Just a few quick points about the "Reverend" Wright and related topics (as you might have gathered by the infrequency of my posts lately, I (like many others, no doubt) am somewhat fatigued by this interminable campaign):
In my last post, I noted that I could see nothing exactly racist about the Wright soundbites that had received so much attention. I still don't. That said, I am now aware of some comments he made that are inarguably racist (maybe they just don't have video of those?). For example, in one sermon he reportedly attributed much of the world's injustices to the "white man's greed." Obviously, that is racist.
Of course, the logical problem with that statement is not what the majority of white people would probably say it is, which would probably sound something like "white people's greed hasn't hurt anyone." Rather, the problem is that white people hardly have a unique capacity for greed. Avarice is not confined to any particular race, and in fact, I am sure there is far too much of it amongst people of all colors.
Indeed, I've heard that the rev himself has retired to million-dollar+ home in some gated community in Chicago, and, while I've no doubt that he (like many other wealthy Christians) would rationalize his own wealth in some way, one could easily argue (as I know I have on occasion) that such luxury in a world filled with poverty is at odds with certain central tenets of the Christian faith.
Ah, but I have little doubt that, skin color aside, Wright has far more in common with religious charlatans like Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, and Robert Tilton (and similar mountebanks throughout history and around the world) than he does with the average American.
In any case, my attempts to parse his comments with an open mind in my last post should not be taken to have indicated that I didn't have a pretty good idea already of the sort of person being discussed...
Which brings me back to the larger issue of Wright's effect on Obama's campaign. Certainly, I continue to believe Obama when he says he doesn't share Wright's racism, not to mention his wacky conspiracy theories about AIDS or his apparent admiration for Louis Farrakhan. Anyone who has actually listened to Obama address the controversy should be able, if they are honest, to see that his thinking is waaay more mainstream (and fundamentally more sound, I'd add) than Wright's.
Now granted, one could say that Obama's long association with Wright speaks ill of his judgement. To some extent, I think that criticism is valid, but on the whole, I think it glosses over the political difficulties faced by someone with Obama's background.
To whit, less than a year ago, it was widely suspected that Obama might not be "black enough" for a lot of black voters, and indeed, many polls suggested that he had not won most blacks over. Furthermore, as a half-white, Harvard-educated intellectual, those kinds of suspicions were presumably held against him even 20 years ago when he first went to Chicago.
As a politician, then (and yes, he is a politician), it was undoubtedly helpful for Obama to prove his bona fides with Chicago's black community by joining one of its major congregations (and, let's face it, while maybe not *all* black preacher's are quite so, um, "out there" as Wright, a great many of them are). And then, even as he emerged on the national scene, gained some traction in the presidential campaign, etc., he could hardly risk alienating what had become one of his most reliable constituencies (i.e., black voters) by simply tossing the old preacher under the bus. And indeed, he may truly have been unaware of the pulpiteer's more incendiary comments. (Granted, I'm a bit dubious that he was totally unaware that Wright had some fairly offensive ideas -- I think it more likely that he just didn't know exactly how offensive some might sound, and, more critically, that some had been taped.)
Unfortunately, the trick for Obama now is that he needs to do just that -- i.e., disassociate himself from Wright -- in order to avoid scaring off a lot of white voters. And doubly unfortunately for him, Wright has shown himself, with his media appearances over the last several days, to be an even bigger clown, showboat, crackpot, etc. than even many Republicans hoped he would be. He is certainly no friend of Obama's. Indeed, it seems that he is selfish enough that in spite of all his talk about the plight of black people, he would rather scuttle a historic opportunity for a black candidate (and someone who was supposed to be his friend) than let his vanity go unflattered for a while (which would really only involve shutting up at least until the election is over)...
Getting more general, I think it's fair to say that it's been a pretty bad month or so for Obama, and some of it is definitely his own fault. For all his obvious intelligence, for his ability to make an excellent speech like the one he did about race in Philadelphia, he can also do something bone-headed enough to cancel out (or even outweigh?) his eloquence (at least politically) in a few short sentences, like his ill-considered "bitter" comments.
Ultimately, I don't know if these non-issues will be enough to sink his campaign. It would be a shame if they did, because I don't think they have anything to do with the substantive issues, and, as I've said before, I do think Obama is best of the three (increasingly unappealing) candidates remaining. But, I have to acknowledge that these sideshows (Wright and the "bitter" flap chief among them) may have hurt him considerably in terms of electability.
I still think his youth, charisma, and sounder policies could see him to victory over old man McCain. (After all, McCain has his own vastly more relevant albatross: Bush.) But, Obama's road to victory is doubtlessly tougher than it seemed only seven or eight weeks ago, and will probably require significantly more savvy than it would've had Wright and the "bitter" thing not become such issues.
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Sunday, March 23, 2008
The Wright Stuff
So Obama's old pastor said some controversial stuff. It would behoove voters, however, to consider more than just the three- or four-second clips that have been played so much in order to get a better idea of exactly what this Wright guy was saying. (Of course, I realize that the average voter is, unfortunately, not terribly interested in getting "hooved," preferring to let his opinions be formed by sound bites and hysterical pundit types, so I don't have a lot of hope that people will delve more deeply on their own. But, for the sake of the more intelligent...)
I have looked, for example, at a 10-minute clip of the sermon containing the "chickens are coming home to roost" quip about 9/11. What does it show? Well, the gist of the argument seems to be that 9/11 was something like retribution for all the awful things America itself has done in the past. Wright mentions how the country was taken forcefully from Native Americans through genocide, how nuclear bombs killed hundreds of thousands of civilians in Japan, and the like. 9/11 then, he says, is something like America being punished for its sins.
So, is this really all that controversial?
I think not. While I think it obviously wrong (in the sense of incorrect) to draw any causal connection between things like the bombing of Hiroshima and 9/11, it is just as obvious that some of America's actions in the Middle East (many of which have been unjust) were viewed by bin Laden et al. as provocations (why obvious? Because he (bin Laden) said so). Now, does that make bin Laden's slaughter of civilians justified? Of course not. But anyone with a little common sense can see that in some vague sense, Wright was right: 9/11 was retribution for some American actions; it was "chickens coming home roost."
Of course, Wright's argument, if one can call it that, was not nearly so subtle: again, there is really no connection whatever between, say, America's mistreatment of the Sioux over a hundred years ago and Al-qaeda's attack. In suggesting that there was, Wright has to make the illogical sort of suppositions that religious types are always keen on making: one, that there is a God, and two, that He would be both so interested in human affairs and so unjust that he would punish individual members of a nation for what other individual members of that nation did at one time or another. Surely, that is stupid on both scores. But, to the extent that the vast majority of voters are kind of stupid in these regards, it wasn't a particularly radical argument that Wright was making.
My larger point, then, is that while brief snippets of these sermons certainly are proving controversial, when one views them in their context it appears far more questionable that they should be so controversial. Now granted, I haven't heard all the contexts for all the offending clips, but if the one above is representative, it seems that the media are successfully making mountains out of molehills.
All of which has some bearing on the even bigger question: how do Wright's statements over the years reflect on Obama himself? Granted, if Wright had been saying, "Go out and kill whitey" or "America is the Great Satan" in all of his speeches for the twenty years or so years Obama has been attending the church, then I'd say Obama would be rightly dead politically. If, however, these few clips, taken out of context, are the very worst people could find, I don't think they can really be taken to reflect seriously on Obama's own views. And indeed, while right-wingers fulminate against Obama over these snippets, saying that he must have known what a bad man his preacher was, I'd say it's perfectly plausible to think that he didn't happen to hear the three or four bits of rabble rousing upon which all the accusations are based.
But hey, let's say he had heard them all. So what? I mean, really. Wright is variously being called a racist, someone who hates a America, and (race-specifically) an anti-Semite. But wait, what, exactly, about even the most offensive of his comments makes him any one of those things? Granted, the "God damn America" bit (which I think is easily the most damaging for Obama) could certainly indicate that Wright is unpatriotic (though again, the context may suggest a far more nuanced view), but I see nothing in the abrasive clips that suggests Wright is a either a racist generally or an anti-Semite specifically. Does he, like so may black leaders, seem to view the world through an excessively race-tinted lens? Fo' shizzle. But I see no "kill whitey" clip/smoking gun that could have demanded, reasonably, that Obama should have leapt up in the middle of some sermon and denounced Wright then and there some 5, 10, or 15 years.
And lacking that, it seems pretty silly to say that Wright himself is a racist, not to mention vastly more ridiculous to say that Obama is too. Even if Wright had made one or two inarguably racist comments over the years, would it follow that Obama must share his pastor's views? Well, could one or two racist comments by someone who is not Obama reasonably be taken to override the hundreds, if not thousands, of statements clearly calling for racial harmony made in this campaign by someone who is Obama (i.e., Obama)? I mean, if Obama says, in effect, "I am not a racist" and "I am not a Muslim" and "I love America" over and over and over again, why would anyone with half a brain not simply take him at his word? I mean, why the hell would someone who hates America run for president? To think that he would, and would lie about his seething hatred just so he can win, you have to actually believe that he is some sort of Manchurian candidate bent on winning the presidency simply so he can destroy the country. And if you're gonna believe something that obviously, well, retarded, then you should just count yourself amongst the conspiracy nuts who think that the moon landing was faked and that aliens walk among us (maybe Obama is one of them!).
No, sadly, what the whole Wright controversy and its effects on Obama in the polls demonstrate, is that far too many voters still have knee-jerk, visceral reactions to images of an angry looking black man. As Wright thunders away in the clips, alarm bells go off in the reptilian parts of some people's minds: "Angry black man scary! Me no like!...What? Obama like angry black man?! Grr, me no like Obama!" A little condescending? Oh hell yes, but all the same, far far closer to the truth, I think, than the Obama's-preacher-is-evil-and-therefore-Obama-himself-is-evil narrative.
Unfortunately, that doesn't mean that all this might not hurt Obama significantly in the long run. I mean, voters wouldn't be the saps that they are if fear-mongering images of wolves and red phones and angry black men didn't have greater power over them than they ought to. And, after numerous efforts by Clinton surrogates and right-wingers to turn Obama's race into a negative, the Wright flap has clearly met with the most success, and I think it will continue to dog Obama no matter what happens.
That said, his speech on race has certainly done a great deal to lessen the damage, and while, as kgaard recently demonstrated so pointedly, partisan hacks will find things to howl about in even the best of speeches, it seems that if anyone has the chops to weather this political storm, it may be Obama.
Meanwhile, Clinton must be hoping, on the other hand, that white voters will flee from Obama en masse, because with the would-be re-votes in Michigan and Florida all but dead, she's gonna need colossal victories in the remaining states to overcome Obama's delegate lead. And, as I said before, I don't think even the Democratic party is self-destructive enough to try to take the nom from Obama if he wins the most pledged delegates, no matter how much Clinton's scurrilous attacks might leave him weakend for the general.
And hey, after five years in Iraq, McCain still doesn't seem to have a firm grasp over something so basic as the difference between Shiites and Sunnis, so I hardly think even a weakened Dem nom can't still have a very solid shot at beating him.
I have looked, for example, at a 10-minute clip of the sermon containing the "chickens are coming home to roost" quip about 9/11. What does it show? Well, the gist of the argument seems to be that 9/11 was something like retribution for all the awful things America itself has done in the past. Wright mentions how the country was taken forcefully from Native Americans through genocide, how nuclear bombs killed hundreds of thousands of civilians in Japan, and the like. 9/11 then, he says, is something like America being punished for its sins.
So, is this really all that controversial?
I think not. While I think it obviously wrong (in the sense of incorrect) to draw any causal connection between things like the bombing of Hiroshima and 9/11, it is just as obvious that some of America's actions in the Middle East (many of which have been unjust) were viewed by bin Laden et al. as provocations (why obvious? Because he (bin Laden) said so). Now, does that make bin Laden's slaughter of civilians justified? Of course not. But anyone with a little common sense can see that in some vague sense, Wright was right: 9/11 was retribution for some American actions; it was "chickens coming home roost."
Of course, Wright's argument, if one can call it that, was not nearly so subtle: again, there is really no connection whatever between, say, America's mistreatment of the Sioux over a hundred years ago and Al-qaeda's attack. In suggesting that there was, Wright has to make the illogical sort of suppositions that religious types are always keen on making: one, that there is a God, and two, that He would be both so interested in human affairs and so unjust that he would punish individual members of a nation for what other individual members of that nation did at one time or another. Surely, that is stupid on both scores. But, to the extent that the vast majority of voters are kind of stupid in these regards, it wasn't a particularly radical argument that Wright was making.
My larger point, then, is that while brief snippets of these sermons certainly are proving controversial, when one views them in their context it appears far more questionable that they should be so controversial. Now granted, I haven't heard all the contexts for all the offending clips, but if the one above is representative, it seems that the media are successfully making mountains out of molehills.
All of which has some bearing on the even bigger question: how do Wright's statements over the years reflect on Obama himself? Granted, if Wright had been saying, "Go out and kill whitey" or "America is the Great Satan" in all of his speeches for the twenty years or so years Obama has been attending the church, then I'd say Obama would be rightly dead politically. If, however, these few clips, taken out of context, are the very worst people could find, I don't think they can really be taken to reflect seriously on Obama's own views. And indeed, while right-wingers fulminate against Obama over these snippets, saying that he must have known what a bad man his preacher was, I'd say it's perfectly plausible to think that he didn't happen to hear the three or four bits of rabble rousing upon which all the accusations are based.
But hey, let's say he had heard them all. So what? I mean, really. Wright is variously being called a racist, someone who hates a America, and (race-specifically) an anti-Semite. But wait, what, exactly, about even the most offensive of his comments makes him any one of those things? Granted, the "God damn America" bit (which I think is easily the most damaging for Obama) could certainly indicate that Wright is unpatriotic (though again, the context may suggest a far more nuanced view), but I see nothing in the abrasive clips that suggests Wright is a either a racist generally or an anti-Semite specifically. Does he, like so may black leaders, seem to view the world through an excessively race-tinted lens? Fo' shizzle. But I see no "kill whitey" clip/smoking gun that could have demanded, reasonably, that Obama should have leapt up in the middle of some sermon and denounced Wright then and there some 5, 10, or 15 years.
And lacking that, it seems pretty silly to say that Wright himself is a racist, not to mention vastly more ridiculous to say that Obama is too. Even if Wright had made one or two inarguably racist comments over the years, would it follow that Obama must share his pastor's views? Well, could one or two racist comments by someone who is not Obama reasonably be taken to override the hundreds, if not thousands, of statements clearly calling for racial harmony made in this campaign by someone who is Obama (i.e., Obama)? I mean, if Obama says, in effect, "I am not a racist" and "I am not a Muslim" and "I love America" over and over and over again, why would anyone with half a brain not simply take him at his word? I mean, why the hell would someone who hates America run for president? To think that he would, and would lie about his seething hatred just so he can win, you have to actually believe that he is some sort of Manchurian candidate bent on winning the presidency simply so he can destroy the country. And if you're gonna believe something that obviously, well, retarded, then you should just count yourself amongst the conspiracy nuts who think that the moon landing was faked and that aliens walk among us (maybe Obama is one of them!).
No, sadly, what the whole Wright controversy and its effects on Obama in the polls demonstrate, is that far too many voters still have knee-jerk, visceral reactions to images of an angry looking black man. As Wright thunders away in the clips, alarm bells go off in the reptilian parts of some people's minds: "Angry black man scary! Me no like!...What? Obama like angry black man?! Grr, me no like Obama!" A little condescending? Oh hell yes, but all the same, far far closer to the truth, I think, than the Obama's-preacher-is-evil-and-therefore-Obama-himself-is-evil narrative.
Unfortunately, that doesn't mean that all this might not hurt Obama significantly in the long run. I mean, voters wouldn't be the saps that they are if fear-mongering images of wolves and red phones and angry black men didn't have greater power over them than they ought to. And, after numerous efforts by Clinton surrogates and right-wingers to turn Obama's race into a negative, the Wright flap has clearly met with the most success, and I think it will continue to dog Obama no matter what happens.
That said, his speech on race has certainly done a great deal to lessen the damage, and while, as kgaard recently demonstrated so pointedly, partisan hacks will find things to howl about in even the best of speeches, it seems that if anyone has the chops to weather this political storm, it may be Obama.
Meanwhile, Clinton must be hoping, on the other hand, that white voters will flee from Obama en masse, because with the would-be re-votes in Michigan and Florida all but dead, she's gonna need colossal victories in the remaining states to overcome Obama's delegate lead. And, as I said before, I don't think even the Democratic party is self-destructive enough to try to take the nom from Obama if he wins the most pledged delegates, no matter how much Clinton's scurrilous attacks might leave him weakend for the general.
And hey, after five years in Iraq, McCain still doesn't seem to have a firm grasp over something so basic as the difference between Shiites and Sunnis, so I hardly think even a weakened Dem nom can't still have a very solid shot at beating him.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
The, uh, Fortnightly Weigh-in -- Clinton on the Ropes
So, a lot has happened since my last post. Let's recap, shall we?
* I'll start with the Republicans, cos they're easy: John McCain will be the GOP's presidential nominee. To steal a line from Colbert, Huckabee may have "majored in miracles," but he apparently failed math. Getting the magic number is only a technicality for McCain. Not bad for a guy who was being left for dead (uh, politically-speaking, that is) a short eight or nine months ago.
How'd he pull this Lazarus routine off? Well, it certainly didn't hurt that his main rival could be described with such great accuracy in this Daily Show send-off. (I found the bit particularly amusing because I had used that exact same epithet to describe Romney only hours before when one of my co-workers told me he was withdrawing: "Good," said I, "that guy's a total ******-***" (or something to that effect)). Not sure why the Huckster didn't do better, but I guess I'm starting to realize that what the average conservative wants is a guy who's basically a complete corporate tool but can also sprinkle some biblical references into his speechifying (apparently, the Huckster didn't fit the bill sufficiently on the first score). Yes, as I read one conservative type saying, Bush was a good candidate cos he was Romney and Huckabee all rolled into one. Sounds like a nightmare to scare Frankenstein to me, but I reckon that is just the sort of jackass who really rallies the righties. Alas, the Decider hisself can only grace us with his glorious leadership for two terms (oh, what a sad day it will be when they put him out to pasture)...
In any case, the torch has been passed to fightin' Johnny McCain.
* But who will his opponent be? Well, after Super Tuesday, there was some wacky spin coming from the Clintonistas that she had done well, crows that Obama's "Obamentum" hadn't really done what was expected, but I, for one, never bought it. Sure, he didn't take California, for example, but for him to have basically managed a draw with the woman who had been the presumptive front-runner at least until Iowa, and then regained that mantle, arguably, after New Hampshire...well, they just couldn't spin that as a good omen for her (or rather, they could, but their jollity seemed a bit forced, to say the least).
Especially with the schedule showing such a good February for Obama. And danged if he and his campaign haven't made the most of it. 10 and 0, particularly with yet another lopsided loss in Wisconsin last night, in which H.C.'s base seemed to increasingly take to the new guy, and it is utterly reasonable to say she's in tremendous trouble. Can you count her out, yet? Nah, that'd be stupid after all the wackiness that's gone on this campaign season, but if I understand the delegate math very well, it sounds to me like she'd need to have the sort of blowouts Obama's been racking up recently to even pull even in the delegate race, and given that her wins have typically been much closer than his, it just seems really, really unlikely that she'll pull that off. Sure, she *might* win Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, but even if she does, it's sounds like it will be extremely difficult for her to make up the delegate gap.
And, whoever has the pledged delegate lead when the dust settles will, I think, be the Democratic nominee. Could the so-called super delegates effectively override the will of the voters and hand the nomination to Clinton if she comes in with fewer pledged delegates? Sure, but besides being patently anti-democratic, it would be incredibly stupid in terms of the chances of beating McCain. Have the Dems been incredibly stupid in the past? Sure, so I guess anything's possible, but I don't think even they are dumb enough as a group to try something like that. Besides, Obama (short of donning a turban and converting to Islam) is obviously the stronger general election candidate, so I think that'll make things pretty easy for 'em, should it come to that.
As it is, I wouldn't be surpised if Obama doesn't take one of those big three states and open up a delegate lead big enough to make it pretty much a moot question. (I.e., it's one thing if he's only ahead by a few delegates, but if he stays up by a couple hundred, it's even harder to imagine the super delegates trying to steal it.)
* So, let's just say it's Obama v. McCain in the general. Well, first of all, I'd have to say that after eight years of Bush, it might seem like the electoral Moirae are finally smiling on us. Well, at least on me, anyway, since that was the combo I was hopin' for.
So, I then have to wonder if things will go completely as I'd like and Obama (the least of all the potential evils, in my estimation) will win in November.
Well, with the caveat that a whole lotta stuff could happen in the next eight or so months, I'd say at this point that it would definitely look like his race to lose. Sure, there's the fact that he's half black, the fiction that he's a Muslim, the "naive" tag, but Democratic voters, for the most part, at least, haven't seemed to take the bait. Will Republicans and independents be more susceptible to such "arguments"? Perhaps, but plenty of them seem to be voting for him in these primaries, so it's doesn't seem right to think they'd abandon him en masse in the general.
And as for the Muslim trick and similar lies, those should provide an interesting test for McCain, actually. Having been burned himself by such scrofulous stuff by the Bushies in 2000, he will probably be given the opportunity at some point to take the high road and call those lies what they are. Will he do the straight-talkin' thing and speak the truth, even if condemning the lies might be politically inexpedient? Or will he act like Bush with the Swiftboaters, vaguely pooh-poohing "outside groups" while clearly hopin' that their lies help him win?
Well, either way, again, I think the younger, charismatic, potential "first ever" candidate has a basic advantage over the old white guy, even if the latter is fairly likable as politicians go. Sure, lots of things could change the calculus. If al-Qaeda attacks in the US again, if Obama is caught in a truly unambiguous case of plagiarism or dirty-dealing with some idicted supporter...then sure, maybe people go with the "safe" choice, the "authentic" war hero.
But, absent some major game-changing event, or a big blunder on Obama's part, I'd put money on him beating McCain come November. I'd estimate by 5 to 10 percent, in fact, since I'm busy prognosticatin'...
Well, we'll see. He's still gotta get by Hillary first.
* I'll start with the Republicans, cos they're easy: John McCain will be the GOP's presidential nominee. To steal a line from Colbert, Huckabee may have "majored in miracles," but he apparently failed math. Getting the magic number is only a technicality for McCain. Not bad for a guy who was being left for dead (uh, politically-speaking, that is) a short eight or nine months ago.
How'd he pull this Lazarus routine off? Well, it certainly didn't hurt that his main rival could be described with such great accuracy in this Daily Show send-off. (I found the bit particularly amusing because I had used that exact same epithet to describe Romney only hours before when one of my co-workers told me he was withdrawing: "Good," said I, "that guy's a total ******-***" (or something to that effect)). Not sure why the Huckster didn't do better, but I guess I'm starting to realize that what the average conservative wants is a guy who's basically a complete corporate tool but can also sprinkle some biblical references into his speechifying (apparently, the Huckster didn't fit the bill sufficiently on the first score). Yes, as I read one conservative type saying, Bush was a good candidate cos he was Romney and Huckabee all rolled into one. Sounds like a nightmare to scare Frankenstein to me, but I reckon that is just the sort of jackass who really rallies the righties. Alas, the Decider hisself can only grace us with his glorious leadership for two terms (oh, what a sad day it will be when they put him out to pasture)...
In any case, the torch has been passed to fightin' Johnny McCain.
* But who will his opponent be? Well, after Super Tuesday, there was some wacky spin coming from the Clintonistas that she had done well, crows that Obama's "Obamentum" hadn't really done what was expected, but I, for one, never bought it. Sure, he didn't take California, for example, but for him to have basically managed a draw with the woman who had been the presumptive front-runner at least until Iowa, and then regained that mantle, arguably, after New Hampshire...well, they just couldn't spin that as a good omen for her (or rather, they could, but their jollity seemed a bit forced, to say the least).
Especially with the schedule showing such a good February for Obama. And danged if he and his campaign haven't made the most of it. 10 and 0, particularly with yet another lopsided loss in Wisconsin last night, in which H.C.'s base seemed to increasingly take to the new guy, and it is utterly reasonable to say she's in tremendous trouble. Can you count her out, yet? Nah, that'd be stupid after all the wackiness that's gone on this campaign season, but if I understand the delegate math very well, it sounds to me like she'd need to have the sort of blowouts Obama's been racking up recently to even pull even in the delegate race, and given that her wins have typically been much closer than his, it just seems really, really unlikely that she'll pull that off. Sure, she *might* win Texas, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, but even if she does, it's sounds like it will be extremely difficult for her to make up the delegate gap.
And, whoever has the pledged delegate lead when the dust settles will, I think, be the Democratic nominee. Could the so-called super delegates effectively override the will of the voters and hand the nomination to Clinton if she comes in with fewer pledged delegates? Sure, but besides being patently anti-democratic, it would be incredibly stupid in terms of the chances of beating McCain. Have the Dems been incredibly stupid in the past? Sure, so I guess anything's possible, but I don't think even they are dumb enough as a group to try something like that. Besides, Obama (short of donning a turban and converting to Islam) is obviously the stronger general election candidate, so I think that'll make things pretty easy for 'em, should it come to that.
As it is, I wouldn't be surpised if Obama doesn't take one of those big three states and open up a delegate lead big enough to make it pretty much a moot question. (I.e., it's one thing if he's only ahead by a few delegates, but if he stays up by a couple hundred, it's even harder to imagine the super delegates trying to steal it.)
* So, let's just say it's Obama v. McCain in the general. Well, first of all, I'd have to say that after eight years of Bush, it might seem like the electoral Moirae are finally smiling on us. Well, at least on me, anyway, since that was the combo I was hopin' for.
So, I then have to wonder if things will go completely as I'd like and Obama (the least of all the potential evils, in my estimation) will win in November.
Well, with the caveat that a whole lotta stuff could happen in the next eight or so months, I'd say at this point that it would definitely look like his race to lose. Sure, there's the fact that he's half black, the fiction that he's a Muslim, the "naive" tag, but Democratic voters, for the most part, at least, haven't seemed to take the bait. Will Republicans and independents be more susceptible to such "arguments"? Perhaps, but plenty of them seem to be voting for him in these primaries, so it's doesn't seem right to think they'd abandon him en masse in the general.
And as for the Muslim trick and similar lies, those should provide an interesting test for McCain, actually. Having been burned himself by such scrofulous stuff by the Bushies in 2000, he will probably be given the opportunity at some point to take the high road and call those lies what they are. Will he do the straight-talkin' thing and speak the truth, even if condemning the lies might be politically inexpedient? Or will he act like Bush with the Swiftboaters, vaguely pooh-poohing "outside groups" while clearly hopin' that their lies help him win?
Well, either way, again, I think the younger, charismatic, potential "first ever" candidate has a basic advantage over the old white guy, even if the latter is fairly likable as politicians go. Sure, lots of things could change the calculus. If al-Qaeda attacks in the US again, if Obama is caught in a truly unambiguous case of plagiarism or dirty-dealing with some idicted supporter...then sure, maybe people go with the "safe" choice, the "authentic" war hero.
But, absent some major game-changing event, or a big blunder on Obama's part, I'd put money on him beating McCain come November. I'd estimate by 5 to 10 percent, in fact, since I'm busy prognosticatin'...
Well, we'll see. He's still gotta get by Hillary first.
Saturday, February 2, 2008
Super Tuesday Pre-Fight Weigh-in - Knockouts and Split Decisions
Well, so much has happened since I blathered last that it would be difficult to express all the things that have wandered through my brain in the meantime. But, I can certainly attempt a sampling:
* The Democratic race got particularly ugly there for a while (no?) with someone (well, several someones) "playing the race card" rather shamelessly, and I don't think it was the black guy...Yup, I agree with the opinion of various other observers who think that Clinton et al. (esp. the ex-president) were subtly, but very intentionally, trying to remind voters that, oh, in case you didn't notice, Barack Obama is black. I think the Clintons made a strategic decision of sorts to go ahead and p.o. the darker-skinned citizens of South Carolina, which they were almost certainly gonna lose anyway, so that they could pigeonhole Obama, so to speak, as "the black candidate" for the rest of the country. Any doubts about whether this was really intentional should've been put to rest when Bill "I did not have sexual relations with that woman" Clinton made the brilliant observation that Jesse Jackson had also won South Carolina primaries on account (by Clinton's obvious implication) of his being black...this, after the race-baiting had already been given significant scrutiny in the run-up to the vote.
Kinda reminds me why I was just a little bit happy to see that bastard get impeached, even if it was by a gaggle of Republican hypocrites. But hey, whatever it takes to win, right?
The question, of course, is whether it will help or hurt Billary come Tuesday. It obviously hurt in SC, but alas, I tend to think it might serve its purpose to some extent in other parts of the country (i.e., all the parts where blacks don't make up 50% of the electorate, which is most of them). Of course, in an earlier post, I submitted that I was somewhat hopeful that most of America was past the point where it would let racism be an issue, and to some extent, I retain that hope. What I was forgetting, I think, is how much politics is a game of fractions and tiny perceentages -- in a very close contest, it's hardly necessary that the Clintons' slimy, racist appeals be bought by a significant minority, let alone majority, of voters. If only, say, five percent here and there are primitive enough to be swayed by such nastiness, that could be more than enough to get her the nom in the long run.
But again, I really don't know if it will have the intended effect. It could even backfire -- let's hope so. (Of course, to be precise, I am speaking about overall numbers; obviously, it *has* angered a great many individuals who might have voted for H.C. otherwise, but it may be that they will be outnumbered, overall, by those who still can't cotton to some "uppity negro" aspiring to the *White* House.)
And of course, the race issue is just one aspect of the contest overall, such that we'll never be able to disentagle it entirely from all the other perceived pros and cons that might sway people to vote for one or the other. For example, a great many women, especially older ones, seem inclined to vote for Clinton for the relatively positive (though not necessarily much less stupid) reason that she is a she. Even absent the race-baiting, that - and the many other perceived pros and cons of both candidates - might be enough to give her a victory.
Indeed, though I (like virtually *everyone* else, I assume) have done pretty poorly with the electoral prognosticating in this particulary wild primary season, I am inclined to believe that the lady Clinton enjoys a slight (but even slight can be significant) advantage going into this most critical of rounds. Because, much as one might sometimes wish that general population was more tuned in to what's happening in the world, the fact is that the vast majority barely know, as Randy Newman might put it, their asses from a hole in the ground, and while Obama may be all the rage amongst the relatively well-educated and informed (and exit polls suggest that to be the case) most people, by definitional neccesity, are relatively clueless and dim-witted. But then, even the most ignorant of voters (excluding the deaf ones) could hardly have failed to hear the name Clinton repeated ad nauseam on their boobtubes these last 15 or so years...And so, methinks that in these 20-some Super Tuesday states she could well have that same dreaded name-recognition advantage that contrubted hugely to burdening the country with another loser Bush presidency these past 7 years.
Yes, it seems that in spite of the enormous crowds he continues to attract, Clinton could well beat Obama by a bit overall come Tuesday. Again, of course, I hope I'm wrong, and certainly there are some signs that could be taken as indictating that he is closingthe gap, but if I absolutely had to put money on it, I'd expect her to have a lead come Wednesday.
That said, and as I've alluded to in the title of this post, it seems that whoever wins on Tuesday is extremely unlikely to do so by a big enough outcome to make the ultimate outcome a certainty. Whatever happens Tuesday, it seems that neither Obama or Clinton will be able to make a credible claim on the nomination 'til many weeks later, at the earliest.
* 'Course, that's on the Dem side. The 'Publicans' nominee may well be decided, more or less, within the week. Or rather, to be precise, it may well have been decided, in effect, when wacky old John McCain managed to knock Romney off yet again in Florida. Yup, in spite of the distaste, if not downright hatred, he seems to inspire in conservative blowhards like Limbaugh and, uh, what's-his-name...the religious twit who thought Spongebob promoted homosexuality -- Oh yeah, Dobson...it seems that the old bugger has managed to come out atop the extremely crowded Republican field. Not bad for a guy who many people had written off as done for back in the summer, though I have to think it has more to do with the 'Publicans identity issues and the crowded, long-unsettled field than McCain's own appeal to most Republican voters. They just couldn't quite buy Romney's latter-day conversion (haha) to basic Republican planks like being anti-gay and anti-abortion, not to mention his freaky-deaky Mormonism, and, as one of this blog's readers pointed out, I guess enough of the party establishment likewise couldn't stomach the more populist aspects of Huckabee's candidacy to swing their support behind him. And so, with votes being split several ways in every primary, guess McCain just emerged as the not particularly popular, but least un-popular choice for early 'Publican voters. And, at least by all appearances, and especially with Huckabee still in the race to siphon away some of the religious-nut votes, it don't look like Romney will have a chance to catch McCain. And indeed, since most o' the Republican contests are winner-take-all, as opposed to proportionally awarded like the Dem ones, it's quite possible that McCain will come out of Tuesday with a virtual lock on the nomination.
* And of course, while that may dismay a lot of right-wingers, McCain may well be his party's best candidate for the general election, given his appeal to people who aren't, y'know, stoopid right-wingers. Like I've said meself, for example, while I find a good deal of McCain's actions and positions to be highly hypocritical, to say nothing of flat wrong in various cases, he certainly strikes me as the least of the potential Republican evils. Indeed, if it comes down to a contest b/t him and Clintons, I can't say, at this point, that I'd vote for her, or even necessarily prefer her. Probably wouldn't vote for him either, but honestly, much as I disagree with some of his postions (he *is* still a Republican, after all, in spite of what some of his own part's critics might say), I think he has shown himself to moderate and sensible enough for the most part that I prolly wouldn't mind the fact that he's anti-abortion, for example (cos hey, Roe v. Wade ain't gonna get overturned anyway, and if it ever does, let's face it, that'd be the Republicans writing their own political death warrant until it were reinstated again)...And then there's the fact that I find Clinton herself pretty damn dislikable.
And, as to much of the preceding paragraph, I daresay a lotta voters may feel the same way. I mean, I still think that Clinton should be able to beat McCain or any other Republican in a general, but given the antipathy she inspires in so many and his own popularity with moderates and independents, I think the old guy would have a pretty decent chance of beating her.
* Now, if it were Obama against McCain on the other hand, I tend to think McCain would have a harder time. True, I the whole race issue still seems to be a bit of an unknown, but I think that Obama's relative youth and charisma would contrast too strongly with the septagenarian for him to keep up, particulary given the fact that Obama (unlike Clinton) has himself proven to be pretty popular with moderates and independents alike.
...
Oh, but who knows what will happen? As I've said before, I can see no option better than an Obama v. McCain general, and it looks like at least half of that combo may get locked in on Tuesday, but as all the craziness thus far has amply demonstrated, there's just no tellin' what'll actually end up happenin'.
Whatever it is, I reckon I'll weigh-in with my own thoughts on it sometime in the aftermath, but for now, I reckon I'm ready to just see what them crazy American voters have to say.
***
* The Democratic race got particularly ugly there for a while (no?) with someone (well, several someones) "playing the race card" rather shamelessly, and I don't think it was the black guy...Yup, I agree with the opinion of various other observers who think that Clinton et al. (esp. the ex-president) were subtly, but very intentionally, trying to remind voters that, oh, in case you didn't notice, Barack Obama is black. I think the Clintons made a strategic decision of sorts to go ahead and p.o. the darker-skinned citizens of South Carolina, which they were almost certainly gonna lose anyway, so that they could pigeonhole Obama, so to speak, as "the black candidate" for the rest of the country. Any doubts about whether this was really intentional should've been put to rest when Bill "I did not have sexual relations with that woman" Clinton made the brilliant observation that Jesse Jackson had also won South Carolina primaries on account (by Clinton's obvious implication) of his being black...this, after the race-baiting had already been given significant scrutiny in the run-up to the vote.
Kinda reminds me why I was just a little bit happy to see that bastard get impeached, even if it was by a gaggle of Republican hypocrites. But hey, whatever it takes to win, right?
The question, of course, is whether it will help or hurt Billary come Tuesday. It obviously hurt in SC, but alas, I tend to think it might serve its purpose to some extent in other parts of the country (i.e., all the parts where blacks don't make up 50% of the electorate, which is most of them). Of course, in an earlier post, I submitted that I was somewhat hopeful that most of America was past the point where it would let racism be an issue, and to some extent, I retain that hope. What I was forgetting, I think, is how much politics is a game of fractions and tiny perceentages -- in a very close contest, it's hardly necessary that the Clintons' slimy, racist appeals be bought by a significant minority, let alone majority, of voters. If only, say, five percent here and there are primitive enough to be swayed by such nastiness, that could be more than enough to get her the nom in the long run.
But again, I really don't know if it will have the intended effect. It could even backfire -- let's hope so. (Of course, to be precise, I am speaking about overall numbers; obviously, it *has* angered a great many individuals who might have voted for H.C. otherwise, but it may be that they will be outnumbered, overall, by those who still can't cotton to some "uppity negro" aspiring to the *White* House.)
And of course, the race issue is just one aspect of the contest overall, such that we'll never be able to disentagle it entirely from all the other perceived pros and cons that might sway people to vote for one or the other. For example, a great many women, especially older ones, seem inclined to vote for Clinton for the relatively positive (though not necessarily much less stupid) reason that she is a she. Even absent the race-baiting, that - and the many other perceived pros and cons of both candidates - might be enough to give her a victory.
Indeed, though I (like virtually *everyone* else, I assume) have done pretty poorly with the electoral prognosticating in this particulary wild primary season, I am inclined to believe that the lady Clinton enjoys a slight (but even slight can be significant) advantage going into this most critical of rounds. Because, much as one might sometimes wish that general population was more tuned in to what's happening in the world, the fact is that the vast majority barely know, as Randy Newman might put it, their asses from a hole in the ground, and while Obama may be all the rage amongst the relatively well-educated and informed (and exit polls suggest that to be the case) most people, by definitional neccesity, are relatively clueless and dim-witted. But then, even the most ignorant of voters (excluding the deaf ones) could hardly have failed to hear the name Clinton repeated ad nauseam on their boobtubes these last 15 or so years...And so, methinks that in these 20-some Super Tuesday states she could well have that same dreaded name-recognition advantage that contrubted hugely to burdening the country with another loser Bush presidency these past 7 years.
Yes, it seems that in spite of the enormous crowds he continues to attract, Clinton could well beat Obama by a bit overall come Tuesday. Again, of course, I hope I'm wrong, and certainly there are some signs that could be taken as indictating that he is closingthe gap, but if I absolutely had to put money on it, I'd expect her to have a lead come Wednesday.
That said, and as I've alluded to in the title of this post, it seems that whoever wins on Tuesday is extremely unlikely to do so by a big enough outcome to make the ultimate outcome a certainty. Whatever happens Tuesday, it seems that neither Obama or Clinton will be able to make a credible claim on the nomination 'til many weeks later, at the earliest.
* 'Course, that's on the Dem side. The 'Publicans' nominee may well be decided, more or less, within the week. Or rather, to be precise, it may well have been decided, in effect, when wacky old John McCain managed to knock Romney off yet again in Florida. Yup, in spite of the distaste, if not downright hatred, he seems to inspire in conservative blowhards like Limbaugh and, uh, what's-his-name...the religious twit who thought Spongebob promoted homosexuality -- Oh yeah, Dobson...it seems that the old bugger has managed to come out atop the extremely crowded Republican field. Not bad for a guy who many people had written off as done for back in the summer, though I have to think it has more to do with the 'Publicans identity issues and the crowded, long-unsettled field than McCain's own appeal to most Republican voters. They just couldn't quite buy Romney's latter-day conversion (haha) to basic Republican planks like being anti-gay and anti-abortion, not to mention his freaky-deaky Mormonism, and, as one of this blog's readers pointed out, I guess enough of the party establishment likewise couldn't stomach the more populist aspects of Huckabee's candidacy to swing their support behind him. And so, with votes being split several ways in every primary, guess McCain just emerged as the not particularly popular, but least un-popular choice for early 'Publican voters. And, at least by all appearances, and especially with Huckabee still in the race to siphon away some of the religious-nut votes, it don't look like Romney will have a chance to catch McCain. And indeed, since most o' the Republican contests are winner-take-all, as opposed to proportionally awarded like the Dem ones, it's quite possible that McCain will come out of Tuesday with a virtual lock on the nomination.
* And of course, while that may dismay a lot of right-wingers, McCain may well be his party's best candidate for the general election, given his appeal to people who aren't, y'know, stoopid right-wingers. Like I've said meself, for example, while I find a good deal of McCain's actions and positions to be highly hypocritical, to say nothing of flat wrong in various cases, he certainly strikes me as the least of the potential Republican evils. Indeed, if it comes down to a contest b/t him and Clintons, I can't say, at this point, that I'd vote for her, or even necessarily prefer her. Probably wouldn't vote for him either, but honestly, much as I disagree with some of his postions (he *is* still a Republican, after all, in spite of what some of his own part's critics might say), I think he has shown himself to moderate and sensible enough for the most part that I prolly wouldn't mind the fact that he's anti-abortion, for example (cos hey, Roe v. Wade ain't gonna get overturned anyway, and if it ever does, let's face it, that'd be the Republicans writing their own political death warrant until it were reinstated again)...And then there's the fact that I find Clinton herself pretty damn dislikable.
And, as to much of the preceding paragraph, I daresay a lotta voters may feel the same way. I mean, I still think that Clinton should be able to beat McCain or any other Republican in a general, but given the antipathy she inspires in so many and his own popularity with moderates and independents, I think the old guy would have a pretty decent chance of beating her.
* Now, if it were Obama against McCain on the other hand, I tend to think McCain would have a harder time. True, I the whole race issue still seems to be a bit of an unknown, but I think that Obama's relative youth and charisma would contrast too strongly with the septagenarian for him to keep up, particulary given the fact that Obama (unlike Clinton) has himself proven to be pretty popular with moderates and independents alike.
...
Oh, but who knows what will happen? As I've said before, I can see no option better than an Obama v. McCain general, and it looks like at least half of that combo may get locked in on Tuesday, but as all the craziness thus far has amply demonstrated, there's just no tellin' what'll actually end up happenin'.
Whatever it is, I reckon I'll weigh-in with my own thoughts on it sometime in the aftermath, but for now, I reckon I'm ready to just see what them crazy American voters have to say.
***
Thursday, January 10, 2008
Primary Weigh-in -- Spoke Too Soon
As I watched the results come in from the Democratic primary, I had to wonder what had happened to those polls showing Obama with a substantial lead: Had his supporters thought it was in the bag and gotten complacent? Had too many independents decided to vote for McCain in what figured to be a closer race? Had those contrarian New Hampshireites simply decided they weren't going to let Iowa and the media tell them who they were gonna vote for? Had Hillary's "tearing up" moment, which I can't help but see as at least partially calculated, actually succeeded in swaying voters to her cause?
Well, the dissection continues, and other theories have been floated (including what may be the most troubling: the so-called Bradley Effect), but in any case it seems likely that a number of factors came together to give Clinton a thin win after a fat victory had been predicted for Obama. And so, it looks like I may have spoken too soon in my previous post. That said, I think Obama's chances are still quite good, but things definitely look a lot tougher than they would have if Clinton had been sent reeling by back-to-back losses. Now, instead of a virtual cakewalk to the nomination, Obama looks to have a much tougher road ahead, and there is a significant chance that Hillary could be the nominee instead.
I can't help but think that that would be a terrible mistake on the part of Democrats. While I do believe that even Hillary ought to be able to beat the Republican nominee, I think there would be a much greater risk that she wouldn't, given the extreme antipathy she generates among most Republicans and even some independents. What's more, while I don't think there are huge policy differences between her and Obama, I think that an Obama presidency would do a lot more to repair America's image around the world and speak more directly to some of the things that are genuinely good about this country and the way it works.
So, will Democratic voters see it that way? I certainly hope so, but it's up to Obama and his people to make that case. It shouldn't be too difficult. After all, he was the one who got unprecented numbers of young people to caucus in Iowa, and he was the one who got tremendous support from independents both there and in New Hampshire. Clearly, he is the one who inspires the broadest range of voters, and therefore the Democrat with the best chance of taking the presidency in a general election.
That said, as Mayor Quimby once noted, and as the voters of New Hampshire so recently proved, people really are just "a bunch of fickle mushheads." It remains to be seen, then, whether primary voters in the rest of the country will see the light. I think Obama still has a good shot at taking Nevada and (even moreso) South Carolina, which would give him some advantage heading into Super Tuesday. But even if he does take both of those, I certainly won't be counting any more chickens before they're hatched. That, above all, is the lesson of New Hampshire.
Well, the dissection continues, and other theories have been floated (including what may be the most troubling: the so-called Bradley Effect), but in any case it seems likely that a number of factors came together to give Clinton a thin win after a fat victory had been predicted for Obama. And so, it looks like I may have spoken too soon in my previous post. That said, I think Obama's chances are still quite good, but things definitely look a lot tougher than they would have if Clinton had been sent reeling by back-to-back losses. Now, instead of a virtual cakewalk to the nomination, Obama looks to have a much tougher road ahead, and there is a significant chance that Hillary could be the nominee instead.
I can't help but think that that would be a terrible mistake on the part of Democrats. While I do believe that even Hillary ought to be able to beat the Republican nominee, I think there would be a much greater risk that she wouldn't, given the extreme antipathy she generates among most Republicans and even some independents. What's more, while I don't think there are huge policy differences between her and Obama, I think that an Obama presidency would do a lot more to repair America's image around the world and speak more directly to some of the things that are genuinely good about this country and the way it works.
So, will Democratic voters see it that way? I certainly hope so, but it's up to Obama and his people to make that case. It shouldn't be too difficult. After all, he was the one who got unprecented numbers of young people to caucus in Iowa, and he was the one who got tremendous support from independents both there and in New Hampshire. Clearly, he is the one who inspires the broadest range of voters, and therefore the Democrat with the best chance of taking the presidency in a general election.
That said, as Mayor Quimby once noted, and as the voters of New Hampshire so recently proved, people really are just "a bunch of fickle mushheads." It remains to be seen, then, whether primary voters in the rest of the country will see the light. I think Obama still has a good shot at taking Nevada and (even moreso) South Carolina, which would give him some advantage heading into Super Tuesday. But even if he does take both of those, I certainly won't be counting any more chickens before they're hatched. That, above all, is the lesson of New Hampshire.
Saturday, January 5, 2008
Weekly Weigh-in -- The Next President?
So, that Iowa vote was pretty cool, no? I mean, you might've gathered that I'm just a tad cynical about the politics, but I gotta admit there's something kinda, ahem, uplifting about a half-African progressive trouncing the field in a state that's -- what? -- 95% white. And doing it with loads of independents and, better yet, young people.
That last point, though it has been mentioned some, really has gotten short shrift from the MSM coverage that I've seen. After all, since I've been alive, I can't recall a single close election where us young folks (and I think I can still barely say "us" :) didn't seem to have a preference for one candidate, but then got crapped on by everyone b/c we couldn't tear ourselves away from the Xbox to vote for, say, freakin' John Kerry. But in Iowa, it sounds like the youth vote really turned out in droves, not merely for a simple, standard-type vote, but for the absurdly long and messy caucus business. That's huge, and to the extent that it gets the ball rolling, it may just prove to have been a decisive factor in choosing the next president.
Not that I'm one of these people who seem to want to regard Obama as some sort of black messiah. Far from it -- he is a pol, after all, and therefore has to automatically be regarded with some suspicion. Certainly, like all of them, I don't doubt that he's done some double-talking, been a hypocrite here and there, or that he hasn't got a skeleton or two in his closet (main thing I've heard thus far was an overly cozy-sounding real estate deal, though that does seem pretty small-time for the avg. candidate). . .
But, in a relative sense, it's hard to deny that's there's something special about the guy, even if in large part it comes down to charisma and the symbolism of what a win for him would mean. His candidacy is truly a phenomenon of sorts at this point, and genuinely unlike anything I've ever seen in the American political world.
But the question remains: can he be stopped? Frankly, I doubt it very much. Certainly, New Hampshire is the last chance for Clinton to save herself -- if she loses there, it's almost impossible to imagine her winning in South Carolina since about half of its Dem voters are black. (And while Clinton can maybe take Nevada -- I really don't know cos I ain't heard much about it -- I get the impression that it doesn't matter too much.) And if she's lost in Iowa, NH, and SC, I think she gets wiped out on Super Tuesday.
So, again, can she win NH? Maybe. The latest polls still show her with a slim lead there, but they were conducted largely before the Iowa result. There's no question that Iowa will give a big boost to Obama, and they're close enough already that it should give him more than enough to deal Clinton's campaign an effectively fatal blow. That is, of course, unless he cocks it up badly somehow in tonight's debate, which I think is extremely unlikely.
In the end, it seems to have come down to this: people just don't like Hilary that much -- she's not gonna inspire people to vote who otherwise might not -- and the opposite is true of Obama. Once it got close in Iowa and he proved that he had a legitimate shot of beating her, people began to rush to support him whilst shrugging their shoulders about her.
So yeah, huge odds on Obama being the Democratic nominee.
As for the Republicans? Well, things remain pretty unclear there. Certainly, I wasn't surprised to see the Huck-ba-crite take Iowa. Don't think he has much chance in NH, which puts it down to McCain or Romney. If the latter loses there -- and my hunch is that he will after the drubbing in Iowa -- it's over for him. But that would leave McCain, the Huckster, and Mayor 9/11 all with some shot at it. As I've said before, I think the bible-thumper would have the inside track there, but it's hard to say for sure at this point.
And would Obama beat any of those guys? I'd give him good odds, for sure, at this point. 'Course, the general election campaign will be a long one, so lots of stuff could happen to change the calculus, but barring any major gaffes on his part or some crazy geo-political event or what not, I'd say he could pretty much walk away with it. That is, of course, unless I've underestimated the latent racism of the American electorate or its ability to be duped by ridiculous cheap shots (granted, one's estimation of the morality and intelligence of John Q. Public is one of those things I've found it's almost impossible to be too cynical about), but I have to think my estimate is close enough.
'Course, someone might shoot him or something -- certainly wouldn't put it past some troglodyte to try -- but I gotta hope that the Secret Service et al. are taking that threat as seriously as they should and will be able to do what's necessary to prevent it.
So right. . . Barack Obama -- the next president(?)
That last point, though it has been mentioned some, really has gotten short shrift from the MSM coverage that I've seen. After all, since I've been alive, I can't recall a single close election where us young folks (and I think I can still barely say "us" :) didn't seem to have a preference for one candidate, but then got crapped on by everyone b/c we couldn't tear ourselves away from the Xbox to vote for, say, freakin' John Kerry. But in Iowa, it sounds like the youth vote really turned out in droves, not merely for a simple, standard-type vote, but for the absurdly long and messy caucus business. That's huge, and to the extent that it gets the ball rolling, it may just prove to have been a decisive factor in choosing the next president.
Not that I'm one of these people who seem to want to regard Obama as some sort of black messiah. Far from it -- he is a pol, after all, and therefore has to automatically be regarded with some suspicion. Certainly, like all of them, I don't doubt that he's done some double-talking, been a hypocrite here and there, or that he hasn't got a skeleton or two in his closet (main thing I've heard thus far was an overly cozy-sounding real estate deal, though that does seem pretty small-time for the avg. candidate). . .
But, in a relative sense, it's hard to deny that's there's something special about the guy, even if in large part it comes down to charisma and the symbolism of what a win for him would mean. His candidacy is truly a phenomenon of sorts at this point, and genuinely unlike anything I've ever seen in the American political world.
But the question remains: can he be stopped? Frankly, I doubt it very much. Certainly, New Hampshire is the last chance for Clinton to save herself -- if she loses there, it's almost impossible to imagine her winning in South Carolina since about half of its Dem voters are black. (And while Clinton can maybe take Nevada -- I really don't know cos I ain't heard much about it -- I get the impression that it doesn't matter too much.) And if she's lost in Iowa, NH, and SC, I think she gets wiped out on Super Tuesday.
So, again, can she win NH? Maybe. The latest polls still show her with a slim lead there, but they were conducted largely before the Iowa result. There's no question that Iowa will give a big boost to Obama, and they're close enough already that it should give him more than enough to deal Clinton's campaign an effectively fatal blow. That is, of course, unless he cocks it up badly somehow in tonight's debate, which I think is extremely unlikely.
In the end, it seems to have come down to this: people just don't like Hilary that much -- she's not gonna inspire people to vote who otherwise might not -- and the opposite is true of Obama. Once it got close in Iowa and he proved that he had a legitimate shot of beating her, people began to rush to support him whilst shrugging their shoulders about her.
So yeah, huge odds on Obama being the Democratic nominee.
As for the Republicans? Well, things remain pretty unclear there. Certainly, I wasn't surprised to see the Huck-ba-crite take Iowa. Don't think he has much chance in NH, which puts it down to McCain or Romney. If the latter loses there -- and my hunch is that he will after the drubbing in Iowa -- it's over for him. But that would leave McCain, the Huckster, and Mayor 9/11 all with some shot at it. As I've said before, I think the bible-thumper would have the inside track there, but it's hard to say for sure at this point.
And would Obama beat any of those guys? I'd give him good odds, for sure, at this point. 'Course, the general election campaign will be a long one, so lots of stuff could happen to change the calculus, but barring any major gaffes on his part or some crazy geo-political event or what not, I'd say he could pretty much walk away with it. That is, of course, unless I've underestimated the latent racism of the American electorate or its ability to be duped by ridiculous cheap shots (granted, one's estimation of the morality and intelligence of John Q. Public is one of those things I've found it's almost impossible to be too cynical about), but I have to think my estimate is close enough.
'Course, someone might shoot him or something -- certainly wouldn't put it past some troglodyte to try -- but I gotta hope that the Secret Service et al. are taking that threat as seriously as they should and will be able to do what's necessary to prevent it.
So right. . . Barack Obama -- the next president(?)
Sunday, December 23, 2007
The Weekly Weigh-in -- Foresight is 20/200
Yes, as this nomination thing really comes to head here, I think it's fair to say that my prognostications of only two months ago may prove to be way way off. Then again, that was what a lot of people were thinking, and, while the rather distasteful general election contest I then saw as likely may not come to pass, I do think I'd picked up on a few of the things that might keep it from doing so.
But let's get specific, shall we? In short, Clinton and Giuliani's respective roads to a nominationjust look a heck of a lot less clear than they did back then. Indeed, they look downright treacherous. In fact, the way things look now, I'd say there's a pretty solid chance that ol' Rudy will be nothing but an afterthought in a month or two. Put simply, it seems like his somewhat odious personal life, coupled with the fact that he wasn't much of a blood-red Republican anyway (oh, and maybe that the whole terrorism/war issue, upon which almost all of his supposed appeal was based, has, somewhat inexplicably, become far less of an important issue for primary voters), has finally caught up with him, and a month or two too soon for his lofty ambitions. Of course, his strategy for a while has been to ignore the first state or two and hope that no one else can pick up the momentum from wins there to stop him in bigger states where he was (until recently, at least) more popular than all the other contenders. And, that might yet work, but, given the way he's been sinking like a rock, polling wise, in even those states (Florida, for example) suggests that he will not be saved by them.
But, then again, things are still incredibly fluid in the whole Republican race. As there were hints of even back in October, the Right-wingers have been rushing towards Huckabee as he seems to be the only semi-viable option who isn't Giuliani, the Mormon, McCain, or some other RINO ("Republican in Name Only"). At least in Iowa, that is. There, I think it will be extremely difficult for Romney to stop Huckabee's surge, especially if he keeps making mistakes -- like saying he "saw" his father march with Martin Luther King, and then having to say he meant "saw" in a "figurative" sense because, well, that probably never really happened -- that point out the fact that he's, y'know, a liar. So, yeah, I see Huckabee taking Iowa pretty convincingly, in spite of the numerous negative stories that are now starting to surface about him (more on that later).
But, apparently the good people of New Hampshire don't have much use for Bible-thumping hicks, so Huckabee doesn't look like he's got a great shot there (unless, of course, he gets a huge boost from an Iowa win). As it stands, Romney still has the lead in polls in the Granite State. But, who's that, roaring up on the outside?! . . . Why, it's 98-years-young John McCain, making a last-ditch sprint for the prize that his, ahem, illegitimate black baby (Karl Rove was the mother -- go figure) kept him from claiming way back in 2000. Seems that with Romney faltering, folks who don't find the Huck-ba-crite too appealing are now giving the old man a seventh look. Coluld it be that he will ride a second New Hampshire win all the way to the White House? Well, probably not, but in any case, it looks fairly likely that the winner of Iowa and New Hampshire will not be one and the same individual, which suggests that things on the Republican side could remain up in the air for quite some time. And so, there might yet be some hope for hizonner Giuliani's big-state plan yet.
But, that's not what I'm predicitng (yes, I still dare to hazard wild, meaningless guesses). No, I think that, as nasty as he apparently is himself, and as unlikely as it might have seemed only few months ago, good ol' Mike "Gomer" Huckabee, will probably get the nomination, if only because I can't imagine any of the other contenders, with all their flaws (both utterly real and simply "in the eyes of" typical Republican voters), being able to stop his momentum. He is, far more than any of the others, truly one of them . . . even if he has helped release a murderer from prison, taken money from cigarette makers while in office (uh, see that same link above), helped protect his son from getting prosecuted for animal cruelty, helped a drunk driver get out of jail in exchange for political donations, and . . . well, the list, apparently, goes on and on. But golly, he shure does love him some Jesus, so, y'know, he's basically the perfect Republican candidate.
Meanwhile, things are almost as wacky with the Dummocrats (heh heh, "Dummocrats") . . . Seems like the once "inevitable" Hillary is suddenly looking a lot more evitable. Indeed, she just may not come out of Iowa with a win. Obama has surged, and what's even wackier, even John Edwards looks to have a pretty good shot -- in the Buckeye state, at least (and if he can win there, well, who knows?). In short, it's looking like a three-way race down to the wire, after Hillary had a huge lead only a couple months ago. As it is, I'd say her odds of still getting the nomination are considerably better than Giuliani's, but that said, I wouldn't say they're significantly better than Obama's or more than mildly better than Edwards' at this point. She's been trending downward recently, while the two guys have been on the rise. She may be able to halt her slide sufficiently to pull it out, but frankly, I hope not. I think both Edwards and Obama would be better candidates in a general election, and since my main hope (such as it is) is that one Dummocrat or another will win next November, I've definitely got a preference for those two.
The good news, far as that goes, and as I've noted before, is that I don't think the eventual Republican winner, whoever it may be, will have good odds of beating the eventual Dem nom, whoever that is. And that includes the Huck-ba-crite, especially as the aforementioned skeletons would get far more scrutiny in the long, long general campaign. That said, I would definitely feel a lot more relaxed about things if it's Obama or Edwards against Huckabee or whoever, given Hillary's own extremely high negatives.
In any case, the one thing I'm certain of, with only a week and a half to go before Iowa votes, is that no prediction at this point would be anything but guesswork. It is just too jumbled up to say anything with much certainty. Which, when it comes to the flaming-car-crash spectacle that is politics, should make things fairly exciting in the weeks to come.
My own preference, to say it again, would be for an Obama-McCain matchup (especially since McCain, for all his past hypocrisies, is the only Republican contender I could actually stomach being the next president -- though my gut has built up an incredibly strong tolerance in the last few years for some reason), but I guess I'll just have to call that an Xmas wish at this point.
And that being said, I think I'll hold off on commenting further on the whole wacky process, at least until after the Iowa results come in. In the meantime, I just wanna sit back and watch the flaming wreckage :^) . . .
But let's get specific, shall we? In short, Clinton and Giuliani's respective roads to a nominationjust look a heck of a lot less clear than they did back then. Indeed, they look downright treacherous. In fact, the way things look now, I'd say there's a pretty solid chance that ol' Rudy will be nothing but an afterthought in a month or two. Put simply, it seems like his somewhat odious personal life, coupled with the fact that he wasn't much of a blood-red Republican anyway (oh, and maybe that the whole terrorism/war issue, upon which almost all of his supposed appeal was based, has, somewhat inexplicably, become far less of an important issue for primary voters), has finally caught up with him, and a month or two too soon for his lofty ambitions. Of course, his strategy for a while has been to ignore the first state or two and hope that no one else can pick up the momentum from wins there to stop him in bigger states where he was (until recently, at least) more popular than all the other contenders. And, that might yet work, but, given the way he's been sinking like a rock, polling wise, in even those states (Florida, for example) suggests that he will not be saved by them.
But, then again, things are still incredibly fluid in the whole Republican race. As there were hints of even back in October, the Right-wingers have been rushing towards Huckabee as he seems to be the only semi-viable option who isn't Giuliani, the Mormon, McCain, or some other RINO ("Republican in Name Only"). At least in Iowa, that is. There, I think it will be extremely difficult for Romney to stop Huckabee's surge, especially if he keeps making mistakes -- like saying he "saw" his father march with Martin Luther King, and then having to say he meant "saw" in a "figurative" sense because, well, that probably never really happened -- that point out the fact that he's, y'know, a liar. So, yeah, I see Huckabee taking Iowa pretty convincingly, in spite of the numerous negative stories that are now starting to surface about him (more on that later).
But, apparently the good people of New Hampshire don't have much use for Bible-thumping hicks, so Huckabee doesn't look like he's got a great shot there (unless, of course, he gets a huge boost from an Iowa win). As it stands, Romney still has the lead in polls in the Granite State. But, who's that, roaring up on the outside?! . . . Why, it's 98-years-young John McCain, making a last-ditch sprint for the prize that his, ahem, illegitimate black baby (Karl Rove was the mother -- go figure) kept him from claiming way back in 2000. Seems that with Romney faltering, folks who don't find the Huck-ba-crite too appealing are now giving the old man a seventh look. Coluld it be that he will ride a second New Hampshire win all the way to the White House? Well, probably not, but in any case, it looks fairly likely that the winner of Iowa and New Hampshire will not be one and the same individual, which suggests that things on the Republican side could remain up in the air for quite some time. And so, there might yet be some hope for hizonner Giuliani's big-state plan yet.
But, that's not what I'm predicitng (yes, I still dare to hazard wild, meaningless guesses). No, I think that, as nasty as he apparently is himself, and as unlikely as it might have seemed only few months ago, good ol' Mike "Gomer" Huckabee, will probably get the nomination, if only because I can't imagine any of the other contenders, with all their flaws (both utterly real and simply "in the eyes of" typical Republican voters), being able to stop his momentum. He is, far more than any of the others, truly one of them . . . even if he has helped release a murderer from prison, taken money from cigarette makers while in office (uh, see that same link above), helped protect his son from getting prosecuted for animal cruelty, helped a drunk driver get out of jail in exchange for political donations, and . . . well, the list, apparently, goes on and on. But golly, he shure does love him some Jesus, so, y'know, he's basically the perfect Republican candidate.
Meanwhile, things are almost as wacky with the Dummocrats (heh heh, "Dummocrats") . . . Seems like the once "inevitable" Hillary is suddenly looking a lot more evitable. Indeed, she just may not come out of Iowa with a win. Obama has surged, and what's even wackier, even John Edwards looks to have a pretty good shot -- in the Buckeye state, at least (and if he can win there, well, who knows?). In short, it's looking like a three-way race down to the wire, after Hillary had a huge lead only a couple months ago. As it is, I'd say her odds of still getting the nomination are considerably better than Giuliani's, but that said, I wouldn't say they're significantly better than Obama's or more than mildly better than Edwards' at this point. She's been trending downward recently, while the two guys have been on the rise. She may be able to halt her slide sufficiently to pull it out, but frankly, I hope not. I think both Edwards and Obama would be better candidates in a general election, and since my main hope (such as it is) is that one Dummocrat or another will win next November, I've definitely got a preference for those two.
The good news, far as that goes, and as I've noted before, is that I don't think the eventual Republican winner, whoever it may be, will have good odds of beating the eventual Dem nom, whoever that is. And that includes the Huck-ba-crite, especially as the aforementioned skeletons would get far more scrutiny in the long, long general campaign. That said, I would definitely feel a lot more relaxed about things if it's Obama or Edwards against Huckabee or whoever, given Hillary's own extremely high negatives.
In any case, the one thing I'm certain of, with only a week and a half to go before Iowa votes, is that no prediction at this point would be anything but guesswork. It is just too jumbled up to say anything with much certainty. Which, when it comes to the flaming-car-crash spectacle that is politics, should make things fairly exciting in the weeks to come.
My own preference, to say it again, would be for an Obama-McCain matchup (especially since McCain, for all his past hypocrisies, is the only Republican contender I could actually stomach being the next president -- though my gut has built up an incredibly strong tolerance in the last few years for some reason), but I guess I'll just have to call that an Xmas wish at this point.
And that being said, I think I'll hold off on commenting further on the whole wacky process, at least until after the Iowa results come in. In the meantime, I just wanna sit back and watch the flaming wreckage :^) . . .
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