By Ronald Baygents, KUNA
Washington : US political analysts generally agree that Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican John McCain are in the best position to face off for the US presidency in the November election, and will prove it on Tuesday, when more than 20 states cast ballots in primaries and caucuses across the country.
At this stage of the US presidential election-year process, the leading candidates — especially New York Senator Clinton and her Democratic rival, Illinois Senator Barack Obama — are focused on securing delegates more than winning the popular vote in each state.
“The reality is we really are in a delegate-by-delegate battle,” said Guy Cecil, national political and field director for Clinton. “In the end, states do not nominate the candidate. Delegates do.” In the early contests in Iowa and New Hampshire, candidates sought momentum. But now, political analysts agree, the Democrats are focused on winning enough votes in the right places to maximize their chances of accumulating delegates.
This means they will fight for votes in states they are likely to lose, or try to maximize their winning percentage in places where they are already strong.
Winning the Democratic nomination requires 2,025 delegates. Almost half the total Democratic delegates will be selected in 22 states on Tuesday, including the largest prizes — California, New York, Illinois, and Massachusetts.
In the Republican race, 41 percent of the 2,380 delegates will be awarded in 21 caucuses or primaries on Tuesday.
For Republicans, most primaries are winner-take-all contests, with no points awarded to the runner-up.
But, under national Democratic Party rules, candidates can earn delegates two ways — by winning at least 15 percent of the vote statewide or at least 15 percent in any of the 224 congressional districts that vote on Tuesday.
By campaigning in Illinois, the home state of Obama, the Clinton campaign hopes to limit its losses there and reap as many delegates as possible. Similarly, the Obama campaign is running ads in New York, where Clinton has a big lead in most polls, hoping to grab a share of that state’s 232 delegates — especially in New York City, where Obama is expected to do well.
The Democratic Party system, which emphasizes proportional representation within congressional districts, dates to 1988. That year, the Reverend Jesse Jackson, a Democrat, ran for president and later complained that he had won substantial numbers of votes in some districts but received no delegates, because they were awarded on a winner-take-all basis.
Delegate math has also altered campaign strategies in the Republican battle. The winner-take-all Republican contests, including in New York and New Jersey, may benefit McCain, the current leader in the polls.
Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has been focusing on California, one of the few Republican primaries to elect district-level delegates. Romney has virtually conceded New York and New Jersey to McCain.
Romney, the Mormon businessman who has placed second in most Republican caucuses and primaries this year, would do better on Tuesday if former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee falls out of the Republican race, analysts agree.
Huckabee, the Baptist minister who won the Iowa caucuses and appeals largely to Christian evangelicals, is expected to draw enough conservative Republican votes in Southern and Midwestern states on Tuesday to tip the balances there in favor of McCain.
McCain is a political maverick who has angered conservative Republicans over the years by taking moderate — and some critics even say liberal — stands on such hot-button issues as tax cuts, treatment of detainees captured in the war on terror, and illegal immigration.
However, McCain has consistently gotten the core of his support from moderate Republicans and independents. Because Huckabee and Romney are both battling for more conservative elements of the Republican Party, McCain is expected to benefit on Tuesday from the Huckabee-Romney split.
McCain, a former Air Force fighter pilot who was shot down during the Vietnam War and held for years there as a prisoner of war, is strong on calling for a tough approach to “radical Islamic extremism,” and also on winning the US war in Iraq.
This was a key reason McCain received the endorsement of former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani last week after McCain won the Florida primary and Giuliani ended his presidential campaign.
Giluiani made the war on terror the centerpiece of his campaign.
McCain also got the endorsement of moderate California Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzennegger last week. Thus, McCain picked up key endorsements from the two most delegate-rich states, New York and California, further bolstering his chances of prevailing in the fight for the Republican nomination
On the Democratic side, former North Carolina senator John Edwards dropped out of the race last week after failing to win any caucuses or primaries.
But Edwards did not endorse Clinton or Obama. He instead extracted a pledge from both his former rivals that they would carry on the centerpiece of his campaign — ending poverty in the United States.
Some analysts said Obama will likely benefit most from the departure of Edwards, since Edwards was perceived as being the strongest Democratic advocate for “change,” the mantra of Obama.
During their one-on-one debate in California last week, Clinton and Obama adopted a civil and cordial tone, dropping the personal attacks that characterized their debate earlier in January in South Carolina.
They instead aimed most of their fire at Republican President George W. Bush and McCain — which analysts believe is the smart approach, since all the major political trends favor the Democrats in the 2008 elections.
Republican unity, and Democratic infighting, have long characterized US presidential elections won by Republicans.
Clinton, the “establishment” Democratic candidate with the best organization in key states, continues to poll ahead of Obama in such critical states as California, New York, and New Jersey.
But Obama is surging, and his campaign raised at least 32 million dollars in January. This sum is significant because no candidate who has secured the party nomination has raised this amount in a single month.
Because of this trend, Clinton well-positioned for “Super Tuesday” and Obama surging, analysts believe the two played it safe during their California debate last week by not attacking each other, thereby risking damage to their currently favorable political outlooks.
Because of the winner-take-all system of Republicans, McCain is expected to be in the best position to possibly win enough delegates on Tuesday to sew up the Republican nomination. Analysts agree it is less likely that Clinton or Obama will match that feat on Tuesday, because of the proportional delegate-awarding system of the Democrats.
States that will vote on Tuesday include Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Missouri, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Tennessee, and Utah.
If, as many expect, the nominations are undecided after Tuesday, the political battles will turn to the Louisiana primary and Kansas Republican caucuses on Saturday; the February 10 Maine Democratic caucus; the February 12 Maryland, Virginia, and District of Columbia primaries; and the February 19 Hawaii Democratic primary, Washington state and Wisconsin primaries.
If the nominations are still unsettled at that stage, the big day of decision would likely be March 4, when the delegate-rich populous states of Ohio and Texas cast their votes, along with Rhode Island and Vermont.