& so here we are on the last primary day! Hard to believe that the 2008 Iowa caucuses were just a short 17 years ago.

Nope! Now it’s a matter of waiting for this particular historical metaphor to happen (indulge us, please)…

or…. maybe not?

Stay tuned! It’s only going to get more exciting from here.

Hey, why not impress your friends & go ahead & call what will happen in the next 72 hours!

..nothing?

..she (finally) capitulates?

..he offers her the VP ticket?

What? Give us your best guess!

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) - Hillary Rodham Clinton has won a largely symbolic victory in Puerto Rico’s presidential primary.
Early returns show the former first lady winning a convincing victory over her rival Barack Obama.
A pre-election poll suggested she could wind up with nearly two-thirds support.
But even in defeat, Obama was on track to gain at least 14 delegates, bringing him within 50 of the 2,118 needed for the nomination.
Aides to the 46-year-old Illinois senator are predicting he will clinch the long-sought prize within days.
Montana and South Dakota hold primaries on Tuesday, the last of the primary campaign season.

Here’s an ad Clinton is now airing Montana & South Dakota:

Kentucky vote tally here. Exit poll results here.

Oregon vote tally here. Exit poll results here.

Clinton’s victory speech (3 parts):

Obama’s victory speech:

So are we done yet?

Doesn’t look like it.. & yet it does.

Here’s the latest Gallup daily tracking poll:

What do you think? 

Welcome to Kentucky/Oregon primary day!

*Oregon’s is a closed primary. Registerd Democrats only.
*52 delegates are at stake
*The entire state votes by mail-in ballot, unlike all others. This could complicate things, as this Washington Post article explains.
*The Oregonian newspaper says turnout is likely to top 1 million. But that’s below their all-time record.

*Like Oregon, Kentucky’s a closed primary. Registered Democrats only.

*51 delegates are at stake.

It looks as if both Obama & Clinton will chalk up a win today.

But Barack Obama’s may be the more significant one, in that he could cross the threshold of a majority of pledged delegates offered in the entire contest.

Hillary’s got another trick up her sleeve, though. After today, she plans to claim she has won the popular vote.

What do you think? Who will win? Post a comment!

For the third time this year, a Congressional district that was once a Republican bastion has fallen to a Democratic candidate.

Travis Childers won over Greg Davis in the race for the 1st congressional seat in Mississippi, 56-44 percent.

This follows a GOP defeat in Louisiana and in Illinois (the latter being the seat vacated by former House Speaker Dennis Hastert).

In all 3 campaigns, the national GOP has funneled money to pay for advertising to tie in the Democratic candidate to national Democrats, including Barack Obama & Nancy Pelosi.

Last week, well before the Mississippi race proved him right, another former House speaker, Newt Gingrich, warned the entire GOP that using those tactics would be a non-starter as a strategy in November:

“The Anti-Obama, Anti-Wright, and Anti-Clinton GOP Model Has Been Tested — And It Failed

The Republican brand has been so badly damaged that if Republicans try to run an anti-Obama, anti- Reverend Wright, or (if Senator Clinton wins), anti-Clinton campaign, they are simply going to fail.

This model has already been tested with disastrous results.

In 2006, there were six incumbent Republican Senators who had plenty of money, the advantage of incumbency, and traditionally successful consultants.

But the voters in all six states had adopted a simple position: “Not you.” No matter what the GOP Senators attacked their opponents with, the voters shrugged off the attacks and returned to, “Not you.”

The danger for House and Senate Republicans in 2008 is that the voters will say, “Not the Republicans.”"

If you’re a Republican who’s rooting for GOP to win this year, then the link above to the rest of Gingrich’s memo should be required reading. If the House leadership ignored Gingrich’s advice last week, you can bet on the fact that they’re paying close attention to it now.

& this week, it looks like they have made some changes. Yesterday, the House GOP announced its new campaign slogan.

…ready? 

It’s “The Change You Deserve.”

Catchy, no? Gotta go with change in your slogan in this “change” election year.

One slight problem, though:

The slogan is already used by the above company. The product? An antidepressant drug.

I suppose if the shoe fits, right?

What do you think? Post a comment!

Hillary Clinton won West Virginia by a 2-to-1 margin last night, 67% to Obama’s 26%.

Watch her victory speech:

But the math remains a tough nut to crack.

Today Obama picked up three more superdelegates.

Yes, we’re back & feeling somewhat better. Thanks for all the kind get-well words. We have 5 posts in the works for today, so check back.

Hillary Clinton can’t close the deal, & her prospects for securing the Democratic nomination are slimmer as of this morning.

Exit poll results here. Interesting tidbits:

• The college student vote was decidedly split in both states
• Voters who called the Jeremiah Wright issue “an important factor” in their vote went overwhelmingly for Clinton. The inverse was true for Obama - voters who didn’t care about it went overwhelmingly for him.
• Voters who made their minds up in the last week swung Clinton. Guess that gas tax holiday pander worked for a lot of folks.

Now for some Cherokee County results! This is the only North Carolina county in the NewsChannel 9 viewing area [in red in the above map]. Despite a huge loss across the state [particularly in the central region known as the “research triangle,”], Clinton won huge in Cherokee County, 73%-25%. Interestingly, neighboring Clay County had the exact same percentage with about half the number of voters than Cherokee County. Details here from the hometown paper, the Cherokee Scout.

Another interesting Cherokee County factoid:

• Total Democratic voters: 3224
• Total Republican voters: 1075

A majority-Democrat county in the south? Yes, it’s more common than you think - Grundy County, Tennessee often shakes out the same way, too. The reason? Many southerners are so conservative that they vote against Republicans because of “that rogue Abraham Lincoln.” No, seriously.

What about Rush Limbaugh’s “Operation Chaos” effect? It seems to have been a factor in Indiana, as outlined here. [by the way, we’d like to go on the record to say we have absolutely no problem with the strategy behind Operation Chaos. Democracies are messy things, & voters of all stripes have every right to vote how they want. To try to put a stop to it somehow would tarnish the democratic values we all share.]

Obama’s victory speech in North Carolina:

Clinton’s “victory” speech in Indiana [2 parts]:

So what happens next?

..ONLY THE UNCOMMITTED/UNDECLARED SUPERDELEGATES KNOW FOR SURE! STAY TUNED!!

Details on North Carolina polls here.

Details on Indiana polls here.

What the candidates should know about Indiana.
What the candidates should know about North Carolina.
Five things to look for in the Indiana results.
Five things to look for in the North Carolina results.
Eight questions that may be answered after today.
Native North Carolinian John Edwards & his wife Elizabeth (surprisingly) say they’re not going to endorse either candidate. See what their likes & dislikes are for each candidate here.
Will the North Carolina results drive Hillary to drink? Matt Drudge got his hands on an internal ‘expectations’ memo from the Clinton campaign that says yes.

Below: Obama campaigns in Indiana

Below: Clinton campaigns in Indiana

Below: Obama campaigns in North Carolina

Below: Bill Clinton campaigns in North Carolina

Your turn! Who’s gonna win which state?? PLEASE comment!!!!

Hillary Clinton won the Pennsylvania primary, 55% to 45%.

Analysis & video clips after the jump.

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HAPPY PENNSYLVANIA PRIMARY DAY!

More links & clips about today than you can shake a cheesesteak at, after you click “read the rest of this entry.

(more…)

Well, here’s a rebuttal to yesterday’s post about the sudden crucialness of North Carolina.

No, no, this article says — it’s Indiana that is the key state that will decide the fate of the Democratic nomination:

Indiana may be the one state remaining on the primary calendar where both candidates begin with a roughly equal chance of coming out ahead.

…

In Indiana, Obama has a home-field advantage, while Clinton has the backing of the popular Sen. Evan Bayh and may have an edge on the kind of economic issues that are likely to dominate the discussion before the state’s Democrats vote on May 6.

So what do the polls say? No idea. RealClearPolitics.com does not have any. Let me know if you see any.

May 6th will be very exciting. We can’t wait!

What do you think? Will North Carolina or Indiana be the deciding state? Post a comment!

JUST IN: TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (AP) - Florida Democrats have abandoned plans to redo the presidential primary with a mostly mail-in vote. Party leaders had expressed concerns about the proposal. The party plan was to run a second primary to seat the state’s delegates at the August convention. The state party considered the idea because the Democratic National Committee is refusing to award delegates based on Florida’s Jan. 29 primary, in which Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton won. The DNC stripped Florida of its delegates because party rules didn’t allow the state to vote before Feb. 5.

Mark Halperin’s page, The Page, over at Time Magazine, has the full letter from the Florida Democratic party. Key paragraph:

“A party-run primary or caucus has been ruled out, and it’s simply not possible for the state to hold another election, even if the Party were to pay for it. Republican Speaker of the Florida House Marco Rubio refuses to even consider that option. Florida is finally moving to paper ballots, which is a good thing, but it means that at least 15 counties do not have the capacity to handle a major election before the June 10th DNC primary deadline. This doesn’t mean that Democrats are giving up on Florida voters. It means that a solution will have to come from the DNC Rules & Bylaws Committee, which is scheduled to meet again in April.”

This is not good news for the Clinton campaign.

What’ll happen? Will they split the delegates 50-50? Or how about adhering to the rules so states won’t try the same thing Florida & Michigan did this year?

What do you think?

Barack Obama won the Mississippi primary yesterday, 61% to Clinton’s 37%.

Based on those percentages, Obama will get 17 of the state’s 33 delegates, & Clinton will get 11. (there are 5 superdelegates still hanging).

Current delegate count: Obama 1606, Clinton 1484.

After the jump, we’ll

1. Take a look at some Mississippi voter exit polls,
2. Find out about another delegate win for Obama announced yesterday,
3. Look into Clinton’s argument that a primary win in a given state translates into a win for the party in the general election, &
4. Take a look ahead (a loooong look ahead) to the next primary, in Pennsylvania.

(more…)

Welcome to Mississippi Primary Day, the latest in our state primary/caucus travelogue.

33 delegates are at stake in today’s Magnolia state contest.

After the jump, we delve into polls & predictions — plus find out which state should have had their primary today.. but didn’t.

(more…)

Obama wins Wyoming, 61-38.

He gets 7 delegates added to Clinton’s 5.

Pledged delegates, Obama/Clinton: 1378/1223

Committed Superdelegates, Obama/Clinton: 210/245

Total delegate count as of Monday morning, Obama/Clinton: 1588/1468.

Obama has a 120-delegate advantage at the moment.

On to Mississippi! Check back for our upcoming preview of the Magnolia state primary soon…

Wyoming’s Devil’s Tower in the eastern part of the state offers an apt current metaphor, dontcha think?

It’s a safe assumption that Wyoming Democrats are a rare breed.

Republicans outnumber them in most districts by 2 to 1 — in some, they’re outnumbered 20 to 1.

But this weekend, those rare Democrats are going to get a big say in the momentum of the race to the Democratic nomination. 12 (suddenly crucial) delegates are up for grabs.

Some thoughts on whom the state will favor (& keeping with tradition a look at some of the state foods), after the jump.

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Democratic party officials are still not finished counting the caucus in Texas.

Hillary won the Texas primary, 51% to 48%. This gives her 65 delegates & Barack 61 delegates.

But 67 delegates are still up for grabs from the state’s caucuses.

Later today we’ll likely know the final delegate outcome in the Lone Star state.

VOTE08 HAS DONE THE MATH & DETERMINED THE MAGIC NUMBER FOR HILLARY FANS TO WATCH FOR LATER TODAY. DETAILS AFTER THE JUMP. (more…)

Who won last night? EVERYBODY DID!

Forgive Vote08 for lapsing into an old liberal stereotype, but after the jump, we’ll make our case & put the night’s biggest winners in order of magnitude.

(more…)

Today is a pivotal moment for all four of the major remaining Presidential candidates.

There are a lot of numbers to digest, & issues to be resolved:

• Will Hillary Clinton stay in the race after today?
  
• Can Barack Obama deliver decisive victories that will convince his party he will be the nominee?
• Will John McCain attain enough delegates (1191) to end the GOP primary race once & for all?
• Can Mike Huckabee pull out a miracle?
• & by the way, what in the heck is a stuffed quahog?

Vote08 takes a look into the crystal ball after the jump!

(more…)

One of my colleagues in the newsroom writes

I review the show Lost for newschannel9.com, but I’m lost when it comes to the Texas Delegates. What is the unique way in which Texas awards delegates? And why is it that the media claims Clinton needs 55% to “break even” in Texas? - Matt Brunson

Matt, you’ve come to the right place, just as Lost fans will come to the right place by clicking on your Lost preview/review page.

Texas’ election rules are as complicated as the plot to Lost. It is an open primary.. & a caucus. Delegates matter in a different way than they do in other states. If you’d like to do some homework, the best site I’ve found explaining Texas election rules can be found here & here, in a blog called “Burnt Orange Report” that, frankly, puts this one to shame. If you’d like to see this blogger’s (extremely researched) prediction as to what will happen, click here.

From what I can tell, the advantage comes down to who can win districts with the highest population of Democratic voters. Hillary Clinton could win by 80% in President Bush’s home district, but she won’t be allocated as many delegates because there aren’t as many Democratic voters there are Republican voters. Whoever can win college towns like Austin, with high percentages of Democratic voters, will get the delegate advantage. This as you may have deduced puts Hillary Clinton at a disadvantage. She will have to win the entire state by close to 60%, & the most recent polls taken there shows she faces an extremely uphill battle.

Matt, I hope this helps answer your questions so you’re no longer “lost!”

Barack Obama & John McCain were both victorious yesterday.

For Obama, it’s now 10 victories in a row since Super Tuesday.

He won 76-24 in his home state of Hawaii, & 58-41 in Wisconsin. For Clinton, the only group that swung her way in the Badger State were women over 60. Obama gained ground in all other demographic groups.

McCain won 55-37 over Huckabee in Wisconsin.

Here’s the current delegate count, per ABC News.

Democrats:

Clinton 1261 (Total Votes: 10,661,812)

Obama 1355 (Total Votes: 10,958,168)

Delegates needed to secure nomination: 2025

Republicans:

John McCain: 960

Mike Hucakbee: 245

Delegates needed to secure nomination: 1191

This is not good news for either Clinton or Huckabee. Clinton needed a good showing in Wisconsin last night to help staunch the flow of positive momentum. The next contests are two weeks from now, in Ohio, Texas, Rhode Island & Vermont.

There’ll be a Democratic debate this Thursday night at 8pm on CNN.

Update: it looks like Obama will get the endorsement of the Teamster’s Union tomorrow.

Here’s a good numbers-crunching piece on how Obama won Wisconsin.

Vote08’s home with a nasty cold & an ultra-slow computer so this post, sadly, will be brief;

The Hawaii primary will be a joke; remember Obama was raised there so voters will give him the hometown advantage.

Wisconsin is far more interesting. The RealClearPolitics.com poll average has Obama with a four to four-&-a-half point advantage. This is a far smaller lead than Senator Obama has enjoyed in the past. Vote08 sees one of two outcomes from the Wisconsin primary:

1.  Hillary Clinton either barely wins (less likely) or doesn’t lose by as great a margin as she has in the past; the entire race to the nomination is “evened out” a bit, or
2. Barack Obama benefits from some of the most open election rules in the country; the Badger state allows registration on the day of voting, & allows independents to vote in any primary they want.

Time now to go nurse a sore nose; tell us what you think! Who wins Wisconsin today? Post a comment & let us know!

Voters in Pakistan choose their parliamentary members today, a day which coincides with our own “Presidents’ Day.”

The Pakistani system is a little different than the American one. Each party (there are more than 2) has a leader who is trying to get voters to choose the party. It would be as if John Kerry was ‘the face’ of the Democratic campaign for Congress in 2006, an off-presidential election year.

Here’s a campaign commercial for one of those parties. Notice how the candidates up for election are faceless & nameless, & that the party’s head is the one whom you see:

Vote08 would like you to ponder this story today & consider our own democracy & your role in it.

The great U.S. Supreme Court Justice Louis Brandeis once said that in a democracy, ‘the most important political office is that of private citizen’

Here’s a look at a ‘how-to-vote’ video broadcast on Pakistani TV. No idea what the video is saying, but the images should tell you enough.

By the way, registered voters in Hamilton County who voted on Super Tuesday: 40.04%

Folks, this is not acceptable. The number is far too low in a country as precious as ours. Many people take their right to vote for granted.

Chances are if you are viewing this site, you are already engaged in the political process & hopefully voted in the recent primaries.

But Vote08 would like to challenge you in the coming months to engage people whom you know who don’t normally vote to get involved. & this doesn’t mean that what we’re asking here is to convince a non-voter to choose a particular candidate. We would argue you’re going to be much more effective if you simply ask “are you going to vote in November?” rather than “WHO are you going to vote for in November?”

Regardless of who people are voting for, there’s an argument to be made — from any political viewpoint — that a greater participation in a democracy produces better results for your way of thinking.

Think about it.

  In another corner of the world, Kosovo has declared its independence today. This is an important step for that country, but a long & bumpy road remains ahead. Remember how important it was when our Founding Fathers took the fateful step against England that helped bring our great nation where it is today.

& Happy Presidents’ Day, everyone.

MARYLAND:

Obama 59, Clinton 37

McCain 55, Huckabee 29

(full vote count here)

VIRGINIA:

Obama 64, Clinton 35

McCain 51, Huckabee 40

(full Dem & GOP results)

DC:

Obama 75, Clinton 64 (latest vote count here)

McCain 68, Huckabee 17 (latest vote count here)

UPDATED (AP) DELEGATE COUNT:

Clinton 1198, Obama 1223. He leads for the first time.

McCain 821, Huckabee 241. The Huck still needs a miracle.

The Washington Post’s Dan Balz has some essential reading for anyone who’s curious as to how the campaign will evolve from here.