No predictions here about the Democratic presidential race — just facts and calculations (with a few necessary assumptions) about what lies ahead now that it’s clear the contest isn’t about to end anytime soon.

Current delegate totals
Here’s the AP count, which includes superdelegates who have made public endorsements. These numbers include the results from yesterday.
Barack Obama: 1,564
Hillary Rodham Clinton: 1,463

Delegates needed for nomination
2,025

Delegates still up for grabs
There are 4,049 delegates to the national convention in Denver — 3,253 pledged and 796 superdelegates who are free to vote any way they choose. So far, 3,027 delegates have been awarded (including superdelegates who have announced an endorsement.)

Here’s how the remaining 1,022 delegates that are left break down:

– Pledged delegates in the remaining states and territories: 611
– Superdelegates who remain uncommitted: 349
– New Mexico’s Feb. 5 primary is being recounted, so no delegates have been awarded yet: 26
– Some Texas caucus votes are yet to be awarded: 10
– John Edwards won delegates before dropping out: 26

The math
You may have heard some commentators say that the math is working in Obama’s favor and that it will be hard for Clinton to catch up. Here’s what they base that on.

Let’s assume that the 36 delegates outstanding from New Mexico and Texas are divided evenly between Clinton and Obama. (That will almost certainly be the case in New Mexico, where Clinton leads 49-48 percent; in Texas it’s possible that Obama may win more than half of the 10, because he’s done well in caucuses so far.)

With that evenly-divided assumption, then…
–Clinton needs to win 55 percent of remaining delegates to win the nomination.
–Obama needs to win only 45 percent

If current trends continue…Obama wins
If Obama and Clinton each corral pledged and superdelegates at the same rate they’ve done so far, Obama wins the nomination. His lead in pledged delegates would trump Clinton’s edge with superdelegates.

Here’s the calculation:
There are 1,022 delegates not yet allocated — 673 pledged and 349 superdelegates.
–Obama has won 52.7 percent of pledged and 45.6 percent of superdelegates to date. If that continues, he would end up with a grand total of 2,078 delegates, or 53 more delegates than needed to win the nomination.
– Clinton has won 47.3 percent of pledged and 54.4 percent of superdelegates. If that continues, she would end up with a grand total of 1,971 delegates.

Who votes next?
There are 10 states left. Wyoming is next, with caucuses on Saturday, March 8. A paltry 12 delegates are at stake.

After that it’s Mississippi on Tuesday, March 11, with 33 pledged delegates.

Then it’s a 6-week hiatus until the big showdown in Pennsylvania on April 22. There are 158 delegates at stake that day.

Indiana (72), North Carolina (115), West Virginia (28), Kentucky (51) and Oregon (52) vote over the following four weeks, and then the last states — Montana (16) and South Dakota (15) — vote on June 3.

Along the way, two terroritories also vote — Guam (4 delegates) on May 3 and Puerto Rico (55 delegates) on June 1.

Wild cards
Michigan and Florida were stripped of all delegates by the Democratic Party for holding their primaries too early. Clinton was the only one on the ballot in Michigan, and the candidates agreed not to campaign in either state. Clinton won both states.

If those delegates were to be seated at full strength: Michigan would have 128 pledged delegates and Florida would have 210.

Also, John Edwards won 26 pledged delegates (AP count) before dropping out. But 14 of those were from the Iowa caucuses, and he’ll lose those as Iowa’s convention and final delegate selection process unfolds.

The fine print
2008 Democratic Convention Watch reports that the superdelegate total has dropped by two to 794.

California U.S. Rep. Tom Lantos died on Feb. 11. Lantos, a superdelegate, had endorsed Clinton. His replacement will be chosen on April 8.

Also, former former Gov. Kenneth Curtis had been listed as a superdelegate from the state, but he’s no longer a legal resident of Maine.

Guess where Curtis has moved: Florida.

He claims that no matter where he lives, he’s a superdelegate by virtue of being a former chair of the DNC. But because he’s now a Florida resident, his vote has been stripped, according to Convention Watch.

Curtis has endorsed Clinton.

You be the pundit
Some websites have provided delegate calculators where you can construct your own scenarios for the remaining states and superdelegates.

Here’s the Forbes site.

Here’s Slate’s.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, March 5th, 2008 at 5:49 pm and is filed under Barack Obama, Delegates, Hillary Rodham Clinton, Presidential Democratic, Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.