Could very well do - the conventional wisdom was that high turnout = good for Obama, but if not, Obama's whole strategy takes a hit. If he loses, both South Carolina and Nevada are suddenly back in play. I still suspect he'll win, though by a few points instead of the 14 I had predicted.
Mostly Manchester and Concord. But you're right! All I can say is that every major poll has been pwned today. wow! So far, they all got it wrong. But now it looks like we got a race! And Hillary better hope Edwards doesn't drop out and send his followers to Obama.
From CQ Politics: We're going to have to wait for some more returns before passing judgment about the solidity of Hillary Clinton's early lead in the vote count (40 percent to 35 percent with 40 of 301 precincts reporting at 8:30 p.m., according to AP returns posted on the Concord Monitor Web site). From CQ Politics' Greg Giroux: The precincts that have reported so far are largely in middle-class and working-class areas that were expected to vote for Clinton. But Obama is expected to win in upper-income and better-educated areas, a presumption based in large part on the Iowa caucus results and polling.
This is one close race. Obama now is closing the gap. It's down to a 3% Clinton lead. It was 6% about half an hour ago. What an amazingly close race this has turned into. I wonder if there was some over confidence among would-be Obama voters in NH who heard the polls and thought their votes weren't needed.
Surprisingly close race. Regardless of who wins, and I think it will still be Obama, but close, it's good for the Democratic Party. A continued race brings more media attention and showcases the differences not only between the candidates, but between the two political parties. That's a plus for Democrats. (IMO!) Impeach Bush.
Good take on the closeness of this race. If things weren't so dire for the nation right now, this thing would be a lot of fun. I just saw that in exit polling Hillary won with women in NH as opposed to what happened in NH. I think it was down to 2% at one point, but has now gone back up to 3%. I think Hillary's organization in NH has been pretty solid for a long time, and that's why she's doing so well here. This is just crazy. No matter what happens tonight, the Rockets have a victory in their built, and that win stretches across both sides of the aisle.
CNN just reported that none of the three major college towns have reported yet. It's gonna be a long night!
One thing I'm seeing a lot of is that there was a surge of support from women voters. Whether it had anything to do with the "tear", can't really say - but it did help "humanize her" so it might have worked. Bill also did a lot of campaigning in strong Obama territory today and that might have had some impact there. 61% reporting now and it's still a 3% lead. Manchester (a Clinton stronghold) still is only 75% in. The colleges better all go big to Obama. I still say NH needs to invest in some electronic voting machines and speed this up. It's been 3+ hours since most polls closed!
They say about 60% of independents went to the Dem primary. But I'm not sure what the expectation was. That certainly could have played a big part as well. Despite being polar opposites on the issues, those two candidates resonate with a lot of the same voters (like me) for some reason.
It'll be interesting to see the analysis after the votes are counted. You just might have explained Obama struggling to catch Clinton. At least that isn't some arcane speculation after the fact. They'll be able to tell where the independent vote went when this is over. Impeach Bush.
40-36 Clinton with 69% of the precincts reporting. I hope that the college towns go Obama in a BIG way.
