Now Hillary's "the favorite once again"? Can we stop worrying about who's ahead by a nose at this exact moment on the first turn?

I'd love to stop the horse race crap, if the horse race didn't matter.

There's no argument that it SHOULDN'T matter, but the fact is that the biggest influencer of undecided voters late in the process is who is perceived to have momentum. Because of that, we need to pay attention to the story and try to shift it. Our reasons for shifting it can and should be based on policies and genuine reasoning, but ignoring the "horse race" only gets you so far, just ask Biden, Dodd and Richardson, all of whom have incredible credentials and ideas.

Just how I see it.

The "horse race" part of this is fun...c'mon, admit it! :)  What I don't like sometimes is how we all focus, and the media all covers, ONLY the "horse race," and not more substantive aspects of political contests.

Give a break for awhile on "who's ahead".  

won by 3%. a win in Florida and Michigan will not add to her delegate total because both had there delegates stripped.  

The argument has been made, and I tend to agree, that Florida and Michigan's delegates will be seated at the Convention. They may be seated last and after some kind of censure vote, but the Democrats are not going to ignore delegates from two critical swing states in 2008.

but if by some freak of fate we have the first contested convention in over 50 years, the fight over seating those delegates will be amazing to watch.

here in Alexandria, the chances of a market sq rally have zoomed up.  Still probably a longshot, but anythings possible.

On the fix at washington post, 800 folks gussed the NH  results. Not one person had clinton winning.
When everybody gets it wrong, That is news.

but we know the country can get it wrong, ergo GWBUSH for 8 years!

CNN is reporting that the culinary workers of Nevada are endorsing Barack Obama as had been widely expected.  That's a major endorsement, as the culinary workers are very powerful in Nevada.

Chris Cillizza:

With so many states -- 24 in all -- voting between today and Feb. 5, it's easy to conjure a scenario where Obama and Clinton both win enough states to keep their campaigns going and relevant. Such a scenario could well mean that states like Maryland and Virginia, set to vote on Feb. 12, and Wisconsin and Washington, set to cast ballots on Feb. 19, could have far more impact on the identity of the nominee than we could have possibly imagined even one week ago.

Stay tuned. We're in for a wild ride.

A political junkie's dreams?

and thats not even talking about the R side :-p

A loss in South Carolina will be the writing on the wall for him; the question is whether he chooses to read it.  If he does let go early, my sense is that it helps Obama more than Clinton, but it's tough to say for sure.

I am probably showing how old I am, but I'll ask the first question anyway.  California used to be a "winner-take-all" state.  Is that still true or am I behind the times?  Obviously, the issue has not mattered much in recent years.
If California is not "winner-take-all," it really makes the post-February 5th primaries very important.

Also for my second question, is it likely that Edwards may want to stay in the race in order to serve as a convention broker.  What do you think?

California Progress Report:

1972 was the last time the Democratic Party allowed any state to use a "Winner Take All" system for National Convention Delegate selection.

A total of 503 Californians will attend the Democratic Convention being held in Denver, Colorado from August 25 to 28, 2008 as delegates or alternates. California Democrats get 441 delegates, the largest number by far of any state (plus 62 Alternates) to the National Convention (August 25-28, 2008) that will nominate a candidate for President and Vice President and adopt a national platform for the party. The second largest state is New York at 280 delegates.

Of California's delegates, 71 are "super delegates"--Members of Congress, Democratic National Committee (DNC) members, and a few others specified in the party's rules--who will represent the state as a result of their elected or official party status and are not elected in the primary. They will officially be "unplegded" as to any candidate for President.

There are 370 delegate slots up for grabs in the primary election being moved to February 5, 2008. 241 of these are elected in each of the 53 Congressional Districts (3-7 slots per District) depending on the vote in that district.

As to Edwards, he probably wants to stay in the race through 2/5, but I'm not sure about "convention broker" as I don't think it will come down to a brokered convention.

on the Republican side, Mac is Back as Pres, and Huckabee as V-P, thus appealing to the broader republican base.  While "they say" the Republican Establishment does not like McCain, I am sure flip flop McCain can convince them he's a Bush clone when it comes to corporatism, and when they see McCain's broad appeal to independents, why not add the Huckster to the mix in order to hang on to the evangelical base? That could be a strong Republican ticket, donchathink? Authoritarian, misogynist, warmongering, Big globalism, etc, etc

The thread states that she won by 6%.  The final count was:

Clinton:39%

Obama:  36%

What exactly is a super delegate and who picks them? From what I have read in this diary, it seems that Hillary already has a nice built-in  cushion.

Super Delegates are not picked by primary voters.  They are elected officials and party leaders.  They go as "uncommitted" delegates to convention.  They can say that they support one candidate over another -- then change their minds.  

It seems pretty super undemocratic to me :)

Sorry for being cynical on this one, but it seems that makes some people in the party have a disproportionately larger influence than the rest of us regular folks.

P.S. Thanks for explaining it, demdiva :)

Do I vote my real preferences on February 12th, or do I vote for a mix of who I'd like and who has a chance of winning.

We need Condorcet or Borda or Instant-Runoff Voting more than ever, even if in the Primary Elections only...

A real democratic ballot would let me rank order my choices from the remaining candidates on the Virginia ballot:

1) Kucinich
2) Edwards
3) Richardson
4) Obama
5) Clinton
6) Biden

The Virginia ballot has those six, though I am not entirely sure what happens if one or more of them has publicly withdrawn from the race by Feb 12.

Of course, we don't live in a real democracy, we live in a pseudo-democracy where we are frequently forced to vote on the least evil candidate rather than really being able to express ourselves.

Additionally we need to make sure that whomever the Republicans nominate, we can defeat that person with our candidate, because four more years of Republican control is unacceptable.   The scary thing is that there are a few candidates on their ballot (Thompson and Huckabee) who'd actually be worse than Bush serving a third term!  If it's either of them I am willing to throw out my preference entirely and vote for anyone in the Democratic column.

It will be an interesting day on February 12th... I am not entirely sure if I will vote my reference (Kucinich), my weighted preference (Edwards), or just make a statement against corporate greed vote for Obama (over Clinton, if it's essentially a two way race by then).  Hell, there is even an outside chance I will vote as a Republican and vote against Thompson or Huckabee if they are by some freak chance in the lead on the GOP side.  There is no Republican candidate I like at this time (ok, Ron Paul is entertaining), but the risk that Huckabee will attain the oval office are far too high.  He, even more than George Allen, must be stopped.