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Declaring Victory? Bad Idea, Obama

Barack Obama reportedly is not heading to Des Moines tomorrow to declare victory in his race against Hillary Clinton. After the North Carolina and Indiana primaries on May 6, an unnamed Obama staffer pointed to the Kentucky and Oregon primaries slated for tomorrow night. "On May 20," he said, "we're going to declare victory." Now, the Obama camp is taking a milder approach.

That said, Obama doesn't have to actually declare victory for the impression to be delivered. After all, he's speaking in Des Moines, site of his victory in the Iowa caucuses four and a half months ago. The campaign has come full circle, is the obvious suggestion. The campaign started here and it ends here.

It's too late for the site of the event to be changed, but there's still time for me to insist, in agreement with Dana Goldstein, that this is a bad idea. The Clinton campaign has legions of supporters who feel their candidate is being unfairly pushed out of the race by the media and, to a lesser extent, the Obama campaign. Why lend (even more?) credence to their complaints? These are Democrats that Obama will need in the fall. He should avoid alienating them at all costs.

Montana and South Dakota, the final primaries, are June 3. Obama can't wait 15 days?






Comments

Obama has not won until the Democratic Party decides he has. It's a "democratic" process with "votes". Obama decides nothing!

Posted by: Kathy Giannini on 05/19/08 at 1:33 PM  Respond

Exactly, how can Hillary win the nominations now? Can someone explain the math?

Posted by: Karl on 05/19/08 at 2:54 PM  Respond

Hillary is done, but I think that Obama should be humble and wait for ALL of the primaries to be finished before he goes "full circle".

Posted by: kirkbrew on 05/19/08 at 3:12 PM  Respond

I'm really tired of this pandering to Hillary's extreme supporters. Obama shouldn't wait 15 more days to declare that which is the simple truth. He's won.

This tactic by Clinton reminds me of Bush's war tactic.. just a few more months translates to just a few more weeks.. then there will be just wait till MI/FL is settled.. then just wait for the convention.. what then.. just wait till after the general?

Of course, it's just fine that she keeps lying about the popular vote. She can stand there and falsely claim she has the popular vote but Obama can't honestly claim he's won the election (assuming the supers move). WTF?

Posted by: KS Rose on 05/20/08 at 7:11 AM  Respond

Yeh, Obama's best bet is to be humble, and come out with an OMG, you voted for me? Unfortunately, that does not work in US politics, where winning is the only thing that matters. Hillary is dead in the water. It seems she wants to experience sinking. I say, give her the chance. It's unique, and she surely deserves it. After that, with "oohs and aahs" we can get on with the business of winning the election.

Posted by: John on 05/20/08 at 9:14 AM  Respond

No offense to you Jon Stein, but screw that.

Where were all the HRC supporters when HRC was declaring "victory" in MI/FL. Did they come out and say, no, these primaries really don't count so that is poor form? Nope.

Why do people keep telling Obama to wait? He should have waited to run, because it wasn't his turn, now he should wait to return to Iowa because even though he leads in the pledged delegates, super delegates, and popular vote, HRC still might have a shot in getting the nomination.

Screw that.

HRC and Gerraro have been talking about the rampant sexism this campaign season. But what about the reverse? Would anybody be asking about Obama to wait, and be humble if HRC were a man? Doesn't that undermine that whole arugment about treating her like an equal opponent--which would imply declaring victory?

Maybe someone else has a different take on it.

Posted by: Tanisha R on 05/20/08 at 9:26 AM  Respond

Clinton takes Indiana by a ‘razor’ and Obama wins North Carolina by a huge margin. Nevertheless, Kentucky, Montana and West Virginia are still to come.

The Democratic race for nomination is still very much alive – and most likely to be decided by superdelegates

If you’re tired of waiting around for those super delegates to make a decision already, go to LobbyDelegates.com and push them to support Clinton or Obama

If you haven't done so yet, please write a message to each of your state's superdelegates at http://www.lobbydelegates.com

Obama Supporters:

Sending a note to current Obama supporters lets them know it's appreciated, sending a note to current Clinton supporters can hopefully sway them to change their vote to Obama, and sending a note to the uncommitted folks will hopefully sway them to vote for Obama. It's that easy...

Clinton Supporters too …. !

It takes a moment, but what's a few minutes now worth to get Clinton in office?! Those are really worth !

Sending a note to current Clinton supporters lets them know it's appreciated, sending a note to current Obama supporters can hopefully sway them to change their vote to Clinton, and sending a note to the uncommitted folks will hopefully sway them to vote for Clinton. It's that easy...

Posted by: feeba on 05/20/08 at 11:05 PM  Respond

She can win because of the math. The earned delegates total must come to 2024 (or more if Florida and Michigan are counted, even by half). Since neither of them can get to that total, the earned delegates become moot. Despite the fact that most contests hinge on who gets the most votes, the primaries don't. They are simply a way for the DNC members to get a good sense as to who the people solidly prefer. That 2024+ number is the MINIMUM number a candidate must get in order to be declared the nominee. When the people disagree so closely, the Super Delegates have to look at other factors. Hillary leads in the popular vote. Forget about the "rules" about MI and FL. The Supers don't have the luxury of sitting back and letting the earned delegates make the nomination, so they have to now look at reality. MI and FL will count in the general election. They are solidly for Hillary. She has also won the most important states for the Democrats to win in the general. And, she leads both Obama and McCain in the polls for Electoral Votes http://electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Clinton/Maps/May25.html

Other factors include how the Republicans will attack, and whether they think Obama could weather it. Clinton has already shown she can weather just about anything.

So, she can win. Once the Super Delegates sit down and start to parlay, they will have to look at all of these things. And with the popular vote being so close, they will risk alienating at least 1/2 of the Democratic constituency, no matter what. In addition, polls suggest that 35% of Clinton supporters will defect to either McCain, or simply write in Hillary if Obama is nominated. Conversely, only 15% of Obama supporters will be lost if Hillary is nominated.

There you have it.

Posted by: Casey on 05/27/08 at 7:39 PM  Respond

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