UPDATE [11:47 PM]: MSNBC has called the Texas Primary for Hillary with 73 percent of the precincts reporting. Not-quite-final score: 51-48. CNN does as well and has the caucus at 56 Obama, 44 Clinton so far. Tim Russert, voice hoarse and going out, argues that this will be a psychological victory for Clinton, changing the narrative and helping her with donors. He also says this will add more fuel to the Clinton camp’s argument that Obama can only win caucuses and struggles in primaries.
Chris Matthews, on the other hand, is balking at the amount of cash that is going to go into the incinerator if the fight lives on.
C’est la vie.
UPDATE [11:13 PM]: Barack Obama gave speech declaring that his campaign is in a “tight race.” Right now Obama Campaign Strategist David Axelrod is talking to MSNBC’s Chris Matthews about whether the Ohio loss is reflective of the perception that Obama can when over the Starbucks crowd but not the Dunkin’ Donuts (my words, not Chris’s, but he could have gotten to the point faster if he’d used my way). Axelrod argued that his team could run the tables, go the distance and whatever other sports analogy you can think of. Once again, I don’t think he actually quoted a sports catchphrase, but it would have been faster than the jibber-jawing.
Texas is still too close to call. Everyone is repeating that we could be up all night. Obama even said during his speech that we may not know the winner until tomorrow. But as Hillary said earlier, “As Ohio goes, so goes this nation,” and apparently Ohio is going to Pennsylvania irregardless of who wins Texas.
Maybe Tina Fey really did save her campaign after all. I know one bespecled minx who’s getting a pretty nice pantsuit for her birthday!
UPDATE [10:21 PM]: Clinton is giving her victory speech in Ohio. In a move, I’m sure someone will froth at the mouth over tomorrow, the crowd at Clinton Headquarters started chanting “Yes, she will! Yes, she will” as if Hillary will rise up and smash will.i.am to pieces.
She calls for more states to have “their voices heard” and gives a pitch for her campaign to go on. So far tonight Clinton has won Ohio and Rhode Island, but the Texas Prima-Caucus is still up in the air.
UPDATE [9:55 PM]: CNN has called Ohio for Hillary Clinton, a big win out of the two major wins her husband, former President Clinton, said she needed to stay in the race. CNN Reporter Candy Crowley and Wolf Blitzer are speculating that because of this win the campaign will likely continue on after tonight.
UPDATE [9:30 PM]: The race keeps getting tighter and tighter in Texas and Clinton’s lead in Ohio may be a paper tiger until more precients report in. CNN has things tied up at 49-49 in Texas with 20 percent reporting. When breaking into the exit polls they found that the African American vote was stagnant, even slightly less than 2004, but that the number of Mexican-American voters were up. Until major metro areas like Houston, Dallas-Ft. Worth and San Antonio report in it will be awhile before this fight is settled.
UPDATE [8:33 PM]: While watching Miracle Mike’s concession speech it occurred to me that Huckabee is Rocky Balboa from the first Rocky film and John McCain is Apollo Creed. Huck fought with honor, but did not win.
He went the distance.
Now I understand why John McCain sometimes played “Eye of the Tiger” at the end of his stump speeches. Although “Hold On to the Vision,” the theme song from the 1986 Jean-Claude Van Dame film “No Retreat, No Surrender” might have been more apropos for the “maverick.”
UPDATE [8:03 PM]: The case of the Ohio crazies has officially broken out (as if the forces of nature and bomb threats weren’t enough). A federal judge in Ohio has ruled for some polls in northern Ohio to remain open and in some cases, reopen due to the weather, so sez the AP’s Frankenstory:
Heavy rain, sleet and ice forced at least 10 precincts to request permission to move, and a few polling spots were running on generators because of power outages.
An ice storm struck Cleveland during rush hour, prompting non-profit groups to stop roving election monitors. ”It is treacherous out there now. It’s just too dangerous for them to drive around,” said Candice Hoke, director of Cleveland State University’s Center for Election Integrity.
Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner asked a judge to hold open the polls in Sandusky County until 9 p.m., to allow voters more time to get to the polls under freezing rain. Ballots ran out earlier in the day, forcing election workers to turn away 300 to 400 people. And a reprinting glitch delayed delivery of new ballots.
On the Republican side, John McCain has officially locked up the Republican nomination by winning Texas. Miracle Mike, the Underdog of Arkansas, hasn’t conceded yet and there is some speculation on the cable news networks that he may be planning some collusion with the once and future king of the RNC. Power sharing options? VP picks? Act of God causing McCain to get up on that stage in Texas and give the nomination to Huckabee because he had a political conversion?
So miracle then, right? Maybe?
CNN’s Dana Bash is reporting that McCain will likely be receiving the endorsement of President Bush tomorrow. A fascinating bit of turnaround since it was originally then Texas Governor Bush who thwarted McCain’s 2000 bid for the nomination leaving pools of bad blood between them. McCain would later sop up that blood, chop down the bile and learn to love the man who once broke his heart.
Rainbows, hearts and happy endings for everyone! Weeee!
UPDATE [7:03 PM]: MSNBC and CNN are projecting that Obama and McCain have won Vermont and McCain has also netted Ohio. Wolf Blitzer is also regailing us with tales of a resolution to arrest President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney if they show up in the town of Brattleboro.
From Scoop Independent News:
The second American Revolution may begin in Brattleboro, Vermont should it becomes the first city in the United States to formally indict George W. Bush and Dick Cheney for “crimes against the Constitution.†The town votes on the following resolution Tuesday, March 4, 2008:
“Shall the Selectboard instruct the Town Attorney to draft indictments against President Bush and Vice President Cheney for crimes against our Constitution, and publish said indictment for consideration by other municipalities? And shall it be the law of the Town of Brattleboro that the Brattleboro Police, pursuant to the above-mentioned indictments, arrest and detain George Bush and Richard Cheney in Brattleboro if they are not duly impeached, and extradite them to other authorities that may reasonably contend to prosecute them.”
Wolfie said the resolution just passed so I imagine they’ll be putting up the “Wanted: Impeached or Alive” posters in the windows of Brattleboro’s tchotchkes shops and fine haberdasheries.
But where will the Vice President go in the fall to watch the colorful foliage and purchase bottles of maple syrup? Damn you, Brattleboro! A pox on all your crazy Liberal houses!
UPDATE [6:01 PM]: MSNBC is projecting that Obama has won Vermont. Matthews is giddy with “no sweep for Hillary” but only a dollop of “Obama won Vermont.” Classy.
UPDATE [5:07 PM]: The Associated Press is reporting that voting is running smoothly, even in election-addled Ohio!
They think. Well, actually despite the positive first sentence of this the article, everything else rapidly devolved into a weather plagued, election quagmire that we may never be freed from. In a day stacked with rainy/icy Acts of God, power outages and moody, bomb-threatin’ middle schoolers, the AP’s chirpy, “Save for a few sputters in troublesome Ohio, voting appeared to run smoothly in four state primaries that could decide whether Hillary Rodham Clinton abandons her quest to be the first female president,” lede seemed a little hollow.
A bomb threat stopped voting at a middle school in one northeast Ohio precinct for about 90 minutes. After trained dogs found nothing, the polls were reopened. Heavy rain, sleet and ice forced at least 10 precincts to request permission to move, and a few polling spots were running on generators because of power outages.
But election advocates worry that final counts from primaries held Tuesday — also in Texas, Vermont and Rhode Island — could be delayed for hours or days, especially in Ohio, where tallying delays have become all too common, as have waits to cast ballots themselves.
I’ll give the AP a break. This is a Frankenstory where they’ve updated it throughout the day with the help of likely more than one reporter. So take it in with a grain of salt. The same story could lede with “Armageddon is nigh! Ohio’s electronic voting machines have come to life and begun the IT apocalypse envisioned by St. James of Cameron.”
ORIGINAL POST: [3:55 PM]
He’s 11-0 and she’s not.
It’s Super Tuesday Redux (or “Critical Tuesday” CNN is calling it as if the candidates are having open bypass surgery). The Obama and Clinton campaigns are still vying for the Democratic nomination that everyone thought would be over with a month ago. Four states are up to bat, including Vermont and Rhode Island. But only two matter, delegate rich Texas and must win Ohio.
Barack Obama is looking for a coup de gras, a definitive win that will render his opponent a head with no body. Hillary Clinton is looking for any glimmer of hope to keep her in the game.
She doesn’t really need that much.
The Clinton camp has pushed back the goal posts and declared that Obama “must win” to prove his dominance. But for Clinton it’s a can’t lose.
She launched a charm offensive last weekend that included an appearance on Saturday Night Live, her new no. one weapon o’ choice to counter media “unfairness,” and finished it off with a visit to The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. While the SNL stint was somewhat humorous and to some TV pundits, endearing, it’s arguable how effective it or the terrible Daily Show visit via satellite was, as the delay ruined any comic timing.
Obama has deployed his troops of volunteers and dispatched a cash armada to flood Texas and Ohio’s airwaves. He has a ground game. He has a TV game. At any moment he could rent some B-2’s and start dropping payloads on Clinton campaigning sites across the Lone Star State.
But CNN and Politico are reporting on some stagnation in Obama’s momentum. Obama has been besieged by drama and rumor in the last few days surrounding one of his economic advisers whispering sweet nothings of NAFTA in Canada’s ear and the trial of a former campaign donor Tony Rezko.
And then there’s the insulting, “Is he a Muslim?’ xenophobic drama. MSNBC’s Chris Matthews made a lot of hay Monday off a brief statement by Clinton on “60 Minutes†where she told reporter Steve Kroft that “as far as (she) knew†Obama was not a Muslim.†Camille Paglia also took umbrage to over it in Us Magazine. Either as a result of that or “the softer side of Hillary” or something else, the polls have started to move narrowly for Clinton, with CNN giving her a one percent lead in Texas.
Controversies and parsed words aside, there is a lot at stake in today’s vote. Bad weather may hamper turnout in Ohio and in Texas tens-of-thousands have already cast their ballots through early voting. And they’re still expecting huge crowds for both the voting and the caucuses. A total of 370 delegates are up for grabs with the majority in Texas (191) and Ohio (143).
On the Republican side, Mike Huckabee is hoping to live another quixotic day to continue to swat at John McCain’s windmills. Hardly any TV press is giving much thought to the other primary going on, but every now and then someone mentions that McCain is still, technically, running against someone despite his lead in the polls and that he can’t afford to be embarrassed again by Huckabee who bested him in a few latter primaries after Feb. 5th.
So hold on to your laptops and your CNN (or your FOX, or you MSNBC, Headline News etc.) With Ohio and its legendary voting woes and now weather trouble, this might be a thrilling, bumpy night.
Rumor also has it that State Rep. Connie Johnson has been fantasizing about becoming the next senator of the 5th District. There are currently two candidates in the race: frontrunner Rodney Hubbard, who has already scored several key endorsements (including Congressman Lacy Clay, Aldermanic President Lewis Reed, and Lic. Collector Mike McMillan) and raised nearly $130,000; and state rep Robin Wright-Jones. A third candidate, Rep. Tom Villa, has long been thought as a possible candidate. His election would mean the City of St. Louis would have an all-white senate delegation for the first time in 50 years.
