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DOING THE MATH = SAME RESULTS

The Barack vs. Hillary circus train has rolled on to Indiana… with a spur line to North Carolina. Both states vote on May 6th. This week, of course, we had a videotape re-run of Senator Clinton bouncing off the ropes and back into the fight… with her nine point Pennsylvania victory. That tapped the sap of the money tree, an injection that’s keeping her campaign off of financial life support.

You all know the numbers… essentially that if even if Clinton wins in all the remaining states she still comes up short in the committed delegate count and will have to lean very heavily on those 300 or so still undecided superdelegates – the Democratic Party’s insiders – who will be left make the decision to put Clinton or Obama up against John McCain in November.

IGNORING THE VOTERS

The superdelegate system is a terrible system; here’s why: These are the party big shots…members of Congress, governors and the like… delegates to the Democratic Convention the last week of August who are free to vote for whomever they choose. Sadly, a large number of these heavy hitters will ignore the wishes of the voters in their home states and/or Congressional districts. That’ll be especially true if Clinton winds up with the nomination.

Even if those superdelegates do tell us know who they are backing, they don’t have to stick with that choice. Clinton's campaign has predicted a summer-long battle to convince superdelegates to back her, which would drag the process out longer than previously imagined by most. It could leave the Democrats scrambling for a Plan B very late in the game. So convention organizers in Denver are busy preparing backup plans for a nightmare scenario in which two potential nominees need to be accommodated -- with everything from the best hotel suites to the choicest Pepsi Center skyboxes split between the Obama and Clinton camps. A convention spokeswoman says: "We fully expect to have a nominee before anyone arrives in Denver." Well maybe, or maybe not. What’s your thinking at this point?

SWITCHING PARTIES TO BACK OBAMA

Now I do want to turn to the exit polls taken as Pennsylvanian Democrats voted because we learned some interesting things. The Dems there were so eager to participate in the hotly contested battle that one in 10 actually changed their party registration this year so they would be eligible to vote in the Democratic race. The contest was open only to registered Democrats. About half the party-switchers had been registered Republicans, while the rest had been unaffiliated with either party or were voting for the first time in Pennsylvania.

The exit polling shows a fifth of Obama’s supporters in PA were newly minted Democrats. Even the former Republicans favored Obama over Clinton, largely invalidating rumors that Republicans would vote strategically in the Democratic primary in support of Clinton, hoping she would be easier to defeat in November.

As expected, Pennsylvania's Democratic voters were overwhelmingly white and — as usual in Democratic contests — there were more women than men. Clinton drew her usual strong support among senior citizens and white women, and won the votes of white men. Those white men, especially blue-collar workers, have been the swing group in most Democratic contests. She even was competitive with Obama among whites under 30 years old, a group that has favored Obama in many states. Obama won the support of black voters and college graduates of all races. One-fourth of Obama's supporters were black, and half had college degrees.

Three in 10 Pennsylvania Democratic voters were union members or had one in their household, and they favored Clinton over Obama. Four in 10 had a gun owner in the household, and gun-owning households also went mostly for Clinton. About one in five Pennsylvania voters said the race of the candidates was among the top factors in their vote. About as many said that about the candidates' gender.

“IT’S THE ECONOMY, STUPID!”

As has been the case throughout the Democratic primary, the economy was the most important issue to voters. Four in 10 Pennsylvania Democrats said the country is in a serious recession and at least as many called it a moderate recession. Only about one in 10 said the economy is not in recession. Clinton did a little better than Obama on who would improve the country's economy, but nearly half of Pennsylvania Democrats thought both candidates would make a contribution to solving the country's economic problems.

How do Pennsylvanians think it will end? Just over half of those voting (and responding to the exit survey) saw Obama as the eventual winner of the nomination. Even one in five Clinton supporters felt Obama would eventually win. But more Obama supporters said they would be satisfied if Clinton won than vice versa. The animosity between the two camps led more than one in seven Obama supporters to say they would vote for Republican John McCain if Clinton were the nominee. Even more Clinton supporters, one in four, said they would defect.

I’ll be back with another THIS POLITICAL WEEK on Fri May 2. In the meantime, keep those comments coming.

Cheers, Bob

Bob_Tarlau's Blog

THIS POLITICAL WEEK

Bob_Tarlau

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