Super Tuesday

In an interview taped yesterday for Inside City Hall, Howard Dean expressed opposition to a brokered convention if the Democratic primary contests fail to produce a candidate with enough delegates to win the nomination.

Dean told Dominic Carter he thinks there will be a nominee by March or April, and if not, "we're going to have to get the candidates together and make some kind of an arrangement."

Transcript after the jump.  read more »

Hillary's Clinton's microscopic victory in the combined popular vote from last night's primary--7,347,971 to 7,294,85--fails to take into account the caucuses that were held in Colorado, Minnesota, Kansas, Idaho, North Dakota and Alaska. All of those contests were won--overwhelmingly--by Barack Obama.  read more »

Barack Obama’s campaign seems to have accomplished two things in the days leading up to the Super Tuesday primaries. It positioned him to battle Hillary Clinton to an electoral stalemate. It also further weakened the declining position of the super-duper Democratic bundler.

Not that they still don't impressively roam the political earth —at Hillary Clinton's "victory" party last night at the Manhattan Center Studios, some of her most loyal and successful fund-raisers were there wearing campaign buttons – but they simply can no longer compete, at least in current circumstances, with the millions of dollars raised by small donors on the Internet.

"The biggest thing from the campaign perspective is all the money that is raised by the people actively trying to raise it is dwarfed by orders of magnitude by the amount that is raised on the Internet," said Obama supporter Orin Kramer, a private equity investor and one of the big names in New York-area fund-raising."  read more »

Michael Bloomberg was, characteristically, critical of the presidential race but emphatically not critical of any one candidate in his first public appearance after the Super Tuesday primaries.

At a press conference in Brooklyn this morning, Bloomberg told reporters, “There’s still three Republicans in the race. Huckabee did reasonably well. Romney certainly didn’t get knocked out. McCain did very well. So there’s a real horse race there. On the Democratic side, Hillary and Obama are still very much in contention. This is Democracy playing out and that’s good.”

More after the jump.  read more »

Following John McCain’s victory in Florida last week the chorus of McCain-hatred grew louder on talk radio shows and on many conservative blogs.

Rush Limbaugh declared that McCain was not conservative and unacceptable as a candidate. Formerly respectable conservative figures took delight in criticizing McCain’s war record—yes, his war record—by tallying up the number of planes he had lost in combat. Ann Coulter and James Dobson, a social conservative leader and head of the Focus on the Family organization, declared McCain so indistinguishable from Hillary Clinton, the featured villainess in any conservative drama, that they would vote for her or stay home.

In short the McCain villifiers doubled down on their bet that they could derail McCain and lift their favored alternative, Mitt Romney, to victory.  read more »

It looks like Obama may have more delegates than Clinton now, although her campaign disputes the math. [Ben]

Still no definitive results from New Mexico. [Albuquerque Journal]

Up next, the Potomac Primary! [AP]  read more »

A major development late in the night turned Super Tuesday 2008 into a near-perfect tie between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. But the advantage going forward may lie with the insurgent.

Just minutes after Hillary Clinton was declared the winner in California, a powerful symbolic victory for her, media outlets reversed field and declared Missouri—which had been trending toward Hillary all night—for Barack Obama. And with that, Obama laid claim to a large state that had been expected in the run-up to Super Tuesday to fall into his opponent's column—something he had failed to do in Massachusetts, New Jersey, Arizona and California.

Both candidates can point to numerous achievements for the day.  read more »

It was a live blog! But now it's an account of how the networks, web sites and local papers around the country covered Super Tuesday.

12:59: OK, we're approaching the six-hour mark, so let's wrap a few things up. Chuck Todd just came onto MSNBC, and based on his infinitely magical formulas, has concluded it's looking like a plus-four-delegate night for Obama (that would be 841-837). But: He said that once the superdelegates—who are still skewing towards Clinton—are factored in, she'll be able to say that she has an overall delegate advantage.

The major papers are explaining the split-vote with the same headline.  read more »

Each of the Republicans can claim some kind of victory tonight, but the big winner is clearly John McCain-–with a major assist from Mike Huckabee.

John McCain won the most delegates today, with a tally that could reach as high as 600, depending on how California shakes out (it has more than half of the number needed to clinch the nomination). McCain did win the most states, but his delegate total was additionally padded by victories in some large winner-take-all states, like New York and New Jersey. He can also claim a win in the South (Oklahoma), along with a string of close second-place finishes in that region (which netted him a bundle of delegates, since those states award their delegates proportionally). His California victory makes for a powerful statement for the kind of day he had.  read more »

With 97 percent of the vote tallied, Barack Obama has taken a 3,000 vote lead over Hillary Clinton in Missouri, reversing the night-long trend in Clinton's favor and causing news outlets who had called the state to pull back their projections. A win in Missouri would represent Obama's marquee victory for the day, a large Midwestern state where Clinton was leading in the polls right up to election day.

UPDATE: Obama wins it.

“Huge night,” said Terry McAuliffe as he walked out of the ballroom, ticking off the states won by Hillary Clinton.

“How about Massachusetts?” he said.

When asked if that win represented a measure of revenge against the Kennedys who had endorsed Obama, McAuliffe said, “We don’t get into revenge. We’re not about that. But let’s put it this way -- it was a fun win.”

It turns out that at the Obama overflow party B there is a party C, sort of--in the basement! These kids party! We were alerted to this latest Obama party by insane screaming and hollering, set off by...
Kansas? Delegates? California exits? Obamatinis?(Did I mention there were Obamatinis?) I don't know why everyone is screaming! This must be how Andy Rooney feels. "We win California, we win the presidential election," a guy says. "Forget it," a girl says. No, wait--yes we...
can?  read more »

McCain in his speech, which was delivered just as the California results were starting to come in: "We are the front-runners for the Republican nomination for President of the United States." Does he have a hunch about how the Golden State is heading?

A New York Republican recounts how he wound up voting for Hillary Clinton by accident. [AdAge] 

David Plouffe call Hillary Clinton’s acceptance of an invitation to debate on Fox News a “tactic out of the second tier congressional campaign playbook.” [Swampland]

Massachusetts college-age voters went to Hillary. [HuffPost]   read more »

After all their expectation lowering, and semi-private worrying, Hillary Clinton’s campaign had a very good night.

“Thank you so much, thank you,” said Clinton from the podium in the center of a ballroom here tonight.

“Tonight we are hearing the voices of people across America,” said Clinton, adding that she had been selected by people of “All colors all faith and all walks of life.”  read more »

With tallies still outstanding from California and a few other states, NBC has Barack Obama leading the day's pledged delegate county, 594-546. (Slightly closer than the Obama campaign’s reported estimate.)

On the Republican side, the numbers are less clear, but NBC is predicting that John McCain will receive between 400 and 600 today, while Mitt Romney will grab between 150 and 400, and Mike Huckabee will finish with about 200.

Hillary Clinton appears to have won four delegates in Representative Jerrold Nadler’s district, a liberal area of the city where Barack Obama was expected to do very well and maybe even win.

According to Nadler, who was walking through the ballroom of Clinton’s party here at the Manhattan Center on 34th street, with 90 percent of the vote in Clinton had 58 percent of the vote. The threshold to win four of the district’s six votes is 58.333 percent said Nadler, who couldn’t help but boast a bit about the result.

More after the jump.  read more »

Hillary Clinton is all on the TVs here--they can't turn her off as they did on New Hampshire primary night. The booing here at Obama party A is heartfelt and loud. (She's speaking incredibly well, by the way.)

Unfortunately a table of guys were hooting and hollering for a WDR cameraman (from somewhere foreign) while Clinton was talking about people who'd died from today's tornadoes.  read more »

John McCain: Connecticut, Illinois, New Jersey, Delaware, New York, Oklahoma, Arizona, Missouri, California

Mitt Romney: Massachusetts, Utah, North Dakota, Minnesota, Montana

Mike Huckabee: West Virginia, Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Tennessee

Hillary Clinton: Oklahoma, Tennessee, Arkansas, Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, American Samoa, Missouri, California

Barack Obama: Georgia, Illinois, Delaware, Alabama, Kansas, Utah, Connecticut, North Dakota, Minnesota, Colorado, Idaho, Missouri, Alaska

After a slow start in the Northeast, Barack Obama is racking up state victories. He has finally been declared the winner in Connecticut, and also Delaware, Kansas, Utah. He also seems poised for wins in North Dakota, Idaho, Minnesota, and Colorado. Earlier, he won his home state of Illinois and Georgia and Alabama in the South.

Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, has the advantage in Missouri (although the state hasn't yet been declared for her), in addition to earlier wins in New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Tennessee and Oklahoma.

That leaves Alaska, New Mexico, Arizona and California. Right now, it looks like Obama and Clinton have both done enough to declare victory on the day -- Clinton because she won some very big states and posted victories outside the Northeast, and Obama because has posted some strong showings in the South, made inroads in Hilalry's turf (in Connecticut and Delaware) and has apparently done very well in the Rocky Mountain area and in the small red state states he targeted. The delegate counts for the day have not been totaled, but both candidates figure to be close.

Clinton, with her Hispanic support, is the favorite in New Mexico. Arizona is probably a toss-up. But given how evenly the night has gone, the winner of California will probably be given a slight edge when the media declares a winner for the day.

To raucous cheers, Mitt Romney just boasted that he's now won all of the states in which he has lived: "Michigan, Massachusetts and Utah."

He didn't mention New Hampshire, where he is a part-time resident (a summer home in Wolfeboro) and where he lost the Republican primary to John McCain.

I met a black Republican for Obama!  read more »

With John McCain, Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney all moving on after Super Tuesday, the next contests will be this Saturday in Louisiana, Washington State and Kansas.

With the strength he has shown in his home region tonight, Huckabee could parlay his strong Super Tuesday performance into Louisiana and Kansas. Washington would be a more natural fit for McCain, although Romney has been trying to pitch himself as a "western" candidate. (This Saturday's contest in Washington is caucus, however, which probably won't matter as much as the primary, which is 10 days later).  read more »

After Eliot Spitzer finished his television interviews here at Hillary Clinton’s victory party, he walked past me in the filing room. I asked him if he would have liked to campaign more for Clinton.

“Nah, we’ve been out there an awful lot. There’s a state to run,” he said, and continued on his way.

Mitt Romney is expected to speak shortly. Notably, he is doing so before California's results come in. Delegates are awarded proportionally there, but Romney could very much use a win. This has not been a very good night for Romney, since he was blocked out of contention across the South by Mike Huckabee. But it has not been nearly as disastrous as some had forecasted, since McCain's victories (outside of Oklahoma, perhaps) might be limited to blue states -- furthring the contention of some on the right that he is the favorite candidate of moderate and liberal Republicans only.  read more »

Super Duper Tuesday, they said.

The primaries will be wrapped up by the first week in February, they said.

Not quite.

As the first numbers started coming in as polls in the majority of the Feb. 5-voting states closed, it quickly became clear that the race between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama would remain very much alive on the Democratic side, and that John McCain had failed to finish off Mitt Romney on the Republican side.  read more »

The crowd at the Obama party in Murray Hill seem to be taking this OK, cheering for delegate wins and the exciting win of Delaware. (Delaware: Still a state!)

They even cheered the exit poll numbers that found that male voters favored Obama. Uh, the men did. The women did not so much! So this is not a grim scene, even as Clinton handily takes New York.

But you know that people working on their first campaign had grander fantasies than a delegate squabble.

P.S. It smells less like barf in the back of the bar.

It's down to Connecticut for Barack Obama if he's going to pick off a victory in Hillary Clinton's backyard. He fared well in New Jersey and Massachusetts -- much better than it looked like he'd do a month ago -- but not enough to win. That means he'll be competitive in each state's delegate race with Clinton but won't reap the psychological benefit of being declared the winner of either state. That leaves Connecticut, where Obama leads by about three points with about one-third of the votes counted.  read more »

It's a bit chaotic here at the New York Obama H.Q. party at Tonic East, on Third Avenue at 29th Street.

Apparently the Giants enthusiasts have been here drinking all day and now they are being displaced a bit by the hopeful young crowd who are arriving in a steady stream. Honestly? It seriously smells like vomit up in the front. I really think some recently hurled!  read more »

As a fuller picture of the results in Southern states emerges, it now appears that Mike Huckabee has undermined Mitt Romney's campaign. Romney, whose last-ditch strategy involves trying to rally the party's conservative base around him in opposition to John McCain and his supposed crimes against conservatism, badly needs a handful of wins in states like Georgia, Tennessee, Oklahoma, and Missouri -- places where his new message should most resonate. But Huckabee's regional and cultural appeal in those states threatened to steal the voters that Romney is targeting.  read more »

Only two states with 8:00 poll closings have been called on the Democratic side: Illinois for Barack Obama and Oklahoma for Hillary Clinton. Neither is a surprise. Okllahoma is the one Super Tuesday state in which Obama didn't run television ads, and Illinois was long ago ceded by Clinton to its favorite son.

What is notable is that Massachusetts, New Jersey and Connecticut are all too close to call. Until recently, these states – particularly New Jersey and Massachusetts – were seen as solidly behind Clinton, but Obama's post-South Carolina surge closed the gap in both of them.  read more »

The biggest news for Republicans at 8:00 is that Massachusetts has been won -- decisively -- by Mitt Romney. John McCain has campaigned in the Bay State, hoping to capitalize of disaffection with Romney from Republicans who feel he abandoned them as governor to pursue his national ambitions. McCain had the backing of two former Republican governors -- Paul Cellucci and Jane Swift (who was pushed out of the corner office by Romney in 2002) -- and hoped to benefit from residual goodwill from 2000, when he blasted George W.  read more »

That Barack Obama has won Georgia is no surprise. That he apparently has won it by such a large margin -- perhaps exceeding 70 percent of the statewide vote, if early reports are true -- is a shock, and could portend trouble for Hillary Clinton nationwide tonight. Georgia's Democratic electorate, like South Carolina's, is about 50 percent black, and Obama has apparently won this constituency overwhelmingly.  read more »

The AP is projecting Barack Obama will win the Georgia Democratic primary. Polls in Georgia closed at 7 p.m.

LOS ANGELES—After last week’s Democratic debate, Big Love actor Bill Paxton went to a private fund-raiser for Barack Obama at the Avalon, a club on Vine Street in Hollywood.

In a VIP room, Mr. Paxton was relating a story to Mr. Obama’s California campaign manager, Mitchell Schwartz, about an awkward encounter he had with real-life Mormon Mitt Romney.  read more »