Booman Tribune

Democrats Abroad Select Obama, Etc.

by BooMan
Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 11:04:42 AM EST

If you are a total geek, you can look at the delegate selection process for Democrats Abroad. The short version is that Obama crushed Clinton in the voting 65.6%-32.7% but only earned 2.5 delegates to her two. He'll probably pick up a couple of extra delegates when they have their convention in April. Possible headlines?

Obama wins 11th consecutive contest.
Obama passes 1200 pledged delegates.
Mark Penn declares that the world is insignificant.

Meanwhile, keeping with international sources, The Guardian reports that the Obama campaign wants a concession.

Barack Obama's campaign, riding a wave of 10 straight victories in the contest for the Democratic nomination after wins in Wisconsin and Hawaii, today urged Hillary Clinton to bow to the inevitable and accept defeat.

Obama's campaign manager, David Plouffe, dismissed her camp's hopes of making a comeback when the power states of Texas and Ohio hold their primaries on March 4, and said Clinton would be unable to bridge a widening gap in delegates.

"This is a wide, wide lead right now," Plouffe said in a conference call with reporters. "The Clinton campaign keeps saying the race is essentially tied. That's just lunacy."

How do you pronounce 'Plouffe'?

Here's some understatement from the Brookings Institute:

While Clinton can ask the party to wait until March 4, she cannot hope to prolong the verdict for an additional seven weeks until her next bastion—Pennsylvania, on April 22—unless the March 4 results indicate that she has halted Obama’s surge.

Even if March 4 yields results that outside observers view as disappointing, the Clinton campaign may be tempted to soldier on. The flow of funds would surely slow, however, and the victory scenarios would become increasingly problematic. A narrow majority based on superdelegates against a clear majority of pledged delegates for Obama would create a furor, as would successful raids on delegates elected to support Obama. Worst of all would be a majority built on delegations seated pursuant to the contested primaries in Michigan and Florida. At some point, the Clinton campaign would have to ponder the relation between the worth of victory and the manner in which victory is achieved. Democrats old enough to have endured the agony of their 1968 convention cannot forget its electoral consequences.

Meanwhile, Joe Klein went to Doha, Qatar and found the Muslim world intrigued by Obama but mostly just exhausted.

The final speaker, a charismatic religious leader from Egypt, didn't want to talk about the next President at all. He wanted to talk about the problems of Islamic youth. But, I pressed, what do you want from the next President? "Change," he said, innocently, "and hope ... for the future."

The Americans in the audience smiled at that: clearly an Obama voter. The notion that the U.S. might elect someone named Barack Obama seemed almost surreal to most of the Islamic delegation. But what was most striking was the overall sense of subdued despair after all the battles and outrages of the Bush years. "The past few years, the Muslims were throwing tables at us," a U.S. Middle East policy expert told me. "Maybe they're just worn out."

Of course, Klein adds:

The distress was deeper than exhaustion. Many of the Muslim delegates seemed stunned, finally, by the rush of history unleashed by the Bush Administration. "Everything the United States has favored is now radioactive, especially democracy," said Rami Khouri, a Lebanese journalist. The Administration had pushed for elections in places like the Palestinian territories where the essential components of democracy—a free press, a free economy, the rule of law—did not exist. Religious parties had won, or gained momentum, in most of these elections, and the U.S. had backtracked, refusing to accept the Hamas victory in the Palestinian territories, re-embracing autocrats like Hosni Mubarak in Egypt. "Our indigenous democratic reformers," Khouri said, "are in retreat across the region."

They should not expect any miracles in the near future. Democrats are going to embrace realpolitik in the interest of stability. We don't have a better option at the moment. If there will be any positive movement, it will have to be on the Israeli/Palestine conflict, not on democratization. Bush's attempt was premature, sloppy, and insincere. Our first priority is now to shore up our alliances and get out of Iraq without it causing a regional conflagration or a crippling disruption of energy supplies.



Display:
How do you pronounce 'Plouffe'?

I'm pretty sure it's pronounced Ploof.

by RandyH on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 11:20:32 AM EST
That's what I say.  Or Plowfe.  I just make up stuff, but I never made up 'Ploof'.  Weird.  That should have been a no brainer.

~~~THIS SPACE FOR RENT~~~
by fabooj (fabooj [at} mail [dot} com) on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 11:27:36 AM EST
[ Parent ]
I found out over at TPM that he was seen in North Carolina today:
David Plouffe was in town today.

The campaign manager for Barack Obama said he was helping organize and raise money for the upcoming May 6 primary, Rob Christensen reports.

"North Carolina could end up being very important in the nomination fight," he told Dome.

Interviewed at a fundraiser in the law offices of David Kirby in Raleigh, Plouffe said that the primary is only nine weeks away and Obama campaign needs to begin organizing in the state as soon as possible.

He said the trip today was not about courting John Edwards, although he acknowledged the campaign is interested in the former North Carolina senator's endorsement.

Back at TPM, Sargent writes the obvious:

Plouffe seems like a pretty major player to be spending time merely organizing in a state who's primary is over two months away, but we'll take his word for it.


~~~THIS SPACE FOR RENT~~~
by fabooj (fabooj [at} mail [dot} com) on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 12:26:42 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Prononced "pluff."

Can't hear ya, Peach!
by AP on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 03:18:52 PM EST
[ Parent ]
I thought I heard the media pronounce it "pluff".

And Obama hasn't passed 2000 delegates - he's one shy of 1200. The total number of pledged delegates available is 2200+.

"If you look for the social economic motive, you will not have to wait for history to tell you what was propaganda and what was truth." - George Seldes

by Real History Lisa (lpeaseRemoveThis@gte.net) on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 12:12:34 PM EST
[ Parent ]
obama lead increases nationally. via gallup's tracking poll:

Obama 47% (+1)
Clinton 42% (-3)
link

and this bit of fundraising news as obama closes in on another record breaking month of fundraising, expecting to exceed the $36m from january...mostly from small donors:

...here's another astonishing statistic: The campaign will soon report that it has enjoyed its millionth donor.

As I reported earlier today, the Obama camp quietly passed the half-million mark in donors for just this year. Now, in an email to supporters that just went out, the Obama campaign wrote:

"We've crunched all the numbers and discovered that we are within striking distance of something historic: one million people donating to this campaign...We're already more than 900,000 strong."

TPM



the revolution will not be televised...
by dada on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 11:29:56 AM EST
Mark Penn declares that the world is insignificant.

lol!

Although it would be funnier if George Bush hadn't said it in earnest.

by maryb2004 on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 11:40:49 AM EST
So the blunt object that is Bush has finally taken it to the point where that dear old concept "democracy" has been so abused that it is now perceived as radioactive? That should be written on Bush's political tombstone, 'the man who made Democracy radioactive'

by mainsailset on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 11:51:45 AM EST
It should be "Obama passed 1200 pledged delegates."

Passing 2000 would be big news, since only 2025 are needed to clinch it.  

Thanks!

by ankylosaurus on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 12:01:47 PM EST
Except that as I clinked the link just now, the number was still 1199.

"If you look for the social economic motive, you will not have to wait for history to tell you what was propaganda and what was truth." - George Seldes
by Real History Lisa (lpeaseRemoveThis@gte.net) on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 12:13:16 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Oh - I see - with the 2.5 from Democrats abroad, he's passed the 1200 mark.

"If you look for the social economic motive, you will not have to wait for history to tell you what was propaganda and what was truth." - George Seldes
by Real History Lisa (lpeaseRemoveThis@gte.net) on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 12:14:32 PM EST
[ Parent ]
thanks, I fixed it.
by BooMan on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 12:17:28 PM EST
[ Parent ]
Btw - you'll love this:

Mrs. Clinton woke up Wednesday to the realization that she had lost nearly every advantage she once could claim over Mr. Obama: money, momentum, a lead in national polls and an edge in delegates. Polls suggest that Democrats now view Mr. Obama as more electable than Mrs. Clinton. After her ninth and 10th defeats in a row on Tuesday in Wisconsin and Hawaii, Mrs. Clinton is running out of time.


"If you look for the social economic motive, you will not have to wait for history to tell you what was propaganda and what was truth." - George Seldes
by Real History Lisa (lpeaseRemoveThis@gte.net) on Thu Feb 21st, 2008 at 12:27:44 PM EST
[ Parent ]


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