AP: Superdelegates breaking heavily for Obama (+27) in last two weeks

Much has been made of the Superdelegate situation in the main stream media.  Story after story talks about how superdelegates will decide the Democratic nomination, and how they might overrule the voters.  This theory has been adopted heavily in this community, where many bloggers have written diaries (some recommended), contemplating what would happen if the superdelegates overrode the will of the people.  New numbers from the AP should start to put these fears to rest.

In the last two weeks, the AP reports that in their newest delegate count, the superdelegate gap is closing between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton.  While she is holding an overall lead of 60 superdelegates (241 to 181), the gap has been closing consistently over the last two weeks.

AP Survey: Superdelegates jump to Obama

Clinton still leads among superdelegates — 241 to 181, according to the AP survey. But her total is down two in the past two weeks, while his is up 25. Since the primaries started, at least three Clinton superdelegates have switched to Obama, including Rep. David Scott of Georgia, who changed his endorsement after Obama won 80 percent of the primary vote in Scott's district. At least two other Clinton backers have switched to undecided.

None of Obama's have publicly strayed, according to the AP tally.

While the fact that Obama picked up 25 delegates is impressive, the real story is that Clinton's count of superdelegates has actually GONE DOWN from her last count.  This shows that while superdelegates may have their own individual preferences of who they support, more and more of them are choosing to side with their voters instead of going with their own personal opinion.  If this trend continues, Obama will not only win the superdelegate race, he will blow Hillary away.  This will make it harder and harder for Hillary to try to justify staying in the race, since she will fall farther and farther behind in the overall delegate race.

All of the "sky is falling" mentality towards the superdelegates is proving to be unfounded.  They are all elected representatives, and will support the nominee that the American people support.  In this close of an election cycle, they may actually be a help to the process during the convention.  If the pledged delegate lead at the end of the primaries remains fairly close (within 300 or 400), the superdelegates will help give the eventual nominee (in this case, it's heavily looking like Obama) a wider margin of victory at the convention.  

Things continue to look good for Obama supporters.  Let's put all of our energy into closing hard through March 4th, and wrapping up this nomination so we can focus on getting a new type of presidential candidate elected in November.