‘Super Tuesday’ leaves candidates in tight race

KATIE CLARK A&E EDITOR KAC729@CABRINI EDU

Primary elections were held on Feb. 5 in 24 states, the largest number of states, ever on one day, giving it the nickname, “Super Tuesday.”

“Super Tuesday” became the day when many delegates were chosen to go to their party’s convention to select their candidate. In these primary elections, the nominees are running against each other in hopes of being the candidate to run in the 2008 Presidential Election. Each state chooses its own date and method of select- ing their delegates to the convention. Before this year most primaries were held in March or April; however this year many states moved them much earlier. Many state parties made this decision in 2007 to move the date to Feb. 5.

In the Democratic primaries, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois and Sen. Hillary Clinton of New York now have almost equal numbers of delegate. These two nominees have turned this into the most important and historical election for our generation. Obama is the first African American to come as far as he has in a presidential election, while Clinton is the first female to have a realistic chance of being elected to the presidency.

At a forum sponsored by the World Affairs Council in Philadelphia on Wed. Feb. 6, Terry Madonna, the director of Franklin and Marshall College Keystone Poll, said, “The Democrats have enormous structural advantages that will trump both race and gender.”

In the primaries of “Super Tuesday,” Obama took the lead over Clinton winning 13 states, while Clinton wasn’t too far behind with nine states. Even though Obama won the number of overall states, Clinton won the states with the higher number of delegates, from 584 votes to 565. From this past weekend,

Feb. 9 and 10, Clinton still remains in the lead with 1,148 delegate votes, while Obama is still not too far behind with 1,121 delegate votes. Obama won five states this past weekend. To win in the Democratic race, one needs to receive 2,025 delegate votes.

“The Democratic race appears just that of a real ‘horse race’ between Sen. Clinton and Sen. Obama, that could see the reverse occur,” said Dr. Jolyon Girard, a history professor. Girard went on to explain that the Democratic Party focuses are going to be on funding and political debates within their own party. This seems to put a delay on their “upcoming contest with the Republicans.”

“I am a conservative, but have been following Obama’s campaign. I really enjoy him as a candidate and his views on the United States; however if he does not win in the primaries, I will go back to my conservative roots and vote for McCain in the Presidential election,” said John Fennell, a junior English and communications major.

The Republican primaries are not as close as those of the Democrats. Sen. John McCain, who ran in the 2000 pri-