No, no it's not me. And that's too bad.

It's Karl Rove. That's cool, I guess.

While, it's not official yet, I feel completely comfortable in calling the results of the primaries: Obama for the Democrats and McCain for the Republicans.

McCain is only a little over 200 delegates away from securing the nomination officially, so no surprise there.

As for the Democrats, Hillary is in a bad bad way. She now trails Obama by 16 points in national polls, and her lead in Ohio has dwindled to 5 in some polls. Note that that's down double digits from just a week or two ago. To catch Obama she needs to win several states by solid margins and keep momentum. At best she'll win a handful of the remaining states by slim margins and that will be offset by solid victories by Obama in the others.

At worst, she'll lose Texas and maybe Ohio. Either way she'll have zero momentum and a growing deficit in the pledged delegate count. Superdelegates have already started switching in modest numbers to Obama and the trend will only get more severe.

Stick a fork in it.


P.S. If you've been following my primary horserace updates any, you'll undoubtedly have noticed that my soft predictions have not been very accurate. For example, I said whichever Democrat won the California primary would win the nomination for them. Wrong.

This primary season has taught me 2 things: first, the system among the states is vastly more complex than I previously realized; and second, the season contains too many variables to allow for any reasonable forecasting of results.

My favorite television show of all time, The A-Team, is returning; luckily its return comes via NBC's online video venture, and not via a crappy remake (e.g. American Gladiators, Knightrider).

Spaniards yell racial slurs at F1 driver Lewis Hamilton...

First installment of many on Obama:

Click here to view the album and full-size photos...

A senior Hezbollah leader has been killed by a car bomb in Lebanon. The terrorist group claims that Israel is responsible for the assassination.

From the Christian Science Monitor article:

Imad Mughnieh's legendary militant credentials, which are thought to include attacks on the US Embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut, made him a prime American and Israeli target for decades and a significant figure in the arsenal of Hizbullah, the Islamist political and guerrilla force that Washington calls a terrorist organization. Analysts say that with Mr. Mughnieh out of the picture, Hizbullah has lost a key asset in its ability to strike in Lebanon or the region.

Good riddance.

This is an "old" story, but in case you didn't hear it yet: the head of the Anglican Church said in an address that it would be "unavoidable" that elements of Sharia (Islamic holy law) would be included within British law.

The comments made by Dr. Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, have caused a backlash in England, even with some calling for his resignation. The Anglican Church, however, has backed him. Further, he has not backtracked from his statement, rather offering a weak apology that he wasn't being clear enough in the words he chose.

A Muslim group has tried, but failed, to impose censorship on Wikipedia, specifically in regards to articles containing images of the prophet Mohammed.

The Wikimedia Group, who runs Wikipedia, rightly denied the calls for censorship.

Don't be fooled by the fact that Drew Carey narrates in this video; it makes a lot of excellent points:



The middle class may be shrinking, but that's because most of them are joining what used to be considered the rich.

Each party's presidential nomination process continues to evolve. After Super Tuesday, Obama and Clinton are more deadlocked than ever. Conventional wisdom says that Obama will excel in smaller and more interior states, and that Clinton will do well in states such as Texas, Virginia, and maybe Ohio. How the Super Delegates vote will probably determine the winner for the Democrats. Hillary has the advantage among them now, but they could easily switch to Obama's side.

For the Republicans, the big shocker was Mitt Romney's announcement today that he is dropping out of the race. After Super Tuesday, McCain had a massive lead in the delegates, needing less than 500 more to lock the nomination. But now that Romney has dropped out, the race might be interesting again. Romney's supporters will likely split widely in favor of Huckabee in future races, and even more significantly, Romney's 256 delegates have to find a new home.

MSNBC has a nice widget for keeping track of the current delegate totals in the Republican and Democrat presidential nomination races. Click 'Grab It' at the bottom of the widget to add it to add it to your site or dashboard.



MSNBC's numbers seem to be pretty good too. They count delegates from caucus states, even though those delegates haven't been officially committed, but unlike CNN, they don't try to estimate the so-called super-delegates in the Democrat race. Those delegates can align with any candidate they want to at the party's national convention.

A week ago, I posted horserace updates for both the Democrats and the Republicans. Since then, Obama easily won in South Carolina, McCain won in Florida, and Hillary won a no-delegate primary in Florida. Also, both Rudy Giuliani and John Edwards have dropped out of the race. Rudy endorsed McCain and Edwards' supporters are more likely to support Obama, so the dynamic of the races should change accordingly.

The Democrats

As I said last week, the momentum is definitely in Obama's favor, but Hillary still has the advantage in overall support across the states on Super Tuesday. However, California has narrowed even further for them, with Clinton up only 3% in the latest Rasmussen poll, though up 11% in another poll two days earlier.

Conclusion: California will determine the Democrats' nominee. My gut says that Hillary hangs on there.



The Republicans

McCain is solidly ahead in 8 states (MN, CT, AZ, OK, NY, AL, NJ, IL) with polling data and is slightly ahead in 4 others (CA, MO, TN, GA). Romney, on the other hand, only has strong leads in 2 states (CO, MA).

As opposed to the Democrats' race, the momentum in the GOP race seems to be split, though more in McCain's favor than not. Romney is only down 4% in the latest CA Rasmussen poll, but the trend supports McCain there. Huckabee seems to be a non-factor at this point.

Conclusion: McCain wins the GOP nomination. Prominent conservatives opposed to him simply haven't had a significant impact prior to Super Tuesday.

Change can be good and bad, you know?