More 4 ran a piece last night that, while far from scientific, just went to show in the midwest how people were very positive about Obama and distrusting of Hillary. They also generally voted McCain if Hillary was running against him but against McCain if Obama was against him. As I say, far from scientific but you could feel the completely different attitudes in these swing voters about both democrat party contenders.

I think the democrats have to look sharp now, they’ve got the polls around them, they have the evidence that Obama is on the up vs McCain while Clinton is on the down…they can see that the idea of a McCain vs Clinton is not looking like it’d go her way. It is also pretty damn clear that McCain is going to take the Republican race tonight. So why on earth would anyone continue to vote Clinton unless a signed up for life member of her fan club?

Obama has picked up almost 10 points on the polls in the last half a month alone while Hillary, as I personally expected, picked up more points when Edwards left the race.

The question is now I guess are the democrats going to fight for a presidential victory or are they going to fight over internal politics, because one way or another, whoever is the “better” candidate of the two doesn’t matter now…what should matter to them is who those independent voters that will need to be persuaded in future months will follow in greater numbers, and right now that person is clearly Obama.

McCain will lose to whoever runs against him. The GOP hardcore just won’t turn out. That line’s a bit of a red herring, if you ask me.

Oi where’s the cool live blogging software!?

Yeah thats coming up! A bit later, when the results start coming in. Its easy to start up and then insert in the code…

It’s cheap cinema time, but I’m actually a more stoked for the rest of the night after I think. ;)

The most important factor is how the Edwards followers vote.

This migration is Super Tuesday’s key dynamic. I think Obama will get the bulk of them.

Lee 1#

Yeah I saw that too, very interesting viewing that. I wonder how relevant it is and if Democratic voters are thinking along those lines?

this is pretty funny.
http://www.slate.com/id/2183594/

on a serious note it does make me think about how pre-determined my support for obama is and the extent of my own free-will. oh well, nothing i can do about it anyway.

apparently huckabee has taken west virginia with a little help from john mccain.

http://marcambinder.theatlantic.com/archives/2008/02/west_virginia_intrigue.php#comments

Poor Romney, he wishes Huckabee wasn’t around to dig into his vote.

CNN is now stating that Huckabee’s taken West Virginia, with help from McCain! Will McCain take Huckabee as his running mate so he can shore up the social conservatives vote?

Heh this is crazy, a Twitter/Google Maps mash up allowing real time map based Twitter updates on the voting tonight!

http://maps.google.com/maps/mpl?moduleurl=http://www.google.com/mapfiles/mapplets/elections/2008/primary/primaries.xml&utm_campaign=en&utm_source=en-ha-na-us-google-mp&utm_term=decision2008

I think Mass. will be a good, early indicator. If Romney does not win his home state by a substantial margin - ten, fifteen points - he will be holed below the waterline.

So, I guess the question is what is the timetable for tonight? When can we expect the results to really start flowing? I’m assuming that most polls haven’t closed yet

Some of them have already started coming in. On others, I expect that CNN and others will soon start making predictions once voting closes and exit polls come in.

Around 12am I’m going to start the interactive discussion applet on here. Come back then!

Well the software stood up to most things…it was working at the end I was just elsewhere! Certainly makes it more interesting to follow these things.