Going into May 6, 2008, it appeared that Hillary had turned the corner on Barack Obama, stealing his thunder on the road to the Democratic nomination.
Hillary's last hope has always been that she could beat Obama on the popular vote, and then she would have a viable argument to turn the Super Delegates her way to cast the remaining delegates to her side.
This was the only possible option available to Hillary, to swing the Democratic nomination her way. Although Obama has a lead in delegates, which precludes Hillary from winning the delegate count - even with Florida and Michigan on the count list - the only hope Hillary had was to swing the popular vote to her side, forcing the Super Delegates to seriously consider swinging their votes to Hillary, to have the delegate count reflect the popular vote.
Of course, I wanted Hillary to win the popular vote against Obama's delegate lead, but I have to be honest. I did not want Hillary to win the popular vote because I like Hillary better. I wanted to see the controversy stir, in order to lay the groundwork for seriously advancing the idea of killing the Electoral College once and for all. My thought is that popular vote should rule.
The Electoral College had its place in the election cycle, back in the days when it took the news of a nation weeks to move coast-to-coast. But, in today's instantaneous news cycle, it makes more sense for the election to be determined by popular vote, as opposed to the delegate count of the Electoral College.
But, here is the deal. With 80% of votes so far counted in North Carolina, Obama's 220,000 vote lead - against Clinton's 40,000 vote lead in Indiana (yes, I should probably wait until all of the votes in Indiana and NC are counted to make this point, but these early numbers ensure that what I am about to say will be accurate even in the morning), it becomes abundantly clear that Clinton cannot close the gap on the popular vote.
If Clinton had the 180,000 surplus at the end of today in the popular vote, then this race would still be on. But, since Obama is the candidate with the 180,000 vote surplus, it makes certain that the half a million or so votes that Clinton needed to close cannot be achieved at this point.
The upcoming states are small population states. Hillary's only hope for going forward in the process was to close the difference in the popular vote heading towards the last states. But, with today's results, Hillary no longer needs to close half a million votes, but now she needs to close 650,000 votes to own the popular vote.
At this point, I know that Hillary will not be up again until 2012. She is done for '08.
Obama seems to have made this connection as his victory speech in NC was the launch point for him, moving him towards the general election race.
Bill Platt
Stillwater, OK
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
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