Delegate Counts
I updated the delegate counters and the delegate totals are current as of 2/26/08. Of course, things are going to change.
Currently, Barack Obama has 1,360, so he needs 665 more delegates to lock it up. Hillary Clinton has 1,269 - which puts her 91 delegates behind Obama.
Meanwhile, John McCain has 994 delegates, leaving him needing only 97 delegates to win the nomination. Mike Huckabee has 239 and the only way he wins is if John McCain has a stroke. He’s playing for VP right now - or potentially setting himself up to rule the New Religious Right. Either way, he’s no threat to McCain. I may have one more update for McCain - after that it just doesn’t matter (actually, it doesn’t matter much now, but what the heck?).
So there are 161 delegates in Ohio, 228 in Texas, 32 in Rhode Island, and 23 in Vermont. That’s a total of 444 delegates to be decided a week from today. The polling favors Obama. The only place that Clinton holds a real lead in polling is in Rhode Island. In Ohio, Clinton leads, but is within the margin of error. In Texas, polls conflict on the leader, but it is within the margin of error. Obama has a fifteen point lead in Vermont. Even if he splits Texas and Ohio dead even - and I expect he’ll get about 2/3 of the delegates - that gives him 81 from Ohio and 114 from Texas or 195. Add in 20 from RI and probably 10 from Vermont and he should pick up about 225 delegates next Tuesday. I really expect it to be closer to 100 in Ohio and 160 in Texas for a total of 290 on the day. Using those as range limits, he would end the day with 1,585 to 1,650 delegates. He would need only 375 to 440 to lock up the nomination.
That would leave between 219 and 154 for Clinton to pick up. Added to her current total, she would have 1,423 and 1,488. With 693 delegates left to be decided in April, May and June (plus 58 for the rest of March in Wyoming and Mississippi), she would just barely have a mathematical chance of getting the nomination. But she would need somewhere around 72% of all remaining delegates after March 4.
In other words - she isn’t as well-done as Mike Huckabee, but she’s close to as desperate as Mitt Romney when he bowed out.
Technorati Tags: delegate counter, delegate total, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, John McCain, Mike Huckabee
February 26th, 2008 at 9:17 pm
[...] Xpatriated Texan wrote an interesting post today on Delegate CountsHere’s a quick excerptCurrently, Barack Obama has 1,360, so he needs 665 more delegates to lock it up…. [...]