The Likely Bitter Pill

Much ink and drama are going to be played out over the next few months, but the end result is probably going to be pretty predictable barring a major mistake by one candidate or the other. At the end of the day, neither Mr. Obama nor Ms. Clinton is going to have enough pledged delegates to win the nomination and it will become a beauty contest between the Superdelegates.

Ms. Clinton has been talking up how she wins big states while Mr. Obama talks about bringing in new voters and can make traditional red states competitive. Both of these are fallacies. In a primary, there are no red and blue states. There are only Democratic contests and your appeal is determined how well you organize and what constituencies you appeal to. Ms. Clinton wins big states because she appeals to the traditional blue collar, union Democrats who make up the majority of the voting blocs in those states. Meanwhile, Mr. Obama is winning African-Americans, young voters, and liberal intellectuals. This gives him power in states where the traditional Democrats have been weeded out. The Democrats may win states like Ohio and West Virginia, but who takes those now will have no bearing on the final outcome against Mr. McCain.

The biggest worry for Democratic operatives when one looks at this analysis is what happens once the folks in the backroom pick one candidate over the other. If Ms. Clinton is selected, she’ll maintain her blocs and will pick up the intellectual liberals. However young voters may evaporate, as their motivation is lost. Likewise, African-American voters may be angry enough to either stay home or give Mr. McCain a look. If Mr. Obama is selected, he’ll maintain his voting blocs, but he may lose some of the working class Democrats. These are the “Reagan Democrats” who pay close attention to National Security and may be turned off by Mr. Obama’s aggressive spending plans that could result in higher taxes.

On top of all this is how the landscape looks once the primary season is over. Knowing that Mr. Obama will almost certainly finish in the lead with pledged delegates, many Democrats would probably prefer him to also finish with the popular vote lead and more states in his column (Mr. Obama currently leads 25 states + DC to 16 states for Ms. Clinton, so he will have won more contests at the end of the day). However, 57% Democratic voters have openly stated that if no one wins the nomination due to pledged delegates then the winner of the popular vote should be the nominee. This is the one avenue still open for Ms. Clinton as she trails Mr. Obama by about 600,000 votes not including Michigan and Florida. If these states get seated or she wins in somewhat similar numbers in the do-overs, Ms. Clinton could take the popular vote lead from Mr. Obama. Then the party elders are back where they started and will have to torque off one constituency or the other.

The choice might come down to which side is more willing to forgive the other or which side is the one that Democrats decide they can sacrifice for the common good. Neither choice is particularly appetizing.