WASHINGTON (CNN) – In recent days, Hillary Clinton supporters have been pushing this notion that the Democratic presidential candidate who has won the states with the most Electoral College votes should get the party’s super delegates and the party’s eventual nomination. We’ve heard it from Democratic Senator Evan Bayh of Indiana and Democratic Governor Ed Rendell — among many others.
They make this argument because Barack Obama remains the leader so far in pledged delegates, the popular vote and the most states won.
Clinton’s supporters note that Obama may have won more states — 27 to 14, excluding both Michigan and Florida whose delegates so far are not being counted because those states moved up their primaries against Democratic party rules. But they argue that her 14 states have a total of 219 Electoral College votes and his 27 states have 202 — and insist that makes her more likely to win the general election in November.
Among the big states she has won are New York and California.
Obama supporters argue that any Democrat likely will capture those states if recent presidential elections are a model. That may be true but John McCain and his supporters are arguing that he might actually have a chance in California given his supposed “maverick” reputation and the strong support of the state’s popular Republican governor, Arnold Schwarzenegger.
Clinton supporters also argue that she has a better chance of beating McCain in swing states like Florida and Ohio — which they say Democrats would need to win in November. They say it’s all about the Electoral College — not the popular vote — as was made clear in 2000, when Al Gore won hundreds of thousands of more votes than winner George Bush.
It’s a controversial point that the Clinton camp makes.
I thought this was pretty interesting.
2 comments:
All politicians do this to some degree. They change what the game is being fought about. Iraq was about nuclear weapons but it changed to liberating the people from Hussein. Obama dodged the "Minister" problem (for lack of a better phrase) by redefining it as a pent-up racism problem. Now Hillary is redefining "winning." Who's next?...
It is kinda of funny how often things can be moved around or refrased to mean to change the meaning of something good and turn it in to something bad and the other way around taking something good and turning it in to something bad its a sure sign of a politician working there game to help them out
Post a Comment