Thursday, February 07, 2008

A long haul coming

Am I missing something or are the Democrats almost certainly headed for an inconclusive primary season? Given the large number of uncommitted superdelegates, it seems that, unless Clinton or Obama starts dominating the remaining races in a way that neither has to date, there is almost no way either of them gets to the 1900+ delegates needed for nomination. If that's the case, there is going to be a knock down, drag out battle for delegates and over what to do about Michigan and Florida.

The conventional political wisdom is that this is bad. But is that right? Assuming that they don't slime each other (an unlikely prospect with the Clintons involved), is it possible that the added attention helps rather than hurts? Who is going to be talking about John McCain while that is going on?

It seems to be both an opportunity and a challenge for Obama. If he can come through this with his dignity intact, then the public, because of all the attention this is likely to get, may feel more comfortable with him. On the other hand, if the Dems let this slip into their default mode of group politics on steroids and he lets this subliminal message he's promoting ("it's our turn") get out of hand, it may hurt.

And, of course, there are party unity issues - particularly (and somewhat ironically) if Hillary wins. It will be hard for that to happen without causing some real hard feelings among black voters. I don't see many going for McCain, but turn out is important and, in a close election, everything counts.

If Obama wins, what does that do for the hispanic vote? Remember, we've nominated a guy who is not a hardliner on immigration and there appears to be a real disinclination of hispanics to support Obama.

And what does McCain do during all of this? Keep his powder dry. And make nice with conservatives - a task that he begins this weekend at CPAC.

On the other hand, I wouldn't be shocked if Obama ran the table.


Anonymous said...

How is over 40% of the vote a disinclination of Latinos to support Obama?

Anonymous said...

Yes, Shark, you are missing something. But don't worry. Simply keeping on supporting McCain although he makes you uneasy! You'll never get it.

Anonymous said...

Well anon 1:23, what is a conservative going to do now? Romney drops out leaving McCain and Huckabee, who has no chance of winning the Rep. nomination. Go all Ann Coulter and vote for Clinton? Yeah right. As a conservative, I am not pleased with McCain and don't agree with him on everything. I do know however that there is no perfect candidate. I am certainly not going to sit it out or vote for the Dem. candidate.

Anonymous said...

Rick's prediction that BHO might run the table, as of late Saturday night, looks amazingly insightful. And then Coulter won't have the opportunity to vote for Clinton. Then we have two candidates who both (for quite different reasons) spent many of their formative years in captivity in SE Asia....