Super Tuesday has come and gone, but the scene is still confused and perplexing. The Republicans have more or less sewn up the nomination process, even, though Senator John Mccain has a harvest of only 517 delegate out of a required total of 1,191. His nearest rival, Mitt Romney has 219 delegates and Huckabee has 158. The surprising aspect of Super Tuesday was the fact that the Baptist minister Mike Hukabee was able to win 5 states and win in states like Georgia, Arkansas, Tennessee and West Virginia. With the "Bible Belt" well covered, I think, Mike Huckabee is in a position to stake a strong claim for the Vice President nomination and John Maccain will need the solid support of the "conservative faithfuls" of the republican party to win. Mitt Romney too fits the bill, but the chemistry beteen Mccain and Romney is too complex.
John Mccain has won in 9 states and crucially in states where the winners take all rule is in place. His win in Arizona, California,Connecticut,Missourie, Oklahoma and Illinois. His victory seems to be the result of the split in the conservative vote between Huckabee and Romney. This spilt has helped now, but in November if the conservative base of the Republican Party chooses to be indifferent, then John Mccain will be in deep deep trouble. As expected Mitt Romney carried the state of Mass, Utah and North Dakota. Not too poor a showing at all, considering the fact that many had written off his candidature.
On the Democratic side Senatoe Barack Obama certainly has the momentum having won in 12 state to the 8 which Senator Hillary Clinton won. In terms of delegates Clinton is slightly ahead with 600 delegates including the superdelegates to 554 for Obama. Hillary Clinton has been able to carry the delegate rich states of New York,New Jersey, Arkansas, Oklohoma, Tennessee, Arizona and California and the Ted Kennedy endorsement did not help Obama in Mass. The Illinos senator, on the other hand has made significant inroads in Minnesota, Georgia, Utah, Delaware, Albama, Alaska, Dakota, Colorado and Kansas. It is quite clear that the "Latino" votes in term,s of identity politics is going the Obama way and he will further consolidate this "vote bank" by the time of the November election. The simple message of "Our Time has Come" is resonating across the nation and if nominated Obama may even win.
The good thing about this primary has been the fact that race is slowly ceasing to be a factor in people's calculations. Large number of whites have voted for Obama, though the minorities still seem to prefer their own ethnic candidate. Hillary Clinton is not even getting the women votes in numbers that she hoped for and this means that gender is not that much of an issue in this election. Hillary Clinton speaks of her "experience" from day one. I cannot think of any public office that she held before becoming a senator from New Yoek. Constantly crowing about her "exprience" versus "hope" seems to be quite a pipe dream.
After the Super Tuesday the Democrats have still not come close to nominating their candidate but the momentum, at least for now seesm to be on the side of Obama.