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Marc Ambinder

Marc Ambinder - Marc Ambinder is the White House correspondent for National Journal and a contributing editor at The Atlantic. More

Marc Ambinder is the White House correspondent for National Journal. He previously served as the politics editor, and is now a contributing editor, for The Atlantic, where he curated the influential Politics channel on TheAtlantic.com and contributed to the magazine. He was also a chief political consultant to CBS News. Earlier, at NJ's Hotline, Ambinder was the founding editor of "Hotline On Call," a pathbreaking political news blog. He also worked as a producer and reporter for the ABC News Political Unit and was one of the founders of ABC's "The Note." Born in New York City, raised in Central Florida, Ambinder is a 2001 graduate of Harvard and lives in Washington, D.C.

Why Shouldn't Superdelegates Wait?

By Marc Ambinder
Apr 22 2008, 10:13 AM ET Comment

Tad Devine and other Dem poo-bahs tell Dan Balz that regardless of the results tonight, superdelegates are likely to swing to Obama fairly soon after voting ends on June 3.

Gallup's national survey today shows that Democrats prefer Barack Obama to Hillary Clinton by ten points, but that Hillary Clinton does (superficially) better in a general election matchup than Obama does.

The superdelegates want a "winner," a candidate who can beat John McCain winner and not a "who got the most delegates or votes" winner. If HRC wins Pennsylvania by a healthy margin and stays in, by the time June 3 rolls around, she's likely to have closed the popular vote gap a lot and the delegate gap a little.

But the superdelegates won't have any additional information about who is best positioned to take on John McCain.

Rationally, why would they decide in June? Wouldn't it make more sense for them to wait as long as possible to see how each candidate polls against McCain or fares in the press over the summer months?

In other words, if it's a winner they want, they'll arguably have MORE information to make that decision the LONGER they wait.

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