It's over!!! The math shows that Obama has won the nomination.

[mckeown1128]

This is lengthy but, hey, this is the DNC system.

The math is based on two assumptions:

1. That the super delegates will not overturn the pledged delegates. Overturning the results of the elections would certainly lead to civil war within the party. We are talking about politicians here... they don't want to rock the boat. So the way of the pledged delegates goes the way of the nomination.

2. Regardless of whether MI and FL get seated, they will NOT be seated in a way that overturns the results of the other primaries. The big killer here to Clinton's case is this:

NHPR's Laura Knoy: "So, if you value the DNC calendar, why not just pull out of Michigan? Why not just say, Hey Michigan, I'm off the ballot?"

Hillary Clinton: "Well, you know, It's clear, this election they're having is not going to count for anything"

http://www.nhpr.org/node/13858

I do think personally that MI an FL will be seated, but only after one of the candidates drops out and releases their delegates. So these two points are made on the basis that the DNC doesn't want any questions about who the rightful nominee will be.


That said. The total possible delegates are 4,048. MI and FL pledged delegates are already subtracted from that over all total. Now since the super delegates will NOT overturn the pledged delegates, we can assume that the winner of the pledged delegates will win then nomination. We have to subtract the super delegates from the total. 4048 - 795 = 3,258

Now, before we forget. Edwards has 26 delegates. So we take 3,258 - 26 = 3,232. Now, to get the magic number of pledged delegates needed to win, we have to divide the number by two and add one to get the majority number of pledged delegates... 3,232/2 + 1 = 1617

So there you have it. 1617 is the number of pledged delegates that either Obama or Hillary needs.

The current pledged delegate total for Obama and Hillary stands at:

Obama 1,158
Clinton 1,016
(With 77 voted on but not delegated yet) Assuming that they will split evenly, (Giving Hillary the extra) That leaves us with.

Obama 1,196
Hillary 1,055

Obama needs 421 of the remaining pledged delegates.
Clinton needs 601 of the remaining pledged delegates.
(Remember we subtracted Edwards's 26 Delegates)

So, out of the remaining 981 pledged delegates, Hillary needs 61% of the remaining delegates in order to overtake Obama.

Now, if you look at the remaining states. General consensus is that...

Obama will win in Mississippi, Wyoming, Oregon, Montana, South Dakota, Vermont and North Carolina(which is the only large state after Pennsylvania)

Hillary has Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, Pennsylvania, Guam, Indiana, West Virginia, Kentucky, Puerto Rico


So, Hillary needs 61% of ALL the remaining pledged delegates.... including 61% of the delegates from states that Obama is expected to win. The problem is that so far, she has only scored above 60%+ in Arkansas.... Obama has scored above 60%+ percent Alaska, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, North Dakota, Louisiana, Nebraska, Virgina Islands, Washington, Maine, Democrats Abroad, DC, Maryland, Virginia, Hawaii.

Obama has been keeping it close in states where Clinton has been winning and has been landsliding where he has been winning. This combined with the fact that Obama is expected to win in a few of the upcoming states and Hillary's money woes, shows that the task is daunting to say the least. Can anyone really claim that she can win over 61% in all of the remaining races... including places like Mississippi and South Dakota??? Obama only needs to lose with a 42% of the delegates in order to get the most pledged delegates.... which will lead to the super-delegates... which will lead to the nomination.

Even if Edwards throws his delegates to Hillary it doesn't change the dynamics enough. People keep talking about how Texas and Ohio wins can turn the momentum.. The problem with this is that if Hillary wins Texas by the current average of 2.8 points and if she wins Ohio by the current average of 10+ , she will certain inly be out of grasp for the pledged delegate lead(Even with the big mo). I think they know this in the Clinton campaign. I think she will be going through the motions until after 3/4. This would explain the concessionesque closer last night.

I know... I know... Obama could perform an abortion live on stage while snorting a line of coke off of an underage prostitute, and have to drop out.(I am being snarky) I know something BIG could happen... but short of something VERY drastic... no amount of plagiarism, Rezko, empty suit attacks are going to change the race THAT much. I am sorry but the math adds up. It is over. Let's stop fighting each other and start talking about how much we all don't like McCain....is anyone still reading this..???

It get's worse for Hillary: See post 13 below. Someone took the time to go even further with the analysis... and theirs is spot on instead of my slightly watered down analysis.

[goldcanyonaz]

1. One or Won?

[mckeown1128]

5. Thanks...

I spent all of that time working on the body just to rush throught the title.

[iconocrastic]

18. You're welcome

[Window]

24. Has that picture been photo-shopped?

It's not very flattering. She looks much better than that.



Peace:thumbsup:

[Window]

39. Nevermind. I saw the same picture on TV...it's geniune.

n/t

[Drunken Irishman]

2. One? :D

[mckeown1128]

6. lol See # 2 nt

[zabet]

3. Based on assumptions.

You said it first.

[mckeown1128]

9. What was wrong with my assumptions?

I can assume when I throw an apple up it will come down.

[zabet]

25. Did I say they were wrong? No.

Why do you have to assume
that the apple would fall?
Law of Gravity dictates that
it will if nothing impedes
its fall. You are assuming
something that has a potential
to have a different outcome,
however unlikely it may be,
there is a chance.

[mckeown1128]

32. Well, accept there is no law of gravity.

There is a theory of gravity. One day you could throw an apple up and it could keep going, the theory of gravity tells us not to count on it... but it does leave the possibility open. Just like I have a theory posted up above. Some theory's are almost as good as facts.

[zabet]

37. Gravity as an assumption is

far more acceptable as a fact because
it happens in reality repeatedly. Your
assumption has not occured yet, and has
not occured repeatedly enough to be considered
having a reliable, predictable outcome, over
and over and over again.

[mckeown1128]

38. Well, I am not saying that my prediction is guaranteed..

I am saying that it is a little more than likely. I think it is a safe bet that Hillary won't be winning states like Mississippi, Texas, etc by 20+ points as is needed to get the nomination.

[mckeown1128]

45. Ignoring me? nt

[La Lioness Priyanka]

4. one?

[mckeown1128]

10. see # 2... nt

[stellanoir]

7. "We are ALL one."

Dr. Bronner

[BooScout]

8. He may have 'one' .........but Hillary will WIN

:rofl:

[cali]

12. You know, it's really time for you folks to

consider that she's unlikely to be the nominee.

[Barack_America]

23. Good luck with that, Cali.

They're unable to see the writing on the wall...or the banana.

[ErnestoG]

57. And they call US "cultists". LAUGH!

[rinsd]

11. You made one mistaken assumption.

"So, Hillary needs 61% of ALL the remaining pledged delegates.... including 61% of the delegates from states that Obama is expected to win."

That would be true if each state offered the same amount of delegates but they do not.

By winning more delegates from the larger states Hillary can afford for more even splits in those states with less than 20 delegates.

[FogerRox]

15. HRC needs to win even bigger in big states, then......

the fact remains she needs to win by an average of 61%, and its a very tall order. Winning TX PA & Ohio by 65% to 7-% is nearly impossible.

Its over.

Its time to go after McCain.

[cali]

16. it's very unlikely she'll win TX

She just started her ground game therel. Obama set his up a year ago and has many more people on the ground. She's pretty deeply in debt. He's on track to raise $60 million this month. That means he'll have far more advertising in major media markets there. It's tied now and he has 12 days left. In state after state, he's closed the gap and pulled ahead. She certainly didn't deliver a knock out blow last night. The odds are against her winning there. Ohio has tightened up considerably. Just a couple of weeks ago she was up 25 pts. Now it's 7 or 8. She may win a tight race in RI, but here in VT she's going to lose by over 20. I just listened to a local radio show about it, and the Hillary SD conceded that she was on track to lose by significant numbers here, and said she wished Hillary had apologized for her IWR vote. She's just not in good shape. It would take a near miracle for her to pull this off.

[Cha]

49. Wow, hilary's SD said she wished

hilary had apologized for her IWR vote? First time I've heard any supporter of hilary's say that.

[ErnestoG]

58. Little late to that party, isn't she?

[Cha]

60. That would be a major desperate

flip-flop.

[ErnestoG]

64. But predictable

[mckeown1128]

29. Well, you would think that would make a big difference, but....

It doesn't... assuming that Obama doesn't win the delegate count in the states that favor him. (Mississippi, Wyoming, Oregon, Montana, South Dakota, Vermont and North Carolina) Assuming (in the magically unlikely case) that he ties her in all of the states that he is supposed to win. The 258 delegates from his states would be 127 added to each candidates total.

The new delegate total would be:

Obama 1,323
Hillary 1,182

Obama would need 294
Hillary would need 474

This leaves 723 delegates from Hillary leaning states of Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas, Pennsylvania, Guam, Indiana, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Puerto Rico

In order for to win they would have to receive the following percentages of the delegates:


Obama 40% of the delegates
Hillary 66% of the delegates

So, even if Obama doesn't win anymore of the primaries. Hillary still loses. I doubt she can win ALL of her strong states by 66%. I doubt she could tie Obama in ALL of his strong states. The writing is on the wall.

[UALRBSofL]

62. The fact is Obama can't get enough delegates to win before the convention in august

So this can play out all the way to the convention at which time the nominee can be picked. :)

[grantcart]

13. Your calculations are incorrect

Actually its much worse for Senator Clinton because delegates are not appropriated by state but by congressional district so she has to get a much larger popular vote to make a change in delegates

Its not divided up by results in a state - in fact in Texas there isn't even a bonus for winning the state as there is in some states

If you win a 2 delegate congressional district you would have to get 70% to get both delegates 51 or 69% are still going to mean a split

IN a 3 delegate district you if somebody gets 51 or 70% you would still split 2-1

In a 4 delegate district at 65% you get a 3-1 split

and so on and that's why they say you really have to get 65% in a congressional district to make up big numbers

and I don't know the exact percentages but you get the point. That is why once it gets to two person race and one person is ahead it is almost impossible for anyone to catch up.

In the meantime the superdelegates are going against Hillary


And this means she has to do even better than before


And finally in Texas (which is 1/3 caucus, 1/2 primary) the congressional districts get bonuses for how many democratic votes in the last election. Those districts that have high African American turn out for example are going to get a much higher percentage of delegates than a Hispanic district because they supported the democratic nominee while the Hispanic districts were more for Bush.

For these reasons many people say that the numbers mean that Hillary cannot win and do not understand why people want to push the campaign beyond the point of no return.

Clinton supporters on the other hand look at the numbers and see that it seems like a small difference and anything can happen.

You can get up to date SuperDelegate announcements here including an additional one today for Obama

[ORDem]

20. Thanks for that addendum!! I'd forgotten about that. n/t

:kick:

[grantcart]

27. Your welcome and I felt bad about the subject line

but felt it would be easier for our Clinton friends to click on that and am trying to help them in their 5 stages of greiving lol

[mckeown1128]

21. I agree with everything you just said...

I didn't go into that level of details because...well I am tired.... and because I was trying to show that even without the complicated disadvantages she has I wanted to show that even if it were in her favor.... she would still lose the nomination. But, regardless thanks for your post. I am going to refer it in my starting post.

[grantcart]

28. Well I have it in my journal so I just keep copying it out

sorry for the subject title but thought it would attract more Clinton supporters. Am trying to help them thru their greiving process lol.

[grantcart]

30. By the way check in here from time to time to see any changes

in superdelegates - gained one more today

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=4708039&mesg_id=4708039

[grantcart]

50. This from Texans for Obama explains the conundrum for Hillary

It will be very difficult for her to improve on this

These guys have gone overboard with what amounts to a doctoral thesis and district by district modeling of what is going on in Texas.

This shows their projection in what they are projecting as Hillary's best possible out come

You can see their entire explanation herehttp://blog.texansforobama.com/showDiary.do;jsessionid=CE0FCBBBF8B966E800CE3315EEACB854?diaryId=891




And if you have any question how serious these guys are here they called for a meeting of the folks who put together the graphics and the folks who were responsible for the data and the folks who engineered the model.

Now that's what I call a committee - I guess everything in Texas is bigger



lordy ok we get the idea man are they fired up in Texas



I guess we don't have to send Oprah to Texas after all.

It all ends in Texas.

[mckeown1128]

54. Wow!!! Thanks for the link. nt

[FlyingSquirrel]

66. Dude why do you cut and paste this on anyone's thread who spends actual time

figuring stuff out? It's pretty annoying.

[Iggo]

14. Dude, you realize that...

...the superdelegates were DESIGNED to override the pledged delegates, right? And if the party is anything like GD:P, there's already civil war within the party...lol.

I'm not saying it's going to happen, and I hope it doesn't, but they exist to override the pledged delegates if necessary.

Or maybe I still don't understand what a superdelegate is.

[northzax]

19. no, you understand perfectly well

Superdelegates are designed to check the momentum of insurgent campaigns. it's the whole point of them.

and this doesn't take into account what the superdelegates should do if Hillary has an actual vote lead of say, 100,000 votes. what then?

[nomorewhopper]

22. superdelegates are a last resort "fail safe"

in case the party elects somebody who is truly insane, or absolutely unelectable. like if we found out that our nominee had murdered somebody in their past during the process, the party elders could step in and put a stop to it.

they will not be used to override anything for this election.

[yodermon]

36. yeah but even *pledged* delegates can change their votes

for extreme cases such as that.

[SteppingRazor]

26. Yeah, but they'd only do so out of dire necessity ...

to replace a candidate that, while doing well in the primary, would get killed in the general. With his obvious appeal to independents and moderates, Obama is anything but that.

[tblue37]

31. They are there to protect against our version of a Mike Huckabee. n/t

[SteppingRazor]

33. Precisely...

Regrettably, they'd probably be used to sandbag a Kucinich or a Gravel.

[ORDem]

17. K&R! Thanks for the detailed analysis. I was worried what you were going

to do with Edwards delegates, but you worked them back in quite well.

In about a week and a half this is all going to be over but the crying.

So, I for one, can put up with the last desperate throes ("it's 48 to 24 in the last quarter, there's still a chance") from the HRC crowd that long. I think Obama supporters should NOT get complacent, but let's tone it all down a bit at this point and hope Hillary (a fine person and one of our greatest Democratic assets) is as hard-biting against McCain as she will be gracious in her concession when this Dem. primary season effectively ends on 3/5.

I'm not trying to be snarky there, but sincere.

:kick:

[mckeown1128]

34. Even if she was endorsed by Edwards and recieved his ...

delegates. It wouldn't change the field that much. She would still have to win big...EVERY where.

[Carrieyazel]

35. Without the 300 or so delegates stripped, (MI and FL) no chance for any one to get to 2,000

You need 2,000 delegates to be the nominee. Now only 3,700 delegates will be allocated in total (including supers) if FL and MI delegates are not seated.

[mckeown1128]

63. That is where the super delegates come in.

They will most likely vote with the winner of the pledged delegates.

[flvegan]

40. Um, cool. Can you predict the Lotto numbers for Saturday's drawing, please?

A PM would be great. I'll share.

Killer, thanks!

[mckeown1128]

65. No predictiona necessary with delegate math. nt

[Johnny__Motown]

41. You forgot Democrats Abroad and Obama's net 2.5 delegates, but I agree with your conclusions anyways

[mckeown1128]

46. Thanks. nt

[rodeodance]

42. AGAIN??

[BigDDem]

43. "It's over?" Great! I guess that means

he'll stop campaigning?

[mckeown1128]

44. ummm.. he still has a GE election. He should finish using his

primary funds...because a campaign commercial is a campaign commericial...

[kristopher]

47. I have a tangental proof to offer

This is purely based on observation and logic, but it rings true to me.

Last night, in the debate, Hillary surprised people by repeating the plagiarism assertion.

Unless she is completely dense, she must have known what the reaction was going to before she said it.

Then she ended her final statement by engaging in the same behavior that she had criticized Obama for.

Was she mad - as in INSANE?

Did she expect that no one would notice?

Of course, "NO!" is the only answer to to both those questions.

So why did she do it?

She knows she is getting out of the race and she wants to leave without having the "plagiarism" charge hanging out there to be used by the Republicans.

She "defused" the topic as it relates to Obama by taking the hit herself. Everyone, especially the Republicans, will walk away with "everyone does it" (and they actually do) firmly planted in their minds.

Just my opinion.

[cooolandrew]

48. Oh heck, how did it ever get this complicated. i've got a headache. Great work though.

[Infinite Hope]

51. As an Obama supporter, I can say there are several flaws in your logic, but interesting anyway. n/t

[mckeown1128]

53. Please share... I would like to know where I am wrong. nt

[grantcart]

52. i made some more additions to the thread you might be interested in

[BenDavid]

55. well my my I never realized so many obama people were math

majors. WOW! Did you all graduate from the Zogby school of advanced math? before we go handing out the blue ribbon lets play the game first. Kind of like on a friday afternoon going ahead and measuring the jacket for tiger woods and two rounds still left to play....super delegates are not bound by any damn rules and if I am not mistaken their vote is secret, just like ours are when we vote....

and one other thing all this bullshit about hrc forcing those superdelegates to vote for her when she is behind is a bit too much....if she loses the nomination, she will concede gracefully and will exit the stage with class as when she entered the stage.

[Johnny__Motown]

56. we can count. can't you?

It is ok, keep your hopes up longer. Donate some more money for her Four Season's hotel rooms. Those are your rights and you should exercises them.

You will simply be all the more crushed when the inevitable happens and you must come to grip with your inability to grasp the obvious.

Good Luck to you

[grantcart]

59. sarcasm is an art that requires wit, knowledge and style - rather outside of

your league

you want more advance models

fine when your finished with these let me know i have a few hundred more. there are people in Texas who have been working on this for months. Do you really think that Obama put together 11 straight victories with bubble gum?

[mckeown1128]

61. Where do you get these neat graphics? nt