Let's Count Delegates

With Iowa, New Hampshire, and the Wyoming Republican caucus now over, it's time to start counting party convention delegates instead of polls. As I mentioned in an earlier post, unlike the national election in November, the primaries are not winner-take-all. 

Here's what's on CNN right now:

Republicans (1191 needed to win)

Romney 30

Huckabee 21

McCain 10

Thompson 6

Paul 2

Giuliani 1

Hunter 1

Democrats (2025 needed to win) including Superdelegates:

Clinton 183

Obama 78

Edwards 52

Richardson 19

Kucinich 1

Democrats excluding Superdelegates

Obama 25

Clinton 24

Edwards 18

Looking at these numbers, the Republican story should be "Romney in the lead". For the Democrats its still neck and neck, but the story should probably be "Obama still in front". But it remains to be seen whether Obama can gain enough support to overcome the Superdelegate bias for Clinton. 

But in summary, it is still very early days and yet again it pays to look at the actual data and not just the MSM headlines.