The one single thing most likely to lose Obama the election has just occurred ...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con tent/article/2008/05/12/AR2008051202554. html?referrer=digg

One of Hillary's PLEDGED DELEGATES defected to Obama.

How is this bad for Obama you say?

It opens up every PLEDGED DELEGATE to insider politics.

If that occurs Obama may face a situation where its insider politics and the party chooses who the party wants.

Hillary Clinton has the majority of the Democratic party votes.

This cycle is stranger and stranger and stranger...

Word is from the press that Michelle Obama will be vetoing Hillary as VP.

Let that sink in for a second.

Word is from the press that Michelle Obama will be vetoing Hillary as VP

Michelle Obama thinks her vote is worth more than the MAJORITY of the democratic party registered voters who voted for Hillary.

What else will Michelle Obama veto?

Are we being asked to elect Michelle Obama as acting president?

Will she be telling Obama who the USA can and cannot be friends with?

And the WHOLE of TEAM Obama is now doing gymnastics on who Obama could pick as VP OTHER than Hillary. IN REACTION to Michelle Obama FORBIDDING BARACK OBAMA.  What a leader that Barrack is.

MAKE NO MISTAKE MILLIONS OF DEMOCRATIC VOTES DEPEND ON IT BEING HILLARY.

Now team Obama will tell you that they can piss on the Clintons and her supporters and tell them its a shower and somehow its our fault when we vote McCain.

Its like someone driving their car off the cliff and turning to their fellow car pooler and saying ok your turn to drive don't crash now.  And afterwards acting all shocked that the car crashed.  They are totally and completely out of touch and view you as bitter about it.

When we lose control of the supreme court remember it was Michelle "I have never been proud of my country" Obama who realized the GOP dream of a conservative supreme court.

It occurs to me that if I was a Republican Obama would want my vote.

As a DLC democrat Team Obama doesn't want to hear from me and Dailykos hates on me constantly.

But if I was a Republican with no past history of voting for the democratic party and was thinking about possibly backing the democratic party again Team Obama would fall all over themselves to court my vote.

My standing in their minds would GO UP!

Its as if the votes for democrats in the past has actually diminished my stature with Team Obama.

Clearly I have been taken for granted as a Democrat by MSNBC and CNN 360 etc.  They don't value my stature as a democrat.  They show bias to Obama because he has crossover support that allows him to over power the democratic base who selected Hillary.

Have we become the party where Republican's in Alaska are more important than Democrats?

Have I been a fool all along to vote for the democrat in elections when I should have been splitting my vote and registered independent?

Team Obama has me thinking VERY seriously about what loyalty means.  I have been loyal and look what its gotten, the candidate of the democratic party voter is likely to lose in the democratic primary.

Team Obama and Dailykos are already talking about running primary opponents in NY against Hillary.

I seriously come back again and again to the notion that I wouldn't have to deal with BS like this if I was an independent or maybe even a Republican.

And to think if I wanted Team Obama to react to me how much more voice I would have if I wasn't a democrat.....

This cycle has been a very sad one for me.

There has been a lot of talk about who the VP would be if Obama wins.

I think if Obama loses its pretty clear that the VP would be offered to him and he would be strongly pressured to accept.

But as a avid Hillary supporter I want to weigh in that if Hillary loses I expect her to be the VP.  I expect this both from Obama and Hillary.

If Obama wins and offers the VP slot to Hillary and covers her from his rabid supporters wrath and makes it clear that we are all in this together and she accepts I would vote for that ticket.

Many people have said that Hillary would not take the VP slot because she has better things to do....

Let me say this as someone who LOVES the Clintons, Hillary you have to take it.

Having Hillary campaign for Obama nation wide speaking his praises would work to heal the divide that Obama has helped create.  But Hillary has some of the responsibility for that divide too.  And I would think much less of Hillary if Obama in good faith offered the VP and her reply was I have better things to do.

So to be clear.  Hillary I totally support you and if you can get the nomination I am with you.  But if you win, I expect you to take Obama with you and it will destroy your legacy in my mind if you don't.

And Hillary,

If you lose and Barrack is the nominee I will expect you as VP.  If he is gracious in offering it to you and you decline It will destroy your legacy in my heart...
Obama the individual can be a gracious and sincere person and I believe he could move beyond the hate that many of his GOP and independent supporters have for the democratic party choice for president.

If he does so, Hillary you are on notice.  We your most loyal fans EXPECT you to be a good soldier and carry Team Obama to victory either as your underticket or with you as the underticket.

Either way Hillary you and Bill are the only way this guy is gonna win...

Tomorrow we will know who the next president will be.

Obama by 20 pts in NC and winning IN by 10 pts and its VERY hard for Hillary to make up the difference.

Obama by 6 in NC and losing IN by 10 and its very hard for Obama to have lead in popular vote at the end of the race.  That coupled with a 1 million vote deficit among registered democrats and Hillary will have a real solid mandate.

Whatever the vote totals Obama needs tomorrow to be a victory for him.

If he wins both states by 1 pts its not a victory and the Hillary momentum story continues and the next batch of states start to really run up the score for Hillary in terms of popular vote.

So if the polls hold up this is the last night that an Obama supporter who knows what is going will feel no pressure =)

Night Night.

OK here is my take on all remaining contests updated.

NC Obama +6 nets 7 delegates
IN  Hillary  +10 nets 6 delegates.

Ky Hillary +24 nets 13 delegates
PR H +20 nets 11 delegates - This is Obama's best chance to do better.
WV H +30 nets 10 delegates

Ore O +12 nets 6 delegates - This is Hillary's best chance to do better
South Dak O +8 nets 1 delegate
Montana O +12 nets 2 deleg

Expected net change in pledged delegates from remaining contests H 40 O 16

OK here is my take on how it will likely go down.

Florida and Michigan will count 100%  Hillary has too many members on the committee and needs 2 uncommitted to have a majority.  To avoid a floor fight which Obama can trigger with his members I believe the will get a compromise of the following.  Enough people understand that if Hillary pushes Florida and Michigan she wins that they won't fight it.

Obama will get a fair number of delegates in Michigan based on 2/3 of uncommitted votes being his.  Hillary will net 55.  37 from Florida and 18 from Michigan.  

Now Assuming that Edwards delegates vote 100% for Hillary as do all other non Obama pledged delegates she needs the supers to break for her 164 to 123.

If all non Hillary pledged delegates vote Obama then Hillary needs 183 to 104 break from supers.

If Obama has a demographic problem that will cause him to lose in November it will be clear by June.

So to sum up I expect Hillary to win if any of the following occur

1)  If Hillary wins the popular vote.  She currently needs roughly 147385 if you take real clear politics estimate for all states and give Obama 2/3 of uncommitted in Michigan which nets him 158778 from her current "lead".  If you count the Washinton primary instead of the washington caucus the net gain in popular votes Hillary needs is ~97385.  Its pretty clear to me that Hillary gets that number but again it will be much clearer on Tuesday.  If she wins the popular vote I expect Edwards and the majority of supers will endorse her.

OR

2)  If Edwards and other unaffiliated pledged delegates vote Hillary.  I believe Hillary has at least 41 supers loyal more than 50/50 from this point on.  Hillary has been the overwhelming choice of the Democratic party members and as soon as voting is over expect to hear that a LOT.  Even if popular vote goes against her if the pledged delegates of Edwards go 100% for Hillary I think she wins.

OR

3)  Obama continues to show unelectable demographics with SWING states in general polls.  This won't move too much and is a fair predictor of who will win against McCain.  This is a total game changer as his super delegates could defect making his position MUCH worse than it currently appears because each defection counts as 2 uncommitted going against him.  If he is unelectable there is a good chance he loses EVEN if he wins pledged AND popular vote.  Hillary will have some LARGE victories and that will give plenty of cover to anyone who wants to switch.

OR

4)  Its also possible that Hillary has a MASSIVE number of sleepers and if she has about 80 sleepers above 50/50 break she will win assuming the contests go as expected.  This is unlikely but because she had 8 years and affected much of the makeup of the DNC from Bill she may have MASSIVE DNC unelected support.  If that is the case she may have already won this and its just a matter of running out the clock.

To the Obama folks it may seem strange to you that the contest actually works out to  give Hillary several shots at winning.  The reason for this is that the Obama crowd have been lying about what constitutes victory.  Pledged delegates is not what American's have historically understood as what determines a WINNER, popular vote is.

And pledged delegates AND superdelegates AND pledged delegates includes Edwards pledged delegates and a few uncommitted ones too.

After Tuesday the die will mostly be set as Tuesday represents 187 of the remaining 404 pledged delegates and 2 highest delegate count states.  Lower delegate states like guam are very unlikely to change by much as a much higher percentage move is required to move the delegate total.  Thus small states match delegate projections MUCH better than larger states.

I want to stake a very clear position.  I support Barack Obama.  I support him in 2016.

I think you should support Barack for the following reasons.

1)  Barack's political missteps are not fatal in the long term.  He has real problems, they are not trivial, the Clintons also have real non trivial issues.  Next time he will dare not say his supporters won't support his opponents.  Next time he will dare not stand against democracy.  But most importantly next time it will be 4 or 8 years later and all his laundry is coming out hopefully in the primary so that even if he loses none of it is new to voters in 2016.

2)  Obama's personality is not fatally flawed.  Obama has taken positions that reveal that he may not be the worlds nicest guy under all his image.  But you know what some of my heroes are not the nicest people in private.  Obama has had a rough life and made some seriously wrong choices but I believe that he means what he has said about hope being that with God people who are bitter inside can be bringers of un-bitterness.  He may be bitter inside, he may have made corrupt bargains in the past (what politician hasn't), but I believe that he genuinely wants hopeful change.  Thats a serious positive for him.

3)  Obama is a even tempered nice guy on the surface.  If you take his surface at face value he is one of the nicest and even tempered people I have ever seen.  That is a legitimate asset in a minority that has to win over voters who WANT to not like him.  This is not a characteristic that is easy to find.

4)  Obama is charasmatic.  Sure Ford could be the first black president if Obama doesn't take the VP, but Ford probably can't fill the charm vacuum.  The recent governor of NY is black and will end the monopoly of non-black governors in NY but its more of a fizzle than a bang.  AAs want and deserve a BANG with their first president and Obama provides that while others may not.

5)  Obama is who AAs want.  We are destined to lose the AA vote soon after the first black president as racism will quickly crumble after a black president.  In a country where the black president is just like AAs each of them will be freer to reach for their full potential and the conservative ones will drift to the GOP.  But we as a party OWE them.  AAs have been very loyal to us, not loyal enough that they can blackmail us with their lack of support, not loyal enough that they can silence Florida and Michigan.  But they have been VERY VERY loyal and we OWE them our support if not in 2008 then at least in 2016 and that starts now.

Now to be clear I AM NOT VOTING FOR HIM IN 2008 and based on Demographics he is not winning in 2008.  But I think its important that as opponents of Obama we need to keep him viable for 2012 or 2016.  

I have said before that I think he does best with a Clinton/Obama ticket because the Clintons have enough good will built up that they can fight the GOP over Hillary and while doing also fight the GOP over  the Obama issues and by so doing destroy some of those issues.

Obama needs someone like Hillary or more importantly Bill arguing that he is a stand up guy that the common folk should be able to relate to.  Because there is bad blood between Obama and Hillary if the Clintons and the Obamas can GENUINELY bury the hatchet and that happens with the Clintons WINNING this round it will make it possible for the mildly racist or mildly conservative democrat who has pent up liking for Bill to transfer that like to Obama, because the transfer will occur on bubba's terms and they trust bubba and its important to them that Obama suffers a little after painting Bubba as a racist.  

To many of them they ARE bubba, they know that, they know Bubba knows that, but most importantly they know Obama knows that and they think he looks down on them.  Obama showing genuine LOVE for Bubba is what OBAMA needs in the long run to connect with the common folk.  And the more obviously hard that is for Obama (such as after losing) the more it will sway voters if it is genuine.  Its like Obama buying the guy who beat him in a fist fight a beer, thats something people understand on an emotional level as a gutsy and brave action even if they were cheering the guy to beat Obama's ass.  That kind of emotional connection turns hate into respect and finally into love and Obama has a way to have the Bubba's of the world LOVE and RESPECT him.

Gore, Kerry, Edwards, Dukakis, Carter, Kennedy, Pelosi, etc etc etc none of them can offer this get out of redneck hell card that the Clintons can offer.  It may not seem fair to Obama but thems the facts.

I think as supporters of Clinton we need to also consider the angle that one day Obama may be our flag bearer not just in the sense that he is the Democratic party man  but he may one day be the Clinton faction man.  As such we need to make sure that we don't damage him for 2016.  The winner of this primary will NEED the other as a running mate and that may lead to VERY strange changes in political backing.  Hillary needs Obama's voters and would be willing to bargain future support and that support only means something if we the Clinton faction are willing to give that conditional support in return for conditional support now.

Keep that in mind friends... =)

Dear Howard Dean,

After seeing Texas give more delegates to the candidate with less people supporting him I have seen clear and un-refutable evidence that Caucus contests don't reflect the will of the people.

I have also seen this in Washinton state where the primary showed a 3% Clinton loss but the Caucus showed a 37% Clinton loss.

I also saw this in Nevada where Clinton clearly won the contest but got a net loss of 1 delegate.

This causes me to question the other caucuses and reject the notion that a crossover vote in Alaska from a Republican can be counted as 10 times more valuable than my vote in California's primary based on popular vote to delegate ratio.  While we ware on that issue why do some states let republicans vote in our primary????  Is this to penalize me for being a faithful Democrat for all my life???

I will be voting for the primary popular vote winner Hillary Clinton in November.

But I will be angry about this issue in 2012 and 2016 and 2020 and I advise you to FIX IT.

If our party named after democracy believes in democracy for all not just those who are willing to be subjected to peer pressure over a time intensive process then I will support future nominees.

If on the other hand those who make  the "RULES" in our party do not believe in 1 person 1 vote, privacy and no obstructions to getting to the pole then I will be forced in future to think of myself as an anti-democrat whenever the nominee is determined by these methods.

Its a different issue but I feel the same way about ANY state for ANY reason getting less than their fair say in the election due to red tape of any kind.  I accept that inclusive measures like letting US territories have delegates do not constitute an unfair diminishing of other states rightful say.  However issues like when to vote are subservient to the right to vote.  

If states want to have their 2008 primary in 2006 and the voters of those states are happy with that than I am happy with that and will side with them in all future disputes.  This is also an issue I will remember in 2012, 2016, 2020 and penalize the party for acting against what I believe in.

In closing I am a believer in Democracy far more than I am a supporter of the Democratic party, recently I have had cause to question my parties commitment to Democracy as I understand it, this was  real shock and my reaction to it will be severe and sustained in the future unless the party fixes the problems.

DTaylor