Obama has already beaten Clinton, so why isn't it over?

[cos]

Returns are coming in on election night; the race has been close and polls show either candidate could win. Now, with 83% of precincts reporting, candidate A is leading 53% to 47% over B. It's an insurmountable lead, and the race is called for candidate A.


That's where the Democratic primaries are: Of the 3253 pledged delegates available, about 83% have already been voted on, and Obama is leading Clinton by about 53% to 47%. We can call the race now.

Or, look at it another way: There are 566 pledged delegates left from states that haven't voted yet. To catch up with Obama, Clinton needs to win about 65% of those, which means she needs to average about 65% of the vote in the remaining states. She doesn't win by that margin pretty much anywhere. So far, Clinton has received more than 60% of the vote in exactly one state: Arkansas. Her second-best result was 58% in Rhode Island. Her other home state, New York, gave her 57%.

If every state from now on goes as well for Clinton as her home state of New York did, then she will get about 322 of the remaining pledged delegates, and Obama will get about 244, for a net gain of about 78... leaving Obama still ahead by about 80-90 pledged delegates! Remember, that's what will happen if Clinton gets a New York level win in every state. Not gonna happen. She might do that well in Pennsylvania, but the next-biggest state to come is North Carolina. We also have states like Oregon and Indiana coming.

One way to look at it is this: For every state where Clinton gets less than 65% of the vote from now on, she's losing ground! Imagine you're a runner 100 feet from the finish line, and there's someone ahead of you who's only 50 feet from the line. If, in the next second, you run 30 feet while the leader only runs 25, now you're 70 feet from the finish and the leader is 25 feet from it. Sure, you just ran a little faster, but your chances of overtaking the leader before the finish have gotten even smaller.

In other words, even if Clinton wins Pennsylvania 57-43, that actually puts her further away from catching up to Obama, not closer. She'll do considerably worse than that in most remaining states.

It's over: Obama will go to the convention with more pledged delegates, and will be the Democratic nominee for President.

What about the Superdelegates?

Democratic members of the US House and Senate, Democratic governors, members of the DNC, and a few other party leaders, are automatically delegates to the convention and can vote for whomever they choose. They're called "unpledged delegates" or "superdelegates" (informally). Even though Obama will have more pledged delegates (from winning actual votes in actual states) than Clinton, if enough superdelegates vote for her, she could have a higher overall total and get the nomination, theoretically.

It's extremely unlikely, for two reasons. First, for superdelegates to overturn the decision of the voters would be a major scandal. Obama's supporters would not see it as legitimate: they'd mostly feel that he won, and the nomination was stolen from him. Black voters, in particular, would rightly feel that the system is rigged against them: finally a black candidate manages to win, only to have party insiders take it away. Superdelegates know this, and of all delegates, they're the ones with the most to care about the party as a whole. They know that if this happens it will greviously wound the Democratic party, and almost ensure that McCain wins. They won't let that happen.

Second, there just aren't that many superdelegates left to go, either. Of the 794 superdelegates, various polls & surveys show about 220-230 say they'll vote for Obama, and about 250-260 say they've vote for Clinton. That leaves only about 240-250 who haven't chosen yet (plus 68 who haven't been chosen yet). Clinton would have to get an overwhelming majority of those delegates to make up for Obama's 100-200 delegate lead. If those remaining 250 feel so strongly about supporting Clinton that they'd be willing to cause such a major scandal, why have they remained undeclared so long? Obviously, because most of them don't. Clinton will not get an overwhelming majority of them.

What about Michigan and Florida?

Michigan and Florida held their primaries too early, and according to Democratic Party rules, their delegates are not supposed to count, so they're not included in any of the counts above. Clinton's campaign is pushing to have them counted, because she won both states. If they're counted as-is, Obama gets 67 more delegates and Clinton gets 178 more, for a net gain of 111 for Clinton.

That, also, will not happen. To begin with, Obama wasn't even on the ballot in Michigan, and you can't vote write-in in a primary. No credible argument can be made that Michigan's election was fair, and there is no way Michigan's delegation will be seated as-is. They'll probably come up with a compromise, like splitting it 50/50 between the two candidates. Florida did have both candidates on the ballot, but neither candidate campaigned there, and many voters stayed home because they were told it wouldn't count. A compromise is likely there too.

Who decides what is to be done with Michigan and Florida? A committee at the Democratic National Convention, whose membership will be proportional from the pledged delegates: in other words, a committee with a majority of Obama supporters. There's no way they'll give Clinton the full 111-delegate advantage that comes with counting the entirely unfair Michigan primary.

However, even if they did, 111 still probably won't be enough to overcome Obama's advantage. He's 160+ ahead of Clinton now; she's not likely to whittle that down to under 120 in the few states left.

Is there any way Clinton can win?

Yes, there are still two possible scenarios in which Clinton gets the nomination, both very unlikely:

• The "Spitzer" scenario: Something very big and very unexpected happens that destroys Obama's viability as a candidate, or forces him to drop out, before the convention. Even if that happens after the last state has voted, superdelegates would still switch to Clinton en masse, and she'd get the nomination. Note, however, that for this scenario it doesn't matter whether Clinton is still running. She could suspend her campaign right now, and she'd still be in position to step back in and accept the nomination if something of that magnitude occurred.



• The convention fight scenario: Clinton keeps camapigning all the way to the convention, whittles down Obama's lead to below 140, and tries to get superdelegates to put her over the top. She can do this with her strategy of racial division. As I explained, this is also very unlikely, but it's the only thing she has left to try for.

Should Clinton drop out?

Obviously this question would make little sense if the outcome were still unclear. I wouldn't want any candidate dropping out until it became clear that they couldn't win. But since it is now clear that Clinton can't win by continuing to campaign, it's a reasonable question to think about. So here's where I switch from factual argument, to opinion.

Contested primaries have a lot of advantages. Voter registration drives, activating local networks, volunteer recruitment and training: Obama will benefit from having to campaign for votes in more states, particularly swing states like Pennsylvania and Oregon. And since Clinton is using a lot of McCain's arguments against Obama, he's also getting practice in dealing with those. On the other hand, McCain's arguments are getting extra credibility coming from a Democrat, and McCain is getting extra time to establish his message and identity for this election, so it's a mixed bag. And there's that racial division Clinton is exploiting, which also does long term damage.

For Clinton's own sake, she'd do much better to stop campaigning soon. The longer she stays in this when people can see she has lost and is only campaigning for a convention fight, the more enemies she makes in the party and the more bridges she burns. For example, if she wants to become Senate Majority Leader sometime, she's hurting her chances.

But from my point of view, as someone who doesn't particularly care about Clinton's future prospects, I think on balance having a primary in Pennsylvania at least would be good. And possibly a few more. Rather than Clinton abruptly dropping out, I think we'd be much better off if she lost some more primaries. Speaking as someone who wants to see Obama become president, the best thing would be for Clinton to lose more votes. Not good for Clinton, but good for the Democrats and for Obama.

Why you should still vote
If you want a Democratic president and were planning to vote in an upcoming primary, you may wonder: Why bother? If Obama has already won, does it matter? Yes, it still matters, because Clinton is still campaigning. By doing so, she is preventing Obama from getting a lock on the nomination by getting enough pledged delegates for a solid majority even without superdelegates. As I described above, there's only one thing she could still be campaigning for: a convention fight, where she can get enough superdelegates to overturn the pledged delegate plurality, and ensure that she will be the loser in November. The closer to Obama she gets, the more likely she is to think of that as a resonable option; the further ahead of her he is, the more likely she is to give it up.

So you're not voting on whether to nominate Clinton or Obama - as far as the primaries go, that choice is made. What you're voting on is the probability of Clinton trying to take it to a convention fight she would likely lose. If you want her to try that, vote for her; if you don't want her to try that, vote for Obama.


In other words, if you want a Democratic president, you should vote for Obama, regardless of which candidate you prefer.

States that still have primaries coming up:
April 22: Pennsylvania - 158 delegates
May 3: Guam - 4 delegates
May 6: Indiana - 72 delegates
May 6: North Carolina - 115 delegates
May 13: West Virginia - 28 delegates
May 20: Kentucky - 51 delegates
May 20: Oregon - 52 delegates
June 1: Puerto Rico - 55 delegates
June 3: Montana - 16 delegates
June 3: South Dakota - 15 delegates

[ table of delegate counts by state ]

Update: I also posted this on Daily Kos and on MyDD. If you have accounts in either place, please recommend?

Comments

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

In other words, if you want a Democratic president, you should vote for Obama, regardless of which candidate you prefer.

This conclusion really doesn't follow from your facts, actually, unless you have some statistics that back up an assertion that the number of votes with which a candidate wins a primary has any bearing on the outcome of the general election.

[cos]

The number of votes by which a candidate wins a primary probably has no bearing at all on the outcome of the general election. But in what way does that relate to my arguments? I don't understand.

Edit: Did you miss the part where I talked about a possible convention fight, and why voting in these primaries still matters despite already knowing who's gonna win?

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Not at all. However, there will be a Democratic candidate whether there's a convention fight or not. That has no bearing on the general contest, which means that voting against preference is not required in this case.

[cos]

In other words, you don't think having a convention fight will be a significant disadvantage? Consider that usually, the presumptive nominee's campaign gets to plan the convention, with their candidate at center, and their message at center. It's a campaign launch. If there's no agreed-upon presumptive nominee, the convention would have to be planned neutrally by the DNC, with no authority for the campaigns, and it will not be useful as a launching point or to get the candidate's message to voters. That's entirely aside from the collateral damage of the fight itself, and having bitter divisions so soon before the general election. I think it has A LOT of bearing on the general election.

Furthermore, there's always that slight risk that Clinton would actually win a convention fight. Not very likely, but disastrous enough to be worth a lot of effort to forestall.

Edit: I'm still puzzled by your earlier comment. It seems you disagreed with me about a convention fight being harmful, but your earlier comment suggested you hadn't noticed that was my reason in the first place. You seemed to think I was suggesting people vote for Obama because the margin of victory in a primary affects the general election, even though I said it was because it would help prevent a convention fight which I claim would be harmful. Even if you disagree with that, I don't understand your earlier comment?

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Well, there's two things. One, I'm not actually seeing any evidence other than your assertion that a contested primary is harmful. I feel that any damage that is going to be done on that front has been done already, and that stating that people should vote against preference to preserve party unity... well, the door's open, the horse is gone, and the thief has already pissed on the wall, if you get what I mean. But more essentially, I feel it's undemocratic. The will of the majority may become fact, but that does not mean that the will of the minority should be crushed in order to get there.

[cos]

Actually, I think contested primaries are on balance good. I said that. That one's a more complex issue, and people can argue it either way.

A convention fight, on the other hand, is most definitely damaging for many reasons (some of which I described above). That's why I suggest people vote for Obama in these contested primaries. He's already going to win, but the more votes he gets, the less likely there will be a convention fight. You certainly can't say that the damage has already been done on that front, because we could definitely still have a presumptive nominee in time to plan the convention to launch his campaign, without a fight. If that damage is going to happen, it's definitely something that isn't certain yet, let alone already happened.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

It is not the responsibility of minority candidate supporters to vote for "the good of the party". By arguing that it is, you're essentially disenfranchising anyone who happens to vote after the midpoint of the election for event planning purposes. To my mind, the Democratic primary system is already undemocratic enough without the argument of peer pressure being added to the mix.

[cos]

This isn't about responsibility, it's about using one's vote to further one's political goals. My argument is that if you're a Clinton supporter who wants to see a Democrat elected president, you are better off voting for Obama - that vote will further your political goals, while voting for Clinton will not do so (you won't make a Clinton presidency likely by voting for her). This would not have been true before the March 4th primaries, because until then she still had some chance of winning the primaries, but now she doesn't.

Don't translate that to "the good of the party" as a way of making it sound vaguely awful. I'm specifically addressing people who want a Democratic president. If that is what you want, then Obama is the right vote. You're not gonna get Clinton, that choice has already happened.

It's unfortunate to be in a state that votes so late that the winner is already known, but I didn't cause that. It's reality, and I'm just pointing it out. A discussion about how the primaries should be scheduled differently, is another thing altogether. I'm unhappy with the way it's done, too.

[dot_fennel]

that does not mean that the will of the minority should be crushed in order to get there.

I do not understand your statement. What's the will, in this case, and what counts as crushing it vs. just disappointing the people in question?

A lot of people want Hillary Clinton to be the Democratic nominee. Odds are, they won't get what they want. Is their will being crushed if Obama wins via superdelegates, but not if he wins through a convention fight? Is their will being crushed if people in North Carolina vote against Hillary Clinton because they think her campaign is hurting the Democratic Party, but not if they vote against her because they prefer Obama? I don't get it.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Suggesting that someone should vote in a manner they're not inclined to do, because of the potential for an easier delegation (maybe) precisely that. It imposes the will of the majority for a spurious reason. Obama is quite likely going to win the nomination at this point, and that is fine. However, saying that everyone left should simply give up and vote for him is really quite arrogant. If the Democrats seriously cannot deal with a contested primary? They're not going to win the general election anyways. People should vote their preference, not to make the candidate's lives easier.

[cos]

I disagree, and I don't think you're seeing my point. It's not that Obama is "quite likely" to win, it's that as long as he doesn't drop out, he will win. That changes things, because it means that a Hillary supporter can't actually get president Hillary by voting for her. Now, if they don't know that, then of course they'll still vote for Hillary, but doing so increases the chances that she'll try to fight at the convention. My advice is specifically for Hillary supports who want a Democratic president is simply this: Voting for Obama furthers your interests, even though you would have preferred Hillary.

The reason is that you're no longer voting on whether Obama or Hillary will win the primaries; Obama will. If you accept that (and I think I provided very sound backing for it), then you're disappointed, sure, because you're not going to get Hillary as president, but you can still use your vote in a way that furthers your desire for a Democratic president, by voting for Obama and helping prevent a convention fight (and the small risk of a disastrous convention fight that Hillary wins, which would absolutely ensure McCain becomes president). It's not "giving up" when you've already lost, and as I said, their vote still matters for another reason. They can't use their vote to help Hillary become president; they can use it to help Obama.

If you don't accept that the convention fight would be a serious risk, with real damage (or if you firmly believe Hillary won't do it), then my advice doesn't work, you're right. If you take that position, then my analysis boils down to simply this: Obama will win the primaries. At that point, you might as well vote for Edwards, or Kucinich, or whoever else you really preferred - they remain on the ballot wherever they qualified for it, even though they dropped out of the race.

None of this suggests that there's anything wrong with contested primaries. I'm not calling for primaries to be cancelled, candidates to be dropped off the ballot, etc. I'm informing people of the numbers (that show Obama will win) and giving my opinion about how they should vote, and why. That's basic democratic politics.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

I understand precisely what you're saying. I just disagree with it, and actually feel it's not only likely to further divide the Democratic party, but is actually quite insulting and contrary to the spirit of a political election, as well as not likely to actually accomplish what you're suggesting that it will. And after all of that, you've still not offered any hard evidence that a contested primary even does damage the eventual general election effort. If you have that information, I'd be happy to consider it, but as it stands this appears to simply not be a logical argument.

[cos]

I'll repeat one last time: A contested primary does *not* harm the eventual general election effort.

[dot_fennel]

Whoa, total straw man there. "Making the candidates' lives easier" has nothing to do with anything.

You make it sound like the primary and the general are two unrelated things, and that whoever wins the Democratic primary gets to start over on the road to the general. That's obviously not true; the whole POINT is that attacks used by fellow Democrats in the primary make the general election harder for a candidate. In that sense, it doesn't matter that Hillary Clinton is running for the nomination; she's not going to get it any more than I am. If she dropped out of the race tomorrow but kept critizing Obama in exactly the same terms, it would be just as bad for the party.

Most people can recover from a sprained ankle, given time. If your body isn't up to that task, you certainly aren't strong enough to run a marathon. And yet, giving someone a sprained ankle the night before they were about to run a marathon is going to screw them up. "If they seriously cannot deal with a sprained ankle, they're not going to finish the marathon anyway." Well, I don't know, but I wouldn't look very kindly on someone putting that proposition to the test.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

Except that's exactly what this is about: the suggestion that the candidate that wins the Democratic primary will have a more difficult time if everyone just voted for them in the first place. That kind of really isn't what democracy is about. Generalizing this argument out, it means that everyone who lives in a state that votes after the "tipping point" beyond which it will be clear who's going to win the primary election has no say in the primary. Fair? I certainly don't think so.

And frankly, your analogy is incorrect. Not being able to hack it in a contested primary election has an awful lot to do with your staying power in a general election. It's more like "If they seriously cannot deal with running a hundred feet without stopping, they're not going to finish the marathon anyway." Actually running a race isn't an imposition, it should be expected of politicians that they do so.

[dot_fennel]

"Running a race isn't an imposition."

You're swinging at your straw man again. The point is not that Clinton staying in the race is rude, or mean to Obama, or unfair.

Obama clearly can "hack it" in a contested primary; he's going to win, after all. (I think Cos's explanation of why this is true was pretty good. If you don't, great, but I want details.) You seem to think that running the primary doesn't use resources-- money, the energy of volunteers, the goodwill of voters, whatever-- to any greater degree than "running a hundred feet without stopping". Sadly, it does. This isn't the Olympics, where everyone who's competing has rested up and gotten back to 100% strength since their qualifying event; the process by which a candidate is defined in public and what Americans think of them is an ongoing one, and it isn't neatly divided between the primary and the general.

Finally, no matter how many friends Cos has, I think he's far from being able to crush the will of the majority just by posting something to the web. You seem to be objecting the very idea that anyone vote based on the consequences of their vote rather than based on... well, on what? On some pure measurement of how much they like each candidate on the ballot?

That was how I voted at first, a few times. But the action doesn't square with the kind of idealism that usually motivates it.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

My point is that people should be able to vote the way they want to vote, regardless of the outcome for the eventual winner of the contest. If someone wants to vote teleologically rather than deontologically, so to speak, that's up to them. I'm objecting to the demand that they do so, and the illogical assertion that this will lead to a Democratic presidential win. It won't.

[dot_fennel]

Demand?

So your problem is just Cos saying "if you want X, you should do Y" rather than "I believe that Y has a greater chance of causing X than not-Y does"? Or is it that a person deciding for themselves to vote "teleologically"* is okay, but encouraging anyone else to take on a consequentialist philosophy of voting is a subversion of their autonomy as a voter?

Or what?

I'm not trying to change your mind here; I'm now just curious to understand, as it seems like there's a difference of principle that lies pretty deep. (Or would this all be totally okay if only it did have some effect on Obama's chances of winning the general election?)



* I just went back and forth with myself about whether I thought "teleology" was really the right word here, since it seems to me like "consequentialism" is a better match for what you're talking about. And then I was like, fuck it, I say "teleology" at all kinds of semi-inappropriate times; I can't rag on someone else for doing the same thing.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

I didn't think consequentialism was quite right in this case, considering that in my opinion, the actual consequences of either vote aren't going to be any different. And no, it really doesn't matter to me who the candidate in question is - taking a zero-sum approach to any political campaign gets up my nose. In this particular case, however, I am objecting to the basic illogicality of the premise. Voting for Obama in the primary will not lead to a win in the general election, therefore the construction of the argument is faulty.

[cos]

Voting for Obama in the upcoming primaries will make it more likely that Obama will be agreed on as the winner at the end of the primaries (in early June), allowing the convention to be planned by that candidate's campaign as their launch. Voting for Clinton in the upcoming primaries will make it more likely that when the primaries end, people will still be arguing about who the nominee will be, even though it will still be Obama. If that happens, and if Clinton chooses to pursue a convention fight based on that, then it WILL very seriously damage the Democratic nominee's chances of winning the general. That's not because the primaries were contested, it's because the convention will be planned and held without an agreed-upon nominee. Obama will still be nominated by that convention, but in a much weaker position, with much less time to put together his campaign, than otherwise.

Now, if you don't believe that, then my recommendation does not hold.

If you do believe it, then it does: Voting for Obama is the best vote if you want a Democrat elected.

I did clearly label that portion of the post "my opinion", though I'm very confident about it.

Making my recommendation out to be immoral, arrogant, illogical, anti-democratic, or any of those similar things, is silly. You could just say "no, I think a divided convention and fight doesn't cause serious harm, therefore voting for Clinton will cause no harm" and we would simply disagree about it.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

I tried that a while back, I seem to recall. I'm sorry that it seems that I'm making out that your suggestion is "immoral, arrogant, illogical, anti-democratic, or any of those similar things,", but actually, I do kind of feel that way.

[eirias.livejournal.com]

Voting for Obama in the primary will not lead to a win in the general election, therefore the construction of the argument is faulty.

Since when does a conditional probability have to be 1 to warrant altering one's behavior?

You're absolutely right that voting for Obama in the primary will not cause him to win in the general, in the sense of being a perfect predictor of the outcome. But cos' argument doesn't rely on that. Most arguments in the real world don't rely on it either.

If you don't want lung cancer, you shouldn't smoke. Yes, you might get away with smoking for 60 years and never having a day of bad health until you get hit by a bus. Yes, you might abstain assiduously and still wind up with lung cancer of some idiopathic origin. But not smoking is still a better bet than smoking.

What he is saying here is this: Clinton cannot win the general, barring weird unforeseen events; therefore if you want a Democrat to win the general, Obama is the only guy who can do it; therefore you should not do things that risk making him a weaker candidate. I find it kind of an odious way to look at politics (hey, I voted for Nader in 2000) but it's probably sound.

Nobody is going to watch you vote to make sure you follow his advice OR ELSE. I don't care if you smoke, either.

[rightkindofme.livejournal.com]

Well *that* worked well when it was Nader or Gore as the options. Sure glad so many people went with someone who wasn't going to win. So of *course* people should vote for Hillary. Because we all want another damn Republican.

Why is it going to go McCain's way if Hillary pushes things to the last freakin minute? If Hillary continues to slam Obama in a way that sounds remarkably like McCain then why won't her supporters be more likely to jump over to the Republican boat in the general? It seems like she is more committed to making sure that Obama doesn't win the general than in trying to ensure a Democratic victory in the general.

For the record: I'm a registered Libertarian. So yes, I usually vote following my conscious. Not in the presidential race. In the presidential race I stop and use some actual logic and wonder who is the best choice of the limited options who have a chance of winning. That is not Hillary by this point in this race.

[tisiphone.livejournal.com]

You know, I find the assumption that all criticism of Obama springs from Clinton and her campaign rather amusing, really.

[rightkindofme.livejournal.com]

Given that I didn't say that and Cos didn't say that you have fun with that. Not all criticism of Obama springs from Hillary. The loud vitriol from within the party springs from her though.

Oh, and awesome job avoiding addressing what I actually said. Given that you were complaining that no one could explain why it was a problem, and I did, then you totally ignored it--I'm very impressed.