UPDATE
McKinney apparently won the DC primary with 55% of the vote - I don't have any other info about voted for other candidates. Also - I'm reading alot of sources who seem to indicate that nader's win in CA is less about groundswell for Nader than the fact that McKinney announced late and didn't campaign there.
Not that you would know it from the MSM, but along with the Dem and Rep primaries and caucuses, third parties are also in the process of choosing a presidential nominee. And yes, all you Nader-haters and Green haters out their can frag me, but this is post is meant to be informational rather than an endorsement of any candidate.
Note, delegates will cast ballots at the Green Party national convention in Chicago on July 12 (at the Blackstone Hotel and Chicago Theatre - home of the 1968 Dem convention, interestingly).
The race is shaping up similarly to 2004, where Nader was the 800lb gorilla, who was seeking the Green Party endorsement (not the nomination, b/c he was trying to cobble together a coalition among Reform, Independence, Green and other 3rd parties), and relatively unknown party activist David Cobb. Cobb went on to narrowly win the nomination on the 2nd ballot, running on a platform of party building at a local level as opposed to the spoiler effect of a Nader run. Cobb was good to his word, spending much of 2004 lending his support to events for local parties and local candidates, and all but telling people in swing states to vote for Kerry. You may know Cobb best as the spearhead of the recount efforts in Ohio (and NM) when Kerry turned his back on the thousands of disenfranchised voters there. Full disclosure - I was one of the few Cobb delegates from the NY delegation in 2004.
This time around Nader is only on a few ballots due to his late interest in the race, but he has stand-ins in a couple of others, who are on the ballot but have announced that their delegates will vote for Nader if he decides to seek the nomination (or endorsement). His main opponent is the controversial but passionately anti-war and pro-impeachment six-term former democratic congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, who hemmed and hawed before officially throwing her hat in the ring a few weeks ago.
Here is a list of all the states (and DC) that get more than 10 of the 836 delegates, as well as the date (if known) and the method of delegate selection. The method of allocating delegates in complicated- based on a combination of factors: Green registration, elected green officials, and green votes in statewide and national races.
168 California Primary February 5th, 2008
44 Illinois Primary February 5th, 2008
44 Maine Caucuses February 10th, 2008
40 New York Balloting April 1st, 2008
32 Massachusetts Primary February 5th, 2008
32 Pennsylvania Caucuses April 22nd, 2008
24 Michigan Selection
24 Oregon Internal Primary
24 Wisconsin Mail Ballots February 28th, 2008
20 Connecticut State convention April 26th, 2008
16 DC Primary February 12th, 2008
16 Florida Mail Ballots February 1st, 2008
16 Maryland State convention
12 Colorado State convention May 3rd, 2008
12 Minnesota Caucus & mail ballots March 4th, 2008
12 New Jersey State convention March 29th, 2008
12 Ohio Online poll March 5th, 2008
12 Texas State convention June 14th, 2008
12 Washington Mail Ballots April 1st, 2008
Full list here.
As for results, this is what I've been able to cobble together:
CA Results (168 delegates available - 20% of total, and 40% of the 836 needed to win the nomination)
Nader: 60.5%
McKinney 26.6%
Elaine Brown 4.6%
Kat Swift 3.1%
Jared Brown, Kent Mesplay & Jesse Johnson less than 2%
IL results(44 delegates available)
Cynthia McKinney 57%
Howie Hawkins (Nader Stand-in) 17%
Kent Mesplay 14%
Jared Ball 12%
AR results (8 delegates avail - Nader not on ballot)
McKinney 20.5%
Jared Ball 10.5%
Kent Mesplay 7.9%
Kat Swift 5.7%
Uncommitted 55.3%
Unofficial MA results (32 available)
Nader approx 47%
McKinney Approx 40%
Mesplay 4%
Ball 3%
Brown 3%
Swift 3%
I haven't found any Maine results yet, but they went overwhelmingly for Cobb last time around (Pat LaMarche won 11% of the vote for Gov here in 2002, and was Cobb's running mate in 2004). The DC Statehood Green Party has a primary today.
I haven't seen any official delegate counts (and with all the state conventions for the states that do not have ballot status, it's unlikely that we ever will), but here's my math for the results above, assuming delegates break down evenly by percentage of vote with no threshold:
419 delegates required for nomination.
Ralph Nader - 117 delegates
Cynthia McKinney - 87
Kat Swift - 11
Jared Ball - 9
Elaine Brown - 8
Howie Hawkins - 7
Uncommitted - 5
Kent Mesplay - 3
Jesse Johnson - 3
Professor and Hip Hop producer Jared Ball has dropped out and not only endorsed McKinney, but has joined her campaign - he may be influencial in the DC primary today. Elaine Brown has also dropped out - and has not endorsed anyone as far as I know, but my guess is most of her delegates go to McKinney. Howie Hawkins is a stand-in for Nader. Swift and Mesplay both ran in 2004, and I think they split between Cobb and Nader.
Clear as mud, right? Looks like we won't have much idea of how things are headed until late March, unless Nader decides between now and then not to run. My guess at this point is that McKinney will end up with the nomination, but not as easily as I would have guessed a couple of weeks ago. Nader's support is strongest in California - he probably won't get any more big wins in big states. New York seems to be rallying around McKinney (the NY delegation was almost all Nader in 2004).
I'll do an update in a few weeks as things develop, and will try to blog from the NY convention, and hopefully from the Chicago Convention in July as well, if I get elected as a delegate again.