Pledged Delegates, Super Delegates, and Time Magazine

On Tuesday we saw Hillary Clinton get trounced by Obama in North Carolina and then win by an incredibly narrow margin in Indiana.

At the end of the day the delegate count was: Obama 1866 (1591 Pledged Delegates and 275 Super Delegates) and Clinton 1697 (1426 Pledged Delegates and 271 Super Delegates.)

We, and more importantly the candidates and their campaigns, can take several lessons from this. The first, and perhaps the most important, is that Rev. Wright’s constant appearances in the media did not hurt Obama. To the contrary, Obama reacting in an honest manner seemed to have helped him. Therefore if the Wright connection was something that either Clinton or McCain planned on making any further use of they will need to find some other negative point. Or, God forbid, run on their own merits.

Also, the primary showed how the voters, or at least a large percentage of them, react to Clinton’s purposed Gas Tax Holiday. Indeed it does not take a Rocket Scientist or, for that matter, a High School Teacher to recognize the real risk in her plan. Leading up to the “Holiday” gas companies would raise the prices of gas. So, there is a strong possibility that the Holiday would end up costing the average consumer, not helping them.

And so Obama’s campaign marches on in much the same style as it has for the past 15 months. Hillary, however, is looking at some changes to her camp. She needs to stop running negative ads, again, they don’t work. She needs to concentrate twice as hard on getting her constituents to the polls, she needs to keep those Super Delegates who support her advocating in Congress for her. She has a long road ahead.

Yes, it is a long road but it is not an impossible one to traverse (need I remind you that many thought she should drop out before New Hampshire and she certainly proved them wrong there). What makes this road even more passable is a media that has already given the Primary to Obama.

Time Magazine is the biggest offender having published a cover story announcing, And The Winner Is…with a big picture of Obama. Obama is winning, he is not the winner. He recognizes this fact but if his supporters do not then Hillary may yet pull out the nomination. If Obama’s supporters put so much faith in Time Magazine that they don’t show up at the polls for these last few contests then the tides could change.

Perhaps, I am preaching to the choir but still, it is worth mentioning, the media can be overly presumptuous and they can end up doing far more harm then good in there false assurance that this primary is over.

See you at the polls.