Obama is Finally the Presumptive Nominee.

With a surge of superdelegates and enough pledged delegates from South Dakota and Montana, Barack Obama has amassed the 2118 delegates needed to capture the Democratic Party's presidential nomination.

It has been a long, hard-fought primary season, and we've been treated to voter participation, fund-raising, and media coverage at scales never before seen. Hillary has yet to concede, but it's clear that she will in the coming days. She still has an opportunity to get out of this race with grace, and I think she will. While she'll certainly be a valuable asset to Obama's general election campaign, I don't think she'd be the best choice for VP, even though she's open to the idea. But that's a conversation for another day.

Now it's time for Obama to set his sights on John McCain without distraction. With the full power of the Democratic Party behind him, I honestly believe that Obama will face little challenge painting McCain as an out-of-touch flip-flopper who can't separate himself from Bush no matter how hard he tries. And I'm sure that all of us in the Harvard Democrats will be happy to help spread that message around campus and beyond.

FYI: included in the giant flow of superdelegates to Obama today was a favorite of ours: Sam Novey's man-crush/employer, Congressman John Sarbanes of Maryland's 3rd district. Mr. Sarbanes, who was uncommitted when he spoke to us this past spring, made it official this evening.

Superdelegates and invisible delegates

First, in the Department of the Obvious: most superdelegates are white men. Really, Sherlock?

But what I actually want to know is this. There's been a lot of talk lately about Hillary Clinton's campaign to get the DNC to seat delegates from Michigan and Florida, overturning its earlier decision to punish those states for moving their primaries up earlier than the DNC allowed. Clinton won handily in both states (granted, in Michigan her name was alone on the ballot with 'uncommitted' and Dennis Kucinich) so seating the delegates would give her some advantage. There are three options floating around: seat them (raising the ire of the Obama campaign and potentially flipping the advantage in pledged delegates), don't seat them (raising claims of disenfranchisement from Clinton's folks and risking alienating voters in those crucial swing states), or hold do-over caucuses to determine the allocation of Michigan and Florida's delegates (widely believed to benefit Obama, who's been much better in caucuses this year, and also just plain awkward). I don't know which I prefer, only that this is an unfortunate situation; but I do feel the case against seating delegates who were allocated based on Michigan and Florida's January primaries is pretty clear-cut. All candidates (for the most part) refrained from campaigning in those states out of respect for the DNC's decision; the results of the actual primaries are different from what would likely happen in those states if they voted now, or if they had voted on Super Tuesday, or if the campaigns had established a presence on the ground there before the election. In the case of Michigan, Edwards and Obama weren't even on the ballot. In short, you don't change the rules after the game has been played.

But I understand the Clinton campaign may well dedicate a lot of energy to getting these delegates seated, and that a lot of people want it. So for all the Clinton people out there: why reseat the delegates? And why not a re-caucus?

Sunday Nights on the Lam: Washington Goes MTV Edition

This week's edition of Sunday Nights on the Lam, brought to you by an unexpected extension on a paper (thanks, Social Studies 10!), features... videos. Lots of 'em.

First, "after much rumination and meditation and deliberation and constipation," some commentary on the Democratic primary candidates via the Beatles:

Next, Bollywood does Obama. I'm pretty sure this is approximately the weirdest thing I've ever seen. It's almost vaguely reminiscent of M.I.A. around two minutes.

Finally, a classic: Condilicious!

And in today's football news, the Packers rolled over Oakland, 38 to 7. Despite being on special teams, Will Blackmon was the surprise high-scorer of the day, returning a punt for a touchdown in the second quarter and jumping on a muffed punt return in the third quarter to seal the game. Will Blackmon, you're my hero. Today.

That's all for this week's Sunday Nights on the Lam. Now go to bed, you hooligans.