The 2012 Plan is a conspiracy theory that Clinton knows she cannot win the nomination this time around, so she needs to make sure that there is no Democratic incumbent in the White House in 2012. Therefore, the theory goes, her primary motivation right now is in weakening Obama and making it less likely that he can beat McCain in the fall. This entails not only negative campaigning, but a refusal to acknowledge the legitimacy of the process by which Obama won the nomination. Under the theory, Clinton will continue to talk about the unfairness of caucuses, the unfairness of the DNC rule on Florida and Michigan, and will never truly concede the race. When the primaries are over, she will pitch her case to the superdelegates despite being behind in both the popular vote and the pledged delegate count.
Personally, I am disinclined to embrace the 2012 theory. I think Clinton is just hoping something unexpected will happen and she wants to be in the strongest position possible to be a replacement nominee. I’ve written before about why negative campaigning against Obama actually makes it less likely that she would be selected as a replacement nominee (because Obama delegates would block her if they see her as responsible for the downfall of their candidate). So, even though I don’t buy the 2012 plan as a theory, I am beginning to wonder when I read things like this:
First, Mrs. Clinton must win the Indiana primary as a means of demonstrating to supporters and donors that she is building on momentum after Pennsylvania, they said, and she must run strongly enough in North Carolina to avoid the perception that she did no better than an even split. Then she must win in a state that catches people by surprise, like Oregon or Montana.
The Clinton campaign must also persuade the Democratic National Committee to seat at least some of the delegates she won in the disputed votes in Michigan and Florida. It must also persuade superdelegates to include the popular votes cast in Florida, and maybe in Michigan, in calculating the overall tally.
Without that latter success, it would be all but impossible for her to match Mr. Obama in the popular vote total. But that is a tough sell because since neither candidate campaigned in those states after they held their primaries earlier than allowed by the party. Mr. Obama’s name did not even appear on the Michigan ballot.
One of Mrs. Clinton’s chief strategists, Geoff Garin, said the campaign hoped to end the primary season on June 3 lifted by a series of victories, and by coming close in the pledged delegate totals and the popular vote — though he declined to say what close would be.
“We’ll know it when we see it,” Mr. Garin said.
This is just magical thinking. First of all, there is no official popular vote where you ‘convince’ people, the DNC, or anyone else to include numbers in the certified tally. Second, the delegates from Michigan and Florida can only be included if Obama agrees to include them. And that is something he will not do if they are going to swing the election to Clinton. Both of those options are as mythical as unicorns.
Third, no matter what happens, Clinton will not finish ‘close’ in the pledged delegate count. She currently trails by 156 pledged delegates. In a worst case scenario Obama might cough up 40-50 of those in the remaining contests. But something closer to 15-20 is more likely. If each state goes according to what the polls currently indicate, Obama will finish with an approximate lead of 140 pledged delegates. Obama also enjoys a popular vote lead of 611,000 votes. To catch up, Clinton would have to win all the remaining states except Montana and South Dakota.
Geoff Garin says they hope to win by ‘coming close in the pledged delegate totals and the popular vote.’ But enough people are on the record, including in Clinton’s own camp, as saying she must win at least the popular vote, that this moves the goalposts off the playing field and out of the stadium.
If I take Garin at his word, Clinton does not plan on conceding even if she finishes behind in both the popular vote and the pledged delegate count, and that is a key premise of the 2012 Plan theory.
Now, maybe this is just bluster, but if Clinton trails in the popular vote and pledged delegate count after the primaries are concluded and she doesn’t graciously concede, but instead argues that the process was somehow illegitimate or that Obama is a bad candidate, then it will be proof that Plan 2012 is in operation.
