“Barack’s impressive showing in our state is attractive to me,†said Senator Amy Klobuchar, Democrat of Minnesota, where Mr. Obama beat Mrs. Clinton two to one in the popular vote last month. “If somehow 200 superdelegates decide this, it will be problematic.â€
Its not an endorsement, but its about as close as you can get.
Update: I got a little ahead of myself.
I am curious. If this same thought process were used on all the super delegates, where would the numbers be. I mean, if Super Delegates were allocated winner take all based on the outcome of their primaries or caucuses would Hillary be in better shape. Something tells me, with her dominance in the big states, that may be the case.
Flash
She said the same thing on WCCO about a week or two ago.
Flash,
I think the votemaster over at electoral-vote.com did that analysis a little while ago. It showed that if all delegates from a state were awarded on a winner take all basis the totals would be Clinton 1746 Obama 1569. Then he showed what the totals would be like of superdelegates were able to make their own choice but pledged delegates were winner take all, in that case the totals would be Clinton 1397 Obama 1255. Some simple math shows that if superdelegates were winner take all from a state, that Clinton would get 349 of them and Obama 314. This gives a net of 35 for Clinton. However, using the superdelegate totals found on openleft.com (which has about the best overall delegate count to be found), currently Clinton leads in superdelegates by a count of 255 to 209, for a margin of 46. So if superdelegates were awarded on a winner take all basis based on their state’s caucus or primary results, Obama would actually extend his overall lead by about 11 delegates at this point. Of course this is a little off because some superdelegates that have endorsed are not from states that have voted yet, but it is pretty close.
So overall I’d say that it would be a wash or a slight advantage for Obama.
Between the caucus results that went Obama and the congressional support of Obama in MN (McCollum, Oberstar, Ellison) and Brian and Donna’s decision to endorse based on the caucus results, it would be hard to imagine Klobuchar going Clinton. She still has the FISA issue hanging over her head with party activists. I can’t imagine she’s looking to buck the will of DFL voters again right now.
It was good, though, that she remained neutral last night at the HH Dinner. This thing hasn’t played out.
She’s our Junior Senator.
Thanks Archer Dem
My guy is out (Richardson) I will support the eventual nominee and have chose to remain neutral so as not to get emotionally invested in a candidate.
It about regaining the White House, that simple!
Yeah, unfortunately Norm Coleman is our senior senator for another few months.
Also, the NYT has a great new seemingly-comprehensive superdelegate tracker / list you can look at now, and see the superdelegates sorted by state / position / primary results.
http://politics.nytimes.com/election-guide/2008/results/superdelegates/index.html
Does anyone know if Mullery and Dominguez lost their endorsements? Does anyone know how that turned out?
Per MNCampaignReport - they endorsed someone else besides Willy Dominguez and chose no endorsement in Mullery vs Flanagan.
I reviewed the MNCampaignReport website and did not see any information on this. Is there a media blackout on this story or what? Who won the DFL endorsement in the Dominguez and Mullery seats? Does anyone know?
Sorry. It’s MNblue.com. See the blog posts there. I apologize.
Loveit: also check out the Minneapolis Issues List: http://forums.e-democracy.org/groups/mpls/messages/topic/650YTqNA9seFLE4eAfZliw
I live in 58B, and my girlfriend was a delegate to the convention this Saturday. Bobby Champion won the DFL endorsement against Dominguez after several ballots. She says she went in pretty strongly Dominguez and by the first ballot had switched to Champion…apparently he looked very good there. In 58A (the Flanagan race), they chose not to endorse. I was up in 49, where Jerry Newton won the endorsement to run in the B-side.
Klobuchar said something similar on MPR last week. If you hear that interview and read between the lines, it’s clear she’s going to support Obama. She makes clear that she’s been decided for some time; She just didn’t want to announce while the race with Hillary was ongoing. She consistently hints that Obama is her candidate.
She sounded resolved that the race with Hillary is going to drag on through Summer, so now she’s just waiting for the right time to announce her support for Obama.
I was the ballot-qualified independent candidate (far to the incumbent’s left) in 58A last time around.
Voters in MN House District 58A won a major victory on March 15th, when delegates to the DFL convention refused to endorse Representative Mullery for a 7th term. Instead, after only three ballots, the delegates voted for no endorsement, which will allow the voters of our district to say whether we are happy with the direction our community has gone during the incumbent’s tenure, or if it is time for more effective leadership at the Capital.
This is great news. In case you haven’t noticed, the DFL nominee is virtually guaranteed to win the house seat, and the unsettled endorsement means that regular north side residents will actually have a say in who represents them in St. Paul. It is unusual for an endorsement convention to reverse 12 years of precedents and deny an incumbent his endorsement. What happened?
First, Peggy Flanagan is not your run of the mill challenger. Her experience on the school board, a job Sen. Higgins calls “the hardest job in elected officeâ€, puts her in a great position to hit the ground running as a powerful ally of North Minneapolis schools. Healthcare is a central issue to her campaign, and she has a “YES, WE CAN†attitude about finding a solution at the state level. Her position as a community organizer with Wellstone Action shows her passion for drawing people into our democratic process and empowering people to make a difference in their own lives and the lives of their communities.
Additionally, she has secured endorsement from a most amazing cast of characters, including Congressman Keith Ellison, State Senator Linda Higgins, Mayor R.T. Rybak, the list goes on and on. But most important, Peggy showed up on the doorstep of almost every delegate to the SD convention, in some cases several times, in order to win the most important endorsements, the endorsements of regular people across the district, from Jordon to Victory. Many of these folks have never seen a candidate at their door.
Finally, perhaps the delegates were unhappy with the direction north Minneapolis has gone during the past decade. I know I am. Joe’s tenure on the Tax committee has seen drastically increased property and sales taxes, and as a result, the average North Minneapolis family is paying a higher percentage of their income to taxes than the average family in our most affluent suburbs. Joe’s tenure on the public safety committee hasn’t reduced violent crime on our streets or made our community a better place to live. We delegates have given the voters a chance to elect more effective leadership. I beg you voters, please do not throw away this opportunity: show up for the primary.
In 2006, I went door to door all over this community, listening to voters concerns, as I ran for State Representative as an Independent. In 2008, I am delighted to endorse Peggy as a candidate who will represent all our residents, who is right on the issues, and who will provide the bold leadership we need at the state capital. I urge your support.
Justin C. Adams