Wisconsin Primary

[hoosier]

I expect there will be a revote in Michigan & Florida. Still, Obama is going to get the nomination in the end. He needs to select Clinton as his vice president to unify the democratic party. Obama will be a stronger candidate, and a better president, if he respectfully co-opts Clinton. I'm sure he is tempted to pick a lower status person from outside Washington.

Do you really think Hillary would accept the VP in this situation? I think her ego is going to be bruised if Obama gets the nomination (on that I'm less certain than you), and I can't see her agreeing to play second fiddle after this primary season.

[SkinBasket]

I didn't think Hill could pull back within striking distance like she did last night. She must have spent the last 7 nights sacrificing goats and bulls to the caucus gods.

It'll be fun to watch Harlan run back under her suit pants if she manages to build some momentum again.

[Harlan Huckleby]

Do you really think Hillary would accept the VP in this situation? I think her ego is going to be bruised if Obama gets the nomination (on that I'm less certain than you), and I can't see her agreeing to play second fiddle after this primary season.

I go back to Huckabee's comment: the Vice Presidency is the job that everybody says they don't want, but nobody turns down.

The VP is a very powerful & prestigous job (at least in cases where the P greatly respects the VP.) The VP has direct input in decisions, sometimes is delegated important authority. Cheney was practically a co-president. A VP is potentially much more influential than a Senator.

The problem with ego comes with the asking part. I can't say whether Clinton or OBama would ask for the help of the other; I am far more confident that either would accept.

Clinton would really strengthen Obama, and I don't just mean by appeasing Clinton supporters. Clinton has deep respect, including grudging admiration, for her strength & intelligence from politicians & middle America. He might delegate health care project to her. And the process of working-out things with Clinton will show a tempering of Obama's achilies heel - his arrogance.

The campaign is going to get more negative. But I don't think either side will cross a certain line, attacking the integrity of the other. Coming together on the same ticket will prevent lasting damage.

(BTW, in the first few presidencies, the winning side would take the losing candidate as VP. Imagine Bush adopting Swift Boat Captain Kerry as his VP. And campaigns used to be even dirtier than they are now.)

[Harlan Huckleby]

In another televised interview, Mrs. Clinton said her close race with Mr. Obama might result in a shared ticket. Speaking on CBS’s Early Show, she said, “Well, that may be where this is headed, but of course we have to decide who is on the top of the ticket.” She said her victory in Ohio indicated that the choice should be her.

[The Leaper]

Hillary is tired of being second fiddle. She, like Favre, is mentally fatigued of it. She wants to be numero uno. She's run a pretty aggressive campaign against Obama...more or less claiming he isn't as fit to be president at this point.

There is a growing hostility between Obama and Hillary supporters...and I'm not entirely sure having Hillary as VP, even if it were to occur, is going to cure all those ills.

For all the blabber on the left about bringing people together, it is clear that the Democrats are just as fractured by class and race lines as the GOP...and maybe more so after this heated contest.

[Harlan Huckleby]

Been listening to progressives on Air America. Oh my god. The theme is indignity that Clinton is continuing her campaign. I've never heard such vitriol. The left's party line is that Clinton is Richard Nixon-like, and they repeat over-and-over that Hillary is winning by the dirty trick of casting Obama as a Muslim. Here is the 60 Minutes interveiew that precipiated this line of attack:

STEVE KROFT: You don't believe that Senator Obama's a Muslim?

HILLARY CLINTON: Of course not. I mean that's, you know, that, there is no basis for that. You know, I take him on the basis of what he says, and, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that.

KROFT: You said you take Sen. Obama at his word that he's not a Muslim...

CLINTON: Right, right..

KROFT: …you don't believe that he's a Muslim.

CLINTON: No! No! Why would I? There's nothing to base that on, as far as I know.

KROFT: It's just scurrilous…?

CLINTON: Look, I have been the target of so many ridiculous rumors, that I have a great deal of sympathy for anybody who gets, you know, smeared with the kind of rumors that go on all the time.

THIS is the crime. When she said "as far as I know", I take it she meant she has heard nothing specific, true or false. Politicians & lawyers reflexively speak this way. The Obama Youth say she is deviously encouraging a smear.

[Harlan Huckleby]

There is a growing hostility between Obama and Hillary supporters...and I'm not entirely sure having Hillary as VP, even if it were to occur, is going to cure all those ills.

You're right about the hostility, and I'm living proof. I don't think the bad feeling will endure, but we'll see.

Clinton is waging a negative campaign, in the sense that she is criticizing Obama. This is not dirty politics, she is hitting Obama on legitimate vulnerabilities. I heard one angry Obamaniac say that Hillary's ringing-phone commercial about experience/reliability was out of the Carl Rove playbook. Obama is NOT the Messiah, he is not above criticism.

[Freak Out]

Been listening to progressives on Air America. Oh my god. The theme is indignity that Clinton is continuing her campaign. I've never heard such vitriol. The left's party line is that Clinton is Richard Nixon-like, and they repeat over-and-over that Hillary is winning by the dirty trick of casting Obama as a Muslim. Here is the 60 Minutes interveiew that precipiated this line of attack:

STEVE KROFT: You don't believe that Senator Obama's a Muslim?

HILLARY CLINTON: Of course not. I mean that's, you know, that, there is no basis for that. You know, I take him on the basis of what he says, and, you know, there isn't any reason to doubt that.

KROFT: You said you take Sen. Obama at his word that he's not a Muslim...

CLINTON: Right, right..

KROFT: …you don't believe that he's a Muslim.

CLINTON: No! No! Why would I? There's nothing to base that on, as far as I know.

KROFT: It's just scurrilous…?

CLINTON: Look, I have been the target of so many ridiculous rumors, that I have a great deal of sympathy for anybody who gets, you know, smeared with the kind of rumors that go on all the time.

THIS is the crime. When she said "as far as I know", I take it she meant she has heard nothing specific, true or false. Politicians & lawyers reflexively speak this way. The Obama Youth say she is deviously encouraging a smear.

Air America is bashing her over that? Ha ha...this race is far from over and the Obama people know that. It's could come down to a convention battle royal.

[Harlan Huckleby]

Air America is bashing her over that? Ha ha...this race is far from over and the Obama people know that. It's could come down to a convention battle royal.

Not just Air America, several Obama-leaning microphone jocks have picked-up on this "story."

I think Obama will enter the convention with a small delegate lead, and he will be ahead in national popularity polls. I don't see the convention denying him the nomination. Clinton is also going to have a STRONG case that she is the best candidate. An Obama-Clinton ticket is the only happy outcome.

[The Leaper]

I think Obama will enter the convention with a small delegate lead, and he will be ahead in national popularity polls. I don't see the convention denying him the nomination. Clinton is also going to have a STRONG case that she is the best candidate. An Obama-Clinton ticket is the only happy outcome.

It will be difficult for Obama to claim he is the best candidate when he did not carry any of the major states that usually determine success in a Presidential election...NY, CA, OH, TX, FL.

It will be difficult for Clinton to claim she is the best candidate when she could not win the overall popular vote and consistently trends lower in head-to-head polling against McCain when compared to Obama.

An Obama-Clinton ticket may seem like a happy outcome, but in reality it could also turn into a disaster if the two individuals really do not like each other...and their supporters don't really get along either. Suddenly, the wave of enthusiam on the Dems side hits a wall of discontent and pointless class/race bickering.

If anything, it would be fun to watch.

[Scott Campbell]

For the Republicans, this has to be la little like the US watching the Nazis fight the Russians on the Western front. Let em kick the crap out of each other.

[Joemailman]

I expect there will be a revote in Michigan & Florida. Still, Obama is going to get the nomination in the end. He needs to select Clinton as his vice president to unify the democratic party. Obama will be a stronger candidate, and a better president, if he respectfully co-opts Clinton. I'm sure he is tempted to pick a lower status person from outside Washington.

Charlie Crist, the Republican Florida governor, has said he is fine with Florida having Democratic primary. Hillary would be favored. Obviously the Republicans would rather face Hillary. I wonder where Jennifer Granholm, the Democratic Michigan governor stands on having a primary there.

I'm not sure Hillary wants to be anyone's VP. If the Dems win control of the Senate and Obama wins the Presidency, she might be able to wield more power as Senate majority leader than she would as VP. Any health care plan Obama would propose would have to have her seal of approval.

[Harlan Huckleby]

March 5, 2008,
Fla. and Mich. Governors: Give Us Our Delegates
By Sarah Wheaton

Florida’s Republican governor and Michigan’s Democratic governor have one major gripe in common: the national parties have punished both of their states by limiting delegates to the national conventions. They released a joint statement today asking for their delegates to be seated.

From Govs. Charlie Crist of Florida and Jennifer Granholm of Michigan:
The right to vote is at the very foundation of our democracy. This primary season, voters have turned out in record numbers to exercise that right, and it is reprehensible that anyone would seek to silence the voices of 5,163,271 Americans. It is intolerable that the national political parties have denied the citizens of Michigan and Florida their votes and voices at their respective national conventions.

Although the appeal is directed at both the Republican and Democratic National Committees, significantly more is at stake in the case of the Democrats. Both parties punished the states for holding their primaries earlier than allowed by party rules (Michigan on Jan. 15 and Florida on Jan. 29), but the G.O.P. only docked the states half of their delegates, and the race appears to have been decided without them. The D.N.C., on the other hand, stripped the states of their entire delegations, and the candidates agreed not to campaign in either state. Senator Barack Obama did not even appear on the Michigan ballot.

Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton won both the Michigan and Florida constests, and as the race becomes a delegate-by-delegate brawl, her campaign has been working to get the delegates seated. There is growing unease with the situation in the Democratic Party, especially given Florida’s election history, and there’s even talk of a revote in those states.

“Today, we each will call upon our respective state and national party chairs to resolve this matter and to ensure that the voters of Michigan and Florida are full participants in the formal selection of their parties’ nominees,” the governors’ statement continued.

[Harlan Huckleby]

Clinton’s Mission Not-Impossible
By David Brooks

A friend of mine observed this morning that this campaign has gone through several four-month phases. On the GOP side, there was the McCain-will-win-the-nomination phase, followed by the McCain-is-doomed phase followed by the Mac-is-back phase. On the Democratic side, the Hillary-is-invincible phase was followed by the Obama-is-magical phase.
That’s a useful way to think about the race because it reminds us that there are at least two more lifetimes to go until November. It also helps us think dynamically over the next several weeks.

We’ve entered another phase. The period of Obama-mania is ending. You can feel the press turning more negative and the Hope speech settling into middle age. Moreover, for the first time, Clinton has a moral narrative to rival Obama’s. If he’s the healer, she is the struggler. She leads a life like regular mortals. Things are tough. She has flaws, but she pushes on. She wouldn’t put it this way, but she’s like the old pickup you can depend on. She has some dents, but you and she got those dents together. And when you need her, she is there for you.

I’m far from the biggest Hillary-lover on the planet, but her resilience and courage is moving. Everybody around her was glum and backbiting through the hard times, but she kept going. This is a useful trait in a president.
Obama is still by far the likely nominee. He has a pledged delegate lead virtually locked up. But she has the ability to seize the debate over the next few weeks. She can do it in a few ways. First, she will have drawn the lesson from Texas and Ohio that attacking works. She can keep up the barrage on him.

Second, she can push for a majority of the overall vote. She’s unlikely to win that without re-votes in Florida and Michigan, so she’ll have to push for that. She’ll have to make the case that everybody’s vote should count. She should offer to split the $15 to $20 million cost of a Florida re-vote with Obama. If he says no, she can ask why he is against democracy. Why does he like the small turnout caucuses over the big turnout primaries?

Finally, she can move to Pennsylvania. It’s a long time before April 22nd. Over the next few weeks, media interest in that primary will build and build. Obama’s string of primary victories will recede into the deepest recesses of memory. Pennsylvania will begin to look like the crucial deciding state and a win there will carry climactic weight. We are used to narratives in which the climax comes at the end of the story, not the middle.

It’s a long shot. It could be Obama will decide he’s tired of being a sitting target and will produce something new. But it’s a plausible way forward for Clinton. It reinforces the notion that she should fight on. It reinforces the notion that the superdelegates should sit on their hands for a little while longer.

By historic standards, close primary contests are not settled in early March. This one could go on without doing terrible harm to the party.

[Tyrone Bigguns]

I think Obama will enter the convention with a small delegate lead, and he will be ahead in national popularity polls. I don't see the convention denying him the nomination. Clinton is also going to have a STRONG case that she is the best candidate. An Obama-Clinton ticket is the only happy outcome.

It will be difficult for Obama to claim he is the best candidate when he did not carry any of the major states that usually determine success in a Presidential election...NY, CA, OH, TX, FL.

It will be difficult for Clinton to claim she is the best candidate when she could not win the overall popular vote and consistently trends lower in head-to-head polling against McCain when compared to Obama.

An Obama-Clinton ticket may seem like a happy outcome, but in reality it could also turn into a disaster if the two individuals really do not like each other...and their supporters don't really get along either. Suddenly, the wave of enthusiam on the Dems side hits a wall of discontent and pointless class/race bickering.

If anything, it would be fun to watch.

You are way overreacting to the situation. It is no different than every other campaign. No different than Mccain supporters having to adopt bush after he took out Mccain. Or Reagan tapping Bush after Bush ridiculing voodoo econ.

By the time it is settled, all the dems will come together against the common enemy.

It will be very easy as the economy will still be floundering, gas prices will still be high..and memories of summer prices will be nightmares...and in the fear of high heating costs for the winter, immigration policies that don't favor the repubs, and a surge that still won't have met the stated goals.