Is the race finished?

Well, contrary to what you might have heard last night, the race isn't over. But it may be getting REALLY close. The main reason was revealed in Hillary's speech last night, which she concluded by begging for people to go to her website and give money. Then there are rumors this morning that she has loaned MORE money to the campaign. In this race, you run out of money and you're done. Of course Hillary can give as much of her own money to the campaign as she wants, but how much is she really willing to part with.

Look for a couple of things to happen in the near future.

#! Howard Dean and the other leaders in the DNC are going to push and push HARD on the superdelegates to declare their allegiance. Possibly even calling a meeting of the undeclared supers. Once they get enough supers to hand it to Obama, it's done.

#2 Hillary may keep her campaign going, even by lending more money to it. Don't' worry about her though. Despite her stump speeches, she isn't hurting AND this can actually be used in her favor when it comes to a "buy out". Which means at some point she could go to Obama and the DNC and say, hey I'll drop out if you pay off my campaign debt. Of course that probably won't be the only thing that she negotiates for...

So why would Hillary even stay in this?

#1 Hoping for Obama to have a Spitzer moment or a lightning strike... you get the idea.

#2 It hurts Obama. That's right if she doesn't get the nod you are not going to see Hillary out there campaigning like a mad woman for Obama (unless of course she is the VP, but I think that is a LONG shot to say the least). Quite frankly, if she doesn't get the nod, then she'll want Obama to lose. That gives her a shot at 2012 and considering this has been her life long goal, she'll be hoping for McCain to eek out a win in November. That would give her a lot of ammo to be the nominee in 2012, which will be her last shot.

Should she stay or should she go now?

Well, there are people on either side here. Some saying Hillary should pull the plug and others pleading with her not to.

Of course Hillary has a different idea of what to do. Now if she thinks that he is going to take her up on it, she has got to be dreaming. Why on EARTH would Obama sign on as her VP? All it would do is make it impossible for him to run in 2012 and "taint" him by associating himself with the Clintons. Not that he doesn't have his own Chicago baggage that he is dragging along. It also ignores the fact that he is actually AHEAD in the delegate count. You have to admire the arrogance of the Clintons to even make the suggestion.

McCain needs to be pushing forward right now. Put his solutions out on the table every chance he gets. Grab the cameras and pull them over, then actually give them something of substance to report.

With all of this joint ticket talk from Hillary, I'm concerned that she's desperate. I'm concerned that her SS have gone out and haven't found enough dirt on Obama to make him look dirtier than her (granted, that would take quite a bit). I'm guessing that he is just going to laugh in her face, pull out his pocket watch and go back to hypnotising crowds while he steals their wallets. If he entertains the idea AT ALL it would mean that the SS dug up something REALLY big and REALLY stinky and it's got Obama's name all over it and they are using it as leverage to get him to take a back seat. But, I'm afraid that is probably not going to happen. For all intents and purposes, the Superdelegates are going to majoritively sign with Obama and Clinton will go back to being a Senator from NY.

If I was Howard "mean scream" Dean(head of the Dem Party), I would be pulling all of the Superdelegates together and tell them all that if they want to save the Dem party that they will all look at who won the most delegates and 'gently persuade' them all to vote unanimously behind that candidate. But then again, that would probably take Hillary to scratch together some humility and a smidgen of character to do what is best for her party... that won't happen.

Polls and elections

Great post at Redstate about polls and primaries.

So who won and who lost last night?

First of all here are the results.

For the Dems:
- Obama
- Edwards
- Hillary (ouch)

For the Reps:
- Huckabee
- Romney
- Thompson/McCain
- Paul (10% REALLY!?)
- Guiliani

Some quick observations.
- The real winners are #1 the Democrats. This whole thing does not bode well for Republicans because if you look at the number of voters, it's amazingly lop-sided. In many districts the numbers were at least 2 to 1 the number of Dems voting vs. the number of Reps and in some cases a 4 to 1 ratio. No bueno. What this means is that the Democratic base is energized. The Republicans... not.
- #2 winner is Obama. He slammed Hillary pretty good, but this isn't the end. Some people attack their opponents with Romney style shotguns. The Clintons? They use snipers and lots of them. Look for the gloves to come off. I think Hillary will still get the nomination. The real danger is if she kisses and makes up with Obama and asks him to be #2. That would be all kinds of no bueno.
- #3 winner is McCain. I know, he came in third. Well, when you are saying that you are going to cut farm subsidies on corn... you ain't going to win an Iowa caucus. Just isn't going to happen. Fiscal conservatives do like the message however and McCain is gaining momemtum... big time.

And on the flip side?
- #1 Loser? Romney. He's done. His last hope is to get the train back on the track in Michigan, which he should win anyway (his dad was a very popular governor there). Unfortunately the first three races are the only places he has spent money. He was banking on Iowa. McCain will take New Hampshire and get momentum for the rest of the primary. Watch Guiliani and Thompson supporters shift towards McCain. On that note...
- #2 Loser? Guiliani. He finished behind Ron Paul. Ouch. He wasn't doing hardly anything IN Iowa, but still... come on. If he doesn't pick up and win by Florida (1/29) he's done. The only way that it will swing his way then is if the other races get pretty evenly split or Romney somehow rebounds to win MI and NV and SC goes to Huckabee. Then he's got a shot... sort of. Quite frankly his message just doesn't appeal enough to the base social conservatives and he doesn't have the magnetism to inspire the fiscal and national defense conservatives to get out and vote for him over the other guys.
- #3 Loser? The Hair or Edwards as some call him. He's done. Always number two, never number one. The anti-Hillarys in the Dem party have there guy now and his name is Hussein. Edwards is done. His numbers will drop to the low teens pretty quick.

Huckabee? I don't know. The margin was certainly larger than expected. The only Republicans fired up about this thing at all are in his camp. Tough call. This definitely will give him a boost, but can he move it forward? I just don't know. I used to be excited about the guy but I've really kind of soured over the way he has stumbled with stupid comments and an extreme lack of foreign policy know how on handling countries like Iran, which is one of the HAVE to's of a president.

Okay... want a rash prediction? It will come down to Hillary v. McCain. The winner... I think would be McCain. I think the anti-Hillary vote would be enough to rally the Reps but not positive enough for the Dems to rally their base... unless Obama was the VP on the ticket, but I don't know if she or he would do it... who wants a their VP and their husband to get a better response from crowds than they do? I personally think that she would choose Richardson or another Dem governor, which won't help her that much.

That's my 2 cents. We'll know more in the next four weeks.

Exciting stuff... if you're a political geek like me.