Campaign Notebook: Dem primary in South Carolina

South Carolina Democrats head to the polls today to apportion delegates among the three remaining presidential candidates. It will also mark the final Democratic primary election (among those that count) before Super-Duper Tuesday on Feb. 5 when, according to pundits and activists alike, all hell could break loose.

Every recent poll has shown Sen. Barack Obama leading Hillary Clinton and John Edwards by statistically significant margins, so there are two questions: are the polls’ methodologies accurate (as opposed to what happened in New Hampshire, where they were almost all wrong) and if so, by how much will Obama win? The expectations game is key here: if Obama’s team publicly anticipates a big victory and only wins by a small margin, Team Clinton gets a momentum bonus. If, on the other hand, they keep expectations moderate, and pull out an 8- to 10-point victory, momentum (and more delegates) go to the Obama camp.

Complicating things further, most recent polls have shown the strongest movement in favor of John Edwards, although he still sits in a close third place behind Clinton. If Edwards can pull out another surprise second-place finish in South Carolina, it helps his argument of viability on Feb. 5, but another third place finish in a state where he won in 2004 and was expected to do well this year…well, it might not be a death knell, but it would raise questions about how he expects to continue on.

Locally, Clinton has a wide network of surrogates from the DFL establishment working hard for her, and Obama has seven field offices in operation along with prime-time advertising on all major Twin Cities TV channels.  If you watch TV and/or pay attention to these types of things, the next ten days should be a bit loud.