So, we’ve had some primaries and caucuses since my last update on the 2008 election. John McCain finally clinched the nomination for the Republican Party which affords him the luxury of traveling the country uncontested to raise money and continue to be incredibly old.

The real spicy part comes with the Democratic Party. On March 4 there were 444 tasty delegates up for grabs in the contests of Vermont, Rhode Island, Texas, and Ohio. Hillary had a reenergizing night winning 3 out of the 4 contests. Yesterday we had the Mississippi primary and it is no surprise that Obama crushed Hillary decisively in that state with a democratic electorate made up of 70% African Americans. I won’t even go into how Hillary got screwed out of delegates in Texas through the caucus process that the Texas democratic party should be ashamed of itself for, but basically there are various estimates for where the delegate count rests for Obama and Clinton. I’m going to cite cnn.com for my delegate count and say that Obama stands at 1,611 to Clinton’s 1,480, a difference of 131 delegates including the dreaded superdelegates.

Now, here’s the part that McCain is salivating over like a…well, a simile doesn’t come to mind right now, but it all ends in a constant democratic deadlock. As I predicted earlier, people are clamoring about Michigan and Florida votes. Instead of having the original votes stand, people are talking about a do over. Now remember there is a 131 vote difference, advantage Obama.

Let’s look at if there were no do over, but the original votes stood, which I at least think is the right thing to do in Florida, Clinton’s crushing results of 50% vs. Obama’s 33% in Florida would net her about another 36 delegates. If Michigan’s original votes stood, that would be crazy bad for Obama, as his name wasn’t even on the ballet. This would give Clinton a net gain of 86 on delegates from Michigan for a total of 122 delegates from both FL and MI. Now, moving on to PA, the next prize on the election list on April 22 and my home state. With 188 delegates, Clinton is currently polling around a sexy 19 point lead. I am going to assume it will hold around this level right up to the election and Clinton will win by a 15% margin on the actual election day. This will net Clinton another 28 delegates and actually push her ahead of Obama by at least 19 delegates. Now honestly looking at the rest of the contests Obama will probably still carry the majority of them, keeping them both nicely at dead fucking even.

Even if there were a do over in FL and MI, Clinton would still poll at about the same advantage of before because of elderly and latino votes. The only different would be MI where they are both polling at 43%, a statistical tie. Clinton would still gain about 36 delegates and will still carry PA and push her very close to Obama. About 240 superdelegates have still failed to pick a side so anything can happen really. The only way Clinton can really have no chance is if FL and MI are still not counted at all. This would be a disgrace to democracy, to tell millions of people who are finally politically energized that their votes didn’t matter. As Obama would probably win the majority of contests to come Clinton would continue to slip back, still holding Obama beneath the 2,025 delegates, but if Clinton gets behind in delegates by more than 200, I think the superdelegates will choose to save the party and unite behind Obama, pushing him across that magical number of 2,025.

Even though McCain is raising far less money than the dems and has to wear Depends, he has the advantage of time and a somewhat united Republican party. He has months to shore up his support to defend against the juggernaut that is the 2008 democratic party. The longer the democrats stay divided, the better for McCain. I personally don’t buy the whole “electability” argument that says either democratic candidate stands a better chance than the other of beating McCain in November. As the democratic party becomes polarized within you are going to get a lot of pissed off voters who will sit at home in November if their candidate doesn’t get the nomination allowing the unthinkable to happen, allowing the Republicans, who so many think have no chance at all, to win the White House in 2008.