Obama easily wins Maine caucuses

Source: MSNBC.COM

AUGUSTA, Maine - Barack Obama defeated Hillary Rodham Clinton in the Democratic Party's Maine caucuses on Sunday, grabbing a majority of delegates as the state's Democrats overlooked the snowy weather and turned out in heavy numbers for municipal gatherings.

With 70 percent of the participating precincts reporting, Obama had 57 percent of the vote, while Clinton had 42 percent.

Democrats in 420 Maine towns and cities decided how the state’s 24 delegates would be allotted at the party’s national presidential convention in August. Despite the weather, turnout was “incredible,” party executive director Arden Manning said.

Read more: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/23098411/

and it seems like Hillary's campaign is in trouble

out of the clinton barnyard this week...

... she has a lot of party machineary behind her. It will be a hard win for Obama even if he manages to swing the people towards him.

She'll fight rules at the convention to try and seat her ill gotten Michigan and Florida delegates for example. And, because she represents the status quo of the democratic party, she may get significant traction on these and other issues. Obama will need a large advantage in the popular vote from here out.

Anyway, Go Obama! I'm crossing my fingers that you can pull this off!

If the Clintons cared about the party, they would not have engaged in the mud-slinging and race baiting they BOTH engaged in. It speaks volumes.

A lot of folks will be pretty disenchanted with the Democratic Party.

I don't know if there will be rioting in the streets....but there sure won't be lines to the voting booths in November

This week, it's going to get pretty disgusting around here.

Praising caucus wins are bs. there are over 1.2 million democrats regtistered in Maine. Less than 5% of registered democrats participated in this caucus. Any inference that the result is reflective of anything other than acitivist opinion is BS.

Washington - 96% Reporting

Candidate Votes Percentage
Barack Obama 21,629 68%
Hillary Clinton 9,992 31%


Nebraska - 99% Reporting

Candidate Votes Percentage
Barack Obama 25,986 68%
Hillary Clinton 12,396 32%


Louisiana - 100% Reporting

Candidate Votes Percentage
Barack Obama 220,588 57%
Hillary Clinton 136,957 36%

And now Maine... not too shabby. I hope the super delegates do not f with this election. They'd be real stupid...

They aren't. They're the number of pledged delegates going on to the next level (legislative district) of caucuses on April 5th. Those people will select delegates to the county caucuses, then the state caucus, which will select the delegates for the national convention.

From the look of that list, you'd be led to believe that only 31,500 or so Washington Democrats actually showed up to vote this weekend, when it was many times that amount.

(It wouldn't surprise me to learn that Nebraska's figures are similar.)

Here are stats from 2004 Caucus State primaries in the 2004 Presidential election. Its shows exactly what the real numbers are behind cacus stattes. Granted the excitment behing Barack Obama has doubled the turnout in Caucus state. It is however, a fact that turnout in caucus states represents a very small percentage of registerd democratic voters. And, in red states the numbers are more meaningless.

For example 38,0000 democrats voted in this years caucus. There are over 380,000 registered democrats in Kansas, and 790,000 registered republicans. Based on acutal numbers, I find it very difficult to make a case for a democratic win in strong red states like Kansas, Idaho, Utah, Georgia, South Carolina, Oklahoma, Alabama and Nebraska.

The numbers dont lie. I wish all would stop inflating their importance.

January 19, 2004

Iowa

Estimated VEP: 2,189,799
Turnout: 124,331
VEP Voted: 5.7%

February 3, 2004

New Mexico

Estimated VEP: 1,294,323
Turnout: 102,096 (more than 23,000 voted absentee)
VEP Voted: 7.9%

North Dakota

Estimated VEP: 452,011
Turnout: 10,558
VEP Voted: 2.3%

February 7, 2004

Michigan

Estimated VEP: 7,257,657
Turnout: 163,769
VEP Voted: 2.3%

Washington

Estimated VEP: 4,251,962
Turnout: 105,000
VEP Voted: 2.5%

February 8, 2004

Maine

Estimated VEP: 1,026,771
Turnout: 18,259
VEP Voted: 1.8%

February 14, 2004

Nevada

Estimated VEP: 1,473,417
Turnout: 9,000
VEP Voted: 0.6%

February 24, 2004

Idaho

Estimated VEP: 959,672
Turnout: 4,920
VEP Voted: 0.5%

March 2, 2004

Minnesota

Estimated VEP: 3,636,712
Turnout: 54,931
VEP Voted: 1.5%

March 13, 2004

Kansas

Estimated VEP: 1,965,865
Turnout: 2,000
VEP Voted: 0.1%


March 20, 2004

Wyoming

Estimated VEP: 377,258
Turnout: 665
VEP Voted: 0.2%

Hillary has said numerous times that she's ready for Day 1. It's just not Day 1 yet. :)

As flawed as he may be, at least HE never said he would choose which powers b*s*/cheney have (illegally) accumulated to keep - a direct violation of the separation of powers (presidents don't GET to pick their own powers).

For her suggestion that she can, I hope her campaign goes down in flames.

oh... woops... wow! - it's in the NE and 97.81% white.... my bad ... darned geography...

huh?? But Billary told me Obama is just a "black candidate"... and now he is winning EVERYWHERE? I am sooooo confuuuused!! ;)

I'm quite enjoying this weekend's political events.

Oh wait a minute...

Each state Obama wins, another Clinton meme goes down the drain.

:rofl: :rofl:


yay Go Obama! :woohoo:

I was mocking the people who accuse Obama of being the latte liberal candidate.

told me Obama's got something special and he'll likely vote for him in the general.

in all of these! Go Barack!

In our caucus in Cape Elizabeth, on the outskirts of Portland, Obama beat out Hillary by a margin of three to one.

I wish we had them here in California, but it'd probably be total chaos.

The local party chapter was totally unprepared for the volume of attendees who showed up. I think they were expecting, based upon prior turnouts, maybe 100 people or so to attend, so they only had two volunteers available to check in the closer to a thousand people who actually attended. It took forever to get us all checked in and we were so crushed into the high school auditorium where we met, we could barely move or breathe. In a way, I was a little disappointed, as this was my first caucus - I've always lived in primary states before now - and I was hoping to see more of the debating within groups for which caucuses are famous. With the volume of participants, that wasn't viable and we just had to line up and be counted. So that was a little bit of a let down, but, at the same time, how can you not be overjoyed by such historically high levels of voter participation? This is what democracy looks like!

close enough for people to actually caucus. :)

:rofl: Now that would be my kind of caucus! Soaking in a tub, sipping some Sangria, and discussing politics! Where do I sign up? :hi:

nice to see another Maine-ah here! :hi:

:hi: Likewise, although I'm afraid my wife and I may not be Maine-ahs too much longer - I just got accepted to law school in New Orleans, so it looks like we may be moving down there shortly. I'm telling myself though that this is a good move politically, as Maine's already committedly progressive, so doesn't need Dems as badly as Louisiana does!

"Barack Obama supporter Pak Lul, who recently became an American citizen and was originally from the Sudan, leaves the caucus in Arrowsic, Maine, on Sunday." Perhaps one of a handful of blacks in Maine.

I could have swore that she was supposed to win that state. I'm really optimistic about tuesday! Part of the reason I joined this forum is to talk to actual Hillary supporters. Because at my high school, Hillary has virtually no appeal at all. But yeah, there was definitely a difference in what the polls said what happen to what actually happened. It's looking good indeed.

GOBAMA!!!!!!!!!!!!! :party: :toast:

:dem:

That's the difference between two parties.

Republican is destroying this country and this world by being violent and aggressive in the world affairs.

Vote for Hillary "bomb Iraq" Clinton == vote for John "bomb Iran" McCain.

Sorry.

I remember how excited everyone was in 2004 when Kerry won the nomination.

So, let's not take anything for granted.

Who wins the nomination is not nearly as important to me as having a Dem in the White House.

So, play nice Obama and Hillary supporters!

general election. I mean the stories that will come out about inaccuracies in vote tabulations, voter suppression, problems with the electronic registration data base. Maybe it'll be different this time.

This weekend he has won in the deep south LA, the great plains NE, the pacific northwest WA,
and the northeast ME. Hillary is in deep shit. And coming up Obama looks strong in the far west
HI, the midwest WI, and the mid atlantic VA, MD, and D.C..

Obama is now a true national candidate and the clear front runner. Hillary's hopes for super delegates
and seating Michigan and Florida might very well be gone too .... the Democratic Party would be
be committing fratricide if it allowed the clear winner, Obama, to replaced by somebody who lost,
Clinton.

getting out the vote and to vote for him. None from Hillary.



doin' a happy dance right now, just got home from work and am very happy to see that he won! :woohoo:

We got four recorded calls from Hillary, and one from Michelle Obama. I was a little surprised that we didn't get more from the Obama camp, it made me think that they perhaps anticipated (correctly, as it happens) that the greater Portland area was already fairly safe Obama territory and so they expended their resources on other parts of the state which weren't as predictable. What part of the state are you in that you received so many calls from the Obama campaign?

a couple of the calls were local folk, a couple were people from probably a call center, and two recordings, one recording was Michelle Obama which we got today.

The huckabee campaign on friday. The only robocall I got. I won't vote for any candidate that robocalls me. After all, if they want me to vote for them, at least have the common decency to have me talk to a real live person. Its ironic to have the huckabee campaign call me, in that I'm in what is likely the liberallest latte-liberal part of my state (bainbridge Island is across the water from Seattle, and a ferry-ride from the downtown)

is as stale as yesterday's news. GOBAMA GO!

I caucused for Obama on Saturday. My precinct had 16 (local) delegates of which 13 went to Senator Obama! :woohoo:

:patriot: Go get 'em sir! :patriot:

A place even lots of Mainers probably haven't heard of. I went to my first caucus yesterday and was surprised by the energy and enthusiasm. Up here, our group includes Madawaska lake and the small town of Stockholm, our caucus was held in the same building as the larger town (not really large, as towns go) of Caribou.

There were a few motivated speakers, and a turn-out the likes of which just hasn't been seen before in the caucus for such small towns. Seven people from my area showed up - we are very small, and the majority are republican I believe. Over one hundred from Caribou came. Very unexpected. They can barely get 10 people to attend the meetings.

Well, turns out I'm the selected delegate for Obama - and my Father was selected for Clinton (we volunteered). Only two from this area, or two more would have gone, two for each candidate. Among our seven, the vote was four to three in favor of Obama - Clinton won in Caribou by about 11 votes.

So I'll be at the state's convention and am doing what I can to keep up with the news and campaign on Obama's behalf. Aside from two young men - both seventeen, I believe I was the youngest person there, 23. I've never been to a convention before so am not sure what to expect - but in the event that I get a chance to speak, I'll be spending the next few months planning a speech. May 30th, the primary will likely be decided by then, but I'm excited to be a part of something.

Our small towns votes are probably fairly insignificant in the grand scheme of things, but nonetheless, I'm proud of the democrats here who participated - who showed passion and enthusiasm. Hopefully I can learn from some of the elder democrats and become much more active in the party in the years to come.