I posted last Sunday about the Jeremiah Wright story and seemed to touch a nerve. I had more comments than any other post in the history of this blog (launched in 2002). This was a great example of what I love about social media -- blogs, Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, etc. We're now connected in a more powerful way to people we want to be connected to but sometimes can't be because of distance, life, etc. High school friends, relatives, colleagues and random web surfers stopped by and joined the discussion. Thank you all. I love having you in my digital living room to talk politics.
In that spirit, I thought I'd unload some of my thoughts on where we are with this election.
The democrats have a train wreck on their hands. We're all hoping for resolution after Pennsylvania. But Pennsylvania will go convincingly to Hillary, giving her another huge state win and providing her more reason not to quit. The latest Public Policy Polling poll shows Hillary with a 26 point lead while others show Hillary with a 12-19 point lead. The key stat from most of the PA polls is Hillary's HUGE lead among women. In the PPP poll, she has a 46 point margin over Obama with female voters (66-22). Women are firmly in Hillary's camp and I don't expect these numbers to change over the next month of campaigning.
The candidates are then on to North Carolina. The state is firmly in Barack's camp, with a large (22%) black population. Then off to Indiana and other small states. Net-net ... neither candidate will reach the magic delegate number. And I don't see a scenario in which either candidate will back down. Obama will have the lead. And Clinton will be energized by winning all the large states.
Now the bigger issue is the lack of a party elder to broker a deal. Howard Dean has no moral authority or muscle to get a deal done. The most effective democratic leader is married to one of the candidates. And the other is off saving the environment. Hillary has lived for this moment. And she's not going to let a small delegate deficit get in the way.
Late last year, I thought it was at least plausible, though highly unlikely, that Barack would eventually take the #2 spot in exchange for the #1 spot in 8 years. But now that he's in the lead and some of the super delegates are committing to him (Gov. Richardson this week), this is even less likely. And for Hillary, creating turmoil actually helps her out. How? She's most likely not getting the nonimation without an amazing showing among super delegates at the convention. So her best bet to become president is to trash Barack and bloody him so that he loses to McCain. And then McCain loses to Hillary in 2012.
The democrat nominating process is now ugly. And it's only getting uglier. I think the best bet right now would be for Hillary to drop out ASAP -- BEFORE PENNSYLVANIA -- and support Obama. By bowing out now, gracefully, she would take the high road and solidify her position as a party leader and stateswoman. She would let Obama spend the next month raising money and looking presidential (like McCain is doing now!). And if she really cares about changing the country, maybe she should consider becoming Obama's #2.
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