Washington, Wisconsin, Hawaii

The last significant presidential primaries until March 4 will be held tomorrow our time: primaries in Wisconsin and Washington for both parties, plus caucuses in Hawaii for the Democrats. Discuss them at your leisure here.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

868 comments on “Washington, Wisconsin, Hawaii”

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  1. No 100

    Interesting argument. However, I think you’ll agree, at least in the Australian context, that there is always a constant contradiction. When polls seek opinion on whether Australians pay too much tax, the response is always in the positive. Yet given the choice between public spending and tax cuts, the answer is always in favour of public spending (as you mentioned).

    In the US, I’m not so sure how long the argument for foreign intervention can be maintained given the increasing fragility of the US economy and the incredible expense necessary in protecting US interests overseas. I don’t see why the US can’t simply take a more diplomatic approach rather than “policing the world” as Mr Paul would argue. It is pretty well settled that the oil revenue from Iraq won’t recover the immense cost of the ongoing war. So, what’s the point, other than to save face or “honour” as Mr Huckabee contends.

  2. Camp Clinton have updated their website with a message “Help Get Out The Vote” with links to actions in Wisconsin and Hawaii. The respective links go to info about polling places and so forth. An interesting difference between Camp Clinton and Obamaland is the focus – Camp Clinton is focused on providing directions for voters whereas Obamaland is about the grassroots campaign and everything that can do for “you” – the voter. It’s an interesting difference and as much as I hate to say this (because of all sorts of personal reasons) – Hillary may be into the Happy Days feeling (looking back to the epic adventures of Bill and his cigars) as opposed to Obama looking more towards that 70’s show demographic – younger, brighter, smarter.

    But if that’s true, I have a problem. Glen – please advice – I posted info on the policy position of Obama some weeks ago (comprehensive and detailed reading material on the campaign site) but if you need additional video aids just let me know and I’ll look into providing the appropriate community assistance (assuming you meet the necessary criteria).

  3. Believe JWH’s $34 billion tax cuts offer was as I believe inconsistentwith the published polls but consistent with what most voters actually would prefer given the choice.

    In the 3 days prior to Rudd’s response I argued with those who believed Rudd should spend the bulk of the $34 billion on public spending to be a guarantee of the ALP’s election loss. Presumably Rudd took the same view as JWH & promised similar tax cuts also.

    Had JWH theoretically gone for public spending (but would never done so) , Rudd still would have gone for tax cuts as the voter puller

    My view re no contradiction is based on the political realtys of winning votes with tax cuts contradicting pollee’s claimed but not real preference for public spending.
    Whereas my view re no contradiction with US foreign (‘public’) spending being preferred by Republican voters & generally by many other US voters is uniquely
    a result of US voters perception that the number one priority is forward defence
    over any other use of Federal funds. But for Australia it would be a contradiction

  4. Hello Davidoff

    “Hillary may be into the Happy Days feeling”
    No my sense is the Fonz is with obama although not demographically

    Wisconsin believe Obama 54/46
    Hawaii believe Obama 60/40 but on such a small sample %’s are meaningless

    earlier predictions remain:
    Ohio Clinton 52/48 and Texas Clinton 52/49
    although haven’t seem any Polls supporting me yet but there is “momentum” time

    what’s your predictions

  5. My predications are at the top of the prev. page
    Hawaii, 4 (52/48 for Obama)
    Wisconsin, 20 (60/40 for Obama)
    And, yes – I know this is going against every poll out there but if I’m right I’ll be on a plaque in the League of Super Heroes – and what more can a mortal ask for?

  6. On Texas – 52/48 for Obama (and yes – I know every poll is saying I’m silly by I still figure that the Obama on-the-ground organization can win this one – and I also think US polling is too fixated on race). On Ohio – I’m giving that one to Camp Clinton by 8 points (56/54).

  7. In anticipation of my desire that your figures are closer than mine, I’ve now engraved your name on that plaque in the League of Super Heroes

    and welded on a champers bottle……already duly empty

    I say anon for another day

  8. So Obama is a copycat. When you put yourself on the pedestal as the prince of words, they should be yours. If not, at least say so. Can we be cynical of his words from now on? Yes, we can.

  11. GP – You’ll probably hate it more if you’ve come across it, but in a case of ‘know thine enemy’, have a look at EP Thompson’s The Making of the English Working Class . This was cultural Marxism in response to what I think that you are arguing. It was widely accepted in US academy and his methods adapted to the US situation by Herbert Gutman and his followers. Borrowed from wiki:

    “I am seeking to rescue the poor stockinger, the Luddite cropper, the “obsolete” hand-loom weaver, the “utopian” artisan, and even the deluded follower of Joanna Southcott, from the enormous condescension of posterity.”
    Thompson attempts to add a humanist element to social history, being critical of those who turn the people of the working class into an inhuman statistical bloc.’

  16. 108 – The Finnegans

    That argument has already been debunked twice in a variety of articles by a number of people in the previous thread. Why do you persist in criticism that is clearly biased and one sided.

  18. asanque – I’m not entirely sure of the lingo, but I think it is called ‘trolling’, usually engaged in by either the ignorant or those being paid to do so.

  21. 2 weeks to go now until the end of the Bush/Clinton reign.

    Hillary is left to her only predictable tactic of attack against Obama.

    it won’t work.

    when you are old,tired and unliked you can’t attack the young,energised and LIKED.

    Iraq…the undoing of Bush/Clinton.

  24. Jasmine if you think John McCain and the Republican Party can beat Barack Obama and the Democratic Party in November 2008 i have some swampland to sell you.

  25. Risky call david…!

    I think I’ll predict Hawaii 64-36 and Wisconsin 56-44 to Obama.

    Interesting today that electoral vote posted a couple of new polls for Texas at 50-48 and 50-45 respectively for Clinton – statistical tie. Yet the RCP average has barely shifted (42.6-50.2). That average more often that not turns out to be right, so it will be interesting to see how that shifts in the coming days.

    I would suggest that by the start of next week, the gap in most polls will be no more than 5. Interesting times.

  26. Jasmine if you think John McCain and the Republican Party can beat Barack Obama and the Democratic Party in November 2008 i have some swampland to sell you.

    The election is over eight months away. Comments like that are ridiculous – you want to see what happens to the Democratic Party if nobody drops out, and McCain gets a three-six month head start in the race?

  27. Max from a week ago:

    Wisconsin believe Obama 54/46
    Hawaii believe Obama 60/40 but on such a small sample %’s are meaningless

    Predictions from a week ago remain:
    Ohio Clinton 52/48 and Texas Clinton 52/49

    Fortunately for me , the Polls do not NOW make my prediction as far out. My swampland was on Obama over Clinton with watering rights.
    Max , do you think the O & Mc swiftboats on both sides will cancel each out

  28. Max @ 126

    that is why Hillary will be conceding shortly after March 4 when it is clear that Obama’s pledged delegate and overall vote lead is too much for Supers to overturn.

    and btw..in the leadup to Nov, conditions are only gonna get better for the Democrats.

  29. HarryH agree re with Clinton….Texas ‘high noon’ approachs at the corral
    does your swampland have watering rights also ?

    my question to Max was wrongly cut & pasted. My question is do you think the Mc swiftboats will cancel the O momentum for change & Mc’s age 100 years Iraq views

    (because Mc or his supporters will look to undermine the O’s acceptability)

  30. Ooh-aaah! Somebody’s getting done like a dinner in WI. Stand-by for the mother of all dummy spits.

    “….preliminary exit poll information from the Wisconsin Democratic primary.
    Key highlights:”

    “Women: Obama 51%, Clinton 49%
    Change vs. experience, 52% to 24%.
    Just 17% are first time voters
    Families with income under 50,000: Obama 51%, Clinton 49%
    Independents: Obama 63%, Clinton 34%
    Seniors: Clinton 60%, Obama 39%
    Top quality – experience: Clinton 95%, Obama 5%
    Union households: Clinton 50%, Obama 49%

    Update: Mike Allen has more: “Democratic officials with access to exit polls say Sen. Obama looks like he’s headed for a huge win in today’s Wisconsin primary. The polls could turn out to be off, as they have in the past. But the officials’ revelation reflects the chatter in the campaigns in advance of the 9 p.m. Eastern poll closing… Obama encroached deeply into three of Clinton’s core groups of voters — women, those with no college degree and those with lower incomes — while giving up none of his own.”

    http://politicalwire.com/archives/2008/02/19/exit_polls.html

  31. Ron,

    I am personally of the opinion that McCain is having little to no effect on the Democratic Primary race (besides the fact he is there and the unofficial nominee already.) I think he knows this too, because he has been relatively silent in recent days (apart from rambling about campaign funds, which I don’t fully understand yet, but I’ll get there.)

    The ‘100 year’ comment was taken completely out of context by the media. Yes it hurt him, but in the end apart from those who are really anti-war, it won’t matter too much. The public know he supports ‘staying the course’ and he is happy with that. How he will differ from Bush will become clearer over the next six months, and will obviously affect his campaign.

    Iraq will be a key point in any general election campaign. But it won’t be the ‘be all and end all’ point that many Democrats were hoping it would be – this is not a re-run of the 2006 midterms.

    I think the Obama momentum as we know it will halt the very moment Clinton concedes (assuming she does). It will be a completely different ball game then. At the moment, momentum is key because it wins him primaries and promotes the air of inevitability. But nobody cares about momentum in this stage of the general election, they want it in six months time (or when you are down by a big margin.) Inevitable is useful in a primary, not so much in a general.

    So, I’m not sure if that answered your question, but it is my general train of thought.

    As for in two weeks… I think Clinton will win Ohio. The lead is too great, and while it will narrow there probably won’t be enough time for him to cut it down (barring a defining endorsement). Texas should be around the 47-47 range come polling day, within the margin of error. It is going to come down to undecideds, which Obama usually wins, but again, it is too close to call – it’s going to be a matter of a handful of votes. Which means it will be a delegate tie, but the media don’t care about that – the message will either be Clinton hung on or the firewall collapsed under pressure. Simple as that.

  34. yes you did answer my question thx Max.

    Your political projections for Ohio & Texas are in the geneal ballpark of my Poll predictions on the day for both Ohio & Texas as the narrowing occurs

    For the Nov Election , my sense is Iraq will be a bigger issue than the Republicans will wish a the Deomocrats will make it so & link McCain’s existing ‘stay the course’ to it. The question of whatever was the context of McCain’s 100 year statement is likely to be lost but rather for middle voters its a stance of Republican’s remaining for a long time for what seems to be another Vietnam type war. I see the issue as a major plus for the Democrats

    The Obama momentum I referred to is a yearning for ‘change’ from both the Clinton & Bush era’s & methods of policy & their outcomes which I feel will be a Nov. factor

    What may change the dynamics is the increasing liklihood of further dramatic economic downturn. Also a subtext of Obama’s race can not be ignored as a negative for him when the actual presidency is on the line.

    Alot can change in 7 months given a political week is a long time , but believe the Obama bandwaggon’s team will be hard to stop & I’m on the waggon

  36. Comparatively large under 45s and under 30s turnouts in Wisconsin, according to the CNN exit poll. This could be a good return for Obama. Will Hillary acknowledge it if she gets another thrashing?

  37. Pancho , one effect of the continued Obama momentum is some voters in subsequent Primarys may not wish to appear to be out of step with inevitability

  38. Of course she won’t:

    http://blog.washingtonpost.com/the-trail/2008/02/19/clinton_defiant_after_wisconsi.html

    ‘Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton has gotten good over the last few weeks at fleeing a primary state she has just lost and trying to turn the page.

    This time around, she did not even wait for the results to come in.

    Instead, on Tuesday night, Clinton announced that she would give a “major address” in Manhattan on Wednesday morning and delivered what aides described as a “preview” here. It seemed clearly designed to be a pre-emptive strike against the news that Clinton had lost yet another primary race…

    Clinton, who has lost more than a half-dozen primaries since Feb. 5, once again did not congratulate her rival as his victory in Wisconsin became official. She did not even acknowledge that voting had taken place that day, instead thanking the high school marching band.’

  40. Those numbers don’t appear to be shifting. 56-43 with 33% reporting. Should be between a 10 and 15 point win despite Hillary’s campaigning for the week in Wisconsin and the tricks of the last few days. Which I believe will translate as about a further dozen candidate lead to Obama.

  43. Another Clinton clayton’s concession speech. For someone who professes to be the leader she seems to be trailing quite a lot.

    Now that Obama is eating into her demographics, Texas and Ohio are looking less likely to be the rocket boosters she needs to even catch up, let alone overtake.

    She’s now on borrowed time.

    Expect the fangs to emerge and the fearsome stuff to start leaping off the TV screens.

    Pass the popcorn, this is my favourite bit…

  44. 141
    Enemy Combatant

    Another Hallmark moment! LOL

    (She bought time on cable, Hallmark I think it was, and just as she was wrapping up to her live audience, the station cut her off and went back to scheduled programming.)

  49. Obama always seems to pull further ahead later in the count….

    Is there a demographic reason for his?

    Like African americans, who vote overwhelming for Obama, live in more densely populated areas which leads to lkarger booths which take longer to count. Hence, Obama gains in the later booths.

    Or it could be a new voter phenomenon altering the expected size of booths. Though they should have a better handle on this by now.

  50. RA I would have thought that the city booths would come in later too (though I have nothing to back me up on this) and Obama’s college blocs and younger people would tend to be there.

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