Official Indiana Democratic Primary Discussion Thread

[Mr. Morden]

I thought they just closed early. Isn't that how Indiana is always one of the first three states called in Presidential elections?

Polls is Indiana close at 6 PM ET for the most part.  They then start counting those counties that are in Eastern Time.  Then, at 7 PM ET, the CT counties close and there's generalyl enough information from the ET countise that networks can generally call the race immediately.  Kentucky is the same way.

While Georgia, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Vermont and Virginia all also close at 7 PM ET, they just then start counting, so they don't have the "head start" that Indiana and Kentucky have.

In 2004, the first four states to be called -- Georgia, Indiana, Kentucky and Vermont -- all happened at the same time, right at the 7 PM ET close.

There is also the fact that, up until 2000, if I'm not mistaken, the networks were willing to call states in which the bulk of the polls had closed, even while there were some counties in another timezone where voting was still going on.  That's how Florida was called for Gore (and then later retracted) while the panhandle was still voting.  That caused such a huge controversy that the networks agreed to start holding back any calls until all polling places in a state were closed.

[Mr. Morden]

When will we get official exit polls from Indiana? Any chance of that happening before 7 PM EST?

No, they won't release the full exit poll until after polls have closed in the entire state.

[Mr. Morden]

Alcon, what is your source for these numbers?  The cable TV networks, or are you getting it from somewhere on the web?

[Mr. Morden]

Here's the exact breakdown on the top issue for Indiana:

http://thepage.time.com/preliminary-exit-polls-from-cnn-2/

Top issue for Indiana voters:

Economy– 65%
Iraq– 19%
Health care– 13%

[Mr. Morden]

HuffPo has updated exit poll leaks:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/06/exit-polls-indiana-north_n_100447.html

    Indiana

    Obama: 50.5%

    Clinton: 49.5%

    North Carolina

    Obama: 60%

    Clinton: 38%

[Mr. Morden]

If Clinton were to end up winning Indiana by a margin between 7 and 10%, then ARG would have been the most accurate pollster for the state.

That would be hilarious.

[Mr. Morden]

CNN just assigned Indiana delegates, 7-3 Clinton...does that mean they're calling the thing?

That's a mistake.  They're probably right but they stand the chance of being Missouried.

Those are probably CD's that are completely in.  That's the only way.

Not really.  We have enough of the vote in that you can calculate a "floor" in the popular vote %age for each of the two candidates.  Thus, there's a minimum number of statewide delegates that you could already assign to each of them.

[Mr. Morden]

Lol.  Did anyone just catch that exchange between Lanny Davis and Anderson Cooper on CNN?  Lanny Davis seems pissed.

[Mr. Morden]

We have to listen to this Lanny Davis for two more hours?  Yuck...

The CNN panel is really getting loopy.