Why Indiana Matters

You could call it a tie-breaker.

After Hillary won PA, she has a new - though small - lease on life. She's proven that she has a good hold on the white, working class voters, and dominated in rural Pennsylvania.

Now the campaigns move on to Indiana, where it is a must win for Clinton. Clinton has moved closer to Obama's lead, but remains a long way off - in fact it's almost impossible for her to catch up (see The Math, below).

But Indiana will be a test. If Clinton performs well, she has more ammunition to attract the super delegates to her camp. If Obama wins, he has the better hand, and will likely force Hillary to drop out (however, my guess is Hillary will run until 2012 without stopping - regardless of the numbers).

Both Indiana and North Carolina will vote on May 6th. Obama is expected to win NC - and a landslide win could be a deal breaker. However, if Clinton is able to keep it close in NC AND win Indiana, she'll hold onto that life-vest a little bit longer.

So - Indiana - of all places - could potentially decide who will be the democratic nominee.

Cross your fingers this thing will finally end... but don't hold your breath.

The Math

Here is how the delegate math breaks down post Pennsylvania:

With a net gain of approximately 12 pledged delegates from PA (after winning by 9%),
Clinton has pulled within 154.

Clinton 1335
Obama 1489

There are 9 contests with 408 pledged delegates remaining. In order to have a majority of the pledged delegates, either candidate must get 1627.

Leaving Obama with 138 delegates needed, and Clinton with 273 delegates needed.

Since Democratic delegates are given out proportionally, Obama only needs to win about 34% of the remaining votes. Clinton, on the other hand, needs to about 67% of the vote.

That is virtually statistically impossible.

So, what's the next measure: Total delegates.

Including Super Delegates, either candidate needs to get 2025 total delegates to win the nomination. Clinton currently leads among supers, 256-234. That 22 point margin was much larger a few weeks ago, but Obama has closed the gap.
So Obama leads in total delegates 1723 to 1591.

Assuming neither candidate gets a swell of Super delegate endorsements in the next few weeks, Clinton again would need about 65% of the vote in the remaining contests to pull close to Obama in the total delegate count.

Finally, we have the overall popular vote:

Obama 14,417,619 (49.2%)
Clinton 13,917,009 (47.5%)

But if you count Florida, where none of the candidates campaigned (b/c FL broke the rules, moved their primary up, and were punished by the Democratic Party - and consequently, all teh candidates SAID they would not campaign there) but Hillary attended for a victory party:

Obama 14,993,833 (48.3%)
Clinton 14,787,995 (47.6%)

This makes Indiana extremely vital.

"IF-YOU to the process"

Now that Clinton has won Pennsylvania, she's going to stay in the race, and continues to make an arguement as to why she should win and Superdelegates should support here.

Jon Steewart had a fairly humorous take on Hillary's changing arguements for why she should win: