check out the added stop Hillary Clinton has made for Montana on 4/5 and 4/6. Montana is a JUNE primary state; the last day of the primary season. No doubt Clinton is sending the subtle message that she's in this race to the end. But why else would she set a Montana campaign stop two months before the primary? Is there an endorsement she's bagged that she'll unveil that day? Look for reporters to start making calls to Montana's Democratic hierarchy, all of whom would be good gets for Clinton: Gov. Schweitzer or Sens. Baucus and Tester.
No need to call Gov. Schweitzer, Chuck. I saw him speak here at BU a few weeks back, and although he wasn't willing to explicitly say it yet, he made it abundantly clear that he plans to support Obama for the nomination. Expect the formal announcement to come the week after Montana's primary.
While I'm quoting Todd, here's his latest update on the delegate math:
It's been a while since we've done the percentage game on the delegate count. Here's where things stand right now. Obama leads among pledged delegates 1408-1251; Clinton leads among superdelegates, 255-218. Added together, Obama's overall delegate lead is 120, 1626-1506. Now, what's left? There are still 10 pledged delegates NBC News hasn't allocated from contests already held. In addition, there are 566 delegates at stake in the remaining contests. On the supers front, there are 321 folks who haven't picked sides (76 of whom have yet to be named; they'll get named at state convention meetings held between now and the end of June). OK, now, let's play the math game. If the remaining contests split up "as expected" meaning Clinton wins her base states (PA, KY, WV etc.) and Obama wins his base states (NC, OR, MT etc.) and the two split Indiana down the middle, the two campaigns will likely split those 566 delegates right down the middle 283-283 (margin of error +/- 5 delegates). This means Obama would need 34% of the uncommitted superdelegates to hit the magic 2024 number, while Clinton would need 72% of the uncommitted Supers to hit 2024.
Assuming I'm reading this correctly, it means Obama needs to pick up 109 more Supers to win the whole thing. Given that a good portion of those 76 "yet to be named" will be picked at conventions in state's that he has already won...
