Who’s your man crush? (Hat tip: BK.)

There will be an Obama rally outside Thompson-Boling Arena prior to tomorrow’s Lady Vols game. Is nothing sacred? ;)

Speaking of Obama, TNR’s Noam Scheiber makes an excellent point, one I hadn’t thought of but wish I had, about how the post-Super Tuesday calendar favors Obama:

There’s not a day on the primary calendar between Tuesday and the convention that has more than four contests scheduled. … Obama tends to do better the more time he can focus on a specific state, [so] I see this slightly benefiting him.

I see it significantly benefiting him. The question, as Scheiber says, is whether Obama can “survive” Tuesday’s mega-primary, the very nature of which doesn’t suit his strengths. “Obama isn’t playing for a win on Tuesday,” he says, but rather “something that approximates a stalemate.” Scheiber elaborates — answering my question from yesterday — that “I’d say that means carrying 8-10 states and 45 percent of the delegates up for grabs.” Sounds about right to me, though I think 6 or 7 states might be enough, depending on which states they are. In any event, the perceptions game is very important in this regard. Obama doesn’t need to “win” Super Tuesday, but he needs to do well enough to convince the media, and through them voters in later states — and, especially, superdelegates — that he’s a viable candidate going forward, not just a one-hit wonder on the verge of flaming out.

Will Maine crush John McCain’s evil heart? It looks like the state where Ross Perot beat George H. W. Bush is once again bucking conventional wisdom, giving Mitt Romney a convincing victory and throwing the nominee-presumptive-presumptive* into a dogfight for second place with Ron Paul:

Mitt Romney appeared to be on his way to a win in presidential preference voting by Maine Republicans as returns were counted Saturday from the party’s municipal caucuses, turning the contest into a race for the No. 2 spot.

Romney, the former Massachusetts governor, had 52% of the vote with 57% of the towns holding caucuses reporting. John McCain trailed with 22%, Ron Paul was third with 19%, and Mike Huckabee had 5%. …

Besides Paul, who visited Maine on Monday, Romney was the only candidate to show up or send a surrogate to campaign as the caususes drew close. His oldest son Tagg campaigned Friday and appeared at caucuses Saturday.

There are still some more caucuses to be held tomorrow — it’s a three-day event — so Paul could still potentially pass McCain. But I don’t think anyone is going to catch the Stormin’ Mormon.

The question is, will this lead to a surge of Mitt-mentum that will carry Romney to a surprise showing on Tuesday? I doubt it. But hey, give the man credit: he’s really good at winning these tiny caucuses that nobody else pays attention to. First we’re going to go to Wyoming!! And then we’re going to go to Maine!! And then we’re going to Washington, D.C. to take back the White House!! YEAAAARRH!!!!!

P.S. I don’t actually think John McCain has an evil heart. It’s just a lyric from a silly song I like.

*He’s not the nominee-presumptive yet, but it’s presumed that he will become such after Tuesday’s results come in. Hence, “nominee-presumptive-presumptive.” :)

Heh.

Today’s updates from both Rasmussen and Gallup show a sudden reversal of the recent trend of Obama gaining ground nationally on Clinton. Here’s Gallup’s chart:

I guess a bunch of those undecided former Edwards voters suddenly finished their soul-searching and decided to go with Hilldog?

Meanwhile, CNN is reporting that John Edwards will not endorse before Tuesday. (Hat tip: Brian Foster.)

The first ever Irish Trojan Super Tuesday Prediction Contest (or if you prefer, Super Duper Pooper Scooper Trooper Blooper Tuesday Prediction Contest) is now online and accepting entries!

Just follow the link and submit your predictions. PLEASE NOTE: You may want to print your entry page before submitting it, as you won’t automatically get a copy of your picks sent to you.

The deadline to enter is noon Tuesday. Details after the jump.

(more…)

You can watch Punxsutawney Phil’s big moment live via webcast starting at 7:00 AM EST.

Of course, as we all know, tradition dictates that if Phil sees his shadow, there will be six more weeks of competitive presidential primaries. If Phil doesn’t see his shadow, Hillary and McCain will wrap up the nominations on Tuesday.

Or something like that.

Although Barack Obama is almost even with Hillary Clinton nationally, the latest polls from Super Tuesday states suggest that he’s within striking distance almost everywhere, but leading almost nowhere (well, at least among the states were there are polls). And he’s running out of time to "strike." With the Super Bowl on Sunday, people are pretty much going to tune out politics until Monday, and that’s already Pooper Scooper Eve.

Democratic delegate selection rules are such that nobody is going to have a commanding victory in the delegate count on Tuesday; even in her best-case scenario, Hillary won’t come anywhere close to "wrapping up" the nomination, mathematically speaking. But with 22 states (plus American Samoa and the Democrats Abroad) going to the polls, it’s imperative for Obama to rack up some "wins" — even though the concept of "winning" individual states is almost meaningless in terms of delegates — in order to create a favorable (or at least not unfavorable) media storyline. If Hillary, for example, wins everywhere except Illinois and Georgia, that would be utterly devastating for Barack’s momentum; people would start to write him off, and Hillary would become "inevitable" again. That would be true even if most of the races are very close and Hillary only edges him by, say, 150 delegates.

My question is, what does Obama need to do? How many states must he win? Marc Ambinder wrote on Wednesday that, based on the polls and his conversations with party insiders, he believes Obama "has an edge in Idaho, Minnesota, Kansas, Alabama, Georgia, North Dakota and Illinois." I’ve also read that Alaska is supposed to be Obama-friendly. Would those eight states — to Hillary’s fourteen — be enough? Can he get away with less than that (say, 5 or 6)? Or, on the contrary, does he need 9 or 10 wins? Does he need his list of victories, however long it is, to include at least one or two non-tiny, non-Southern states that aren’t Illinois? (Connecticut and Colorado, maybe?)

By the way, I’m working on a Super Tuesday Prediction Contest, so stay tuned for that. I’ll probably post the entry form later tonight or tomorrow.

The little-noticed Maine GOP caucuses start today and continue through Sunday, with most of the meetings taking place tomorrow. There is some speculation that Ron Paul might win.

P.S. Maine is the devil, you know.

Rasmussen’s latest daily update is out:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Friday shows Barack Obama inching closer to Hillary Clinton in the race for the Democratic Presidential Nomination. It’s now Clinton 43%, Obama 37%. A week ago, Clinton had an eleven point advantage, 41% to 30%.

Daily tracking results are collected via nightly telephone surveys and reported on a four-day rolling average basis. The last two nights of tracking were the first without John Edwards in the race. For those two nights, it’s Clinton 44% and Obama 42% meaning that Clinton’s support is essentially unchanged. This suggests that many former Edwards supporters now support Obama, many others have yet to make a decision, and few currently support Clinton.

[You know what I bet would help those "many others" make a decision? A freakin’ endorsement! Argh! -ed.]

Two day results are based upon a relatively small sample of 476 Likely Democratic Primary Voters and should be interpreted with caution. The next Presidential Tracking Poll update is scheduled for Saturday at 11:00 a.m. Sunday will be the first update based completely upon interviews since Edwards left the race.

Gallup should have an update later this afternoon. Also, Rasmussen will release its Tennessee poll later today. It’ll be interesting to see whether it mirrors the Hillary landslide suggested by InsiderAdvantage.

P.S. On the other hand, with regard to those "many others [who] have yet to make a decision"… it has been suggested that the so-called "Bradley Effect," in which opinion polls mask voters’ racial prejudices, is most likely to be seen "not in the black candidate’s poll numbers but in the ‘undecided’ category":

Here’s how the Bradley Effect works: A stranger calls you to ask how you intend to vote. You do NOT intend to vote for the African American, but you don’t want to get a lot of guff from this stranger about how you must be a racist if you won’t vote for the African American. So you answer, “Not sure.” In all the classic Bradley Effect elections (and NH fit the pattern), the polls got the vote for the African American about right, but OVERREPORTED not sure and UNDERREPORTED the other candidate’s vote.

I don’t know if that’s right, or if it’s happening here. I hope not!

P.P.S. Gore?

P.P.P.S. Obama will be in New Mexico this evening. Richardson?

UPDATE: Gallup’s out, and it’s more of the same. Clinton leads 44% to 41% over the last three days of polling:

Gallup Poll Daily tracking shows Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama as close as they have been since the polling program started at the beginning of 2008. Forty-four percent of Democratic voters nationwide support Clinton, while 41% support Obama, within the poll’s three-point margin of error. [Derek’s head asplode! -ed.] The data suggest that Obama has gained slightly more — at least initially — from John Edwards’ departure from the race. In the final tracking data including Edwards in all three days’ interviewing (Jan. 27-29 data), Clinton had 42%, Obama 36%, and Edwards 12%. Since then, Clinton’s support has increased two points and Obama’s five. Tomorrow’s release will be the first pure post-Edwards three-day rolling average.

Sweet.

You need a tech support article for this.

Politico’s Ben Smith reports that John Edwards was in North Carolina last night for the UNC-Boston College basketball game. Is he still in North Carolina? If so, do we know that Barack Obama isn’t in North Carolina, or on his way there? (The Page lists no public events for Obama until 4:15 PM.) Time is running out for my predicted Friday-morning Boyz 4 Change endorsement announcement…