Blogtrek

Super Tuesday

It is now 2004 February 3 21:54. The primary results are mostly in. Not all of them are in, but enough are in to make some conclusions. First the results:

Delaware: Kerry easily, half the vote, with Dean, Clark, Edwards, and Lieberman (second) around 10% each.
South Carolina: Edwards; what is surprising is the margin by which he took the state. Polls had him only slightly ahead; he won by about 15% instead.
Oklahoma: Edwards or Clark. I thought Clark would win this one, but Edwards is essentially tied with him, with Kerry a little ways back. Edwards has the lead as I type this.
Arizona: Kerry. CNN projected him the winner even though a grand total of 0 votes have been counted.
Missouri: Kerry easily, with Edwards a strong second.
New Mexico: No results in as of yet.

So what does this mean? I think Edwards is going to get it. Here is my review of the candidates' status:

Graham: Ran out of money last year and quit.
Braun: Quit in January after seeing that she was not going to win much.
Gephardt: Quit after finishing a dismal fifth in the Iowa caucuses.
Lieberman: Finished poorly tonight, including Delaware where he was expected to be strong. Just now I got word that he is withdrawing from the race.
Kucinich: He may or may not quit; can keep up as long as the money is there. But it won't make a difference because he is only picking up low single digits.
Sharpton: Strong showing in South Carolina, so may continue; otherwise in the same situation as Kucinich; won't matter.
Dean: Didn't win anything! He is doing poorly in all of the contests I have seen, at 6% in South Carolina, well behind Sharpton. I think he is going to quit soon.
Clark: Doing the best he can in Oklahoma, but is not winning anything. He may hang in a while but I expect that he may throw in the towel soon.
Kerry: Doing well everywhere, except maybe South Carolina. He is the leading contender and may remain that way for a while. But…
Edwards: Clearly has the momentum. He did much better than expected in Oklahoma and South Carolina and is doing well everywhere else. He is still behind Kerry, but this guy is on a roll, and he may be charismatic besides.

That is why I think Edwards is going to win the nomination; he will probably pick Clark or maybe Kerry as his running mate.

How well will he do against Bush? I think he is going to lose, as it stands now. Bush has the keys; he has lost four of the Lichtman keys but is apparently holding on to the others. For Edwards to defeat Bush, two more keys will have to topple, with one being the short-term economy, which I believe will be measured by the number of jobs available. The other would have to be something like Third Party, Scandal, or Social Unrest. It is conceivable that Edwards will get the electoral victory and Bush the popular, reversing the 2000 debacle and returning the favor.

But why did he do so well tonight? And why has Kerry emerged all at once as the leader? I believe there is one primary factor that will determine who will get the nomination from what I have seen so far: ability to defeat Bush. Kerry now leads him a whopping 7%, and Edwards by 1%. All the other candidates trail Bush. If you beat Bush in a poll, you will do well in the primaries.