Brief Super Tuesday Update

On the morning after Super Tuesday, the dust has mostly settled, although all results aren't set in stone quite yet. There weren't any huge surprises last night, so there's no need to go into a detailed accounting here (at least not right now), but for a little more, The New York Times has a nice, succinct analysis of where the presidential races stand after last night. (The Times also has a nice graphical summary of last night's results.)

As expected, McCain widened his lead in the Republican race, although he didn't win big enough to claim the prize just yet. Huckabee did surprisingly well, his support still came almost exclusively from southern evangelicals, and his showing last night likely hurt Romney much more than McCain. In fact, McCain and Huckabee have been particularly friendly, since Huckabee's presence in the race is probably still a net benefit for McCain. For example, the outnumbered McCain supporters in the West Virginia caucus last night gave their support to Huckabee to prevent Romney from winning. This could be an early hint at a McCain-Huckabee ticket for 2008, but alternatively this could just be smart political strategy from McCain.

The race on the Democratic side, however, remains neck and neck. As of the publishing of this blog post, almost all vote tallies are in, and the majority of delegates have been decided. The only race that hasn't been called is New Mexico, where Obama maintains a slim lead with 92% of precincts reporting. Obama and Clinton traded victories last night, with Clinton coming out of the contest with a slight advantage in delegates. The biggest disappointment for Obama was California, where Clinton won, despite Obama polling well leading up to the election. On the other hand, Obama did well nationwide, across racial lines (doing particularly well among white males). Obama won a tight victory in the swing state Missouri, and he had some impressively large victories in a variety of states (80% in Idaho, 74% in Alaska and Kansas, 67% in Colorado and Minnesota, 66% in Georgia). Regardless, the Democratic race continues, as tight as ever.