I had briefly thought about this a few weeks ago, but dismissed it as a serious possibility at the time.

If Clinton Wants VP, Obama Can’t Stop Her
(Bob Beckel, RealClearPolitics)

It’s all over. Obama will have about 54% of the delegates and Clinton 46%. (I know there are a few delegates missing. Some are Edwards, a few uncommitted, and a few refusing to decide- another wash). Hillary Clinton will have come up short by 150 votes. But this isn’t horseshoes. That said she still comes in a very close second, which puts her among the closest runner-ups in Democratic Party history.

So Barack Obama is free to pick a running mate? Not so fast. Her losing margin of 150 is only 19% of the super delegates at the convention. Most of the 795 super delegates have been put under enormous pressure by both candidates for months. For those that chose Obama the decision was an especially painful one both personally and politically.

…

Just consider for a moment the final phone call with Bill Clinton when the super delegate had to tell him he or she had decided to go with Obama. Clinton,” It’s time to make a decision. Hillary needs you and I need you. We’ve been through a lot together. When you needed me I was there, now we need you”.

Super delegate, “Mr. President, this is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, but I’m going with Obama because (whatever). Ask me for anything else Mr. President, but I’ve got to do this”. Clinton, “I’m very disappointed and personally hurt, but do what you think you have to do. So long.”

Now imagine its June 4th and Clinton calls again. Clinton, “I know Obama has enough votes to win, but I wanted you to know Hillary has decided to run for vice president at the convention. You know there are two roll call votes at the convention: first president then for vice president. I know you are voting for Obama for president. Fine, but I want your commitment to vote for Hillary for vice president.”

(via Wonkette)

Basically, the deal is this, while for many many election cycles, it has been the case that the Presidential nominee picks who they want and the convention rubber stamps it, it is indeed actually two separate and completely independent votes. There have been times in history where the Presidential candidate didn’t even bother stating a preference for VP, they just threw it open for the convention to decide. But even if the presidential candidate does state a preference, the delegates are under no obligation to honor it other than tradition and the fact they like their candidate and want to respect their wishes. This is true for even pledged delegates and as the author points out, superdelegates will feel even more free…. especially those who remained uncommitted for a very long time and are now basically just going for Obama because they want to pick the winner.

All it would take is a small number of Obama delegates (pledged or super) to decide that even if Obama picks someone else, even if they strongly support Obama for President, they want Clinton to be VP, and that would be that… even if Obama doesn’t want it. And the numbers are close enough that Clinton probably could peel off enough Obama supporters to do this… if she really wanted it and applied enough pressure in the right places.

But would Hillary really go this route? Can you imagine just what chaos there would be if Hillary tried to force herself onto the ticket against Obama’s wishes?? Can you imagine how the campaign would look between the convention and the general election if there was open hostility and resentment between the Presidential and VP candidates?

No, this will not happen. Even Hillary is not that Machiavellian.

Um, OK, maybe she is. Every time someone underestimates what level she can go to, they are proven wrong.

Perhaps this article is actually a coordinated back channels message to Obama threatening to do this if Obama doesn’t pick her to try to pressure him into doing so. But she wouldn’t actually do it would she?

Would she?

And really, does she truly WANT to be Vice President under Obama? Why would she? I can’t imagine that would be a fun place for her.

But you never know.

I would be negligent if I didn’t mention that Palm Bay, FL (the town I lived from the end of December 2004 until I moved to Bellevue, WA in 2006)… is on fire.

$10 Million In Damage As Fires Continue To Burn
(WFTV)

A staggering 162 homes were damaged or destroyed by wildfires that burned through Palm Bay Monday and Tuesday. Officials said that that number would likely grow.

Officials first reported more than 60 of the homes were so badly damaged they can’t be lived in any longer. That number was later dropped to 40. Preliminary estimates put the dollar figure for the destruction at $9.6 million. Assessment teams continued to survey damaged areas as firefighters battled flare-ups. In all, nearly 10,000 acres burned in Brevard County.

I’m not in regular contact any more with anybody who still lives in that area (although I think Amy might be), but good luck to anybody who is still there.

I gather the exact area our house was in has not been directly hit yet, but that the fires are not that far away.

Pr. George’s Executive Switches To Obama
(Rosalind S. Helderman, Washington Post)

“I cannot in good conscience go to the convention and not support Barack,” Johnson said in an interview. “She ran a great campaign, but she fell short of the line.”

…

Unlike superdelegates, who are free to endorse either candidate, Johnson is one of 28 pledged delegates who have agreed to represent the 36 percent of Maryland Democrats who voted for Clinton on Feb. 12.

(via 2008 Democratic Convention Watch)

The Democratic Convention Watch article has some additional analysis on how Clinton ended up with a faithless pledged delegate. (It looks like thier screening process was a bit flawed, he had actually declared for Obama originally, then changed his mind to Clinton, and is now changing back… the campaigns normally pick their pledged delegates based on unwavering solid loyalty and commitment. Oops.)

Just one new superdelegate today. An Obama superdelegate. The significance this time is that according to CNN’s count (this happened with other people’s counts a few days ago) Obama and Clinton both have 273 superdelegates. So Obama has now, for the first time, caught up with Clinton in superdelegates. This was the last metric in which she was undeniably ahead. No more.

Updated stats:

The new delegate count is: Obama 1865, Clinton 1697, Edwards 19

In percent terms that is: Obama 52.1%, Clinton 47.4%, Edwards 0.5%

2025 delegates are needed to win.

There are 467 delegates yet to be determined.

Obama needs 160 more delegates to win.

Clinton needs 328 more delegates to win.

In percentage terms, that means:

Obama needs 34.3% of the remaining delegates to win. (It was 41.1% before IN/NC.)

Clinton needs 70.2% of the remaining delegates to win. (It was 62.0% before IN/NC.)

I thought it might be time to update the delegate estimates from the rest of the primaries. I last did this estimate on May 3rd.

By the way, those predictions from the last time were exactly right for Guam (2 to 2 split). For Indiana and North Carolina I had predicted 97 Obama, 90 Clinton. The actual results were 99 Obama, 88 Clinton. Pretty close.

Running the rest of the states based on the pollster.com averages as of a few minutes ago, you get the following:

• West Virginia: 20 Clinton, 8 Obama
• Kentucky: 35 Clinton, 16 Obama
• Oregon: 29 Clinton, 23 Obama
• Puerto Rico: 32 Clinton, 23 Obama
• Montana: 10 Clinton, 6 Obama
• South Dakota: 6 Clinton, 9 Obama

First of all, yes Ivan, this still shows Clinton ahead in Oregon, even though all the recent polls have showed Obama ahead. This is because there still haven’t been enough polls with Obama ahead to flip the overall trend percentage… yet. It is fairly obvious that it will happen, it just hasn’t yet. And I am going with pure, unadulterated pollster.com averages, so those are the numbers I am using right now.

Anyway, of those six primaries, Clinton is at the margin she needs to “be on track” in only one… the next one… West Virginia. She is close in Kentucky though, so if she gets a media bump out of West Virginia for her absolutely crushing margins, she might be able to be “on pace” in Kentucky as well.

Assuming of course that more superdelegate announcements in the three days between now and the West Virginia primaries don’t make her ratio needed to win even higher… which will probably happen, potentially putting even West Virginia out of reach. There are now more superdelegates left than delegates to be determined by primaries, so they actually matter more now.

The total of all six remaining given these estimates would be Clinton 132, Obama 85. That has Clinton getting 60.8% of the delegates, well below the 69.6% ratio she currently needs to win.

If that happened, we would have the following:

Delegate count would be: Obama 1945, Clinton 1828, Edwards 19

In percent terms that would be: Obama 51.3%, Clinton 48.2%, Edwards 0.5%

2025 delegates are needed to win.

There would be 256 delegates yet to be determined.

Obama would need 80 more delegates to win.

Clinton would need 197 more delegates to win.

In percentage terms, that means:

Obama would need 31.3% of the remaining delegates to win.

Clinton would need 77.0% of the remaining delegates to win.

It must suck for her to go out on a string of wins, but still lose. Oh well.