insomnia: So, what happened in California?

Insomnia (

insomnia) wrote,
@ 2008-02-05 22:10:00

So, what happened in California?

So far, It looks like absentee ballots are having a HUGE effect on this race... unfortunately, not for the better. Lots of people obviously voted-by-mail a long time ago, and the races don't reflect the polls at all as a result, except as far as voters in the last few days are concerned, a majority of whom have supported Barack Obama.

How bad is the vote-by-mail effect? Take a look at this report from Glenn County:

Glenn updated 18 minutes ago	Clinton	794	50%	33% reporting
	Obama	457	29%
	Edwards	280	18%

That's right. John Edwards is still in this race... and in the counts reported at this point, he's got double digits in most counties, so Unfortunately, many of those Edwards voters are wishing they had their ballots back tonight. I would be willing to bet a fair amount of Clinton voters wish they had their ballots back too.

Still, taking a look at the results, it's clear that it will tighten up somewhat, as the last votes to be counted will skew most heavily towards Obama. Some areas have already moved over into the Obama camp, but since we're back to paper ballots, it will take a long time to complete the counts. Tomorrow midday will give us a better picture, I suspect.

------------------------------
UPDATE:

If you look at just the votes which were cast yesterday in California, as opposed to the mail-in votes, Barack Obama won handily.

If you look at the votes by county with the mail-in votes,it's glaringly obvious that most of the votes were pre-South Carolina. This will not be the case for the rest of the election. Americans today know Barack Obama much better than last week... and they like what they see.

We have watched Hillary Clinton spend corporate lobbyist money at a rate faster than they can replace. In January, an army of Obama supporters raised $31 million, while Hillary raised about $15m, mostly from big donors who can't contribute anymore.

We have taken every low blow that she and her husband could afford to throw at us... and now, they're punched out, hoping that they can bribe our candidate out of the race with the Vice Presidency. Now they're low on funds, pleading for debates so that they can get some free air time.

They're claiming victory, and yet the gap in delegates between us and them is almost exactly as narrow as it was yesterday, and a strong victory with Democrats Abroad will make it almost exactly even.

It's pretty clear who's in a strong position now. After this point, all the momentum and support leans heavily to Barack Obama in the upcoming races. Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington, Maine, District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia, Hawaii, and Wisconsin.

What we have witnessed tonight is the high water mark for Hillary Clinton's presumptuous, overbearing quest for power.

(26 comments) - (Post a new comment)

	tacofordinner 2008-02-06 06:40 am UTC (link)
	I wish I had my ballot back. (Reply to this)

haruhiko
2008-02-06 06:53 am UTC (link)

I ended up voting for Edwards (I still did not feel comfortable with Obama or Clinton, I'm sorry to say), and I think it's too easy to assume that most of us Edwards supporters would have gone to Obama (a lot of us are just stubborn die-hards), but you make a great point in this post and it's exactly why I don't vote by mail. Besides the fact that I enjoy the feel of actually participating in an election by going to the polling station, presenting my physical self in public, and casting my ballot in person, I know that my decisions are mine to change and reevaluate until the very last moment.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

	granting 2008-02-06 12:58 pm UTC (link)
	... you voted for someone who suspended their race AFTER he suspended his race? (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

haruhiko
2008-02-06 03:15 pm UTC (link)

Damn right, because I believe in the concept of voting your conscience in the primaries and sending the message that there are voters out there who are not satisfied with EITHER of the front-running candidates and are also not willing to settle for an "either/or" situation when it's only the primary stage. I didn't want my vote to help either of the two front-runners (despite rumors to the contrary I don't believe that Edwards supporters like myself are spoilers for Obama) and I wasn't going to stay at home and not vote. *shrug* Take it and judge it as you see fit.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	autolycus 2008-02-06 08:24 am UTC (link)
	Worse yet, here in Missouri, the ballots, the actual physical ballots at the election, were old ballots printed at the start of the process. So we still had Kucinich, Edwards, Biden, Duncan Hunter, Fred Thompson.. et al. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	mely 2008-02-06 03:28 pm UTC (link)
	It was that way in at least part of California as well (Reply to this) (Parent)

	womanonfire 2008-02-06 08:56 am UTC (link)
	i did my best. i used that vote online system you pointed me to hope those votes end up doing something. meh. (Reply to this) (Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-06 11:28 am UTC (link)

Thank you, a.

No meh. Things are looking better than I thought!

If you look at just the votes which were cast yesterday in California, as opposed to the mail-in votes, Barack Obama won handily.

If you look at the votes by county with the mail-in votes,it's glaringly obvious that most of the votes were pre-South Carolina. This will not be the case for the rest of the election. Americans today know Barack Obama much better than last week... and they like what they see.

We have watched Hillary Clinton spend corporate lobbyist money at a rate faster than they can replace. In January, an army of Obama supporters raised $31 million, while Hillary raised about $15m, mostly from big donors who can't contribute anymore.

We have taken every low blow that she and her husband could afford to throw at us... and now, they're punched out, hoping that they can bribe our candidate out of the race with the Vice Presidency. Now they're low on funds, pleading for debates so that they can get some free air time.

It's pretty clear who's in a strong position now. After this point, all the momentum and support leans heavily to Barack Obama in the upcoming races. Louisiana, Nebraska, Washington, Maine, District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia, Hawaii, and Wisconsin.

What we have witnessed tonight is the high water mark for Hillary Clinton's presumptuous, overbearing quest for power.

Edited at 2008-02-06 11:34 am UTC

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

	granting 2008-02-06 12:59 pm UTC (link)
	Where are you seeing the breakdown between votes cast yesterday and absentee ballots? Also, while fundraising is important both as a sign of support and the practicality of having money... money alone means little. Just ask Romney. (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-06 08:19 pm UTC (link)

CNN announced last night that Obama was getting the most votes at the polls, but it's clear that by looking at state results where up to 18% of supporters were Edwards, that a very large percentage of votes cast were old mail-in votes from before South Carolina.

The other races ahead won't be like that. They'll be viewing the election from what they know of Obama's campaign today, not two weeks ago. And they'll also hear more about Obama's message, because he's got a clear lead in both grassroots support and advertising. And, yes, you can't buy elections, but it certainly helps, particularly when combined with a strong ground game.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	paisleychick 2008-02-06 04:50 pm UTC (link)
	If you look at this gif from sec of state - even if all the people who voted for John voted for Obama, Hillary still won out. I'm glad you're still very upbeat about the results. But, even in the example you used, it was Hillary 50% and Obama + John at 47%. (Reply to this) (Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-06 08:04 pm UTC (link)

I understand that she won the most votes overall, but if everyone had cast theirs last night rather than a week ago, he would've probably won the state.

You don't get states with up to 18% Edwards without having about half, if not more, of the votes cast a week ago. Well, countrywide, it isn't a week ago anymore. People know Obama better now, and you won't get all those Edwards votes in upcoming races. Obama also has the most money and the most grassroots support, and the next races are very much skewed in his favor.

That bodes very well for his campaign, over all.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

mely
2008-02-07 04:24 am UTC (link)

Unless there are people that are out of the loop enough to not realize Edwards was no longer in the race when they went to vote on Tuesday. Here in California everything I read said to vote "No" on proposition 91, including the people that originally backed it and in the "Pro" argument column in the voter information guide. Yet from the numbers I saw, a decent number of people still voted yes (~40%). I'm not sure how that happened.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

	swingland 2008-02-06 06:31 pm UTC (link)
	do you think 'bama is fucked? discuss. (Reply to this) (Thread)

	insomnia 2008-02-06 08:00 pm UTC (link)
	All the info today suggests that he won more delegates last night, so I think he won. That said, due to the party rules, it looks like superdelegates are going to decide things. He's going on from here to a whole bunch of wins, and will get those superdelegates over to his side, I suspect. (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

	swingland 2008-02-06 08:09 pm UTC (link)
	your optimism disgusts me. where is the cynical counter-culture journalist that we've all come to know and love? (Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-06 08:25 pm UTC (link)

I'd be more cynical if it didn't look good for him overall. The big question is whether the party leadership and all those superdelegates are going to commit party suicide or not by continuing to disproportionately back Clinton, because by the time all of this plays out, it is very unlikely that Hillary Clinton will have the most delegates from the actual state races. The superdelegates would have to vote against the will of the voters, which would be bad news for going into the general election with any kind of unity.

(Reply to this) (Parent)

raccoon714
2008-02-06 07:42 pm UTC (link)

I really think you're going off the deep end, reading tea leaves from coffee grinds. You're wrong that Barack Obama won the vote totals that were cast at the polls. Hillary's margin was very significant; in more than half of the large counties around the state, she clobbered Obama by ten points or more. The reverse cannot be said for Obama's vote totals in the counties he has won.

Let me just say that your rhetoric is dangerous, adding exceedingly little to the substantive debate between the two candidates while stirring propaganda that is simply not supported by the facts. Hillary won by 400,000 votes. That's no fluke. And in the grand scheme, John Edwards was non-issue. He didn't even matter.

Remember our earlier discussion: I voted for Barack Obama, but for no good particular reason. I'm sure many others went the other way under the same rationale. You had even agreed that Hillary was the more pragmatic candidate. What's wrong if millions of other Californians thought so as well?

(Reply to this) (Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-06 07:58 pm UTC (link)

CNN last night reported that he won the vote totals at the polls in California, but in the larger picture, it's not of great importance.

All the major news sites are now predicting that he won on delegates, which is quite significant, considering... and he's set up for additional victories, which should give him the momentum. He's wisely said that there will probably be another debate, but that we've already had far more debates than in the previous election, so he's basically denying Hillary free air time, while outspending her on the ground and doing a far better grassroots campaign.

So, no... I'm not out to stir propaganda. He's got the edge going forward.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

raccoon714
2008-02-06 08:15 pm UTC (link)

I've said to many Barack Obama supporters over the past couple of weeks that winning California outright was not necessary to win the nomination. In fact, the primary here was a must-win for Hillary. If Barack had won outright, the nomination would be over.

CNN is full of shit. The networks declared the Hillary the winner an hour after the polls had closed. What garbage! I worked the entire day yesterday at a polling station. I've worked on campaigns in California for the last four years. Doesn't happen that way. But you also have to remember that Los Angeles County always (count on it) reports dead last. And Barack Obama got rolled the fuck over.

Look, man. I'm not trying to bust you up for no reason. I read your journal because I think you're intelligent and sensible on a variety of issues. But expect to get nailed when you go crazy. And I really hope you don't mind.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-06 11:18 pm UTC (link)

Of course Hillary won in California, but that doesn't mean that CNN was wrong when it reported that Obama seemed to be winning overall amongst people who voted on that day. I'd like to see the stats on this myself, really... but considering that he was initially being reported as having only 31% of the vote -- based primarily on absentee ballots -- and as of now he's being reported as having nearly 43% of the vote -- that obviously indicates that ballots actually voted last night were very close indeed.

Obviously though, each polling place is going to differ. I just think it's counterintuitive and really premature to write off Obama's surge, especially in the last week here, especially considering that polls from last week were putting him at only 32% of the vote. He got at least a 10% bounce, even though we know that about half of those votes were cast based on how the campaign was doing back then.

So, no. You're not busting me up, nor have I gone crazy. I'm not saying that Obama didn't lose California, but I am saying is that clearly he had momentum at the polls, and that it's reasonable to assume that some of that momentum is going to carry on nationally, especially in states that are more likely Obama victories, and he has the clear upperhand financially and as far as volunteers go.

Perhaps you just didn't get my point?

Edited at 2008-02-06 11:21 pm UTC

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

raccoon714
2008-02-07 03:59 am UTC (link)

Plenty of the momentum you reference is hype. Barack Obama lost all of the largest states, with the exception of Illinois and Georgia. This is not a campaign where a thousand paper cuts will do the job. I doubt Obama has much of a chance in the Texas or Ohio primaries. I think you forget that by virtue of decisive victories that Hillary has achieved will bring it's own momentum as well. But even worse is your analysis that he clearly has momentum. With the absence of Edwards, there aren't any alternatives. So naturally Obama would receive a bump. I'm not trying to put down your fervor, nor am I saying the Obama campaign is over. But reading your posts over the last several weeks, it seems to me you're doing the job of which the Clinton campaign has also been accused: inflating expectations.

When I said earlier about not wanting to bust you up, I meant pot shots. To not my take my criticism or analysis the wrong way. Which you haven't. This is good discourse.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-07 04:37 am UTC (link)

This is a campaign of paper cuts, I would argue. Attrition, plain and simple. You win some, you lose some, and you try to win more than you lose. Obama has done that with delegates *AND* with states. He will do that with a whole bunch of states coming up, and hopefully the momentum gained plus the additional time to get out his message will earn him split decisions in Ohio and Texas.

When I say that Obama has momentum, I essentially mean is that he is clearly still competitive and has surged in the last week or so pretty much dead even in support nationwide, actually picking up more delegates than Clinton, and not giving potential supporters particularly meaningful reasons for doubt.

It's silly to think that winning NY and California matters that much, if the results are a virtual tie, and if the delegates are fairly evenly split due to proportional representation. Lots of people in the US do not identify with either state... quite the opposite.

So, when I say momentum, I mean that things are practically even, and that the campaign couldn't get about 50% of the total vote without gaining not just the majority of Edwards supporters, but many Clinton supporters as well. Meanwhile, Obama supporters show no signs of defecting. I think that will be a trend, with a gradual 1-2% of the national support moving his way per week as things go on. The Clinton campaign just doesn't have as much possibility of getting good news for awhile, and that will hurt them... papercuts, perhaps, but meaningful ones in this war of attrition.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

raccoon714
2008-02-07 06:38 am UTC (link)

I think you underestimate the importance of the establishment, and how deeply seated the Clintons have become to that end. What you said about the gradual 1-2% certainly didn't work in California.

And there you go again making statements that are not supported by the facts: Clinton won New York and California by significant margins. Delegate seats will not be split evenly. Other than Illinois and Georgia, Barack Obama did not win states decisively. Clinton, however, did in most every instance. If you want to talk about trends, these aren't very favorable.

You mentioned wondering how the superdelegates will swing, once the convention arrives. Outside prospects don't favor Obama. The surveys might, but don't confuse poll numbers. And mind what I said about heightened expectations.

I'll say this now that I've cast my ballot. I don't care who wins the nomination.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

insomnia
2008-02-07 11:39 am UTC (link)

"What you said about the gradual 1-2% certainly didn't work in California."

You're right. Based on the percentage of the vote Obama got in CA last night, as compared to the 32% in the poll I cited from a week ago, it wasn't a gradual 1-2% shift per week. It was closer to 10%.

If that kind of shift continued, it would be great... yet completely unrealistic.

When I say that the delegates are fairly evenly split in NY and CA, I mean that it's not "winner-take-all", but split roughly analagous to the percentage of the votes recieved. As a result, winning in California and New York isn't any kind of a knockout blow.

A good example of how this plays out: The 19 extra delegates that Clinton won in CA are made up for by lopsided Obama victories in just the state of Idaho, where he got 12 more delegates than Clinton, and Colorado, where he got 7 more delegates than Clinton. And yet, I'm not hearing from people how Obama racked up 67% of the vote in CO and 79% in Idaho. Those aren't just strong victories. Those are absolutely, crushingly lopsided, and the delegates won there show this.

It also points out that you're really offbase when you suggest that Illinois and Georgia were his only decisive victories. Unlike Hillary, Obama is running a 50-state strategy, with campaign HQs in all states. He racked up 75% of the vote in Alaska, for instance, and while that's only a 5 delegate gain relative to Clinton's delegates in that state, well... that kind of thing adds up. And he won that decisively, because Hillary did not campaign in Alaska. He even won in Utah with 57% of the vote! North Dakota with 61%, Kansas with 74%, Alabama with 56%... all very strong victories that you didn't seem to notice.

What it comes down to is this... Obama isn't necessarily fighting for outright wins in all the big states. He's fighting for close races there, and numerous strong victories throughout America, in all those states which have traditionally been ignored by the Democratic Party's failed big state strategy. He's out there, making real systemic changes in these states, helping turn them from red to purple, in play for the next election.

If the Democrats embrace an elitist core, and burn younger voters, former Dixiecrat states, states in the Midwest, Southwest, etc... that's a recipe for failure that they'll end up paying for. If they embrace Obama, however, there's a real chance that they'll set the Democratic Party up as the dominant party until all those 20something Obama voters become the 50something mainstream.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

raccoon714
2008-02-08 02:40 am UTC (link)

Again, reading tea leaves from coffee grinds. Obama simply did not receive a gradual 10% jump. Combined with the fact that John Edwards had dropped out from the race and that there few alternatives to Hillary Clinton, obviously Obama received votes from that vacuum. You think that jump was entirely just because of Obama and his message? Give me a break.

You just changed your story about New York and California, by the way. You're definitely right about the margins of victory for Obama in a handful of other states. I hadn't read the national returns as carefully as I ought to have.

Your last paragraph would make a lot of sense only if you could be sure Obama would win the presidency after locking up the nomination, two things that are very far from certain. A general election against McCain would be tough. Ever figure that older voters might disproportionately vote for McCain, as opposed to black man with an admitted funny name? I think you're knocking back too many cups of the Kool-Aid. And many polls have already stated that Republicans are more likely to vote for Hillary than Obama against McCain, which does not exactly fit your red to purple analogy.

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