SteveSilver.net

Delegate New Math

Daniel Koffler is right:

There are literally uncountably infinitely many possible manipulations of the primary and caucus results, of which uncountably infinitely many produce a lead for Hillary Clinton, uncountably infinitely many produce a lead for Barack Obama, uncountably infinitely many produce a lead for Mike Gravel, and uncountably many produce no determinate leader. (That's not an exhaustive profile.) For example, if you only count states Barack Obama won, Obama's lead in both delegates and popular votes is massive; mutatis mutandis for Clinton. If you only count Gravel voters, Gravelmania is sweeping the Democratic party. Also, if you only count states that are yellow on Wikipedia's US map, or only the total number of commonwealths won, or only count the average elevation of states won by each candidate, or only the total number of years voters for each candidate have lived, or total X chromosomes possessed by each candidate's supporters, Hillary Clinton is killing it. But if you only count states named for French and English monarchs, only count the total student loan debt of each candidate's supporters, or only count membership totals in facebook support groups, Obama's coasting.

But if you use crazy, undoubtedly controversial metrics like "popular vote" or "delegates," Obama is winning. I'm old-fashioned, I know.

Posted by Stephen Silver at April 25, 2008 05:12 PM