The state of play in the Democrat Primaries

So Hillary Clinton is now in the race for a while longer after what can only be considered a very good night for her. Very strong in Ohio, huge in Rhode Island, and winning the popular vote in Texas. Vermont was never going to go her way and she didn't bother with it. By my calculations Clinton should have made up around 20 (it depends on the Texas Caucus results) delegates. This leaves her still with a lot to do. In fact, she'll have to, on average, win all 12 remaining primaries by 61 - 39 to catch up with Obama's delegate score. However, I'm not convinced she has to match his pledged delegate score. If she averages 55 over BHO's 45 then it'll be difficult for the media narrative to anoint him as the victor even though he'll have around a 70 pledged delegate lead. In that situation I think the calls would be too great for a fascinating convention and a scrable to pick up every last super delegate, along with Hillary trying to reinstate Florida and Michigan. So could this happen? Let look at the remaining 12 primaries.

Wyoming comes first this saturday and it only has 12 delegates. It is also a caucus, which so far has been benefiting BHO. The vote will be quite important for momentum but it is very quickly followed by the larger Mississippi (33 pledged delegates), on tuesday and as such the US's least populous state is unlikely to greatly affect the outcome. There appear to be no polls for either the southern or north western states and the press seems to be looking straight ahead to Pennsylvania with its 158 delegates and potential to end the Clinton campaign. A lot with happen between now and then. Pennsylvania isn't until the 22nd of April so we have at least another seven weeks of this. But Hillary is currently holding the advantage there with a 9% poll lead over BHO and is leading about 70-30 on intrade (with only 30k traded). However, reports that the Clinton camp didn't even file a full delegate slate for Pennsylvania suggest that the campaign is currently a bit thin on the ground.
A small win in Pennsylvania (52%), which appears quite possible will put her in a very difficult delegate position but will keep her in the race until May 6th when Indiana and North Carolina offer a collective 187 pledged delegates. This is the point where it starts to look very difficult for her. The Bayh machine should help HRC in Indiana but she might be in serious difficulty in North Carolina. The problem for both the Clinton and the Obama campaign is that there appears to be no reason why Clinton would drop out unless the press decide that it has to be Obama and decided that super-delegates are undemocratic and don't really count. At which point, Clinton is over. But the media is a fickle creature and could easily decide a delegate dog fight at the conference is much more exciting than a messianic half-Kenyan liberal.



P.S. try playing around with the slate delegate calculator