The Daily Show and The Colbert Report clearly both watch Meet the Press. Two of my favorite shows seized on Clinton surrogate and former head of the Democratic National Committee Terry McAuliffe talking about his and Tim Russert’s dad watching the Democratic campaign from heaven. Unfortunately for McAuliffe, Tim Russert’s dad lives.
Something else McAuliffe said on Sunday, however, caught my attention. McAuliffe said several times that Senator Clinton trails Senator Obama by roughly 100,000 votes in the popular vote. Russert knew immediately where McAuliffe got this number, responding, “You’re counting Florida and Michigan.” McAuliffe replied that the votes from both states should count, and that it would be unfair to the voters in Michigan and Florida if they weren’t.
We have heard this line from the Clinton campaign for a long time. This talking point, though, has taken on an additional level, which McAuliffe said on Sunday: Obama made a political decision when he took his name off the ballot in both states to appease Iowa and New Hampshire voters. The argument that the votes in Michigan and Florida should count towards the popular vote tallies has yet to include this rationale until recently (as far as I am aware – if someone has evidence that multiple surrogates were peddling this argument, please post in the comments section).
That Clinton is continuing to massage her case with the popular vote is a clear signal that not only is she remaining in the race, but that, in her mind, she can still sway superdelegates. Why is this so important? If Clinton wins a landslide victory in West Virginia today and is somehow able to makeup the 100,000 votes between now and June 3, then she and her surrogates will blanket the airwaves with the contention that she now leads in the popular vote, and if the superdelegates pick Obama they are going against the will of the people.
Obama supporters and most neutral observers, as well as some Clinton supporters, will not be swayed by this argument. Just because Obama’s decision is now supposedly “political” does not mean that superdelegates are going to change their minds on how to calculate who won the popular vote; can Clinton legitimately argue that her decision to be the only major candidate on the Michigan ballot was not a political decision? Also, the candidates were not allowed to campaign in either Michigan or Florida, yet Clinton is arguing that those votes are equal to those in states where the candidates were allowed to campaign, which intuitively is rife with problems. Superdelegates who are not already in Clinton’s corner will remain unpersuaded, as will the press.
Who are endangered of being swayed, or having their perspectives hardened, are Clinton’s supporters. There is a significant difference between your candidate falling short of the necessary delegates and your candidate falling short of the necessary delegates despite receiving more votes than her opponent. Democrats are particularly sensitive to this proposition already, thanks to the 2000 election fiasco. That Clinton is the first woman who has come this close to a major party nomination adds the additional complication that many of her supporters will feel that a societal prejudice has kept her from capturing victory (just like how many African-Americans will become even more disillusioned if the superdelegates choose Clinton, which I discussed in a previous post). Will women turn out for Obama if their candidate of choice had the nomination stolen from her by a bunch of powerful men? There is a real chance that too many women will stay home, thus giving the presidency to McCain.
At this point, Clinton cannot win unless Obama somehow completely implodes between now and the convention. Yet, she can still do a significant amount of damage through strengthening the resolve of her supporters to the point where they become so disillusioned that they do not vote at all in November. We are not at that point right now, but the Democrats run that risk if Clinton seizes on the popular vote argument. It is time for party leaders to step in, especially her allies in the Senate, and end this race before she sabotages Obama’s chance beyond repair.
