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After Obama adviser David Plouffe’s spin-credible, twist-tastic, distort-errific memo about expectations for Super Tuesday, any media manipulation coming out of the Clinton campaign today should look relatively tame.
Always count on them to surprise. During a conference call, Clinton strategist Howard Wolfson kept insisting that Hillary is leading in delegates. “We currently enjoy a delegate lead,” he said, “and will maintain that” after Feb. 5.
Well, sort of. Hillary is leading only if you count superdelegates, the 800 or so party leaders and elected officials who commit themselves to a candidate before or during the national convention. By CNN’s current count, she is leading with 232 to Obama’s 158. In terms of pledged district delegates—you know, the ones that come from actual votes—Obama is winning. He currently has 34 to Clinton’s 21. (If you count Iowa and Nevada’s delegates, he’s winning 63 to 48.)
Why does Wolfson count superdelegates? Because “the delegate count includes superdelegates,” he said. Again: sort of. If you’re talking about the number of delegates that will ultimately be awarded to the winner of the nomination, then yes, it does. But if you’re talking about the election part of the election—the number of delegates allocated based on people going to polls and voting—then you wouldn’t include those numbers. When we watch the votes come in Tuesday night, the networks won’t report superdelegates.
The reason is that superdelegates are notoriously fickle. If either candidate takes a decisive lead in the district delegate count, expect superdelegates to jump ship in packs. That’s why superdelegates will matter only if the primary race comes down to a brokered convention—a scenario Wolfson floated during the call—in which candidates barter for unclaimed delegates. He’s right that if this scenario occurs, Clinton’s superdelegate lead will turn into a real advantage. (Also consider how much better Clinton would be at the wheeling and dealing necessary for such “brokering”.) But that lead evaporates if Obama ends up winning more district delegates. For Wolfson to predict that Clinton will emerge from Feb. 5 with a delegate lead that includes superdelegates—but to refuse to predict the same thing without including them—rings a tad disingenuous.
Of course, there are other complicating factors besides superdelegates. For instance, Obama and Hillary won delegates in Iowa and Nevada, but those states don’t actually commit them until April, which means they could switch loyalties before then. The wild cards of Michigan and Florida could also decide a tight race, as the Clinton team jockeys to get the delegates “seated” while Obama’s people try to stave them off.
If the counting battle is any indicator, this primary could get ugly: If we can’t even agree on who is winning now, how are we supposed to figure out who won?
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Last time we checked, expectations didn’t mean anything anymore. Now that the campaign is in a new, delegate-oriented phase, expectations and momentum are supposed to be the artifacts of the early-primary-state days. Expectations mattered in Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina because those states were the slingshots and gatekeepers to the White House. With upward of 20 states voting on Feb. 5, the same rules aren’t supposed to apply.
Yet, it seems campaigns can’t shake old habits. Today both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton’s press outfits tried to manipulate tomorrow’s narratives before voters set foot in a poll booth.
But interestingly, one tried to lower expectations while the other raised them. Obama’s campaign manager David Plouffe sent a campaign memo to reporters that showed how crappy Barack Obama was doing in the polls as recently as two weeks ago. This is OK only because Obama is doing so well in the polls now. Furthermore, the eagle-eyed crew at Politico noticed that Plouffe was quoting Obama’s worst polls in every state. Two weeks ago, if you would have asked Plouffe about those polls, he would have thrown a stronger poll right back in your face.
Clinton, meanwhile, is gently tamping expectations overall, but not among Latinos. Hoping to stem the recent narrative that Obama is making gains among Latinos, the campaign bragged about a meaningless straw poll in an e-mail blast today. Clinton won a straw poll conducted by Piolín, the most popular Spanish-language radio show in the country. According to Clinton’s peeps, “Of the 819 people who called in, 59% said they’d vote for Senator Clinton, 36% for Senator Obama, 2% for John McCain, and only 3% of voters were undecided.”
Sigh—of course “only” 3 percent were undecided. Nobody calls into a radio straw poll to express his or her wishy-washy support of absolutely nobody. Moreover, has the almighty Mark Penn sunk so low as to throw us a nonsensical straw poll stripped of any methodology outline? If Clinton’s campaign is going to raise expectations, they might as well do it right. Dennis Kucinich used to tout some obscure Internet straw poll every week of his campaign. Maybe Kucinich’s former polling adviser defected to the Clinton camp. It’s never a good sign when the candidate of inevitability is aping the candidate of un-electability.
But Clinton isn’t alone in hyping Piolín’s impact on the Latino vote. Just last week Obama press secretary Bill Burton sent around a link to a Kos post on Piolín’s friendly treatment of Obama. Burton expected Piolín’s attention to help on Feb. 5.
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The cable news tickers are going to be in overdrive tomorrow night. With so many states’ results coming in all at once, it’s going to take some restraint for pundits not to extrapolate meaning from early wins on the East Coast. But in this case, all Feb. 5 politics really are local. Below you’ll find an outline of poll closing times, after which we’ll start seeing some of the first returns and exit polls. Still, we could be in for a long night. (All times EST)
Afternoon: West Virginia**
7 p.m.: Georgia
8 p.m.: Alabama, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Massachusetts, Missouri, New Jersey, Oklahoma, Tennessee
8:30 p.m.: Arkansas
9 p.m.: Minnesota*, New Mexico*, New York, Rhode Island
10 p.m.: Arizona, Colorado*, Kansas*, Utah
11 p.m.: California
12 a.m.: Idaho*, Montana*, North Dakota*
12:30 a.m.: Alaska*
*Time is an estimate because it’s a caucus state.
**Time is an estimate because it’s a convention state.
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First things first: The new “Yes We Can” video produced by Black Eyed Peas frontman will.i.am is good. Really good.
The song consists entirely of Barack Obama’s words, sung and respoken by will.i.am’s friends, singers, songwriters, and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. It’s like a less cheesy “We Are the World” but features performers your parents—and probably Obama—have never heard of. (Watch it here.)
It also led to this amusing exchange between will.i.am, the video’s director, Jesse Dylan, and interviewer Alicia Davis on ABC News’ “What’s the Buzz”:
Alicia Davis: Now, what are some of the changes you want to see right now?
will.i.am: Education. Um, America’s finance. You know, getting our dollar up to where it should be.
Jesse Dylan: Stopping the war.
will.i.am: Stopping the war. Health. Um, international policies. You know, good things.
Davis: Good things. We can support that.
I wouldn't give him a cabinet position, but he'd be a perfect minister of culture.
P.S. -- For the record, this is the fourth great song about Barack Obama. Others here, here, and here.
UPDATE 5:05 p.m.: A reader points out another solid Obama tune, this one by Kidz in the Hall. Hear it here.
UPDATE Feb. 5, 4:46 p.m.: Wow, there are a lot of these things.
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The latest Is it a story? story is Hillary Clinton’s alleged mistiness/vocal tightening at a morning event at the Yale Child Study Center. Given the effect her Diner Sob had the day before the New Hampshire primary, naturally everyone’s tear-dar is set to ultrasensitive.
So, did she actually cry? Have a look at some of the descriptions from people who were there:
“Penn Rhodeen, who was introducing Clinton, began to choke up, leading Clinton's eyes to fill with tears, which she wiped out of her left eye. At the time, Rhodeen was saying how proud he was that sheepskin-coat, bell-bottom-wearing young woman he met in 1972 was now running for president.”—The Swamp
“Mrs. Clinton, looking teary, raised her left hand to her cheek and brushed something away with her finger.”—The Caucus
“Clinton lost her voice pretty badly while at a roundtable in New Haven, CT. She asked for a lozenge and water, and after a minute, she tried to answer a question on health care. She got one short sentence out, and then breathlessly said, ‘This comes and goes.’ ”—First Read
I talked to someone who was at the scene, who said it was the transitive property of Rhodeen’s initial choking up that moistened Hillary’s ducts: “This dude was essentially holding up a boombox playing ‘In Your Eyes,’ while we all awkwardly listened. … You know how some people read their own vows at the altar? And you want to puke? Like that.”
So, it’s not like Hillary welled up unprompted. Which raises the obvious question: Was Penn Rhodeen an emo plant?
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We have seen our share of strained Super Bowl/Super Tuesday analogies. This one, from commenter "acptulsa" in the Sports Nut Fray, has to be the best:
The media said the Giants couldn't win - Suppose
they could be just as wrong about Ron Paul?
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When Rudy Giuliani bowed out of the Republican race, it took all of five minutes for news of his McCain endorsement to leak.
John Edwards, by contrast, is taking his time. It’s been almost a week since the former senator dropped out of the Democratic race, sparking speculation about a possible endorsement. But with Super Tuesday polls opening in less than 24 hours, we’re getting tired of holding our breath. A former campaign official says an endorsement today is “highly unlikely.” What’s Edwards waiting for?
A couple of scenarios:
He doesn’t want to pick the wrong guy (or gal). The Democratic race is still up in the air. If Edwards endorsed a loser, he would risk lowering his already depleted cachet. Plus, who wants to lose a general election, lose a primary four years later, and then have your candidate lose the general after that?
He’s holding out for a better deal. Endorsements often come laden with promises of sweet Cabinet positions, ambassadorships, and other appointments. Or sometimes a candidate just wants certain issues prioritized—in this case, probably poverty and corporate greed. Maybe Edwards hasn’t secured the promises he was hoping for and is waiting for a better offer.
He doesn’t actually want to influence the election. In his concession speech in New Orleans, Edwards said he was stepping aside so that “history can blaze its path.” Perhaps he wants to let the American people make their own decision, without his help.
He simply hasn’t decided who he prefers. You’d think that after a year of locking horns with these two, Edwards would have a fave. But the trail doesn’t allow for many intimate policy chats. Both Clinton and Obama have universal or near-universal health care plans; both want to reduce corporate influence in Washington; both have won wide union support. If Super Tuesday doesn’t produce a clear front-runner, Edwards will still have plenty of time to make up his mind.
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By Christopher Beam and Chadwick Matlin
With Super Tuesday looming, the past week has been as frenzied as any period in the presidential race so far. No longer courting one state at a time, the candidates have burned carbon and cash in record quantities, sometimes touching down in as many as three states in one day.
So, where have they visited and why? Here’s a quick rundown of their travels, with links to maps of their paths, powered by Slate’s Map the Candidates. Click on a candidate’s name to see where he or she has visited nationwide; click on a state to see the candidate’s visits within that state.
Hillary Clinton: If Clinton loses delegate-saturated California, it’s her own fault. She made four full stops in the state (plus a debate appearance), compared with Obama’s one town hall event last week. Yet, the more California sees of Clinton (or hears about Obama), the worse she does in tracking polls. Clinton also tried to protect her rapidly narrowing leads in Massachusetts, Missouri, and Connecicut—making two stops in each state. She wasted valuable time in Georgia, where Obama has a South Carolina-size lead in the polls. It appears Clinton damaged her African-American support outside of the Palmetto State, as well. Still, Clinton is the favorite going into Feb. 5, although Obama is gaining ground in nearly every state. To fight back, Clinton’s ad buy covers almost all the Feb. 5 states.
Total states: 11. Total stops: 19.
Barack Obama: Obama has been a beast on the trail the last 10 days. After winning South Carolina, Obama has buzzed his way through 16 states but hasn’t stayed long. He’s held more than one stop in only two states (California and Missouri). Eight of the states he visited, Hillary Clinton never touched. (And five of which Bill Clinton never set foot in, either.) Usually favoring massive, 20,000-person rallies over intimate affairs, Obama’s strategy has been simple: get his face in front of as many people as possible. Huge crowds turned out in Idaho, Minnesota, and Colorado. But that strategy means he can’t linger long in any state, so he has supplemented his rallies with a massive advertising budget. Obama’s Super Bowl ad buy was more impressive for its audacity than its content. All of this seems to be helping: He has seen his poll numbers jump nationwide and hasn’t had a press day since South Carolina.
Total states: 16. Total stops: 18 (through Monday).
Mike Huckabee: Other than an extended, two-day stay in California, Mike Huckabee has barely left the South. He’s made at least two stops in Tennessee, Georgia, Alabama, Arkansas, and Oklahoma (not to mention pre-Florida-primary stops in Missouri). Huckabee figures that if he can’t capture the evangelical vote in the South, he can’t capture any piece of the vote anywhere else. Plus, Huckabee’s regional focus helps him efficiently run on whatever fiscal fumes he has left in the tank. If Huckabee were competing in the Democratic race with proportional delegate assignments, he would have a much better chance of lasting beyond Feb. 5. But in winner-take-all states, not even a concentrated focus will rescue Huckabee—even in the Evangelical South.
Total states: 7 states. Total stops: 21 (through Monday; not including stops in Florida).
John McCain: Ever since winning Florida, McCain has racked up more endorsements than a NASCAR driver. Rudy Giuliani has backed him, as has Arnold Schwarzenegger, Steve Forbes, Ted Olson, the Los Angeles Times, and seemingly every other mainstream paper in the country. His support in national polls is nearly double Romney’s; he beats Hillary Clinton in head-to-head matchups. And with an influx of post-New Hampshire funds, McCain has the luxury of conducting a truly national campaign. His media team said it made a seven-figure ad buy, touting McCain as the “true conservative,” in all of the Super Tuesday states except Utah. States with lots of delegates—California, New York, Illinois, Massachusetts (Romney’s home turf)—crowd his schedule. But he has also dropped in on winner-take-all states Delaware and New Jersey, plus Romney strongholds (a relative term, at this point) Georgia and Alabama. And whereas Romney has dispatched his family on the trail, McCain has real surrogates like Joe Lieberman and Forbes spreading the word.
Total states: 10. Total stops: 14.
Mitt Romney: Super Tuesday could well be Romney’s last stand. The GOP primaries are largely winner-take-all, so whoever dominates is likely to emerge with a strong lead in delegates. In the past week, Romney and his jet-setting brood have focused on states with significant religious conservative populations, where McCain’s lead isn’t decisive. On Sunday alone, Mitt blitzed Missouri and Illinois, wife Ann visited Minnesota, and his son Josh campaigned in Colorado. He has also tried to chip away at Mike Huckabee’s base in evangelical strongholds Tennessee and Georgia. The campaign’s media strategy shows similar selectivity: Instead of blanketing all 21 GOP states with ads (as McCain is doing), Romney is buying spots in big markets like California, where they’ll do the most damage. And of course he’s banking on wins in Utah, where he attended the funeral of Mormon leader Gordon Hinckley on Saturday, and Massachusetts. If he can’t count on those, he’s in trouble.
Total states: 9. Total stops: 13.
Ron Paul: Rep. Ron Paul doesn’t have Oprah or a Secret Service escort or two press buses tailing him. But after raising $20 million in the fourth quarter—more than any other GOP contender—he does have enough money to conduct a national campaign. Nevertheless, he has been selective. Over the past week, Paul has focused on states holding caucuses rather than primaries, since a relatively small number of caucus-goers can affect the outcome. He dropped by Maine, where he won 19 percent of the vote in the state’s nonbinding caucus poll; North Dakota, which is up in the air after its most devoted courtier, Rudy Giuliani, dropped out; Colorado, the biggest GOP caucus, with 46 delegates at stake; and Washington state, which doesn’t actually caucus until Feb. 9 but furnishes 40 delegates. It’s hard to say what happens if Paul’s Super Tuesday performance disappoints; his national numbers are still hovering in the single digits, but he’s not running out of money anytime soon.
Total states: 6. Total stops: 15.