Wednesday, March 12, 2008

The Ides of Texas Are Upon You

Remember March 4 when Hillary won Texas? Well, just hold your horses.

Texas is the only state in the union that allows people to legally vote twice: once in the primary, and once in their local caucus, or, as they are called in Texas, “precinct conventions.”

Roughly two-thirds of the pledged delegates (126) are determined by the outcome of the primary, and the remaining delegates (67) are determined by the results of the caucuses.

Only those who have already voted in the primary are allowed to vote in a caucus.

When the media proclaimed Clinton the victor in Texas, the caucus results were simply not part of the equation. But now that more than 24 hours have passed, something fascinating is happening.

Obama appears to be winning Texas.

  Consortium News

Curious whether Barack Obama or Hillary Rodham Clinton won Texas' Democratic caucuses March 4? The official results won't be available until March 29.

[...]

The overall delegate tally in Texas is tied at 92, pending the outcome of the remaining nine delegates from the caucuses.

[...]

Until then, the last reported results — from 41 percent of the precinct caucuses — show Obama ahead with 56 percent to Clinton's 44 percent.

[...]

[An] estimated 1 million Democrats — far more than ever before — showed up for the caucuses, which were held right after voting ended in the first part of the Democratic contest: a standard primary administered by state government.

[...]

Houston's 857 precinct results are still coming in, said Harris County Democratic chairman Gerald Birnberg. The count has been slowed because precinct convention chairmen ran out of official sign-in sheets, so they tore "Democrats Vote Here" signs off the wall and scrawled the preferences of caucus-goers in long hand. Birnberg said a dozen workers have put in 12-hour days since March 4 just making sure the paperwork was right, without even counting the votes yet in the state's largest city.

  AP

My guess is Houston goes Obama. I also guessed earlier when it looked like she might have some trouble with Texas, Hillary was going to raise a stink about our quirky primary/caucus (Texas Two-Step) voting practices. I expect it to happen yet.


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