Democrats: Where Do Things Stand?

Okay, we know pretty much as a given now that John McCain will be the Republican nominee (with Huckabee a likely VP nom). And we know that this is bad because he is to Bush's right on the war he does not meet Sean Hannity's standards of insanity.

But where do things stand with the Democrats moving forward?

Here is their primary schedule for the next few weeks-

Feb. 9 -- Louisiana primary, Washington and Nebraska caucuses
Feb. 10 -- Maine caucuses
Feb. 12 -- Primaries in Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C.
Feb. 19 -- Wisconsin primaries; Hawaii caucus
March 4 -- Ohio, Rhode Island, Texas and Vermont primaries
March 8 -- Wyoming caucus
March 11 -- Mississippi primary
April 22 -- Pennsylvania primary
May 6 -- North Carolina and Indiana primaries
May 13 -- West Virginia primary
May 20 -- Kentucky and Oregon primaries
June 3 -- North Dakota and Montana primaries
June 8 -- Puerto Rico

There are a lot of delegates at stake, so folks living in these states... your votes count!

But what of the superdelegates? Is this a good situation or no? On MSNBC the other day, Dan Abrams and others debated this issue before the discussion devolved into a shouting match. Ultimately, it doesn't seem they understand how this works any better than I do.



(Happy note, though? Joe Lieberman has been stripped of his superdelegate status)

For what it's worth, DNC Chairman Howard Dean doesn't think things will get this complicated. He says he expects we'll "have a nominee sometime in the middle of March or April." And if we don't? "[T]hen we’re going to have to get the candidates together and make some kind of an arrangement." Huh? Shit, now I'm more confused than ever.

[Related reading: TIME Poll: Clinton More Beatable than Obama]