Column: ‘Momentum’ and the media

By Asim Thakore
March 7, 2008

I was wrong. Or at least my predictions of a narrow Obama victory in Texas and a toss-up in Ohio were wrong. In my defense, I made the pick six days before the primary (apparently, you go to press with the numbers you have, not the numbers you want). On Tuesday, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., won three primaries in Texas, Ohio and Rhode Island, the last by a landslide.

So, why and how did Clinton score victories in both big states, given the conventional wisdom (and polling) of last week that said she was done? Well, she did it by going after Obama in reasonable attacks, not silly accusations of plagiarism. This included picking up on and running with a story that Obama’s chief economic adviser Michael Goolsbee had met with Canadian officials to assure them that his strong anti-NAFTA stance in Ohio was little more than political posturing. The North American Free Trade Agreement is extremely unpopular in Ohio, and until this story broke, Obama had been doing quite well on that issue. In addition to completely undermining his credibility on NAFTA, the Goolsbee piece also took off some of the Obama brand’s luster, and reduced him from his superhero status as The Changemaker to a more ordinary politician. The minute the story hit the papers, Barack’s goose was essentially cooked in the Buckeye state. Obama carried five counties in Ohio, encompassing Cleveland, Cincinnati and Columbus. If he wants to be a viable candidate in the general election, he has to do more than win urban voters, and he has to win Ohio.

In Texas, Hillary won by a huge margin among “late-breaking” voters, and carried her bedrock of support in the state: Hispanics. Obama’s money and organizing simply weren’t enough to eliminate Hillary’s head start in the Lone Star State.

In any case, look for the “momentum” to shift toward Hillary now. Momentum is perhaps one of the most overused words in political analysis, yet it’s a nebulous thing. Basically, it boils down to how much positive media attention a particular candidate is getting, which helps fundraising, which in turn increases positive media attention. Momentum is little more than a byword for a daily ass-kissing session from Wolf Blitzer. Hillary had better run with whatever positive press coverage she gets, because Mississippi votes next week with Wyoming on Saturday, and while I’m not predicting anything, I do know that only Obama’s campaign had begun organizing in those states before Tuesday’s primaries, and that Mississippi has a larger proportion of black voters (who tend to lean toward Obama) than most states.

Obama still has a better chance of wrapping up this nomination than Hillary. He leads in delegates by almost 150. He has to shore up his support among self-identified Democrats; Clinton beat him by wide margins in this demographic in Ohio. He has to win Wyoming and Mississippi to stop the media from forcing the conventional wisdom toward a Clinton “streak,” and then he has to win Pennsylvania by a respectable margin. If that happens, then Clinton will face much more pressure to drop out, and the now infamous super-delegates will fall in line behind the popular choice.

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Column: ‘Momentum’ and the media

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