Trends and Departures
The Republican race for president seems to be firming up while at the same time thinning out: as Giuliani drops out (and the Free World gives a collective sigh of relief), McCain maintains his 10-point lead over Romney and Huckabee, who are still neck-and-neck for second place. The Gallup Daily Tracking Poll (which Josh Marshall talked about but strangely did not link to) shows the GOP landscape:
It looks like McCain has a pretty good lead, but not a decisive one–even with Giulani’s backing, he won’t go above 40% if even that high. While McCain is the solid frontrunner, the numbers are more or less stuck where they are, and we could be looking at a brokered convention.
Similarly, on the Democratic side, there is no clear winner. Edward’s departure today could help either candidate or simply split the difference between them both–it’s anybody’s call. And with Gallup’s nationwide poll showing Hillary leading Obama 42% to 36%, you might think she has a comfortable lead–until you realize that exactly one week ago, it was a 46% to 30% lead. And then you see the trend:
That’s an average one-point gain for Obama every day, and a one-point loss for Hillary every day. Which suggests that just three days after the last reading (that would be February 1), they should be neck-and-neck, and by Super Tuesday, Obama could have a comfortable lead over Hillary.
Not that that’s going to happen, of course. It could, I hope it will, but I doubt that the trend will remain unbroken. The question is, what could break it? Florida was the big bet, but (a) Hillary was expected to win big there anyway (she won 50% to 33%), (b) the delegates aren’t even supposed to be seated, and most importantly, (c) the Florida win for Hillary seems to have barely made the news. The closer Republican race is drawing more attention, and Edwards’ and Giuliani’s departures have stolen even that spotlight. Which means that Hillary will not get nearly as much a boost out of Florida as Obama likely got out of South Carolina.
Then there’s the question of why the trend is happening; it’s clearly not a prolonged South Carolina “bump” for Obama; the trend, after all, started a week before South Carolina–ironically, at about the same time Obama made his Reagan analogy. South Carolina may have accelerated Obama’s rise a bit, but it did not cause it.
So what did? My guess (and admittedly it’s a biased one) is that (a) as more and more people see Obama and Hillary in action, the more the like Obama and don’t like Hillary; (b) Hillary’s negative campaigning may be a big factor; and most of all, (c) voters may be choosing Obama as the more electable candidate as the Super Tuesday ballot grows near and people start firming up on who they’re going to vote for.
One thing for sure, you can’t call this race boring.
Item c is no small potato.
I was getting my hair cut yesterday, in Mesa, Az. I had no idea there were so many neocon/movement conservatives afoot. Now most of the people in there were old, but not all, and more than half were women. Anyway, somebody mentioned politics, and a few minutes later someone was saying how bad the democrats were, then, someone mentioned Hillary, and everyone left the side lines and piled in on her: how much they hate her, him and how they didn’t like the Republicans running, but would do anything and everything to stop her from getting elected. Surprisingly, the women were the most vociferous. This really shocked me on several levels.
Now I’m not a big Clinton fan, but I stood up for the Democratic position and touched on how the country had been ruined by Bush: looting the treasury, concentration of wealth, let our enemy getting away and then attacking the wrong country. That meant nothing of course, what really mattered was how awfull she was. I tried to ask what it was specifically that she did that they didn’t like, but no one could put their finger on it. Someone mention how awful she was to support that man during the Lewinsky scandal. And once Lewinsky’s name was mentioned the intensity magnified again.
Hillary might be able to win the nomination. She might be able to win the general election. But she will get out the vote for Republicans in a way that no single person, movement or issue could ever do. They hate her worse then they hate bin Laden, whom I secretly believe Republicans actually like for a layer of reasons.
I’ve said it before, but never realized the extent:
Hillary energize and unifies the right and dispirits and divides the left.
She is poison or kryptonite to the Democrats.
I will vote for her, of course. And 9 months from now, maybe the nation will be so deeply in economic ruin and chaos that past hatreds will melt away. But more likely she’s the Republican’s dream candidate.
As Eric Alterman said : (http://mediamatters.org/altercation/200801300004#1)
“The Edwards campaign was a surreal experience that should inspire a doctoral dissertation or two. He was both the most progressive candidate on issues and the most electable on paper, and yet he did not get the support of most progressives or most professionals. This despite the fact that he actually ran a terrific campaign and, more than Obama and Hillary, defined it in a positive direction. That he forced the other candidates to respond did not end up mattering as much as the media’s fascination with all things Clintonian, Obamian, and the egregiously awful coverage of Edwards. …
… In any case, the Republicans have picked their only “safe” general election candidate, and the Democrats have rejected theirs. The assumption of many is that it’s a Democratic year, so the party can afford to take risks. Let’s see …”
Another point Alterman makes, if McCain gets the nomination, is whether or not to campaign on age, specifically, whether McCain is too old for the office.
“Should Democrats run against McCain as too old to be president? I think so. It’s dangerous, but so what? He may not be too old today, but what about four years from now? Ronald Reagan was already losing his mind by the time he left office. And he was younger than McCain will be. This is a high-risk strategy vis-à-vis the older part of the electorate, but I’d risk it. It will actually affect lots of people’s votes.”
After what I saw yesterday, it’s not a bad idea. Most older people can’t wrap there minds around Obama, they think he’s Osama. So alienating them is no big loss. Also, a lot of older people who still have their minds, know older people that have lost their sharpness. So many won’t be offended.
I’m often surprised by the number of people who are either basically on the side of the Democrats, or independents who are definitely leaning Democratic this time around… but they don’t like Hillary either.
Hell, *I* don’t like her. I’m not even sure why. I don’t think it’s that she’s a strong woman in a position of power; there’s other female politicians that I really like, admire, and would support.
But for some reason, the Clintons just inspire hatred. On paper, Hillary is definitely the better candidate compared with Obama. (Of course, I thought Edwards beat them both by far, but for many reasons this just wasn’t his year.) Yet for whatever reason, she just isn’t a natural politician like Bill Clinton was/is.
I think there’s not a chance that Edwards endorses Hillary. It’ll either be Obama or nobody. Hillary is far more closely linked with all of the corporate complex that Edwards was running against; even while Obama is a lot more “establishment” than he appears, he’s still much more an agent of change than Hillary is.
I agree with what both of you are saying. Hillary is seasoned; she’s been smeared and survived; she’s a sharp political operator; she is experienced and knows the issues; she is generally liberal, and I think would be an acceptable president. Yes, I do not like her campaign style at all, but in light of the fact that almost any candidate will have warts, I am willing to forgive quite a bit for a president who will generally do the right thing.
For example, Bill Clinton did a lot of stupid things, may have been brash and so forth–but he got the job done. At the end of the decade, he passed the usual test: are you better off, and is the country better off, than when the president came into office? Clinton passed that easily. Credit the Republicans if you must for pushing for some things, Clinton was the president it got done under. And a large percentage of the failures were more due to Republican witch hunts than anything else. Had the Republicans not had Clinton’s dalliances with women or the stale-and-meaningless WhiteWater affair to start their investigations with–both of those being utterly irrelevant to Clinton’s performance as president and issues that would have been ignored in any other presidency (look what Dubya has gotten away with, he makes Bubba look like a deacon of the church)–then Clinton would be remembered as one of the greats of the last half century.
So I would tolerate Hillary because I would know that generally, she’d do a good job, no matter what I thought of her tactics; I’d accept those as part of most politicians’ packages.
The problem is, Hillary is polarizing. Tim makes an excellent point that I had not explored: not only is Hillary polarizing, but she also has the added effect of galvanizing the right wing. Hillary would draw a negative-reaction vote that Obama would stifle.
Among liberals, the two candidates are in a dead heat. But once the chemistry of the campaign changes–something which is not reflected in current polls, even the “Clinton/Obama vs. McCain/Romney” types–and we have a Democrat vs. Republican in the same race… well, McCain would draw even centrist liberals away from Hillary, while Obama would take centrist (and even more right-wing) conservatives away from McCain. Obama would appeal to many right-wingers, either gaining their vote or suppressing their anti-candidate reactions, whereas Hillary would become a clarion call for the Republican base to organize and come out in strength. They’re good at that, and Hillary would motivate them like Obama would not.
All things considered, Obama’s the best shot we have; Hillary is our most likely basis for defeat, as much as the nation wants to move away from the right this year.
Well, I agree, Clinton proved to be an excellent administrator of government: he keenly managed to side-step several global economic meltdowns (Argentina/Latin America, Russia, East Asia) and even stopped a terrorist attempt and so there’s no reason to believe that a Hillary administration wouldn’t be any less well governed.
I also agree, Obama is the best we shot we have, (but I feel we lost our best shot when Edwards stepped out). My nominally independent, but effectively far-right wing family (my mother punched a ticket with Nixon’s name on it five times, and someone with George Bush’s name on it six times) were slowly coming around to accept John Edwards. Not because of me, they think I am the lost child, but because me sister was also bringing up Edwards name. Hearing from two of us. But if Edwards was reaching my parents then he could reach almost anyone. His failure is a major victory to corporate elite and the very wealthy (top 1%) and a major defeat for almost everyone else nation wide and world wide.
Obama’s real problem is his name. (See this letter to the editor at the Arizona Republic:http://www.azcentral.com/arizonarepublic/opinions/articles/0131thurlets313.html)
Older people realize we have had two enemies in the last decade or so: one named Saddam Hussein, the other Osama bin Laden. Two of Obama’s three names reminds older and conservative voters of our enemy, while McCain is a war hero from the Vietnam era who suffered through prolonged torture. Many, mostly the elderly, will not be able to wrap their heads around the idea of punching a ticket for someone with Obama’s name on it, Shakespeare’s quote on the triviality of names (a rose is still a rose) not withstanding.
This is why Alterman’s strategy of attacking McCain on his age might be appropriate (first because he’s at the age where the mental faculties can go, second because many elderly people suffer from diminished mental capacity, they won’t be able to get around the name thing, so risking alienating them is not such a big risk).
(Interestingly enough, a donut whole has appeared in Obama’s youth appeal. Apparently the 25-30 year old segment tend to lean towards Hillary, while the 18-25 and the 31-36 tend to lean towards Obama!)
The emphasis on youth will make them feel empowered, something that youth always yearn for. These days, facing bleak future’s thanks to Bush, empowerment of youth is likely to gain a lot of traction.