Who built that? (Pool photo/NBC NY)

Obviously all we think about, all we care about, here at the real estate desk is, well, real estate. Which is why one line in particular jumped out during the president's speech at the Democratic National Convention last night.

"I promised to refocus on the terrorists who actually attacked us on 9/11," President Barack Obama declared. "And we have. We’ve blunted the Taliban’s momentum in Afghanistan, and in 2014, our longest war will be over. A new tower rises above the New York skyline, Al Qaeda is on the path to defeat, and Osama bin Laden is dead."

A new tower rises above the New York skyline.

Well, technically two are rising, and really, they've basically stopped rising. Unless the president was referring to the other two, which are trying desperately to rise. But we digress.

Not to take a political cheap shot, but didn't it seem like President Obama was taking some credit for helping 1 World Trade Center get to where it is? Granted the thing was practically invisible until shortly before he took office, so maybe such a claim is not outrageous. Just as we got Osama bin Laden on his watch, we have watched the World Trade Center retake its place on the skyline for the duration of his administration.

It is not as though President George W. Bush really did much for the rebuilding of Ground Zero, either. Almost entirely it was political brinkmanship (and infighting) in New York, Albany and Trenton that (slowed down and) helped launch the rebuilding of the World Trade Center. If anyone deserves credit in Washington, it is Senator Chuck Schumer and Congressman Jerry Nadler (not to mention former and current Senators Clinton and Gillibrand) who lobbied tirelessly for billions of dollars in federal funds to help Lower Manhattan rebuild.

Did the president take credit for rebuilding the World Trade Center last night? Of course not. This is a practice in exactly the kind of out-of-context-taking the media loves, the kind that ensnared the president when he uttered those four fateful words, when Mitt Romney declared "I like being able to fire people."

Still, the phrase jumped out at us. It was striking. Maybe more than anything else, it was all we could think about (again, we love real estate). After all, the sentiment does fit into the Obama narrative, the idea, the very thing the president meant when he said "You didn't build that," which is that you didn't build that on your own.

The same goes for the World Trade Center. Perhaps no single project since the Tower of Babel has been such a work in design by committee. We are better off for it, and worse off as well. As with all things in government, all things in society, all things in humanity. The same thing goes for the Empire State Building, the Washington Monument, the space program, Medicare, public housing, public schools, food stamps, social security, the Interstate Highway system.

You didn't build that. We all did. And sometimes, when the strife bubbles up to the surface at Ground Zero, it is good to be reminded of this fact.

Here's one, pointed out to us by Lost Remote. Washington Post reporter Ed O’Keefe recorded the clip above using his cellphone and streamed it live onto WashintonPost.com.

"This is one of the first times a newspaper organization has had the ability to bring this level of live video coverage to viewers," according to a WashingtonPost.com publicist.

The Washington Post and Newsweek.com equipped its journalists with cell phones featuring an application produced by Comet Technologies. According to the company's Web site, the technology has been in development for four years and is the first and only technology that allows reliable video to be transmitted to and from common cell phones. Cool stuff.

Take this 39-year-old man, who is offering a "free spa quality sensual massage for Obama supporters!" He adds: "Would love to meet and greet and touch a good energy soul in for the convention. Tall and fun with a great touch."

Or the 32-year-old man staying at the Aurora Hotel who was looking for a "cowgirl": "Are you a lady voting Obama? Are you looking for a little fun tonight during the convention? Perhaps you like to cum over and "Watch" with me? I'm serious about meeting up with a good-looking lady for the afternoon/evening and if you're serious about meeting up with a good-looking guy; what are you waiting for? Get back to me!"

Perhaps this 40-year-old blogger suits your fancy? " I'm in town for the Democratic National Convention. I'm a fit guy, 5'11" who recently got out of a relationship. I'm a writer--I mean stuff other than blogging. I went to one of those selective East Coast schools and would prefer someone who is clever and worldly." Actually, never mind. This guy sounds like a shmuck! (Related: is "I'm more than a blogger, I'm also a writer" the new "I'm not just a waiter, I'm also an actor"? Anyone?)

Then there's the 49-year-old man who offers to "pleasure" (we won't get into further details) a female Obama delegate. He assures his readers that he loves to please!

Finally, we have this young man, who is interested in performing oral sex in exchange for tickets to Obama's speech. And just in case you didn't get the message the first time, he repeats: "YOU MUST HAVE OBAMA SPEECH TICKETS." Got that?

So we're happy to report that the witty couple is still going strong and getting in on the action in Denver. They're guest blogging on Entertainment Weekly's PopWatch Blog during the convention.

"Our first impression of Denver: It's Reno, but bigger," starts out their first entry, titled "Insanity in Denver." They've been running into Christians in street malls and "feverish nutballs," as they put it. What about the Hillary supporters?

Outspittled! Go susbscribe to the RSS feed for the next few days (we did!). Their dispatches are going to be hilarious.

So now I'm on the blog again, live from the Democratic National Convention, and I'll be posting regularly from today forward.

(Evidently I miss being flamed on a daily basis...)

What this would mean, in terms of the zero-sum nomination contest, is that Barack Obama will have dodged a bullet.

In real terms, such a compromise will cost Obama about 19 delegates – half of the 38 delegate advantage Hillary Clinton racked up when she won the January primary by 17 points. (The final figure could be altered slightly, depending on how the 17 percent of the vote that John Edwards won is treated.)

That's not a huge deal for Obama, since he will likely end the primary season in early June with a lead of around 125 pledged delegates--and it doesn't seem probably that a do-over primary would have yielded a radically different result. It's true that turnout, in comparison to other states with legitimate primaries, was very low in Florida, but polls for a prospective do-over vote showed that Clinton's 17-point edge was likely to hold. This way, Obama would cut Clinton's delegate gain in half.

Moreover, the lack of a do-over primary – and the likely Clinton victory it would bring – spares Obama time, money, and the embarrassing headlines that would follow a defeat, possibly a lopsided one. Unlike in Michigan, where polls show Obama in potential position to win in a re-vote, voters in Florida seem to have held Obama's stance on their primary against him, not just in polls that pit him against Clinton, but also in general election match-ups with John McCain.

Here's the other reason why avoiding a do-over in Florida is probably fine by Obama: The state is a stretch for him in the fall. This is partly to do with the controversy over the primary (it's one of the few states where Clinton runs stronger than Obama against McCain in general election polls) but also because the state continues to move toward the G.O.P. Recall that George W. Bush dramatically expanded his Florida margin between 2000 and 2004 and that in 2006, the best Democratic year in a generation, the state still elected a Republican governor, and by a solid margin.

A do-over in Florida would only cost him time, money, grief and delegates.

In that ‘84 campaign, the Obama role was played by Gary Hart, whose “new ideas” fueled a stunning 13-point victory in New Hampshire that rocketed him to the top of the race and, within weeks, brought Walter Mondale -- who had entered the campaign as the most prohibitive favorite in primary history -- to the brink of capitulation. A Hart sweep of Super Tuesday in early March 1984 would have flushed the former vice president from contention, but when Mondale narrowly won two states that day (to Hart’s seven), the press declared him reborn. When the primaries and caucuses finally finished in June, it was a draw: Both men had won about the same number of pledged delegates and Hart had even edged Mondale in the combined popular vote.

But the nomination was Mondale’s because most of the superdelegates -- party leaders and elected officials who account for 20 percent of all convention votes -- had been with him from the start, long before Hart had emerged as a viable option.

“My wife and I called every one of them personally between the California primary (on June 2) and the convention, and overwhelmingly they said, ‘I wish I hadn’t committed to Mondale, but I’m committed,’” Hart said.

Even though polls the weekend before the convention showed Hart vastly outperforming Mondale against Ronald Reagan, the superdelegates stuck to their commitments, Mondale was nominated, and the party suffered a 49-state landslide in the fall.

Hart, who teaches at the University of Colorado-Denver, is now supporting Obama. There are clear similarities between the old Hart coalition and the one Obama is building this year: college-educated voters, political independents, and younger voters. The Clinton and Mondale bandwagons also look alike, filled with members of core Democratic constituencies: women, Hispanics, lower-income white voters. (The main difference: Hart struggled to attract black support, which Obama has practically monopolized.)

Hart sees the Clinton-Obama race playing out the way his did, but with the potential for a very different ending.

“It will go to the convention like it did in ‘84, but (Obama’s) got a much better chance of getting support from superdelegates than I did, because most of them were lined up with Fritz before New Hampshire.”

That’s the key difference: While Hart had toiled in virtual anonymity before New Hampshire made him a star, superdelegates have been aware of Obama from the beginning of this race. And they may be savvier in 2008 about not lining up so quickly behind the establishment favorite. Superdelegates were a new creation in 1984.

“I assume (Hillary) and her husband are on the phone with them now, and they’re saying, ‘Remember when I had you to the White House,’ or ‘Remember when I campaigned for you,’” Hart said.

Obama’s pitch, Hart believes, is his ability to attract independents and Republicans to the ticket in the fall.

“It’s going to be a question of loyalty versus electability,” he said, “because it’s going to be clear to everyone by then that (Obama) is the strongest general election candidate.”

The electability argument, he stressed, is not just about whether either candidate is capable of winning the general election; it’s a matter of what effect their presence will have on other Democratic candidates who will be on the ballot with the ultimate nominee -- more than a few of whom will be superdelegates at the convention.

“If some of them are elected officials who will be up in ‘08, they might be persuaded,” said Hart. “The idea is not just to win -- it’s not to get dragged down.”

That might explain why so many prominent Democrats from red states -- like Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius or Nebraska Senator Ben Nelson -- have endorsed Obama, and why Obama won massive victories on Super Tuesday in Republican bastions like North Dakota, Alaska, Utah and Idaho (with a staggering 81 percent). Even if those states will be written off by Democrats in the fall, Hart said, picking a presidential nominee who can at least keep the bleeding to a minimum makes a big difference to Democratic candidates.

He offered his own personal experience as a senator from Colorado: “In 1980, I ran for re-election, and I had to do so on a ticket that included Jimmy Carter, who was very unpopular in my state. I had to run 26 points ahead of him in order to win. That is not something that is easy to do.”

One of the reasons Hart is so confident that the ‘08 race will last to the convention is Clinton’s ability to retain support from most of the core Democratic groups that Mondale did, which gives her a considerable leg-up -- as it did for Mondale -- in some of the biggest delegate prizes on the map, thereby making up for Obama’s considerable advantage in many smaller and mid-size states.

“I think that support has always been with her,” he said. “The question was whether it was going to erode and slip away, and at least at this stage, in states like Massachusetts, New Jersey and California. It has not.”

Looking at the upcoming primaries, Hart said he believes that Obama “has got to broaden his appeal to the Hispanic community,” especially if he wants to compete in the March 4 Texas primary. The other big states on the horizon include Ohio, also on the 4th, and Pennsylvania, which suddenly looks like it will be relevant on April 22 -- after a five-week gap without a single nominating contest. Clinton enjoys the support of both states’ Democratic governors: Ted Strickland in Ohio and Ed Rendell in Pennsylvania.

“I lost Pennsylvania, but won Ohio -- so that’s winnable for him,” Hart said. “Pennsylvania is a little tougher because it’s a state where there is considerable machine strength.”

The only way the race won’t reach the convention, according to Hart, is if Clinton runs out of money -- something that suddenly seems possible, with the news that she loaned her campaign $5 million last month and that key staffers are working for her without pay -- or if one of the candidates makes “a fatigue-induced mistake” that gets blown up by the media. Hart has some experience with this: In the final days of the ‘84 marathon, he made an off-hand remark about New Jersey and toxic waste that ended up dominating the news and quite possibly cost him the state -- the only one of the final 12 contests that he lost.

“These candidates are really, really, really tired,” he said. “And I don’t think most people and most journalists understand that.”

Dean said he thinks there will be a nominee by March or April, and if not, "we're going to have to get the candidates together and make some kind of an arrangement."

Here's the transcript from NY1:

This is probably a meaningless distinction, but in the event that the Hillary-Obama race ends up dead even (as in, they are separated by just a few delegates) after the primaries and caucuses are finished, Edwards could still have some leverage with his small bloc of delegates, particularly if his suspended candidacy somehow can gather another few dozen delegates in the remaining primaries.

Still, the biggest x-factor in an even Hillary-Obama race is the 796 super delegates, who aren't pledged to anyone and who can wait until the first ballot at the convention to make up their minds.

But it’s unlikely to happen. Right now Edwards has only 26 pledged convention delegates (14 from Iowa, four from New Hampshire, and eight from South Carolina). He also has support from an estimated 32 super-delegates (elected leaders and party officials), but they can back out at anytime. Chances are that his total is not going to get much higher.

To add to his pledged delegates, Edwards needs to get at least 15 percent in every state yet to vote (not necessarily at the statewide level, though, since delegates are apportioned by district). But his failure to break through in the first four states is making him less relevant to the Democratic race every moment. He was always overshadowed by the Hillary vs. Barack storyline, but now he's utterly eclipsed by it.

What happened in South Carolina is instructive. It is Edwards' native state and he sought to rally regional pride as the only candidate with a local accent. He performed well at the pre-primary debate, positioning himself as a "grown-up" who wouldn't stoop to the petty name-calling in which he said his rivals were engaging. There was even talk in the final days of an Edwards surge, one that would vault him into second place, ahead of Hillary, thus fueling him with some badly needed momentum in advance of Super Tuesday.

But no such thing happened. In the same state where he won 45 percent in 2004, Edwards finished a distant third, with just 19 percent. And he only did that well thanks to lopsided support from his home region.

The problem for Edwards is that, compared to the states that will vote next Tuesday, South Carolina is as good as it gets. Besides his personal ties, he also had a week to focus his energy on the state with dozens of campaign appearances, and he enjoyed generous media coverage. But Super Tuesday is essentially a national primary. Momentum, money, and media coverage propel candidates, and Edwards is running empty on all three. Meanwhile, the Hillary-Obama race is hotter than ever, likely to attract newfound interest from those who have been soft supporters of Edwards.

If the best Edwards could muster in South Carolina was 19 percent, then he figures to fare considerably worse on February 5 -- well below the 15 percent threshold in just about every state and district. And in presidential politics, bad news begets bad news. A disastrous Super Tuesday will dry up Edwards' support in the post-February 5 states, particularly if the two front-runners remain locked in a tight contest.

400 to 500 convention delegates may seem like a modest goal, but Edwards could fall well short of it. Sure, if Hillary and Obama end up even at the end of the primary season, then even 100 Edwards delegates could make the difference. But chances are that Edwards' final tally will fall well short of 796, which is the total number of super delegates. And it is those super delegates, much more than Edwards' delegates, who now loom large over the Democratic race.