Counting the Delegates

I've been analyzing the caucus and primary schedule through February 5^th, the so-called Super Tuesday, attempting to apportion the GOP delegates. If my math and sources are correct, there are just over 1300 delegates available in the 29 states. Most pundits and prognosticators talk about who's going to "win" a given state, but what goes unsaid is that delegates in most states are assigned proportionally. Most states are not winner-take-all. I suspect most of the winning talk is geared around the notion of momentum. In a normal year, momentum is pretty important, and it won't be without merit this year, but do not expect a coalescing around a single candidate. This thing is going to remain fractured, with at least 2 viable candidates going into the convention. That hasn't happened in so long that most observers dismiss it out of hand, but when you count up the delegates, it's hard to see it any other way.

If a state is not winner-take-all, it will generally apportion its delegates by primary vote portions, statewide and/or by congressional district. A few have thresholds, where a candidate needs to break a certain barrier (say, 10% or 20%) to get any delegates. The WTA states are (with delegate counts): New York (101), Connecticut (30), Delaware (18), Arizona (53), Utah (36), and Missouri (58). Besides the home-state wins in NY/AZ/UT (I'm counting Utah as a home state for Romney), I predict that Rudy Giuliani will take CT (solid) and DE (iffy) and that Mike Huckabee will take Missouri. (On further research, it appears that some other states have changed their rules to be WTA. I updated the delegate table below, but not this paragraph.)

Another aspect to keep in mind is that the GOP has awarded bonus delegates to states with Republican governors, senators, and further representation. That gives a boost to the delegate counts in Southern states, a strength for Huckabee. And the GOP has penalized those states holding primaries before Feb 5^th, impacting Michigan, New Hampshire, Wyoming, South Carolina, and Florida. Those states will have their delegate counts cut IN HALF.

Here's how I see the rest of the first 29 states going. I have a detailed spreadsheet backing this up, but I'm not going to post it all. So I'll follow convention and list my predicted winners. And by winners, I mean the candidate that I expect to receive the most delegates from a given state.

Candidate		# States Won	List of States Won
Mike Huckabee		10	IA, SC, AL, AR, GA, MO, MT, ND, OK, WV
Rudy Giuliani		7	FL, CA, CT, DE, IL, NJ, NY
Mitt Romney		6	MI, NV, ME, CO, UT, MA
John McCain		4	NH, WY, AZ, MN
Fred Thompson		1	TN
Ron Paul		1 (throwing a bone)	AK

And here are my projected delegate counts through Feb 5^th, not including the national superdelegates.

Candidate	# Delegates
Mike Huckabee	423
Rudy Giuliani	359
Mitt Romney	194
John McCain	205
Ron Paul (and others)	73
Fred Thompson	59

I'll check back after Iowa & New Hampshire to take a look at the post-Feb 5^th primaries. Will we get more clarity by then? Well, if my prognostications are close to correct, Fred Thompson will not be in the race by mid-February, and I believe he'll endorse fellow Senator John McCain. Mitt Romney will have a difficult decision to make. Does he continue spending his fortune when he may be in 4^th place? If we are truly heading to a fractured convention, then he might be smart to stay in the race, and position himself as a compromise candidate (a tough sell given his incessant attacks on Huckabee and McCain, and the notion by then that McCain is the better compromise candidate).

In fact, I'll go on the record right now that the GOP candidate will be either Mike Huckabee (on the 2^nd ballot) or John McCain (on a later ballot after intense backroom wrangling, and with Huckabee as his VP). Wow.