack up a commanding delegate lead. So, for Clinton, Feb. 5 is about maximizing her advantage in states that already favor her. She owns the tristate delegate behemoth of New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut (468 delegates total). Plus, Arkansas (47) still remembers her as their First Lady before she became the country’s. She polls favorably—and Obama polls poorly—among Latinos, which means that Arizona and New Mexico (105 delegates total) are friendly states thanks to their 25 percent-plus Hispanic population, but Obama won’t cede those votes. The Latino-factor also helps her in California (441) where she already polls well, but she’ll need to spend considerable time there to fight back against Obama’s made-for-Hollywood life story.
States to tackle: Arizona, California, Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, New Mexico, Massachusetts
States to ignore: Arkansas, Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey, New York
Barack Obama: Nationwide, Obama hopes to combat Hillary’s name-recognition with his own star power. Besides blitzing the national media, he’ll probably start with his home base, Illinois (185 delegates), and focus on states with caucuses like Kansas (41) and Minnesota (88), where he might repeat his Iowa victory, and open primaries in which Independents and Republicans can vote as well. Obama should also tackle purple states in which Democrats normally fare poorly, such as Colorado (71) and Missouri (88), to draw out Hillary-hating indies. Independents can also vote in the day’s biggest prize, California (441), although Hillary has an edge in Golden State polls. The other grand prize, New York (281), is also Clinton country, but Obama will likely try to foment an uprising in the Big Apple—a victory there would make for giddy headlines—and leave the boonies to Hillary.
States to tackle: Illinois, Colorado, Kansas, Minnesota, California, New York
States to ignore: Arkansas, Connecticut, Oklahoma, Delaware
John Edwards: Assuming John Edwards stays in the race through Feb. 5, he’ll have to find a way to play kingmaker with his delegates. That means concentrating on states where he can pull in at least 15 percent of the vote, which is the Democrats’ threshold to receive delegates. He should concentrate on the South to capture the white vote that Obama doesn’t grab and Clinton doesn’t compete for. He already has roots in Georgia and could do well in Alabama and Tennessee (248 delegates total). From there, he can look to his strong second-place finishes in 2004 for inspiration. Missouri, Oklahoma, and Utah (164 delegates total) all leaned toward Edwards in 2004, and could do so again. There probably won’t be room for him in California or New York (722 delegates total), but squeezing any delegates out of those two would add a few jewels to the crown.
States to tackle: Alabama, California, Georgia, Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Utah
States to ignore: Arkansas, Colorado, Illinois, New York, New Jersey
The Republicans
For the GOP, Tsunami Tuesday’s influence depends on how many people are still in the race. If Rudy Giuliani and Mike Huckabee stick around after Florida, both could run regional campaigns in the Northeast and South, respectively, that could keep the race muddled. But if it becomes a two-way race, the Republicans’ winner-take-all delegate rules mean that John McCain or Mitt Romney could hold a commanding, but not invincible, lead moving forward.
Rudy Giuliani: For Rudy, Feb. 5 is everything. He took a gamble by ignoring the earliest primaries and focusing on Florida. If he wins there, media coverage will carry through the Super Tuesday states and he’ll look like a genius. If he loses—which is likely—he enters the Big 2-5 without a single victory to his name and he’ll look like a fool. Either way, he should focus on big coastal primaries like California and New York (274 delegates total), where John McCain is putting up a fight. Nearby winner-take-all states like New Jersey, Connecticut, and Delaware (100 total) are also must-wins. He’ll likely pick up a few delegates in states that award them proportionally (Massachusetts, Illinois) and the caucuses (Colorado, Maine), but those contests are unpredictable. Keep in mind: An ailing economy hurts Rudy. As recession looms/hits, Romney’s perceived business acumen translates to electoral strength, while Giuliani’s national security chops lose relevance, especially against an energized McCain.
States to tackle: Connecticut, Delaware, New Jersey, New York
States to ignore: Arizona, Arkansas, Alabama, Tennessee
John McCain: McCain’s success on Feb. 5 relies heavily on his ability to get Republicans to trust him—which is what went wrong against George Bush in 2000. Polls show him competing with Giuliani in New York, Connecticut, and New Jersey (183 delegates total), and Giuliani’s likely third-place finish in Florida on Tuesday should allow McCain to command the national security vote nationwide, including the Northeast. All three of those states have closed primaries, which means McCain won’t be allowed to rely on his usual trump card—Independents. There aren’t many open primary states, and many are down South (Alabama, Georgia, and Tennessee—175 delegates total), which means McCain may have to tussle with a regional-minded Huckabee. Out West, McCain’s home state of Arizona (53) will back him, but he’ll have to contest Romney’s Reagan rhetoric in California (173). If he really wants to stick it to Romney, he can campaign in Massachusetts (43), where a Romney defeat would be embarrassing, if not devastating.
States to tackle: California, Connecticut, Illinois, Missouri, New Jersey, New York
States to ignore: Arizona, Montana, North Dakota, Utah
Mitt Romney: First thing first—Romney shouldn’t have to set foot in Utah (36 delegates), where the majority of the population is Mormon and he’s a local hero for saving the Olympics. If he runs on his fiscal record, he should compete well in industry-heavy Delaware, Illinois, Missouri, Oklahoma, and West Virginia (217 delegates total). His nobody-noticed win in the Wyoming caucuses implies he may have some success in other Great Plains states like Montana and North Dakota (51 total). Also, his Reagan-coalition message (and Reagan looks) could help him grab the biggest delegate prize, California (173 delegates), which would be a coup over McCain, who currently leads in the polls.
States to tackle: California, Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, Oklahoma, Tennessee
States to ignore: Alabama, Arizona, Connecticut, New York, Utah
Mike Huckabee: Huck hasn’t won a contest since Iowa, but he’s far from toast. Of the 21 states holding GOP elections on Super Tuesday, about half are Southern and Midwestern states with lots of religious conservatives—in other words, electoral goldmines for Huckabee. Oklahoma’s winner-take-all primary will likely furnish Huck with its 41 delegates, and Arkansas (34 delegates) belongs to him. But it’s the Southern states like Georgia and Tennessee (127 total), which award most or all of their delegates proportionally, that will constitute the bulk of his winnings. Whereas Giuliani needs a handful of big wins, Huckabee should shoot for a barrage of small victories. Problem is, he’s running low on money, which makes national retail campaigning difficult. Look for more cheeky Web videos and other free media gimmes.
States to tackle: Alabama, Georgia, Missouri, Oklahoma, Tennessee, West Virginia
States to ignore: Arkansas, California, Connecticut, New York
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COLUMBIA, S.C.—I arrive at the 10:45 p.m. Obama rally to discover they’ve closed the doors. No one is to be let in. Not even campaign staff. Fire marshal’s orders. Variations on this scene happen every few days. There’s always some fire code invoked, then quietly violated. You learn to talk your way in, find another entrance, or slip past the volunteer on door duty while she’s immersed in her BlackBerry.
But these guys look serious. A group of official-seeming men in blazers stand behind the plate glass doors, trying not to make eye contact with the horde of press people outside. A woman taps on the glass; they just shake their heads silently. When this A-Team leaves, the unfortunate job of bouncer falls to a secret service lug. He looks exactly like Herc from The Wire, gentle side and all. Just as he’s rounding the corner, almost out of sight, you can see the stone face crack a smile.
Meanwhile, it’s not getting any warmer outside. “There’s gotta be a formula,” says one reporter. “Forty degrees outside … however many journalists …they know exactly how long till we leave.”
Another journalist doubts the room has reached capacity. “Not even Bon Jovi could fill this thing up.”
“Is it like a club?” cracks a guy toting a camera. “Do you have to bring a girl to get in?”
Then, as often happens when you leave trail reporters alone, the campaign slogans start to come out. “What’s keeping us here is the audacity of hope,” someone points out. “Yes, the time for change has come,” responds another, shivering. “We certainly are outsiders,” observes a third.
Finally, a staffer comes to the door and tells us to go around to the front. There, chief strategist David Axelrod emerges with Stacey Brayboy, the South Carolina campaign director. They’ve come to apologize. “I’m sorry, it’s full,” Brayboy tells us. “There’s 2,500 people in there,” Axelrod says. “It’s inspiring. You guys are inspiring, too.” My heart would flutter if it weren't frozen solid.
As a consolation prize, Axelrod promises free tickets to the Saturday-night election rally—which most of us registered for days ago. A reporter wonders out loud if there’s a piece to be written about the event being full. “That’s news, right?” No one answers. I crack open my laptop.
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FLORENCE, S.C. – No matter how many “truces” the Clintons and Barack Obama call, no one seems willing to concede the last shot.
At tonight’s rally, Obama rattled off his usual litany of defensive parries. He said he never praised Ronald Reagan, but that he wanted to create “Obama Republicans,” just as there were Reagan Democrats. He joked about e-mails alleging he’s a Muslim. He recounted pledging allegiance to the flag since he was 4 years old. As in the past few weeks, he dedicated much of the speech to defense.
But then Obama unwrapped a new slam, fresh from the speechwriters’ pen, no more than a couple days old: “If you get the war wrong, and you get health care wrong, it’s not a question of being ready on Day One,” he said, borrowing Hillary's favorite line. “It’s a question of being right on Day One.”
Just goes to show that when it comes to unprovoked attacks, no one is innocent. What’s a truce when you’ve got a zinger like that?