I was perusing the news this morning when I came upon this article in the New York Times with some clarifying quotes from Governor Dean.
There is a front page story on this article now by DHinMI about the political ramifications. I'm writing about the winning delegate and popular vote margins he's suggested.
The article is short and sweet and contains some choice quotes. And it gives me a nice excuse for some fun calculations.
'I think it would be nice to have this all done by July 1,' Dean said on ABC's 'Good Morning America' program.' 'If we can do it sooner than that, that's all the better.'
It's obvious to everyone, and especially to superdelegates like Dean that the longer this primary continues, the more potential damage the candidates can do to one another. What Dean is saying is that after the final primary in Puerto Rico, there is no reason for any superdelegate to wait until the convention before going public with their vote of support for one candidate or another, because by that time, every metric with which you can use to decide upon your endorsement will be clearly ennumerated: pledge delegate totals, popular vote totals, primary state contests won, etc.
There is also this vital bit:
'The candidates have got to understand that they have an obligation to our country to unify,' Dean said in another interview on CBS's 'Early Show.' 'Somebody is going to lose this race with 49.8 percent of the vote and that person has got to pull their supporters in behind the nominee.'
The first sentence echoes the recent sentiments of many party leaders who have spoken out, and now both Senators Obama and Clinton have both put themselves on record as saying that they will work for party unity once the nominee has been chosen.
The second sentence is the biggie. Chairman Dean gives us a number by which to calculate what the popular vote margin may be. The 49.8 percentage could easily be used to calculate the pledged delegate totals as well.
Kos on the Popular Vote Deficit
Hiraga has Updated Popular Vote Totals
PocketNines has Popular Vote Projections
Wikipedia's Delegate Numbers
I start out my simple calculations with these numbers:
Total number of delegates -- 4049
Total number of pledged delegates -- 3254
Total number of superdelegates -- 795
Popular vote to-date from Hiraga's diary are:
Obama -- 13,140,000
Clinton -- 12,380,000
Total -- 25,520,000
Difference -- 760,000
Kos sets the popular vote margin to-date at 813,000 plus change. Let's go with the lower difference from Hiraga here to account for any strange variations in the numbers.
Using popular vote projection values from PocketNines (a great source for number crunching and initial values):
OVERALL POCKETNINES' Turnout Predictions:
Pennsylvania - 1,543,000
Indiana - 1,223,000
North Carolina - 1,576,000
West Virginia - 301,000
Kentucky - 436,000
Oregon - 544,000
South Dakota - 82,000
Montana - 164,000
And I'll add these numbers:
Puerto Rico - 1,000,000
Total -- 6,869,000
The numbers for Puerto Rico are a blind guess by me, because they've never voted in a presidential primary before. Therefore, any errors in the calculations are my own and not from the cited diaries.
Jay Cost at RealClearPolitics has a spreadsheet on which you can calculate the results for the final primary states. You can also check out Obama's leaked spreadsheet for more insights.
So, we know what the pledged delegate numbers are and we can set a threshold based on Governor Dean's numbers.
Pledged delegates -- 3254
Winner's percentage -- 50.2
Second Place percentage -- 49.8
Winner's pledged delegate haul -- 1633.5, say 1634
Second Place pledged delegate haul -- 1620
Difference -- 14 pledged delegates
This, in and of itself, is revealing. The DNC Chairman thinks that a 14 pledged delegate lead is enough for one candidate to call him/herself the winner. And this 14 pledged delegate lead is enough to give the winner standing to call all Democrats to his/her candidacy.
What if we do the numbers by counting in all the delegates.
Total number of delegates -- 4049
Winner's percentage -- 50.2
Second Place percentage -- 49.8
Winner's total delegate haul -- 2032.6, say 2033
Second Place total delegate haul -- 2016
Difference -- 17 total delegates
Not much of a difference between the two numbers there. If we go with Obama's estimate from his "leaked" spreadsheet, he will have a 67 pledged delegate lead by the end of the primary season, which is well past the Dean threshold for winning the nomination. This is a conservative number, as he is likely to have more by the end of the nominating contests. Poblano has some numbers that include seating the Florida and Michigan delegates as is, which "would cost him 56 delegates" by poblano's reckoning. I think this is as good a number as any I can come up with. At present, the likely scenario would be that the Florida and Michigan delegations will be seated, but the delegates would be allocated 50/50. There are other possibilities, and I'm happy to amend this diary to reflect the more relevant scenarios if you want to suggest some.
What if we do these calculations with the popular vote totals. It's a bit trickier here, because the numbers are still in flux and we don't know what the turnout will be for the final few primaries. We do know that the turnout will be higher than usual because the two candidates have decided to give me a 4-6 month long heart-attack by keeping it exciting. I'll happily defer to PocketNines and the analysis in this diary. Again, I didn't include Florida and Michigan in these calculations. If you have a suggestion on some numbers I could use, let me know.
The total popular, using Kiraga's numbers and PocketNines projections, and my flagrantly random Puerto Rico numbers is 32,389,000. Now, doing the same simple calculations as performed on the delegate numbers:
Total putative popular vote -- 32,389,000
Winner's percentage -- 50.2
Second Place percentage -- 49.8
Winner's putative popular vote -- 16,259,278, say 16,260,000
Second Place putative popular vote -- 16,129,000
Difference -- 131,000 total votes
And there you have it. Using PocketNines' estimated popular vote numbers, even with Florida and Michigan included in the tally, Clinton comes up short (140,000 vs 131,000) and that 140,000 vote number is after giving Obama zero popular votes in Michigan. Otherwise, Clinton doesn't come any close than a difference of 140,000 votes.
I will not presume to tell Senator Clinton nor her campaign that the probability for her staging a comeback is remote, at best. However, I don't mind giving superdelegates some of these numbers and having them wait until the results from the final primaries are in before they make up their minds.
Add these numbers to the growing chorus preaching party unity and decisive action on the part of our party leaders and superdelegates. I'm cool with having this primary season go through Puerto Rico, but anyone waiting untilt he convention to voice their preference should have a good hard look at the numbers and the reality of an unscathed Senator McCain.