By Rick Morris
Sports gamblers don't care about the ultimate outcome of games; they only care about who covered. Likewise, for politicians and the entire political chattering class, pointspreads are also the end-all, be-all. Except they're known in that realm as "expectations."
History will record that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama each went 1-1 on Tuesday night, with Obama pocketing North Carolina and Hil-Rod (ultimately, after a long wait) clinching Indiana. Frankly, the straightforward historical record is also meaningless, because the key difference in the outcomes came in the expectations: Obama "beat the spread" in North Carolina and also managed to "cover" in Indiana, coming tantalizingly close to an outright win that would have ended the process already via superdelegate stampede on Wednesday. On a completely different topic, anyone wondering why the Democratic machine in Gary, Indiana held back results until the wee hours of the morning would do well to read the epic book "Will" by G. Gordon Liddy for an explanation of how Lake County REALLY operates.
But back to the topic at hand: Obama, already the frontrunner, was able to consolidate his delegate lead by whipping Hillary all over Tobacco Road and by holding her to a near-tie among Hoosiers. The shock of Obama's turnaround Tuesday (especially in light of a tough few weeks in terms of primary results and headlines about his personal associations) was such that it triggered the primary season version of the election night "call" by networks. Tim Russert of NBC News set off a mass media stampede by proclaiming the race over and Barack Obama the winner. The conventional wisdom of the moment is that Obama's coronation in Denver at the convention is a done deal because of the way the numbers have materialized.
While media organizations, campaigns, and participants at every level of the process all have metrics that point in that direction, it's likely that none of them have anything quite as solid as what we're about to unveil here.
I've recently become acquainted with an excellent writer named Jacob Rosen, who writes about many different topics just like those of us here at The FDH Lounge. He's a busy, busy man and a man of many talents so I don't know when it will be feasible on his end, but it seems likely that we'll be able to feature him in some form through the FDH media family in the days ahead. When you read what we've got here, you'll understand why that thought causes us such enthusiasm.
Jacob sent us an email that he gave us permission to quote liberally here and we will. This is excerpted from his excellent email newsletter. He performed a statistical analysis on the Democratic race for president -- and found it quite uphill to say the least for Hillary at the moment. In short, he devised a metric he called the "glorious, magical number" that calculated her overall chances in the race.
"This number represents the break-even percentage point in which a) Hillary Clinton must win a difference over Obama for the overall super delegates, and b) the difference she must win in the remaining primaries.
Before the Pennsylvania primaries on April 22nd, the glorious, magical number stood at about 12.24% -- meaning that if Clinton were to win the remaining primaries by this number, and eventually increase her lead over Obama in terms of super delegates to this number, the overall delegate race would be tied in the end. Since Clinton did not win by 12.24%, but came awfully close to a 10% victory over the 158 pledged delegates, the glorious, magical number increased to 12.90% (which includes Guam results.)
In North Carolina and Indiana, Obama netted a total of 12 delegates (97 to 85) according to the most recent numbers available on RealClearPolitics.com. With these numbers, the glorious, magical number has increased to an astounding 16.40%. The number is now so large because North Carolina and Indiana represented just under half of the remaining pledged delegates remaining after Guam and Pennsylvania. This number may even seem quite irrelevant, because Clinton's super delegate lead is now only at 2.07% (down from 9.54% pre-OH/TX, 4.90% pre-PA and 2.65% pre-NC/IND.). So in order to catch her break-even point of pledged and super delegates, Clinton would have to exponentially increase her lead of super delegate supporters.
According to numbers on www.demconwatch.blogspot.com, the unofficial delegate totals from Michigan (with Obama as the uncommitted) and Florida for Obama and Clinton are 122 to 178. Including this into the total of overall pledged delegates, and the glorious, magical number at this point in time becomes 10.87%. Thus, if Clinton is to have any logical chance at winning this thing, or even making a point to seat these delegates in the first place, she must increase her overall super delegate lead to 10%. That should be the initial goal for the Clinton campaign, as the number of undecided super delegates out-weighs the number of remaining pledged delegates (264 to 217).
I have not seen very good polls just yet from upcoming primaries spots of West Virginia, Kentucky and Oregon. Once I do, however, I will be able to predict what the glorious, magical number will become like I did pre-NC/IND. According to poll averages RealClearPolitics.com from NC and IND (which I then formulated around 100% total), I had predicted the glorious, magical number to increase to 15.90%. The change of 0.5% is noted because of the impressive performance by Obama against the pre-primary polls (the first time since before OH/TX)."
Again, that's excellent work by Jacob right there in terms of breaking down the race with cold, hard numbers. Is there anybody out there not named Bill, Hillary or Chelsea who still thinks a win is possible? Actually, Chelsea seems pretty sharp to me; I wouldn't even necessarily count her with the believers at this point!
This race is done even if the Clintons don't realize it yet. As the Democratic party and their element in the left-wing blogosphere gets ever more angry about Obama still having to work for the nomination while John McCain gets a free ride, look for the recriminations directed at the Clintons to skyrocket. One wonders what Keith Olbermann's next misogynistic call for somebody to deal forcibly with Hillary will entail and whether this time he'll be getting waterboarded by the Secret Service. Then again, since the Secret Service doesn't look kindly on objects of their protection throwing lamps at people, they probably won't lift a finger and Olbermann, Kos and everyone else on that side will be able to keep spewing their impotent, murderous rage at Hillary.
Showing posts with label Secret Service. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Secret Service. Show all posts
Thursday, May 8, 2008
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Obama candidacy: high stakes for USA
By Rick Morris
Hillary Clinton's campaign is seizing on the prospect of Barack Obama raising hopes that can't possibly be fulfilled as a desperate grasp to keep him from the Democratic nomination. However, despite the fact that everything she says should be taken with an entire shaker full of salt, there is an underlying undeniable truth that is at least somewhat related to Hillary's point: the Obama candidacy has moved this country to a point where the stakes are very high in terms of any potential for national unity and maybe even viability down the road.
Although it's folly to draw too close a comparison with the Middle East, because our country on its worst day is 1,000 times more stable than the lands of feuding fanatics in the desert will ever be, it's worth thinking back to the launch of the Second Intifada in 2000. The first (and God willing, only) President Clinton brought together the key players in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to try to put together a nice 11th-hour gloss on his troubled legacy. Hopes were high as the parties agreed on almost all key points. And then -- it collapsed. Yasser Arafat walked away from the table at the end, unable or (probably) unwilling to compromise on the final sticking points. At that point, the bitterness of the raised expectations boiled over and the Palestinians took their militant operations to new heights, threatening the entire region.
Now, I don't think anything like that is possible in the literal sense here in America. I'm even dubious that we'd see a repeat of the urban riots of the late 1960s or those that followed the Rodney King verdicts of 1992. I could be wrong, but I don't think the strife that could arise between the races in this country will erupt in the streets.
However, it's not necessary to have a situation crest to that level for it to truly become a crisis. This country has traveled down a long road of redemption, first becoming the only country to go through a bloody war with itself to extinguish the crimes of slavery, then legislatively addressing the wrongs of Jim Crow. While the media has long harped on remaining points of contention between the races, such as how to administer affirmative action programs, we're at a point of overall peace between races in this country that our parents and grandparents probably could not have envisioned. Go talk to an elderly relative if you don't believe this assertion.
But with the country very much on the verge of electing its first black president, hopes have been raised to a point that could prove dangerous for all of us down the road. Let's examine some scenarios:
^ Hillary overtakes Obama for the nomination through "shenanigans." We've already addressed the point that Hillary has to pretty much leave a smoking crater where Obama used to be if she's to still get nominated. How's that going to go over in the minority community, with a longtime purported friend of theirs destroying their would-be pioneer?
^ John McCain comes back in the polls to win in November. With cynicism still high in the black community on issues of racial justice (for reasons I would partially agree with, given this nation's history), how's it going to look if McCain pulls out a win when all the polls indicate otherwise? Frankly, to many blacks it'll look like this country would never elect a black man under any circumstances.
^ The worst case of all: assassination. The internal strife this country endured in the 1960s over matters of race and war shook us all like nothing since the Civil War. I daresay that if the worst fears of many blacks are realized and Obama does not survive his campaign, the Sixties might look like a cakewalk in terms of ANY prospects for significant national unity. There's no way to ever undo the damage that such a tragedy would inflict on our country, no way to avoid the permanent bitterness if not outright hatred that a significant percentage of our fellow Americans would always carry with them. To a much, much lesser extent, the same would be true if Obama had an unsuccessful presidency and did not get reelected; the sense would be that America dumped him at the first available opportunity regardless of what any of the facts on the ground were.
Because assassination would rip this nation apart at the seams from now until the end of time, it's especially unforgivable that the Secret Service had such an egregious lapse (in Dallas of all places!) when they reportedly relaxed weapons screening at an Obama rally in the interest of speeding up the process. Because an Obama assassination would be more damaging to the country than any single killing that has happened in our history, his security detail should be significantly above and beyond that of any other candidate. The full weight of the disciplinary process needs to come down on any individuals responsible for this idiotic and amateurish decision.
Aside from keeping Obama's security air-tight, there's nothing that can be done to head off any damage from the possibility of high hopes being dashed. At the end of the day, he's a politician like anyone else, albeit a very talented one, and he's going to have to navigate the political process like anyone else. If he has a successful presidency, he'll move us much further along the path to racial reconciliation that we collectively began in the 1960s. Anything short of that is going to set us back in terms of truly being "One Nation Under God," and the only question is how far we get set back.
Hillary Clinton's campaign is seizing on the prospect of Barack Obama raising hopes that can't possibly be fulfilled as a desperate grasp to keep him from the Democratic nomination. However, despite the fact that everything she says should be taken with an entire shaker full of salt, there is an underlying undeniable truth that is at least somewhat related to Hillary's point: the Obama candidacy has moved this country to a point where the stakes are very high in terms of any potential for national unity and maybe even viability down the road.
Although it's folly to draw too close a comparison with the Middle East, because our country on its worst day is 1,000 times more stable than the lands of feuding fanatics in the desert will ever be, it's worth thinking back to the launch of the Second Intifada in 2000. The first (and God willing, only) President Clinton brought together the key players in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to try to put together a nice 11th-hour gloss on his troubled legacy. Hopes were high as the parties agreed on almost all key points. And then -- it collapsed. Yasser Arafat walked away from the table at the end, unable or (probably) unwilling to compromise on the final sticking points. At that point, the bitterness of the raised expectations boiled over and the Palestinians took their militant operations to new heights, threatening the entire region.
Now, I don't think anything like that is possible in the literal sense here in America. I'm even dubious that we'd see a repeat of the urban riots of the late 1960s or those that followed the Rodney King verdicts of 1992. I could be wrong, but I don't think the strife that could arise between the races in this country will erupt in the streets.
However, it's not necessary to have a situation crest to that level for it to truly become a crisis. This country has traveled down a long road of redemption, first becoming the only country to go through a bloody war with itself to extinguish the crimes of slavery, then legislatively addressing the wrongs of Jim Crow. While the media has long harped on remaining points of contention between the races, such as how to administer affirmative action programs, we're at a point of overall peace between races in this country that our parents and grandparents probably could not have envisioned. Go talk to an elderly relative if you don't believe this assertion.
But with the country very much on the verge of electing its first black president, hopes have been raised to a point that could prove dangerous for all of us down the road. Let's examine some scenarios:
^ Hillary overtakes Obama for the nomination through "shenanigans." We've already addressed the point that Hillary has to pretty much leave a smoking crater where Obama used to be if she's to still get nominated. How's that going to go over in the minority community, with a longtime purported friend of theirs destroying their would-be pioneer?
^ John McCain comes back in the polls to win in November. With cynicism still high in the black community on issues of racial justice (for reasons I would partially agree with, given this nation's history), how's it going to look if McCain pulls out a win when all the polls indicate otherwise? Frankly, to many blacks it'll look like this country would never elect a black man under any circumstances.
^ The worst case of all: assassination. The internal strife this country endured in the 1960s over matters of race and war shook us all like nothing since the Civil War. I daresay that if the worst fears of many blacks are realized and Obama does not survive his campaign, the Sixties might look like a cakewalk in terms of ANY prospects for significant national unity. There's no way to ever undo the damage that such a tragedy would inflict on our country, no way to avoid the permanent bitterness if not outright hatred that a significant percentage of our fellow Americans would always carry with them. To a much, much lesser extent, the same would be true if Obama had an unsuccessful presidency and did not get reelected; the sense would be that America dumped him at the first available opportunity regardless of what any of the facts on the ground were.
Because assassination would rip this nation apart at the seams from now until the end of time, it's especially unforgivable that the Secret Service had such an egregious lapse (in Dallas of all places!) when they reportedly relaxed weapons screening at an Obama rally in the interest of speeding up the process. Because an Obama assassination would be more damaging to the country than any single killing that has happened in our history, his security detail should be significantly above and beyond that of any other candidate. The full weight of the disciplinary process needs to come down on any individuals responsible for this idiotic and amateurish decision.
Aside from keeping Obama's security air-tight, there's nothing that can be done to head off any damage from the possibility of high hopes being dashed. At the end of the day, he's a politician like anyone else, albeit a very talented one, and he's going to have to navigate the political process like anyone else. If he has a successful presidency, he'll move us much further along the path to racial reconciliation that we collectively began in the 1960s. Anything short of that is going to set us back in terms of truly being "One Nation Under God," and the only question is how far we get set back.
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