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North Carolina Update #4

Some counties in North Carolina have the jurisdiction to stay open a bit later if there are circumstances deeming such a move necessary.  A late start causes a polling place to stay open late in coastal Pamlico County, while a rural voter in Johnston County takes this whole "race for the presidency" thing a bit too literally...and crashes into the polling place (everyone's ok).

Beware the Exit Polls...

Mark Halperin lists three legitimate reasons to be skeptical of exit polls in today's contests:

1. They are not closed contests open only to Democrats.
2. Turnout is going to be huge (probably record breaking).
3. The absence of recent competitive primaries.

And I'll offer a tale of how exit polls differ from reality:

In November 2004, campaigns saw the first signs of exit polls from VNS (Voter News Service).  Called up a friend to let him know that victory was within our grasp.  We had slain the dragon, we were storming the castle, justice would be restored by way of a Democratic administration.

Then the actual returns came in.  We weren't winning Florida, in fact we were losing by some 400,000 votes.  Democrats barely defended Oregon, which was supposed to be a dark blue state.  We weren't winning Ohio - we ultimately lost it by 80,000.  And a whopping .4% is the margin by which Democrats held Wisconsin.  My friend kept the voicemail and played it back for weeks on end after that.  Good comedy.  Bad reality.

Moral of the story: exit polls are worth what you pay for them.

North Carolina Update #3

Via phone and working with a team of people, have been spot-checking polling places in Raleigh, Greenville, Charlotte and Greensboro today.  Turnout is steady and high, though a bit quiet at the moment (midday is always the slowest).

It's apparent that some precincts in Raleigh are starting to swell as precinct 16-08 in Raleigh is already experiencing a 20-minute wait.

Precinct 119 doesn't have enough parking - poll workers employing "curbside assistance" which basically means bringing the ballots to a person's car and they vote there.  Kind of like a drive-thru.

North Carolina Update #2

Turnout in Greensboro still steady. Bill Clinton on the ground in Charlotte at polling places all morning.  My guess is that he will be down East in Greenville later this afternoon.

Precinct 18-05 in Raleigh has seen 814 votes cast out of a possible 2,193 votes available. That's nearly a 40% turnout with roughly 7 hours left to go...

The "Choose-Your-Own Adventure Primary"

From today's Raleigh News & Observer:

If Clinton wins Indiana and Obama North Carolina:

Nothing changes. Both candidates were expected to win those states, both will claim victory in their own ways, and the national press moves on to West Virginia, Kentucky and Oregon. Clinton is still an outside chance for the nomination.

If Clinton wins Indiana and North Carolina:

A game-changer. Clinton argues she is the only candidate who is electable, while some superdelegates begin to worry that the damage from Rev. Jeremiah Wright, etc., is too great. Obama is red-faced before thousands at Reynolds Coliseum.

If Obama wins Indiana and North Carolina:

Less of a game-changer. Obama argues he has won over the elusive blue-collar vote in a state favored for Clinton while hanging on to college students and black voters. Clinton rebuts that Indiana has not gone for a Democrat since 1964 so it doesn't really count.

If Obama wins Indiana and Clinton North Carolina:

Mass confusion. Both campaigns charter last-minute flights to the other state. Dan Rather comes out of retirement to coin a metaphor for the situation involving corn cakes and griddles but no one understands what he's talking about.

If Mike Gravel wins anywhere:

Hysteria. Reporters wander around in a daze. Pollsters jump out second-story windows. Bloggers say they saw it coming all along. Plagues of locusts swarm the earth. A third of Democratic voters turn red. Mike Munger reveals he is the anti-Christ.

North Carolina Update #1

Even though it is the 10th largest state in the nation, voters in North Carolina have never cast more than one million ballots in any primary election.  They will surpass that number today.  Last weekend marked the conclusion of an early vote period which saw nearly half of a million ballots cast.

By way of comparison, the Carolina early vote in 2008 surpasses the total turnout of the 2004 primary election, as well as the early vote turnout for the 2004 and 2006 general elections.  This high turnout is in line with what we've seen in other states this year, but has also been sparked by a competitive gubernatorial primary in both parties.

UPDATE 11:35 AM Eastern: turnout in the East has spiked considerably, now looking at heavy African American turnout and light to moderate White voter turnout.

Participating continues to be very heavy in Charlotte, though the mayor is running for Governor on the Republican side. Thus this may not necessarily indicate Democratic turnout that is drastically higher than anywhere else, but rather that Republicans are actually turning out in high numbers in this region.

If it's Tuesday, it must be Election Day

At first glance, it might seem a coincidence that two states deeply steeped in basketball tradition are holding primaries on the same day today.  But then again it's probably not an accident that both opted to schedule elections after the conclusion of basketball season in March.

Looking at today's balloting, Supers again will be looking at win/loss margins and which candidate can generate momentum from these elections.

Curious to see if Senator Obama can keep a comfortable margin in North Carolina, and if Senator Clinton squeaks or cruises by with a win in Indiana.  In this Super's opinion, because of the polling disadvantage Senator Obama had heading into the Indiana primary two weeks ago, a loss in that state will probably not affect him as much as it might affect Senator Clinton.

Live blogging from the Tar Heel state today.  Stay tuned.

Kentucky Preview

Seeing as this weekend marks the 134th running of the Kentucky Derby, figured it might be time to take an early look at the May 20th primary there.  Currently, Senator Clinton holds a hefty lead of some 30 points.  A lot can happen in the next 20 days between now and that election, but it is still noteworthy.

Because if that margin holds, the Clinton campaign will pick up a sizeable portion of that state's 51 pledged delegates.

Not sure if Kentucky has ever experienced a competitive presidential race during Derby, so it will be interesting to see how presidential campaigning weaves in with this weekend's race days.  Will try to post some campaign snippets out of Louisville on Friday.

Indiana & Delegate Math

There are nine contests left, and we can either comfortably predict as to which way these states will go, or we cannot predict but there just aren't enough delegates at stake to make a huge dent in the standings.  But there is one battleground left.  Forget Iowa and put aside Pennsylvania - because it's all about Indiana.

Indiana is the only significant toss-up state left.

So the question on May 7th, the day after Hoosiers have voted, no longer relies on momentum or wins and losses - but on margins and delegate allocation.  Some argue that the question of wins and loses is in fact valid now, though a Washington Post editorial says it's valid to wait.

A lot of us have tried to make predictions, and today Libby Copeland struggles over the complexity of the math, which I might add can also be mind-numbing to a person like me who is one of the variables.  But it might not matter.

Because neither candidate will win a majority of delegates at the end of this nomination period, the metric likely to be used will be which candidate came closest to the magic number of 2025.

. . .

Edit: I had originally inserted another note here about Florida and Michigan.  But I misinterpreted the rules which pretty much made my thoughts moot - so I've deleted.  Nothing to see here below the ellipses folks, carry on.

Election Night!

I love primary election nights - it's like a playoff series!  One team needs to demonstrate victory by a series of wins.  Should a team down 2-3 in a series  pull out?  No way - game 6 could be huge and might bring a game 7!  But I digress.

It is election night.  And I will get together with friends and watch returns.  And my cell phone will ring with calls from surrogates at each campaign, talking about the returns, talking about how their candidate can claim victory, and why I should declare as early as tonight.

Best part about election night?  John King's giant touch-screen on CNN.  Even the New York Times is talking about that thing.