Could the convention force Hillary onto the ticket?

Could the convention force Hillary onto the ticket?

Will the “dream ticket” happen whether Obama likes it or not? An interesting scenario on what could happen at the Democratic Convention in August over the party’s V-P choice is set out in this piece from Huffington Post. Jason Linkins puts it like this: “You imagine being on the floor in Denver. Hillary’s delegates, NEARLY HALF THE DELEGATES, are demanding she be on the ticket. These are true believers who have stuck with Clinton through thick and thin. To them,…

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Should Gordon take a lower profile?

Should Gordon take a lower profile?

Screen shot from the Daily Politics What’ll be the polling impact of today’s media blitz? It has been very hard over the past eight or nine hours to avoid Gordon Brown. He’s gone from one TV or radio studio to another doing a big series of interviews to try to seize back the initiative. But will it have helped in the polls and at the Crewe and Nantwich by election? How will all this be going down with the public….

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Will the other firms follow ICM on voting certainty?

Will the other firms follow ICM on voting certainty?

Is this the first polling move in the post-Ken world? In a number commentaries ahead of the May 1st London mayoral election I questioned whether the telephone pollsters were over-stating Ken’s support because of the way they calculated voting certainty. In fact it was this element that caused me to maintain a big betting position on the Tory even when the phone polling firms had Ken ahead. For it was clear from the turnout history of previous mayoral races that…

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Is it going to be an Obama-Edwards ticket?

Is it going to be an Obama-Edwards ticket?

Time Magazine’s Mark Halperin is predicting a big announcement tonight. Could it be that John Edwards has come off the fence and is going to endorse Barack? Or could this be the start of something bigger – an Obama-Edwards ticket? The website Political Insider is making a strong case for Edwards who was , of course, the V-P nominee in 2004. We shall see. Mike Smithson

Who’s going to lose votes to Gemma in C&N?

Who’s going to lose votes to Gemma in C&N?

Could Miss Great Britain affect the by election outcome? One of the “other” candidates who might have an impact on Crewe and Nantwich is Gemma Garrett – Miss Great Britain. On the face of it the move seems like a PR stunt designed to boost her profile but, to her credit, she has started to campaign and has already got into a spat with Labour. Gemma says she is about “bringing beauty into politics and turning back the tide of…

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Should Andrew Neil be the BBC’s main political anchor?

Should Andrew Neil be the BBC’s main political anchor?

Surely it’s time for the curtain to close on the Dimbleby era? Just under a fortnight ago I had a rant about the woeful inadequacies of the BBC’s election coverage and many others have joined the criticism. The antics of Jeremy Vine have been the main focus but these were singled out as an example that something is going badly wrong. Since then we have two more impressive US primary election nights on CNN and the more you see their…

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The by election betting – the morning after

The by election betting – the morning after

C&N punters mount their own U-turn Yesterday evening, less than two hours after Darling’s commons statement on the tax U-turn I published a chart here under the headline “Darling gives Labour a boost in the Crewe betting“. This has been picked up in the media and on a number of other sites and presented as an instant verdict on what Brown and Darling did yesterday. Well after consideration the markets have returned to almost exactly where they were 24 hours…

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So the Democratic race goes on

So the Democratic race goes on

But do these final primaries matter at all? After her expected huge victory in the predominantly white working class state of West Virginia Hillary Clinton was in upbeat mood overnight and made it clear that she is still striving to become the next president. This is her biggest victory so far yet the mood of the commentators was that it was irrelevant. Only 28 delegates were at stake, the outcome had been widely predicted, and Obama’s quiet campaign amongst the…

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