NYT-Clinton needs three breaks to beat Obama

[underpants]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23717598

POLITICAL MEMO
By Adam Nagourney

updated 11:30 p.m. ET, Wed., March. 19, 2008
WASHINGTON - Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton needs three breaks to wrest the Democratic presidential nomination from Senator Barack Obama in the view of her advisers.

She has to defeat Mr. Obama soundly in Pennsylvania next month to buttress her argument that she holds an advantage in big general election states.

She needs to lead in the total popular vote after the primaries end in June.

And Mrs. Clinton is looking for some development to shake confidence in Mr. Obama so that superdelegates, Democratic Party leaders and elected officials who are free to decide which candidate to support overturn his lead among the pledged delegates from primaries and caucuses.

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“They are going to have to be flawless in executing the strategy, which achieves the goal of taking away the advantage Obama has in pledged delegates and the popular vote,” he added. “Any major setback could undercut that goal. Obama is in the advantageous position.”

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Popular vote a distant target
Mr. Obama’s edge over Mrs. Clinton is 700,000 votes out of 26 million cast, excluding caucuses and the disputed Florida and Michigan results. About 12 million people are eligible to vote in the remaining contests.

Aides to the two candidates said even with the best possible showing for Mrs. Clinton in the states ahead, it was hard to see how she could pass Mr. Obama without Michigan and Florida.

She received 300,000 more votes than Mr. Obama in Florida in January. In Michigan, where none of her major opponents were on the ballot, she drew 62,220 more votes than the rest of the opponents. Mrs. Clinton’s advisers said that absent some deal to seat the delegates from those states, the campaign would still argue that the popular vote in Michigan and Florida be counted.

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But the audience now is as much the Democratic superdelegates, who are especially attuned to politics and questions of electability in the fall, as it is rank-and-file voters.

Mrs. Clinton’s advisers said they had spent recent days making the case to wavering superdelegates that Mr. Obama’s association with Mr. Wright would doom their party in the general election.

[thereismore]

1. How truly classy of her - dredging out Wright at every turn. Blech. nt

[Skwmom]

2. What a bunch of b.s.

She has to defeat Mr. Obama soundly in Pennsylvania next month to buttress her argument that she holds an advantage in big general election states. (HER OWN SUPPORTER, RENDELL SAID EITHER DEMOCRAT WOULD WIN IN NOV - AND WITH THE ECONOMY TANKING AND BILLIONS BEING SPENT IN IRAQ, RACE WON'T BE THE ISSUE).

She needs to lead in the total popular vote after the primaries end in June. (THE POPULAR VOTE DOES NOT DECIDE. HOW MANY OBAMA SUPPORTERS DID NOT VOTE B/C OBAMA WAS ALREADY BEATING CLINTON BY A WIDE MARGIN IN THEIR STATE BUT WOULD HAVE IF THEY KNEW IT WAS THE POPULAR VOTE THAT ACTUALLY COUNTED? THIS IS WHY YOU DON'T CHANGE THE RULES IN THE MIDDLE OF THE GAME. WHY HAS NO ONE BROUGHT THIS POINT HOME?)

And Mrs. Clinton is looking for some development to shake confidence in Mr. Obama so that superdelegates, Democratic Party leaders and elected officials who are free to decide which candidate to support overturn his lead among the pledged delegates from primaries and caucuses. (THE ECONOMY, THE WAR, ETC WILL BE THE DECIDING ISSUE IN NOVEMBER, NOT THIS WRIGHT STORY THE CLINTON CAMP AND MEDIA IS PUSHING).

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Note: I used all caps to highlight my response and the original post.

[jakem]

3. Well, her campaign has been so 'flawless' so far...

:rofl: