Reply #17: In another super tueday state [View All]

Rhode Island, Kerry has an even larger lead:

2/12/2004

Kerry 70%

Edwards 11%

Dean 10%

Other 7%

Undecided 2%

Data Collected
2/11/04

Geography
State of Rhode Island

Sample Population
388 Likely Voters

Margin of Error
4.6%

Client
WLNE-TV Providence

http://www.surveyusa.com/currentelectionpolls.html

In pledged delegates, Dean is now in last place of the major candidates and was behind Clark in these delegates:

But the delegates, that's what matters.

It takes 2,161 delegates to lock down the Democratic nomination for president at the convention in July. If you look at the numbers on Sunday morning, John Kerry has 320, compared to 136 for Howard Dean. If you look closely you'll see that most of Dean's delegates are "super delegates," political officials who operate outside of the primaries and caucuses, who gave their support to Dean back when he was the hottest ticket in town. But super delegates often change their minds. Of the pledged delegates, Dean is dead last among the four major candidates. The American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees has pulled its support of Dean, saying it'll hold out for the general election. But the unions haven't mattered too much so far, and Dean has pushed all of his markers into Wisconsin. He's hoping for a bounce.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/gate/archive/2004/02/13/campaigndiary.DTL

Now the AFL-CIO has set up a meeting for this coming Thursday to officially endorse Kerry:

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney scheduled a meeting of the federation's general board for next Thursday "to officially endorse" Kerry, according to the memo obtained by The Associated Press.


AFL-CIO spokeswoman Lane Windham confirmed that Sweeney will recommend the move. "But we're a democratic organization and it is ultimately up to the general board to decide who they will endorse," said spokeswoman Lane Windham.


The AFL-CIO, with a membership of 13 million is one of the key pillars of the Democratic Party, and an endorsement of Kerry signals the groups desire to unite behind a challenger to begin the campaign against President Bush (news - web sites) this fall.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040214/ap_on_el_pr/democrats&cid=536&ncid=536

The all the polls available fot the March Second Primaries have Kerry with huge leads. This was of course prior to Clark dropping out. We will have to see it this results in even larger polls for Kerry, particularly in Wisconsin where Clark had moved into low double digit pollng numbers in that state.