Month: January 2008

Heh:

As Clinton Communications Director Howard Wolfson said, "This is a race for delegates…It is not a battle for individual states. As David knows, we are well past the time when any state will have a disproportionate influence on the nominating process."

They’re showing a close race between McCain and Huckabee. Some interesting data here:

Evangelicals – Mike Huckabee 41%, John McCain 27%, Fred Thompson 14%, Mitt Romney 11%

Evangelicals may have made up more than half the voters. Still too close to call.

The man Fox News dismisses has now beaten Fox News’ unofficial candidate in three out of four early contests. Just saying …. You will notice that Hewitt counts Giuliani’s one delegate and omits Paul’s 6.

Plouffe complains. Here’s a first-hand account of alleged Clinton campaign sleaze. But Obama got 13 delegates anyway – one more than the Clintons.

Poll manager Renell Brown checks for a name on the voter registration list at the Penn Center voting precinct during the South Carolina Republican Primary January 19, 2008 in St. Helena Island, South Carolina. Voters took to the polls Saturday in South Carolina’s Republican presidential primary. By Stephen Morton/Getty Images.

A 51 – 45 win is good news for Clinton. But it doesn’t translate into a big advantage in delegates. There are 33 from Nevada:

Sixteen of the 25 delegates are allocated proportionally to presidential candidates based on the support for the candidates in each of the state’s three Congressional districts. Nine delegates are allocated to candidates based on the support among all of the delegates attending the convention. The remaining eight unpledged delegates are chosen from party leaders.

A Hispanic Luntz focus-group member predicts that Latinos will not vote for Obama. Why? A black woman wants to know. She gets no answer. But she knew the answer already. The Clintons’ greater emphasis on Obama’s race probably helped solidify Latino discomfort with a black candidate. But it was there already.

I didn’t know this:

Clinton had more than twice the number of Nevada unions supporting her as either Obama or John Edwards.

Edwards – in a union-dominated caucus – got 3.74 percent. Ouch.

Fascinating data from Nevada: just as Hispanics went overwhelmingly – 64 – 24 – for Clinton, blacks went more overwhelmingly – 80 – 16 – for Obama. I’d say this is a vindication of the Clintons’ racial polarization strategy: force Obama to be the "black" candidate and rely on some white and Latino discomfort to build up their own vote margins. Not a good strategy for the South, but great for the West and California. The Clintons have done the math.

There’s the usual generational split, of course:

Obama won the support of voters under age 45, while Clinton won among older voters. Voters under age 45 broke for Obama over Clinton 48 percent to 34 percent, while those over 45 chose Clinton over Obama 54 percent to 33 percent.

But the Latino vote contains grim news for Obama:

Hispanics made up 14 percent of Democratic caucus-goers in Nevada today, and they overwhelmingly supported Clinton. She got 64 percent support from Hispanics, while Obama got 24 percent and Edwards got 9 percent.

That will make a bigger difference in California. It was still close, though: 51 to 45, and completely in line with the last polls.

(Photo: Mario Tama/Getty.)