We are trying to engage in a civilized conversation here and throw ideas left and right and judge them of their merit, and you post a picture of two kittens. I don't understand this juvenile behavior, really.  How old are you for the love of god? I think it is past your bed time...go to bed.

Great stress relief.

No way does Obama need Clinton's baggage bringing him down. He has enough of his own baggage with his sketchy associations and outspoken wife that he doesn't need two burdens (Bill and Hillary) bringing him down.

Obama needs a boring and sensible pick with no baggage and a strategic state affiliation.

Clinton should pick Strickland, should she manage to steal the election.

Let's see.  If you assume that Obama is too lousy to win the White House, but the other candidate is so lousy she was beaten by a lousier candidate, then why would you multiply the lousiness factor by combining them together in one ticket?

Really, when you look at it that way, at that point you would be better off just picking two random names out of a telephone book and making that the ticket.

Fortunately, Obama is one of the most talented politicians we have ever seen.  I know that because Bill Clinton said so on the Charlie Rose show.

I included the polls from NY and NJ just to compare them with the same polls taken in 2004. If our candidate in 2008 is behind McCain by 2 while our candidate (Kerry) in April 2004 was up by 18, that gives you an idea about the handicap of the race in other states.

I know that NY and NJ will go democratic, but you have to look and pay special attention to the margin of victory. A victory in NY by 2 points pretty much means that that candidate has lost every toss up states to his opponent. A victory by 15 or 20 (this is NY we are talking about) means that our candidate is not only solid with the democratic base, but also attract those independents leaning-democratic and those moderate republicans such as the one in NY. Translate that in other states: it means the message of the candidate is working on these two groups and that in states like PA, MO, or OH, the campaign needs to increase its ad buys and target specifically these two group to tilt the state in its favor.

Remember, you want to spend your money in places where you are likely to change minds and tilt the state. You don't want to spend your money in solid democratic states like NY, CA, and NJ. You might do some ad buy, but a very small one, just to remind voters that there is a campaign going on.

Polls in states this early indicate one thing: the front-runner (whoever it is) is having hard time closing the deal. This is the importance of those polls. They also indicate that the front-runner might need to work on his narrative/message a bit, add more substance here and there, or add more inspiration, or talk about a new subject, or which demo. group is still indifferent to you and so forth. I remember in the 1988 campaign, the national polls were giving us a 20 to 28 points advantage over Bush senior, but when we looked at the state by state polls, we were tied or slightly behind in a large number of them. Of course, the slightly-behind thing became a tsunami by August and by September/October, we pretty much knew that were going to lose.

Florida is a very good example of the problems of Senator Obama with the elderly and the Latinos/Hispanics. He is behind McCain in some polls by as many as 22 points. Now, look at other states with large elderly population and you pretty much know that you are losing that state too.

"It means he cut a 20+ point deficit "

Earth to leshrac55.  Obama was down an average of 10 points in the 5 polls conducted in February.  12-13 points in March average.

He was never consistently down 20+ points in the RCP average since there's been a heated primary race.

Please stop spreading BS.

RCP...know it, love it, use it:  http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/ 2008/president/pa/pennsylvania_democrati c_primary-240.html

I support Senator Obama and i voted for him already in Super Tuesday, however, i do not worship him and i do criticize him when i see and feel like he made a mistake like his behavior in the MI/FL debacle. I do not hate Senator Clinton. I actually came to admire her tenacity. You have to tip your hat to her. Any other candidate who have folded like a cheap chair under pressure.

More importantly, as a democrat i want to WIN. I want to see a Democratic president in the WH. If that means it has to be a joined ticket, so be it. If that means it has be Obama, so be it. If that means it has to be Clinton, so be it.

I agree partially. There's little chance that Obama will win, and no matter the margin of victory, it won't help Clinton catch up in pledged delegates. But right now, I don't think that's what Pennsylvania is all about. I think it's more about Clinton trying to prove to the superdelegates that she's more electable.

And yes, that is shaky ground. You're right in the fact that a primary victory means nothing for the general election, but that's how it's going to be spun if they can make the case. And however terrible the logic may be, it may be the case that enough people thinking wrong thoughts all of a sudden turn them into right thoughts.

But anyways, that all said, there has to be some percent threshold that Clinton would cross to let this all happen, and I think 10 may be too low. I said in another comment that 20 may be too high...so I don't know, peg it at 15? I'm not really sure where to put it without gaming expectations.

link to this please?  everything that I have heard and read has Hill gaining +10 nothing more.

We break open the champagne.

She will fight on and win WV by 20 and KY by 30

If Senator Obama wins NC by 50 points, it means that he got a load of delegates in the primary. It does not mean a thing for the general elections. NC is a red state and Obama or Clinton will not move it in the democratic column.

There are key states that we democrats need to focus on, and Pennsylvania is one of them.

Accuracy is a good thing.  Clinton has not "lost 28 primaries".  Eleven of Obama's wins were caucuses - many of them in states that neither he nor Clinton have any hope of winning in the General Election.  Disagree all you like, but caucuses and primaries are very different beasts.

I don't think they're an Obama supporter either. Wanna know what tipped me off? Mentioning the spending. Anyone who knows anything about the race knows that Obama has TONS of cash to spend, far more than McCain. It only makes sense for him to use it.

And even MORE important is to know that Hillary is running a deficit. That hardly seems responsible to me. So if we're going to talk about spending, Obama wins hands down.

I'm amused at the fact that after being mocked for it for months now, Clinton supporters continue to declare certain states highly important and others inconsequential.  Indiana and North Carolina combined are larger than Pennsylvania.  But that intrudes upon their "big state" meme.  Georgia is the same size as New Jersey, but commentators on Super Tuesday kept lumping her 10% NJ margin in with Clinton's "big state wins" while ignoring the 35% beating Clinton took in Georgia.

Anyone can pick and choose metrics by which their candidate looks better.  Luckily we only have one which picks a nominee: whoever gets 2024 total delegates.

So I guess Hillary will lose Wisconsin, Conn, Iowa, Missouri...ect....

Come on, you know this is the DUMBEST argument with the worst logic. Primary(caucus)/General Election = apple/orange.

Using numbers very favorable to Clinton, Obama should finish with around 1680 pledged delegates, with 1550 for Clinton.  Obama already has 231 superdelegates committed to him, bringing his total to at least 1910.  There are 65 add-on delegates left to be assigned, mostly in states that he won, so that's at least another 35 or so add-ons, bringing him to 1945.  At this point, he only needs 80 more superdelegates to win, and that's assuming he doesn't gain a single superdelegate from now to the end (besides add-ons), a very unlikely situation.  Several superdelegates have already indicated they are likely to support the pledged delegate winner, and many more will follow suit.

Even under the most pro-Clinton predictions (blowouts in PA, WV, KY, IN, and PR, and narrow losses in NC, OR, MT, and SD), she still needs 2/3 of the uncommitted supers to win.

Under much more likely predictions (NC canceling out PA and IN, and a more sizable Obama margin in OR combined with under 60% Clinton victories in WV and KY) Obama will finish with around 1700 pledged delegates, meaning he only needs about 60 of the uncommitted supers (Clinton needs 75% in this case).

If Obama should overperform (tiny loss in PA, landslide in NC and OR, narrow win in IN, keeping KY, WV, and PR closer), he could end up with around 1720 pledged delegates and only need 40 uncommitteds (Clinton would require 83% then).

Ultimately though, the final numbers won't budge much because there's only 8 states, Puerto Rico, and Guam left.  The only question is whether Obama gets enough superdelegates from now until May to put him over 2024.

Chirp Chirp Chirp

If McCain becomes president we will lose two more rational Supreme Court justices to Scalia clones.  If we can't beat McCain now we won't beat him in four years, regardless of how bad things get.  If America is willing to elect him considering how bad things already are, we might as well just get ready for 2016.

Not a sunny prospect.

1. If Obama gets the nomination and loses to McCain, he will never get another chance. The Democratic Party hasn't re-nominated a general election loser since Adlai Stevenson was nominated in 1956 after losing in 1952.

2. If the Democratic nominee (whoever that is) loses to McCain in this year, of all years, the Party will have sealed its image as the Party that can't win the top spot. That will just make it harder for our future nominees.
   
3. No matter how bad McCain might turn out to be, it's hard to imagine that he could be so much worse than Bush that it would give us clear sailing in four years.
   
4. If we get veto-proof majorities in both Houses of Congress and thereby prevent McCain from screwing everything up, that will, paradoxically, make it even harder for our Presidential nominee in 2012.
   
5. It's the Supreme Court, stupid. A strong Democratic majority in the Senate might prevent the appointment of complete right-wing wackjobs, but they'll still be conservatives. Maybe they wouldn't vote to overturn Roe v Wade or vote to take away our civil rights in other ways, but I sure don't want to take that chance.

Bottom line - we should treat this election as if it were now or never, because it just might be

"Her chances of doing that, with a 25% win today would be about 15%."

Divining this 15% figure out of thin air sounds more like clairvoyance than mathematics to me.  

You say this:
"she needs to win 60% of delegates in all of the remaining contests for her candidacy to mean anything"

I'll ignore the fact that your comment intentionally trivializes and demeans Clinton and the enormous breadth and depth of support which she has had and continues to have. Like it or not, win or lose, her candidacy has meant and means a great deal.

Your argument implies that this nomination process is an election process, which it is not. There is a reason why the DNC runs these contests as a fluid series of races over a long period of time. Things change, impressions of candidates change, new facts emerge. The caucus and primary contests are not final, binding results but rather are intended to inform the DNC as to which candidate is the best candidate and the most electable candidate against McCain. That is the ultimate goal obviously. It is why the superdelegates exist and why the pledged delegates are one component of a larger process.

Obama's failure to win large primaries in large, complex states has worrisome ramifications re his strengths and weaknesses in the GE and his supporters should be able to acknowledge that. If he loses PA and exit poll data shows no movement of support outside of his core constituencies, will you not question his electability in the GE? He cannot win the GE with the base and ceiling of support which he has. In the "Potomac Primaries" it looked as if he could break out of those barriers, but that was 2 months ago and the news has not been good since then. He needs another VA, frankly.

Obama and his supporters would be wise to learn from this process where his support lies and where he has his work cut out for him if he does succeed in getting the nomination. That, too is a goal of these primaries.