It’s impossible not to get a little excited about what Bernie Sanders just pulled off in Michigan. I am so schizophrenic about this race. I always root for Sanders to win every contest even though I’m not at all convinced he’s the right candidate for the job. What it reminds me of is one of those situations in sports where you know you need the team you don’t like to win so your team can make the playoffs, but you just can’t bring yourself to root for (in my case) the Boston Red Sox or the Dallas Cowboys.
This is why I can’t endorse a candidate.
It’s also why I’m trying my hat at just doing analysis with no advocacy.
The Sanders win in Michigan has changed the race. There can be no doubt about that. But before Sanders supporters get too excited, I have to douse them with some cold reality.
Sanders got crushed in Mississippi so badly tonight that he barely made the 15% minimum threshold to get some delegates there. And this was a two-person race. It was just a brutal drubbing. Clinton is also controlling almost all the superdelegates out of Michigan. It’s likely that she’ll emerge from tonight with the most delegates from both states, and also with a significant net gain in her delegate lead. Sanders cannot afford to have victories like this.
However, if he can translate his win in Michigan into wins in other upper Midwest states like Ohio, Illinois and Wisconsin, he’s going to start eating into Clinton’s earned delegate lead.
It’s almost impossible for him to catch her in the overall delegate race, but this is mainly due to her dominance with superdelegates.
She shouldn’t be worried at all, really, but this is a setback for her. And it’s exposed a weakness that most people thought would be a strength. She’s not getting it done with the very same white working class Democratic voters who formed her base of support eight years ago.
Trump’s arguing that he can steal these voters in November and carry blue states. McCain thought the same thing, but he’s a different kind of politician than Trump.
In any case, my hat’s off to Sanders and his organizers. Very, very impressive work tonight. No one will be asking him to drop out now and he’s going full speed ahead with a head full of steam.
