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Tuesday 6 January 2009

What's next?

With Barack Obama on holiday and Hillary Clinton down at her house in New York, there’s a slight lull in the Democratic campaign and a chance for us to think about how this all might end. The first thing to note is that if Obama is ahead in the popular vote, as he currently is, as well as in  pledged delegates then he will—barring some unforeseen disaster—be the nominee. The super delegates are not going to buck the will of the people in such an obvious way and risk splitting the Democratic Party for a generation in these circumstances, especially as the well of support for the Clintons among them does not run that deep.

If Hillary is to have a chance of the super delegates bumping her in front of Obama for the nomination, then she needs to be ahead in the popular vote. If she is, then she can start arguing about how much of Obama’s delegate lead come from caucus states which unfairly discriminate against her support—the results in Texas, where Hillary won the primary and Obama the caucus held that evening, proves this point for her.

Hillary currently trails Obama by a tad over seven hundred thousand votes if you don’t count Florida and Michigan. If you do, the deficit shrinks to a mere 80 odd thousand. It looks like Florida and Michigan, which were not contested because the states held their contest earlier than the national Democratic party allowed, will not re-vote—which is a major blow to the Clinton campaign as it is hard to justify counting votes from an uncontested election.

Still there is a slim chance that Hillary could at least pare back Obama’s advantage in the popular vote to such an extent that counting Florida, where Obama’s name was at least on the ballot unlike in Michigan, gives her the edge. To do this, she would have to win big in Pennsylvania. An average of the most recent polls there put her more than 16 points ahead and the smallest lead she has had in any poll this month is 12. Hillary needs to maintain that advantage.

Then, Hillary would have to win at least one of Indiana or North Carolina and run Obama close in the other state. If she were to lose both, then her chances of overtaking Obama in the popular vote would recede and she would be faced by calls to get out for the good of the party from a series of senior figures. However, if she were to win both—and polls show her only a few points down in North Carolina—then Obama would be under real pressure especially as Hillary can expect to rack up a big win in West Virginia a week later.

In the five contests that follow, you would favour Obama in three and Hillary in two. She would probably have to win by mighty big margins in her states to get close and win Oregon, the most populous of the three Obama-leaning states.

The key to this scenario is a big win in Pennsylvania. This, oddly, poses a dilemma for Obama. If he were to campaign all out there over the next four weeks, he could probably keep Hillary’s margin of victory down but would still probably not win. In some way, this is enough. But to go all out and not win, especially after his recent troubles, could weaken him significantly for the fight ahead.

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