Scott:
Look at the results from the WP:
Mich. Caucuses
Updated 11:14 PM ET
Precincts:100%
Candidate Votes %
Kerry
84,214 52%
Dean
26,994 17%
Edwards
21,919 13%
Other
29,802 18%
Full Results
Source: AP
Wash. Caucuses
Updated 11:14 PM ET
Precincts:97%
Candidate Delegates %
Kerry
10,578 49%
Dean
6,583 30%
Kucinich
1,695 8%
Other
2,916 13%
Full Results
Source: AP
The papers are portraying this as a blitz. Bullshit. Kerry is at 50% give or take. See Bush against Keyes in 2000 for what a blitz looks like. See Dole against Buchanan after K Street’s money and a media gang-up destroyed Pat. Kerry IS clearly a front runner. However his delegate count after a series of ‘wins’ is still below 50%. Dean dangled the bait before Edwards and Clark this week when he refused to rule out a VP run. They are all wheezing and short of money. If Clark or Edwards can knock the other out in Tennessee and Virginia next Tuesday there is a chance for a stop Kerry coalition the same way there was a stop Dean. Clark and Dean are essentially singing from the same songbook when Clark can remember his positions from one day to the next. Edwards is doing a mixture of Gephardt and Kucinich. Essentially with Lieberman and Gephardt out they are all doing versions of the Dean of 2003. Dean can claim victory on THAT score whatever happens with the nomination.
Also the media drumbeat may score against Kerry. The name of the game is build them up and tear them down. Per NYT web site [the same paper that in its accompanying article calls Washington Wisconsin at least twice] shows delegate race as follows after tonight:
Kerry – 220
Dean – 137
Edwards – 89
Clark – 86
Sharpton – 4
Kucinich – 2
Unchosen – 3783
To Nominate – 2181
Kerry is a big 10% of the way there. He has better odds to win than the other three but so did Dean six weeks ago. He is chugging along but scarcely blitzing. The media scrutiny so far has been annoying rather than deadly but it is not going to stop. He’s been able to highlight his service record in Vietnam which was commendable [more so than Bush’s in the NG; much more so than Dean’s phony medical excuses]. However the drumbeat is not just the usual suspects on the right [WSJ, WT, RNC, Drudge…]. It is the established media like AP and WP doing due diligence. Thirty years of everything from the Winter Solider Hearings/Veterans Against the War to the Big Dig in Boston. This could be a long spring from a man who is accustomed to getting a free ride from the national media on the grubby realities of Massachusetts politics.
posted by scott 8:41 PM