Right now, Hillary is like a hooked shark flipping around on the deck of a fishing boat; she's dangerous, but you know she's done for. While it may be frustrating for Obamanauts to watch this, Obama's team foresaw a long struggle.
The following is adapted from the "leaked" spreadsheet that came from Obama's campaign back in January (please excuse the lack of formatting):
DELEGATES FOR:
OBAMA HILLARY % VOTE DIFFERENTIAL
OH 68 73 -7%
RI 8 13 -15%
TX 92 101 -4%
VT 9 6 +11%
TOTAL 177 193
(This is actually starting to look quite prescient.)
Obama now has a lead of 155 to 160 pledged delegates (1193 to 1038). If Hillary manages these wins, as Obama's team foresaw, she'll cut that lead by a big 16 delegates tomorrow. Nowhere near enough to remain credible. And about 9 of those delegates she'll lose back in Wyoming and Mississippi next week.
After March 4, it looks like this:
DELEGATES FOR:
OBAMA HILLARY % VOTE DIFFERENTIAL
WY 7 5 +20
MS 20 13 +24
PA 75 83 -5
GU 2 2 +11
IN 39 33 +7
NC 61 54 +8
WV 13 15 -12
KY 23 28 -14
OR 28 24 +5
MT 9 7 +11
SD 8 7 +15
PR 25 30 -9
TOTAL 310 301
TOTAL PLEDGED DELEGATES TO DATE (per RCP):
1193 1038
PLUS MARCH 4
1370 1231
AFTER MARCH 4
1680 1532
These don't quite add up to the total number of pledged delegates because...well, I'm not sure. Snafus in voting or delegate assignment; Edwards delegates, maybe...I dunno.
(Personally, I think a 4 point loss in TX will wind up GAINING delegates for Obama, because of the different weighting of Latino and black districts and his usually lopsided success in caucuses, where 1/3 of the delegates will be chosen.)
The Obama predictions after March 4 seem conservative. After her slash and burn campaign, Hillary is going to get swamped in OR and NC, at least, by much wider margins than his team predicted.
So, after Tuesday, the super delegates are going to be looking at these numbers and realize that Obama will need only about 345 superdelegates total to put him over the top when the voting stops. He's already got 199, so he'll need only 150 or so more to make him the presumptive nominee in June.
Hillary, in contrast, will need over 450 superdelegates to overrule the will of the Democratic voters (because Obama has already a near-1 million vote plurality that she is not going to overcome) and a majority of the ELECTED delegates. She has 241 superdelegates now, and she's losing them, not gaining them. It's impossible for her to convince enough more super d's to join her quest to overrule the primary and caucus voters. In fact, I suspect she's already got as many commitments as she's gonna get. It's just not going to happen for her.
So, even if she wins a close one in TX (by 5% or less) and by 10% in OH (and she'll be happy to do that today), Vermont and RI will be a wash, and she'll gain at most 15 delegates, 10 of which she'll lose back in the next 7 days in WY and MS.
After that, it's obviously just pointless, and Obama can be excused if he starts playing the "I did not have sexual relations with that woman" tape on every TV and radio station in the US. So far, he's really played softball. She deserves a few figurative body blows after her performance today.
And pleae don't talk about MI and FL. This has to be, and will be, settled long before some mythical convention battle to seat those "delegations."