What R hatred was there for Kerry before the general? He was the most liberal Senator, but Obama holds that one this time around.

R's may be indifferent towards McCain, but as the prospects of as many as three pro-abortion judges be put on the Supreme Court comes up, they'll rally around him.

And Republicans thought Bill Clinton looked down on them (probably because he outmanuvered them), but it was almost entirely a fabrication.

So how does everyone see tomorrow's contests going? Washington, Louisiana, Nebraska. Obama sweep?

I'll be very surprised if he doesn't win Washington handily. Hillary got 5,000 people last night, Obama is likely going to fill Key Arena (17,000) today. Traffic is horrible around here this morning (I work fairly close to the Key). Last poll I heard he was up double digits here also....

You know Kerry's still in the Senate, right? And so is Ted Kennedy? I can't imagine Obama is the most liberal Senator.

Pretty much. Obama has done well in the South, and in traditionally red states so far. No reason to think the trend won't continue.

The same outfit that named Kerry most liberal last time around named Obama this time around. It sounds good, but there is dispute about which votes they classify as "liberal".

Oh, so you're telling me it might be biased? No way!!!!

I'm surprised they have enough voting data on Obama to put something like that together, frankly.

It takes the votes of the different bills and arranges the Senators by their percentage of votes cast that were "liberal" and "conservative".

I'd be surprised if it wasn't.

LOL. To you. Perception is reality.

Wouldn't perception be perceived reality?

Depends on how you see it I guess.

:D

I think that the story right now (though Ohio-Texas) is:

Maine, Texas, Ohio: Clinton

Virginia: Toss-up

Everything Else: Obama

I would say that if any states suprise and break from this narrative, it would be a huge boost to the winning candidate.

In the two recent polls I've seen Obama is up 20% in Virginia.

Id move Vir to Obama as JP said and Maine is probably closer to a toss up. Hillary was up a good amount there as of the last poll but that was in december I believe plus it is a caucus which BO has swept so far. If BO doesnt win everything but one state heading into March 4th I think it would be viewed as a huge disappontment to him though maybe not in the media.

I agree with both of you that this is what the polling is saying, but I also remember the New Hampshire polls and the Super Tuesday polls in MA, NJ, and CA.

I think that the pollsters are having a hard time figuring out Obamamentum and seem to overestimate it after his really good showings. So I am being cautious and assuming that they are overestimating his support after a good Super Tuesday.

As for Maine, it is a caucus state, but it is an older working-class white state with a very small in-state college population. I think that Clinton takes it easily.

But the polls basically got Obama's support in NH correct, it just turned out that undecideds broke very heavily for Clinton. The same thing happended in SC except undecideds broke heavily for Obama. In VA there aren't enough undecideds to swing it to Clinton. I'd bet good money that as of today she needs to steal voters from Obama in the next few days if she's going to win.

And I just read another site suggesting Harold Ford as Hillary's front running VP choice if she were to win the nomination. I don't know how I forgot him, but..that's an interesting idea and one that doesn't sound too crazy to me.

Looks like Obama won Nebraska and Washington by a nice margin.

And now Louisiana.

For the first time, I'm starting to think Obama could actually win the nomination. Momentum is really kicking for him right now.

More policy-laden infusions in his victory speeches. Trying to be more Presidential again. The momentum is a new thing for him and being the guy on top is hard to do, when you're always the underdog. So it's a whole new game. He was really brave by attacking her the way he did tonight in that speech, going after McCain too for the first time in such a high profile situation.

I think he's going for the death blow and that's probably smart to make people think "what if this guy can pull this off?"

But..I still can't believe the Clintons will let it go this easily. I feel like they have something up their sleeve to kill him off or at least, to injure him going forward. I almost feel like they'd rather see McCain in the White House than him, though obviously they'd never say that.

FOX News is really trying to sell their viewership on him being the "black candidate". But the title doesn't stick, but man..they're funny on how they try to heap praise on him, but throw that tag on him. CNN brought it up, but Roland Martin debunked that notion earlier.

LOL

Sorry DC but claiming he's anything but that is genuinely funny.

(That's true in more ways in just the obviously comical one, but I decided I'd just go with the humorous one here, screw the political commentary)

Sidebar here.

If Hillary does eventually lose, is it the biggest failure in U.S. political history?

Off-hand, and admittedly I'm working from recent memory not looking up historical context, I can't think of a bigger flop in terms of expectations versus outcome.

Rudy Giuliani was once the consensus frontrunner and he wasn't even competitive, anywhere so he's a colossal failure.

I don't follow politics all that much, but if Obama wins, I think it's more of a attribute of Obama's determination and resilience then any failure on Hilary's part. Giuliani being a complete non-factor in the Republican primary seems like it would be a bigger failure to me.

I'd say that Thomas Dewey's collapse against Harry Truman in 1948 would still rank as the biggest failure in U.S. political history. Going into the election season, Truman's approval rating was at 36%, and he was nearly universally regarded as incapable of winning the 1948 election.

Yeah, ever since 2002 we've seen Giuliani as a big potential GOP candidate for post-Bush. All of last year he's the front-runner and prohibitive favorite. And in the end I'm not sure he got a delegate.

I think Rudy ended up with 1 delegate, same as Duncan Hunter got and 3 less than Ron Paul had when Rudy dropped out. Hillary losing is a pretty big failure though, but at least she's been competitive and is still in the race.

The only thing that surprises me about Giuliani is how anyone ever seriously thought that a pro abortion, pro gun control, pro gay marriage, public adulterer was ever going to win the Republican nomination. Say what you want to about McCain's lack of conservative credentials, but he makes Giuliani look like Ted Kennedy.

I think this thing may be far from over by the way. Hillary should do very well on March 4th. Hillary was up 42 percent to 19 percent when Ohio was last polled at the end of January. There haven't been any recent polls in Texas but I'd bet Hillary wins that state since Obama hasn't faired well with Hispanics.

That being said, I'm voting for Obama on or before May 6th if it looks like Indiana might matter.

Pretty much what VV said on that, Giuliani's backing was all shadow not substance (and his tactical ability was obviously as bad as anyone in the history of politics as we now know).

Compare that to how long Hillary has been a presumptive Presidential candidate (pretty much from the day Bill left office) and the presumptive favorite. Plus the organization was certainly in place (although I'd say it has let her down in the earlier stages) the funding was there & had a huge headstart. You add it all up, I'd have to think this is one of the most disappointing showings at least in my lifetime, a coronation instead of a race would seem like the expected outcome.

edit: As much as I loathe Hillary, I'm actually starting to look forward to reading the insider accounts of where & how things went so wrong (assuming she does end up managing to lose). It should be some fascinating stuff, and that's not the sort of thing I usually enjoy reading for people I can't stand (as I'm too turned off by them to be able to tolerate their p.o.v. in the explanations).

No idea. The guy was such a failure that he wasn't even going to win his home state according to the polls. Hillary, Obama, McCain, Romney, and Huckabee all managed to do that fairly easily.

+1

She's had eight years -- at least -- to prepare. She raised $100 million against a nominal candidate for her Senate race in 2004 and she ended up with just $10 million after it was over. What? So much for her warchest for this race.

Even with that, she was the establishment candidate and presumptive frontrunner since 2000. All anyone in 2004 could talk about was whether she'd get in the race or not, be VP or whatever and she just beat the drum of "I'm a Senate, yadda..."

She has to win this thing. She's been preparing for it and Bill has been behind the scenes behaving and trying to repair the Clinton legacy to make sure people maybe didn't think as much about how they hated them and instead, about 'making history'.

But then Obama shows up and crashes the party. It's far from over and I feel the Clintons will do almost anything to win this thing, even if it means killing off a party superstar in the process, because in their minds, they are proxy for "What's good for America." Akin to the parent who tells you to take bitter medicine because it'll "make you feel better".

I'm just not convinced they'll let it go and that's the thing that makes me really reluctant to see any path to how he'll eventually get elected.

But then, I never saw him making it this far.

I think March 4th is key as well. Texas and Ohio favor her as well as the other two states on that day, Vermont and Rhode Island. She can sweep that day and take all of the momentum away, or Obama can steal Ohio and keep it somewhat close in Texas. We'll have to wait and see how Obama winning all of the states leading up to that factors into the voters decisions.

That's the thing that I think will make such an interesting thing to read the insider views on after it's all over. If she wins, of course, those won't be written for a long time if ever but if she loses I have to think some people will be willing to talk about how they let it happen.

I suspect she got some bad advice from "experts" who weren't part of her original enclave, as she seemed to regain momentum for a while once she brought back in some of her old clique but now that seems to have stalled too.

My instinct is that the rifts inside her campaign have been significant and they ended up pulling her in too many directions trying to be everything to everybody (that she figured might eventually vote for her). She's also been running to beat McCain IMO, and overlooked the fact that she had to win the nomination first.

They just underestimated him. Of all of the people in the race, no one saw him as the formidable opponent. They didn't think he could out-Dean what Howard Dean did starting off in Iowa in '04, by using the internet to build a grassroots movement of people allied towards winning the big dance.

Obama's ground game is nuts and he's smart by getting Governors to endorse him, because that only helps things on primary/caucus days. Say what you want about "experience" or whatever, but as CEO of his campaign, he's done a heck of a job starting from absolute scratch and if that's any indication of what he can do as a national leader, well...let's just say those opposed to him better get out of the hose and douse this fire quick before it consumes everything in sight.

Don't know how much polls are worth at this point, but here's last week's Columbus Dispatch on Ohio.

http://www.dispatchpolitics.com/live...litics&sid=101

Shows Hillary winning easily there, with McCain over Romney by 6 points (but only 3 points ahead of "Undecided")

She'll win Ohio, but Texas is in play and he's been gaining there for weeks now. And the Hispanics there aren't the same sort of voting bloc like you have in California, so that'll play out interestingly for them going forward, seeing as she needs a sweep on that day to keep the whole "I win the big states that matter" argument moving on.

That's a very good point. Much of the Hispanic support for Clinton in southern California was also tied into union endorsements. Texas is a "right to work" state, and the Hispanic percentage of support is much less certain for Clinton in Texas than it was in California.

I would've thought Ohio would be Obama territory. Shows what I know.

From the Washington caucuses today:

Precinct 702 in Port Townsend, WA

Obama v. Hillary

1988 Democratic Primary Results

I think going through the remaining twenty states that are still left for the dems and a conservative calculation is Obama getting over 1900 delegates not including the Super Delegates. So, as long as he can get aportion of the Supers he should win the nomination even if Hilary wins out in Tx and OH as well as Pennsylvania. Since on like the Republicans the Dems have delegates broken up based on districts.
1550 delegates
current totals:Clinton:1100 Obama: 1075
Primaries/caucuses left and delgates left:
http://politics.nytimes.com/election...ies/index.html

It's always amazing to me in retrospect that Jackson won 9 states.

It's also amazing that Al Gore was a pro-life, pro 2nd amendment, pro prayer in pubic schools, conservative democrat in 1988. Quite a change from the Al Gore of 2000. In 1988 he got obliterated by the ultra-liberal Dukakis in the primaries.

What's up with the Alutian Islands?

Al Gore in 2000 would be massively bigger.