The Wall Street Journal-20080205-Our Viewers Guide to Super Tuesday- What to Look For as Results Begin Rolling In This Evening From Closest Thing Ever to a National Nominating Primary

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Our Viewers Guide to Super Tuesday; What to Look For as Results Begin Rolling In This Evening From Closest Thing Ever to a National Nominating Primary

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It's not the Super Bowl of politics, but it could be the playoffs. In any event, tonight's television broadcasts of results from the parties' presidential-nominating contests mark the closest thing to a national primary day in history.

Never have so many states -- 24 of them -- held primaries and caucuses on a single day, including California, the biggest convention-delegate trophy by far. There is suspense: By night's end, a clear Democratic favorite could emerge in the nip-and-tuck battle between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, and John McCain could be the apparent Republican nominee.

A caution for viewers in the East: Polls won't close in the Golden State until 11 p.m. EST. Moreover, California's delegate treasure isn't winner-take-all in either party. So even if the popular-vote winners are clear before midnight, the delegate allocations probably won't be.

For political junkies -- or casual channel-surfers -- what follows is a viewer's guide for watching the returns. All times are Eastern. In allocating delegates to the summer conventions, just under half the Republican contests are winner-take-all; those are indicated by an asterisk. The rest -- and all Democratic contests -- award delegates by various proportional formulas. Typically, they give a portion to the statewide winner and allocate the rest based on the winner of each congressional district. Contests are primaries unless indicated as caucuses.

For those scoring at home, Sen. Clinton starts the big night with an estimated 261 delegates to 190 for Sen. Obama; 2,025 are needed for nomination. Sen. McCain has an estimated 93 to Mitt Romney's 77, Mike Huckabee's 40 and Ron Paul's four; the Republican nominee needs 1,191.

7 p.m.

By prime time, the results will be in from West Virginia's Republican-only caucuses (30 delegates), which end at 12:30 p.m. Mr. Romney's hopes are evident in his decision to make an Election Day visit to the state. But, as with his recent wins in the little- contested Nevada and Maine caucuses, a victory here shouldn't be read as a harbinger for the night.

Polls close in Georgia (87 Democratic delegates, 72 Republican). While the Republican race is mainly McCain vs. Romney, the Peach State is a first test of whether Mr. Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor and Baptist preacher, is siphoning enough Southern and conservative votes from Mr. Romney to be his spoiler.

Georgia could also signal whether a big turnout of black voters will lift Sen. Obama in Southern states, as they did in South Carolina last month, and whether Sen. Clinton is consolidating white votes now that former North Carolina Sen. John Edwards is out of the race.

8 p.m.

Voting ends in 10 states -- as many as voted in all of Super Tuesday 2004 -- providing tests of strength in the Northeast, South and Heartland.

New England could split in both parties: Former Gov. Romney is favored in home-state Massachusetts (93D, 43R), as is Sen. Clinton. But neither Sen. McCain nor Sen. Obama is ceding the state, and wins for either of them would signal a bad night ahead for their rivals.

Sen. McCain is expected to take the other New England state, Connecticut (48D, 30R*), as well as New Jersey (107D, 52R*). New York Sen. Clinton is also counting on those two neighbors, but Sen. Obama threatens.

Similar dynamics hold in Delaware (15D, 18R*). Obama wins in these mid-Atlantic states could signal a wave for him that will wash all the way to the Pacific.

For the Republicans in Alabama (52D, 48R) and Tennessee (68D, 55R), see Georgia, above. Sen. Obama is favored in Alabama, but not Tennessee, which has one of the South's smallest black populations.

He is expected to romp in his delegate-rich home-state, Illinois (153D, 70R), and Sen. McCain is expected to win most of the Republican delegates. But next door, Missouri (72D, 58R*) is competitive in both parties; Mr. Romney needs a win if he has any hope of slowing Sen. McCain.

Sen. Obama is expected to win the Democrats-only caucuses in Kansas (32), as well as nearly all the other five states holding caucuses, reflecting his superior grassroots organizing. Time-consuming caucuses require more get-out-the-vote work than secret-ballot primaries. Oklahoma (38D, 41R) is likely McCain and Clinton ground.

8:30 p.m.

Arkansas (35D, 34R) is home turf for Mr. Huckabee and former Arkansas First Lady Clinton. But she and her husband, the former governor and president, have campaigned here more than Mr. Huckabee has felt the need to.

9 p.m.

Valuable home-field advantages here: The second-biggest delegate prize, New York (232D, 101R*), will likely go to its second-term senator; look to see whether she does better than Sen. Obama did in Illinois. Sen. McCain is expected to get nearly all New York's delegates, and probably those from his home state of Arizona (56D, 53R*). At this point, he could be half way to the nomination.

Arizona will test Sen. Clinton's claim to Latino support. Sen. Obama is giving her a fight, with help from popular Gov. Janet Napolitano. Latinos will also influence the outcome in the caucuses in Colorado (55D, 46R) and the Democrats-only New Mexico primary (26); Sen. Clinton hopes to win both. But as in two other caucuses ending at this hour, in North Dakota (13D, 26R) and Minnesota (72D, 41R), Sen. Obama has the organizational edge.

10 p.m.

Utah (23D, 36R*), the most Mormon state and the site of the 2002 Winter Olympics he rescued, is solidly Mr. Romney's. By now, pundits will be making delegate-allocation estimates from earlier states.

11 p.m.

California (370D, 173R) polls close. The statewide vote winners will claim victory, but the real victors will be the ones with the most delegates -- and that may not be known until daylight.

Sen. Obama held a huge weekend rally ahead of the Democrats-only caucus in Idaho (18). He looks for a symbolic victory beyond its few delegates to back up his claim that he can attract new voters in Republican strongholds.

Midnight.

For Eastern die-hards awaiting California returns, day's end will mean the close of caucuses in two final states -- Alaska (13D, 29R) and, for Republicans only, Montana (25).

Sen. Obama is favored in Alaska. Republican strategists say Mr. Paul, the antiwar libertarian congressman from Texas, could actually win his first contest in Alaska; Mr. Romney is counting on the state and Montana.

But by now, depending on what is known about other states' proportional allocation of delegates, Sen. McCain could be the presumptive nominee. As for the Democrats, stay tuned for another month or so.