Delegate Count

Since presidential primary elections are usually over by Valentine's Day nowadays, it's easy to forget that what really matters is the number of delegates a candidate has, because it's the delegates who do the actual selecting of their party's presidential nominee.

This year, because the fields are so wide open and populated with so many qualified candidates, politicos are drooling over the idea that conventions could become relevant again, that no candidate will get a majority of delegates.

I'm one of them. I'd think it'd be neat.

Here's how things stand at the moment:

So Romney's "two silvers" haven't been particularly bad for him, and McCain's big win didn't do all that much for him on the delegate front - though of course prominent wins open the door for future prominent wins and more delegates, just as the inverse is true for losses.

Now, these totals, particularly the Democrat total, include some superdelegates, and I haven't dug in enough to understand exactly how those have already been pledged. You can look on CNN's delegate scorecard to see how these breakdown.

I highlight this just to once again say that, at this point, it's too early to annoint anyone, or to shove out folks like Romney and Edwards.