Obama’s “Big” Win
Published January 7th, 2008Obama won the Iowa caucus, which brought him slightly closer to catching Hillary for the Democrat nomination.
Wait, what? Catch Hillary? Yeah. Once again, the media is blowing Iowa WAY out of proportion and completely ignoring how the nomination process works. First off - Obama’s win wasn’t as huge as the media would like you to believe. Because of the structure of the caucus in Iowa, people who vote for candidates that get less than 15% in their district MUST vote for someone else, or no one at all. Based on entrance polls, it would seem that Obama got the vast, vast majority of the votes from those “non-viable” (the Iowa term) candidates. Maybe up to 5 or 6% of his total. Suddenly his win over Hillary and Edwards isn’t so strong. Secondly, the delegate system is NOT winner take all. Obama picked up 18 delegates from Iowa. Hillary got…16. By the way, you need 2,025 delegates to win the Dem nomination. Oh, and certain party members and elected officials get to vote too - some of them have extra weight, so-called Superdelegates. So currently, when you add it all up, Hillary already has 169 pledged delegates. Obama has 66, Edwards 47. Edwards got 17 delegates from Iowa!
But does the media mention this? Not really. They’re all caught up in Obamarama. Obama has gotten a 10% bounce (in some polls) in New Hampshire - supposedly because he had a huge Iowa win. Sheep, I say. Vote for who you believe in, not who won the last state. Even if he wins New Hampshire by 10% or so….he will still be trailing in delegates. But I doubt the media will mention that either. Winning IA and NH is no lock either, contrary to the beliefs of those with short memories. In 1992, Bill Clinton lost IA (badly) and NH. Last time I checked, Democrats ended up pretty happy with him.
New Hampshire is tomorrow. We shall see what happens. But what is said in the media is only partial truth right now, at best. There’s a long way to go. I’m not necessarily rooting against Obama or for Hillary, I just get a little hacked off at the falsehoods in the press about the political process. Educate yourself on how it works - because that’s the only way to get your candidate to the top.
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