Democratic Primary Race

Howard Dean's campaign manager, Joe Trippi discusses the primary. Interesting reading.

"I would give Obama a probability of 70 out of 100 that he will be the nominee, but Clinton could still pull this out."

"I think there is a much bigger chance [of someone else becoming the nominee in a brokered convention scenario] that the two of them will be running together, like it or not. But there is a remote chance of a third candidate if this gets really ugly and Clinton takes a meat ax to Obama."

"I don't see the Clintons walking off the field if Hillary has the popular-vote lead, which is a realistic possibility. And I don't see Obama walking away from a lead among pledged delegates. That is why I think it is likely that, however this is resolved, the two of them run on a ticket together, and here is why: In 1976 and 1980 we had fights that went to the convention. In 1976 it was Ford and Reagan fighting it out and Jimmy Carter became president. In 1980 it was Ted Kennedy and Jimmy Carter and Reagan became president. History says you don't want to campaign into the convention, even if McCain will be carrying George Bush's baggage. So I think there will be tremendous pressure on the eventual nominee to pull the party together by picking the other."

"I think it is a mistake to match Clinton attack for attack. It demeans his overall message and destroys his reason for being as a candidate of a different kind of politics. If I were in the Obama campaign I would have him give a major speech this week and tell Pennsylvania and the nation that they now have a clear choice. That if they want attack-and-run politics as usual, then they should vote for Hillary Clinton. If they want to turn the page, the people of Pennsylvania can say no to the status quo and yes to real change."

"Clinton has to win Pennsylvania, but then she has a small chance of defeating Obama in North Carolina — and that might shock the superdelegates into rethinking Obama further. The red-phone ad worked, so they need to keep doing that to raise doubts in people's heads. But the problem she has is very real. They won't be defeating just Obama anymore; they are going to have to crush all those young people, African-Americans, and progressives in the party that have embraced Obama's candidacy. That is one of the reasons that she keeps mentioning what a great vice-president Obama would be, even as she makes the case that he isn't ready to be president. In the end, Clinton may need a self-inflicted mistake by Obama to get the nomination."

"I think Obama has a strong chance of winning the general with any number of possible vice-presidential nominees — Mark Warner, John Edwards, or Hillary Clinton and a host of others. I think Clinton, if she somehow gets by Obama, has almost no chance of winning the general now unless she picks Obama. She seems to get this already. If Obama has more pledged delegates going into the convention, it will be very hard for his supporters to accept Hillary Clinton somehow winning the nomination."

"That is the whole point. If the Obama camp can't cope with this, then better we all find out now. It is in the end what Clinton is hoping for — her campaign will try to force as many errors as possible and keep the pressure on Obama now. If he passes this final test, he is the nominee. If he falters, the party may turn to Clinton."