Of all the nights, I never suspected that tonight would be the one. And then I saw all this:

HuffingtonPost Headline: "THE PRESUMPTIVE NOMINEE" (All blue letters, above pic of Obama and Wife).
Drudge Headline: "THE NOMINEE." (Understated (by drudge standards) underlined caps below pic of Obama and wife.)

Then Tim Russert said this:



The NYT reports that Clinton advisers expect calls to quit the race from supporters, even:




And it appears that Clinton may have secretly loaned her campaign some money in the run-up to the election. Ouch.


So my questions for you...

After more than 16 looooong months since Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announced their candidacies for the presidency, has the democratic primary come to an end?

Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?

Is the party healthy, are its november prospects good?

Hillary Supporters: What's on your mind? Tell us your frustrations, let's talk it out.

Hillary didn't lose - Obama won.

The party is still relatively healthy, because George Bush is still a Republican, and now they can get back to beating that drum. There is plenty of time left to remind Americans which party has been running things into the ground for the past 8 years. I still like them in November, as long as Hillary does the right thing and gets fully behind Obama - or at least out of the way. Which she probably will, since if she continues to peck at him, she will become the most polarizing and hated person in the Democratic party - among Democrats. She's not too stupid to see that her political survival now depends on Obama pulling out the win in November so she doesn't become known as the one who blew the election.

Hillary supporters should have nothing to beef about. She lost to a better candidate, and it was a good fight. He played clean, certainly cleaner than she did.

It's late (or is it early?) and I'll hit this in greater depth some other time, but here's the long and short of it.

1. It should be over but Clinton is favored to win in both West Virginia and Kentucky. It won't help all that much, but it's her call. There probably isn't much point to it besides digging an ever deeper hole of debt to Mark Penn, but hey, it she wants to keep bleeding money to no good purpose, why should anyone stand in her way?

Depending on her capacity for to suffer abuse and scorn, she can drag her carcass all the way to the convention in August. Having been married to Bill all these years her tolerance for punishment and humiliation is rather high. It won''t change a thing. The superdelegates are not going to break her way and that was her last, best hope for a come-from-behind thrilling finish.

The whispers for her to get out---NOW---will soon become a scream. She won't listen. She can't win, but she still won't listen.

Stay or go. Who cares? I don't anymore. It's time to get ready for McCain. Hillary has faded into just another object in Barack's rear view mirror.

2. Obama will be the nominee. I don't have to chuck my lawn sign in the trash or peel the bumper sticker off my ride just yet. How did Hillary lose? Too long and too sad a story to go into here, drewyorktimes. Hell, she probably hasn't figured that one one yet.

3. No. The party is not healthy. It's fractured. Not splintered, but there are some serious cracks in the coalition and Barack Obama is going to have to spend some time patching them up. It only looks like we're a long ways from November. Changing course from a primary to a general election isn't done immediately or even smoothly. But it has to be done in the window of time still available to the Democrats.

None of which means John McSame can't be beaten.

The bad thing is we're going to have to keep hearing this "Dream Ticket" crap for the next few days and weeks. The pundits are already saying Obama will have to offer Clinton the vice-president slot to pull the Dems back together.

Nonsense. I wouldn't offer the second spot on the ticket to Hillary. She might accept just out of spite.

If it were up to me, I'd give Hillary a porterhouse steak pantsuit, some A1 sauce and lock her in a cage with a couple of hungry grizzly bears and whatever happens, happens.

That probably won't happen either.

Careful with the food analogies here, NT, they upset some of the inmates.


Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?

Probably he will get the nomination, but I don't think this food fight is over quite yet. I think the Clinton campaign is waiting/hoping for another big Obama mistake that would really cause him to lose standing in a general election campaign. Then, they could make the argument to the super delegates that "this guy is damaged goods". Maybe they have some bombshell on him that they've been saving.

If she does end up losing I think one of the reasons will be because she tried to run a classic 20th century campaign and Obama ran a 21st century campaign. He used the Internet for fund-raising and campaigning far more effectively than she did and was able to outspend her several times over in critical states. States that he didn't necessarily win, but where he came close enough to offset any real delegate losses to her. It would be interesting to see what the delegate count would be had the Democrat primaries been winner take all in each state with a primary. If I get a chance, I'll run the numbers, but I bet they would show Clinton ahead.

But for now, I don't think the fat lady has sung yet. She may be in the building, but Obama won't know if she's there to sing, or to debate him.


Aquilla

I personally like the AP headline:

"Clinton is Toast?"

http://www.americasdebate.com/forums/index...st&p=244774

I haven't seen Zack's explanation about how he was so-o-o-o wrong in his projections in the post below.

Zack's Predictions

Hopefully he'll defend his position rather than hide for the next two months.


You might also try explaining this prognostication whiz.

Rubbing it in is such poetic justice, especially when one considers asinine, trolling posts like the one below.

The fight goes on...John McCain will be the next President of the United States. You have to realise the DNC is made up of a conglomeration of disfunctional groups they will say do or basically stab one another in the back for power. So what does that leave us? Hillary-Biyatch, NoBama Hussein, and John McSane. Just great.

Good morning BoF! I guess you missed this post http://www.americasdebate.com/forums/index...st&p=244843 where I explained your links. I was a little off on IN and I'd guess a lot of folks were based on the polls leading up to the primary.

I could hardly sleep last night wondering how so many folks could vote for Obama, I actually thought that many Afro Americans would back away from him because he outed his spiritual guidance leader. I was thinking that the AA vote in NC/IN would break 80-20 because he outed Rev. Wright and that the demographic that always votes for Hillary would increase by an equal amount for the same reason as they did.

I would say that Hillary is dead meat unless she has a silver bullet in reserve that will destroy Obama. I would think she is about broke by now but can easily win WV/KY and can win in PR and take all the delegates there. Obama can pick up some votes in the Eastern panhandle of WV but if he goes into the mountains one of those mountain men will show off their rifle skills and end his venture, the same in KY.

At this point I guess it doesn't much matter if it is Clinton or Obama that runs against McCain in the fall since they are both damaged goods but I would have rather had Hillary defeat him to destroy the far left of the party. Just to see Governor Richardson's face when she got the nomination would be priceless.

There will be a lot of news between now and the end of the primaries, I think the WOT emergency funding will fill the news and there is surely going to be a showdown. Bush has never backed down on his basic funding demands in the past and it appears the far left want to test him once again. This will suck all the air out of the room if it becomes showdown time and put the war center stage. Who will it boost, we'll see?

Like my new signature? Guess it will be popular in the general?

Edited to add: Turn on CSPAN right now to see the news comeing on the Iraq War funding, Republicans to protest delay in war funding today!

I don't know, Aquilla. I think it may be far closer to being over than you believe. Hillary's "victory" speech in Indiana last night sounded strange - almost half victory speech, and half concession speech - and I don't mean her congratulating Obama on his NC win.

She almost seemed subdued at times. Bill and Chelsea looked shell shocked and depressed. And Hillary talked far more about supporting Obama if he won last night, more than she ever has in the last 6 months.


That's certainly true, and applies to Indiana, as well, I believe. Terry McCauliff was on any and every TV morning show yesterday, crowing about how well Hillary was going to do in Indiana, without actually saying by how much. Two percentage points? He was bragging about two percentage points? I think they expected to do far better than that, perhaps in the range of 8 to 10 points.


The fat lady may not be singing yet, but you can hear her warming up in the wings. Clinton and nearly all of her major mouth pieces have cancelled all TV and personal appearances for the day after her Indiana "win". Add to the fact MSNBC just reported that she had to loan herself $6.4 million to finish out these two races, and she may need to loan herself even more to continue. The likelyhood of her getting any more major contributions, after last night's performances are going to be problematic, at best.

Holy crap, you mean the food fight is OVER????!!!!

And here I had just gone from Rocky Mountain oysters to angus porterhouse, being as we're just swimming in it.

Okay, so we get Obama and the Republicans have McCain, and now the real fun begins.

This will be a monumental election season. I am very pleased to have lived this long. Whoever wins will be leading this country into unknown territory. No matter how you slice that, it comes out as a tasty sammich.

Aquila, don't look for me to be tossing any of that sammich your way. It's just too good to waste

Meanwhile, all the pundits can go take a flying leap. I am so sick of your shull bit.

BTW, this is such a good morning full of those words that mean so much (hope, change, moving ahead, getting better, and so on) that I cranked Etta James (7 Year Itch) and played blues harp along with that enormous voice, woke up Lydia early (she doesn't mind), so the planets have aligned right and the moon is in the seventh house (whatever), and this is really the age of you know what.

Or maybe I'm just in a good mood.

You are simply creepy.



If she isn't forced out by the remaining Super's just finally showing they have a collective pair and finally declaring for Obama. Clinton will try and hold out long enough for the meeting at the end of the month on FL and MI. I am sure they have a story about how the people rose up to declare she was destined to have those states and the nomination.
I am not sure who is more desperate at this point Hilary or Hannity. Anyone see his desperate attempts to keep the Hilary dream alive during his show. Luntz was looking at him like he was either drunk or painfully stupid. Operation Bloated Self Importance has been as effective as Hilary's campaign.


Bill looked like he was watching Blanche DuBois when her friends came to take her away

After more than 16 looooong months since Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announced their candidacies for the presidency, has the democratic primary come to an end?

Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?

Is the party healthy, are its november prospects good?

Hillary Supporters: What's on your mind? Tell us your frustrations, let's talk it out.

Obama is without a doubt the nominee, unless the party wants to shoot itself in the foot for the next 10 years. Its not over. It won't be over till June 3rd. We only have 3 weeks or so till the last Primary so since we've come this far there really is no reason not to go the last mile. Even if Clinton has seen the light she should finish it just so no one complains that she was forced out or that their votes didn't count. The party's health at this point depends on the loser. If the loser comes out and really and honestly supports the winner there is no reason the Democrats can't win in November.

After more than 16 looooong months since Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announced their candidacies for the presidency, has the democratic primary come to an end?

No. Clinton will now make a stronger push to have Florida and Michigan counted. She is already asserting that 2,025 is not the magic number, 2,209 is the number needed (this includes Florida and Michigan). The Rules and Bylaws Committee is meeting at the end of this month to make a determination regarding Florida and Michigan. There is no way she will back out before that Committee meeting. The nominee will not be decided until after the last primary has occurred. As frustrating as that may be, that's probably best. I don't believe the Democrats will allow this to continue all the way to the convention... not when the party has been so clearly and passionately divided by these two candidates.

Is the party healthy, are its november prospects good?

Currently, no... I wouldn't say the Democratic Party is healthy, not when you have two candidates so close on the issues and yet some of the candidates' supporters claim they will vote for McCain over the other Democratic nominee. That's not a healthy party. If there is time to close that divide and allow people to get over the fact that their candidate lost, then the prospects in November are good. If not, the Democrats will show, yet again, that they are capable of clutching Defeat from the jaws of Victory.

Looks like bad news for the Clintons. Expect here to stay and then make a push for the super delegates. She will argue that Obama us un electable because of Wright, “guns and religion” gate and other Obama “friends – like Ayres recently seen stomping an American Flag in 2001.

Dean and the Dems have made it clear they intend to use the “100 years of War” statement out of context to attack McCain – thus we can expect that the other side will not be feeling bad about going after Obama, his friends, gaffs and general liberal voting record.

A recent recording of Obama promising the Teamsters that he will deal with their (deserved) oversight will also not help Obama everywhere.


Yes this election will be a bitter fight – with the Dems having the overwhelming advantage this year.

Rumor is Iran, Al Qaeda, and Iraqi insurgents will make a “Tet offensive” push in Sept to ensure Obama victory and their best chance to win in Iraq.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,293024,00.html

Your source doesn't even mention Obama. Where is your support for the assertion that one of the intended consequences of this rumored offensive push is to "ensure" an Obama victory?

I didn't miss anything, Zack. Your interpretation of Scott Rasmussin's polls (original post) did not support your predictions. You need to divest yourself of that crystal ball.

Then in the follow up post, which I didn't miss, but quoted in part, you wrote...


When you post something just to push buttons of a few, you jerk the whole board around. That in my opinion is trolling.

I remember one time when my dad and I went out salmon fishing on a charter boat off the coast of Washington. We hit a school of salmon and started pulling them in like crazy. All the commotion in the water must have drawn the sharks because one of the people on the boat hooked a shark. The crew brought it on board and shot it in the head. Even after that, the shark still tried to bite him and ended up whipping him in the leg with his tail. Talk about a nasty abrasion! I relate this story to you because there's something about the Clintons that reminds me of that shark. And there's something about the Democrat Party that kind of reminds me of that deck hand.


Aquilla

1) For all intents and purposes, yes. The racial backlash for the Super D's pulling HC out of their hat now would just be too great and I do not think Mich and Fla will make much of a difference.

2) Yes. She lost because she represents, or was pictured to represent, the status quo ante. Obama represents something "new" and Dem voters, in particular, are very frustrated.

3) No, I think the Dems will lose in Nov at the Pres election. While voters are frustrated, ultimately this nation will not elect a man with no executive experience; with little experience of any kind in govt; with a very, very liberal background, voting record and agenda; with a book, Dreams, that calls into question the sincerity of his entire post-racial election theme; with an Islamic sounding name and unusual background; with a graceless, loud, outspoken wife and longtime pastor; and with some other unusual friends and fellow travelers.

I think the Jewish power structure in the US and Israel will be very much against Obama, as well, and these groups have often supported Democats.



http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0307/3177.html

Obama will get most of the black vote, as Dems always do; and he will get the urban, young, collegiate idealist, white vote; but he will not get the great middle, which he must have to win; and he of course will not get the traditional Repub base. The big issue is whether the trad Rep and great middle will vote McCain, stay at home, or vote third party.

All the Dems needed to do was nominate a solid, well-qualified, uncontroverisal candidate, as Repub are hurting after 8 years of Bush. The Dems aren't doing that, and I think it will cost them.

4) As I do not support HC, I willl say simply that she expected to win, as did her supporters, and this must be a great shock considering her background and power structure. I am sure she couldn't imagine, either, being betrayed by so many black Dem voters whom the Clintons counted as their own. Black Dems have clearly voted their color here, to the tune of about 91% for Obama nationwide.

After more than 16 looooong months since Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announced their candidacies for the presidency, has the democratic primary come to an end?

If Hillary had an ounce of sense instead of a shipload of ego, she'd concede the nomination. Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the case. She will doggedly refuse to admit defeat and drag this out til the bitter end, not giving a tinker's damn about the damage she's doing in the process. Here on , Aquilla will keep using tired food analagies to the point of making people want to vomit.

Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?

IMHO, yes. It has been a close race, but the people have proven that they don't want another Clinton administration, regardless of who is at the helm.

Is the party healthy, are its november prospects good?

I think Hillary's refusal to admit defeat has hurt the party, but Bush is still Bush, and still a Republican, and McCain is just more of the same, so whoever is the Democratic nominee has an automatic leg up regardless.

Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?


It occurs to me that Hillary made what might be the cardinal mistake in American politics: Not fighting for the Black vote. Along with Evangelicals, the Black vote is one of those constituencies that is regularly assumed to be in the pocket of one camp or another, so democrats don't show up to megachurches, and republicans don't come to West Philadelphia.

What a mistake.

AD, if any of you ever run for office--- TRY TO GET BLACK VOTES!!!

Today it seems a given that the Black vote was going to tip 90 percent to Barack Obama. But, if you'll rewind the tape, remember when everyone was wondering which way Black women would slant? When Hillary and Barack polled about even on the black vote? After Iowa, that was bound to go up in his favor. But if she could have kept the black vote down to say 75 percent Obama, or even 85 percent Obama, she'd be the nominee.

It was almost like they were offended by having to fight for Black votes so they gave up trying. Instead of recognizing that black people had invested their hopes in Obama (much as older women had done for Hillary) Bill treated Obama with contempt, he belittled him, not understanding that voters and superdelegates like James Clyburn would take that as a belittlement of African-American hopes and dreams. That's what the fairtytale comment was all about. It wasn't that the comment was necessarily offensive, but that it suggested that Obama's hopes were ephemeral and unrealistic, bound to fail: It was a big "no, you can't" to a constituency that would much rather buy into Obama's "yes, we can."

And then, at the end Hillary blew it again: So she needed to sow some division and chum it up with blue collar truck drivers, fine. But what was preventing her, Senator Miller Lite, from dipping into a few black beauty salons to chat it up with the women there? Scheduling problems? She didn't need to win back the vote, just tamper it down some. If she'd just ever so slightly dipped into the black vote, this would have been a different nomination process. But once they lost the black vote, they acted like there was no way to get back even 2 percent of it.




Amazing post. Right on the money.



This is idiotic. Rumor is that John McCain doesn't know the difference between a shia and a sunni. Rumor is that the US government infected black people with aids to make Zambia a poorer nation. Rumor is that Barack Obama stole your wallet. Rumor is it's not smart to vote on rumors.

This doesn't exactly fit the topic but in a year with terrible polling results I think an operation that called the Indiana and North Carolina results right on needs to be recognized.

Zogby May 5th Poll Results

And if any of those blue collar workers think Hillary gives a rat's beehind about them, I got a bridge I'll sell them. This older white woman does not support Mrs. Clinton. Some (a lot?) of us don't fit neatly into those stereotypical "slots".

She still can win within the realm of possibility, her chances just got cut in half to about 5%. The Popular Vote is/was her only chance to take it away from Obama without splitting out too much of the party. What she must do, in my humble ignorant opinion is the following.

- Seat the FL/MI delegates in any way she can so long as she makes sure Obama still cannot reach the finish line without significant Superdelegate help. That would require something like a 50% penalty to both sides. She shouldn't care about the delegates. She shouldn't have ever been caring as soon as Mississippi was over and it was apparent that she couldn't catch him "the legal way". Clinton just wants the popular vote and she can lay claim to to it in Florida. Maybe Michigan if she agrees to a 55/45 delegate split with a 50% penalty off the top and to give Obama the "Uncommitted" vote. The point is just to maximize the popular votes she gets while minimize the delegates distributed thereby keeping the clock ticking. It should be fine with him since truthfully part of that vote should belong to Edwards.

In truth, she should have done this prior to Pennsylvania, but at this point, she has no other choice. She cannot reasonably expect the supers to wait until August to crown a winner. It just won't happen without some significant reason and even if she does, they might not go by the margin she hopes for.

After that the score would look like (using RCP numbers and including those odd caucuses):
17,059,041
16,632,861
Clinton Defecit: 426,180

- She campaigns hard in the straggler primaries and comes up with 400,000 net votes. It depends on how interested the people in Puerto Rico are in Clinton and the Dems. If by the margins she pulls with Latinos then she has an outside shot depending on if the turnout breaks 1,000,000 or so. Not likely though but better than that 5%. Assuming, and thats a big assumption, that it does, she can gain about 150,000 with Carolina numbers and still she would be shy about 75,000 votes. A truly desperate maneuver and if she truly cares enough, she could (reasonably) argue that those four odd caucuses without actual vote counts shouldn't apply. That could get her in. Everyone would hate her to no end, but really...she doesn't have much of a choice. This strategy really looked better during the six-week break in primaries when the Wright thing just got off the ground. But oh well. Her fault.

EDIT: Forgot the last part

After all of that if by some miracle she has more popular votes (including the odd four), she tend whines and complains about how Obama's victory was only brought about by a statistical fluke in the apportionment of delegates. That to ignore her win is to ignore the will of the people and to commit the very same injustice *cue America the Beautiful* that Al Gore endured by the Supreme Court. In a Ms. Clinton goes to Washington moment, Obama is defeated and Clinton is declared the winner. I love a good story.

"Betrayed?" What a crock.

Did the majority of Black Democrats wake up one morning and decide to go en masse to Obama or was it because the Clintons in an act of both monumental political stupidity and career suicide deliberately went out of their way to alienate African Americans?

As usual your analysis superficially skates over the real reasons why Hillary is bombing with the Democratic Party's most loyal voting bloc, and it's not simply based upon a mutual racial identity.

If Hillary Clinton fails to wrest the Democratic presidential nomination from Barack Obama, there will be plenty of second-guessing about how she ran her campaign. What if her loyalty to campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle and chief strategist Mark Penn had not prevented her from demoting them sooner? What if her electoral strategists had better understood the power of caucus states and the way in which votes cast there translated into delegates? What if she had actually planned for the month following Super Tuesday, thereby preventing Obama from posting the 11 straight wins after Feb. 5 that provided him the pledged delegate lead he enjoys today? But beyond these questions, one little-discussed factor (with direct or indirect relation to all of the above) appears to have had fatal consequences for Clinton's campaign: She failed to mount a strong enough challenge to Obama's claim on the African-American vote.

Though a majority of black voters may inevitably have gone for Obama, nothing precluded the wife of the so-called first black president from keeping Obama's margins among blacks significantly narrower -- say, losing to him by 4-to-1 or even 3-to-1, rather than the devastating 9-to-1 margins by which Obama has often won African-American Democrats. "The Clinton campaign has been focused on Barack Obama's performance with white working-class voters in a few states, but they fail to mention Senator Clinton's abysmal performance with black voters all over the country," says political consultant and Obama supporter Jamal Simmons. "She has gone from leading among black voters to losing them 90 percent to 10 percent in Pennsylvania. One would expect Obama to win these voters, but 90-10 is a total collapse that Obama is not experiencing among any constituency. Simply put, Hillary Clinton has a black problem." link

What you fail to understand quick is the Black vote is not obligated to Barack Obama OR Hillary Clinton. She came into this campaign as the popular and respected figure among Black Americans who embraced and supported her husband. As for Obama, he had to introduce himself to a skeptical Black community that knew little about him beyond giving a pretty speech at the 2004 Democratic Convention---just like the rest of America.

Certainly the Black vote was going to go for the Democrats in a big way. But which Democrat was up for grabs. Obama didn't so much take them away as Clinton pushed them into his arms.



Now, now, my dear DaffyGrl, you've got to cut Aquilla some slack. He's just trying to tweak the board's Dem/liberal constituency. I take it all in stride because after all when you've got to hang your hat on replacing the historically unpopular George Dubya Bush with the historically old John McCain, you've got to find something to laugh about.

After all, "Hoisting One for Fred!" never really took off...




Me too. The problem is this type of story tends to end as soon as you wake up.

There's one big problem with your 400,000 popular votes theory KBlackJack7 and that's Hillary already is in the tank by 700,000 votes to Obama. Even if he didn't pick up another vote, your 400,000 number still leaves her in a 300,000 deep hole.

Hillary can't ignore the superdelegates. There aren't enough votes or delegates available in the remaining primaries to overcome Obama's advantage. That just leaves the making her case to the superdelegates and hoping another scandal erupts that makes her case that Obama can't beat McCain in the fall.

Oh, and for all my Republican compadres on the board, I wanted to pass along this little nugget of glad tidings:

Shellshocked House Republicans got warnings from leaders past and present Tuesday: Your party's message isn't good enough to prevent disaster in November, and neither is the NRCC's money.

The double shot of bad news had one veteran Republican House member worrying aloud that the party’s electoral woes -- brought into sharp focus by Woody Jenkins' loss to Don Cazayoux in Louisiana on Saturday — have the House Republican Conference splitting apart in "everybody for himself" mode.

"There is an attitude that, 'I better watch out for myself, because nobody else is going to do it,' " the member said. "There are all these different factions out there, everyone is sniping at each other, and we have no real plan. We have a lot of people fighting to be the captain of the lifeboat instead of everybody pulling together."

In a piece published in Human Events, the Republicans’ onetime captain, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, warned his old colleagues that they face "real disaster" on Election Day unless they move immediately to "chart a bold course of real reform" for the country.

And in a closed-door session at the Capitol, National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) told members that the NRCC doesn’t have enough cash to "save them" in November if they don't raise enough money or run strong campaigns themselves. link

Hmm...it appears there's not enough lifeboats available for all the rats trying to desert the sinking ship that is the U.S.S. Permanent Republican Majority. Looking a bit more like the Titanic these days.

nighttimer: I agree with you on the fact that it was her fault for not reintroducing herself to the Black community. The perfect time in my opinion would have been to win the Mississippi Primary. Of course she wouldn't have won, but thats besides the bigger point of eating into the Black community to set her up for a better showing in NC and PA.

I'm not sure what you mean by still being short 300,000. I counted all primaries including FL and MI and gave Obama the Uncommitted vote. I double checked my addition. Where'd I go wrong?

Has everyone turned into a pundit? What is the hurry? There is a process in place for selecting the nominee. It has not been completed. The process is not completed until the convention takes place. The media has turned the legitimate pirmary process into a circus and most here seem to be willing to follow this shallow lead.

No need to "defend" me, NT. Daffy wants to vomit because the Patee she tried to sneak away with was actually Alpo. I love it when a plan comes together. But, I think there's still a little life left in this food fight, so keep your spud gun at the ready. Here's some ammo for you. I don't think this whole thing is over yet, not quite. And Hoisting one for Fred still has its upside.


Aquilla

What's "shallow" about wanting to see this thing come to an end? Hasn't this gone on long enough for you? You need 20 more debates or so to make up your mind?

So, is your complaint with the Democrats fighting this out to the bitter end, Gray Seal or just the process? If that's the case I imagine you're really honked off at the Repubs for wrapping this thing up over two months ago.

You're right that there is a process in place for selecting the nominee. It does not have to be completed before a nominee emerges.

If the media has turned the primary process into a circus they're just playing their role as the clowns.



Oh, it's over all right. Hillary blew it back in Pennslyvania when she compared herself to Rocky Balboa. She forgot Rocky lost to the Black guy in the first movie.

Fred's a real chick magnet all right. IF you dig old bald guys with babes young enough to be their daughter.

Of course, the alternative for Slow-talkin' Fred could have been this.

After more than 16 looooong months since Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announced their candidacies for the presidency, has the democratic primary come to an end?

No. The primaries continue through June 3. This kinda thing can be found online.

Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?

No. Nominees are determined at the national conventions. Such information can also be found on teh internets.

Is the party healthy, are its November prospects good?

That depends on who they ultimately nominate. The party is reasonably healthy, but their prospects for winning the presidency in November grow increasingly slimmer.

Hillary Supporters: What's on your mind? Tell us your frustrations, let's talk it out.

While I'm not a "Hillary supporter", I must admit that I am nevertheless frustrated. It is looking to me as though the Democratic party is yet again in the process of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory. Months ago, I said that if anyone could screw up a sure thing, it was the Democrats. It looks very like that's exactly what they're doing. The party's only hope now is a brokered convention. Whether the Dems will still throw the election to the GOP or not depends on how many delegates come to their senses between now and then.

Otherwise, I can only agree with Gray Seal:

Well, I'm not sure we classify as "pundits." But this is a debate forum and the question is "is it over?" And it seems we people who can add up delegates say, yes! It obviously is.

Here's the Forbes delegate counter:

http://www.forbes.com/2008/02/27/obama-cli...7delegates.html

Go have some fun with that. I gave Clinton 75 percent in Kentucky, West Virginia and PR (even though I think she'll pull less than 60 in PR). Then, I gave her a kind 50/50 split in the Obama states of ORegon, SD, and Montana.

That brings the total to...

Obama: 1,920
Clinton: 1,834.
Goal 2025.5

That means that Obama needs 105 superdelegates from the remaining 270-- oh wait, make that just 101. And counting.

Clinton, on the other hand, needs uh... 76... plus one hundred... (math is neither me nor Mike Huckabees strong suit (nor clinton's it seems))... plus 25


76
25
100
bring down the 1 from the 11

//1
put a 1 up top

193. So we have 270 superdelegates left and, under the most favorable circumstances imaginable, she needs all but 77 of them. For every one SD that breaks for Obama, she needs two or three in her camp, too. Ever played gin rummy? Kind of like diggin' in the stack for cards you know ain't comin'.


Or, let's be *magical*!!

Let's see what it would take for Hillary Clinton to win.


Let's give Hillary 75 percent in every single state between now and PR. On top of which, heck, lets give her 90 percent of the vote in West Virginia. No! Let's pretend that West Virginia Governor Joe Manchin stages a coup and institutes a farcical Stalinist regime in which Hillary Clinton win an impressive 100 percent of the vote.

Final tally: Obama still ahead 30 delegates.

It's done!

Wertz:



Funny. I don't remember John Kerry having to wait until the convention to find out if he was the nominee. Or Bill Clinton. Or John McCain, George Bush, Mike Dukakis, Ronald Reagan -- even Ted Kennedy knew he was a lost cause by then, too.

Take a look:



I'm curious how you feel about the election, Wertz. Think you'll vote for Obama? For McCain Nader, neither, none? Do you feel that Obama won more or less fairly? I mean, neither side is windex clean, but compared to say, other recent presidential elections, how does this one look to you?

What I can tell you is that this race is over. Hillary Clinton is out of money, out of opportunities to turn the race around, out of momentum, out of patience from even her supporters like DiFi who is asking that hand over a copy of her campaign plan before she continues campaigning. McGovern has asked her to step down, and though Wesley Clark denies it, there's reports that he has asked the same. Superdelegates in this news package say they're considering flopping over, and that even her top loyalsts are telling her "you can't win." Meanwhile, Obama is in DC right now making the rounds with scores of undecided super delegates. Short of a stalinist purge in the next 6 states, Hillary Clinton cannot win the commanding totals she needs to clinch it. And Obama is almost certain to.

You say this fight goes to the convention, but thats incorrect. 2 groups of people get to decide when the race ends: the voters and the superdelegates. We're just about out of voters, and the superdels have all the interest in the world to wrap this thing up so we can get back to reminding the world that the past 8 years have an endless disaster.

Actually the golden number is 2024. It dropped a small amount over March. That number by the way is not set in stone and will change according to how FL and MI are seated. (yet another reason why she shouldn't have waited until this late in the game to just go ahead and seat them.)

Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?

90% of me says yes. She lost because she gave up on the black vote. It truly delivered for Obama and is the one of the main reasons he was able to capsize her if infact it does happen.

Is the party healthy, are its November prospects good?

Of course. The Democrats aren't stupid enough to let this get between them and the White House. Even if Clinton supporters don't like that she has little chance, they're not going to risk another eight years of Republican rule over a their tantrums. Though oddly enough, I feel she has every right to continue just as Huckabee did and his situation was much more dire...

Hillary Supporters: What's on your mind? Tell us your frustrations, let's talk it out.

EdiT: I still have no clue why people insist on looking at the delegates anymore as anything but what it is, a timer. It's Clinton's countdown clock to attempt to rally a popular vote up nothing more. Those scenarios have been drawn dozens of times and they haven't changed since April. The Clinton camp knows it isn't winning the delegate count. If it's been smart, they haven't been trying to win the delegate count. It's been banking on the popular vote since it's frankly a better argument to make to the Democratic-yes-the-same-embittered-ones-from-the-2000-Election Party come convention time.

No frustrations. I'm still pulling for Hillary and will continue to until she is legally declared the loser. I was always going vote for the Dem regardless of the outcome of the race. It's silly to project the voting habits of people months in advance and say that they were tearing the party apart. This is nothing compared to the silent anger in the Republican camp over their nominee. Anything can happen.

I'm not getting this carping about "why is everyone trying to be a pundit?" Um...well, could it be because this is a debate board and unless we engage in a little amateur punditry here what are we supposed to be debating? Who's going to win American Idol?

It's not "shallow" to have an interest in politics and debate election results and what may come next. As politically unaware as many Americans deliberately choose to be, it is lacking in depth to criticize those who do have an interest.

Just as you're not required to post on , you also not required to post in threads you don't see any purpose to.



Which means what? Choose the candidate the majority of Democrats have rejected? Not everyone is longing for a return to the 90s. This Hillary-or-Bust mindset is what will "throw the election to the GOP."

It's been a long, costly and at times downright divisive campaign between Obama and Clinton and as she hasn't thrown in the towel yet, it's going to go on a while longer. Apparently, as long as there's a picogram of a chance, Clinton wants to hang on to the bitter end. But I have yet to see anyone advance a winning scenario that doesn't require radically reworking the rules she already had agreed to on Michigan and Florida or totally trashing Obama and the party by trying to fight it out on the convention floor.

A brokered convention is a death wish. If the Democrats try to snatch away at the 11th hour the nomination and hand it to Hillary, they might as well hang a sign up reading, "CLOSED DUE TO MASS INSANITY."

You may not be a Hillary supporter, Wertz, but you certainly leave no doubt you are a Barack opponent. Get your wish and you guarantee President McCain.

Something every Hillary Clinton supporter (or those who say they aren't but obviously are) had better wake up to some hard facts of political life as explained by Mr. Marcellus from Pulp Fiction:

"Painful as it may be, ability don't last. And your days are just about over. Now that's a hard muthaf***n fact of life, but that's a fact of life your a** is gonna have to get realistic about. You came close, but you never made it. And if you were gonna make it, you would have made it before now." link

Hillary isn't dead yet. She may have to be at least considered by Obama as part of a (ugh) "Unity ticket." Personally, I wouldn't hire Hillary to drive Obama's tour bus, but he's a lot more magnanimous than I am. I don't see any reason to get in bed with a rattlesnake and not expect to get bitten, but stranger relationships have made for stranger political teams.

In politics, like sports, if you can't stand to lose you'd better stay on the sidelines, because lose you will and sometimes the failures are spectacular. Anybody can be a winner. The real test of character comes when you have lost and how you handle the defeat.

It would seem some folks are going to need some time in a cool, dark room to process what's happening and how they're going to deal with it. In the stages of grief, it appears it's a bit too early for some Clinton supporters to reach "acceptance."

Is the party healthy, are its november prospects good?

She will fight on and this is not good for the health of the party.

Obama should win in November even though McCain is more experienced and a better choice for the office.

Yes. Barring a phenomenal change in momentum, Obama will be the nominee.

Unlike other posters, I don't think the black vote was particularly important. Like-ability, coupled with ethnic euphoria, drew in myriads of new voters that swarmed all the traditional democratic strong-holds. More than any candidate in my memory, Obama was a game changer.

It reminds me of the Dot-Com bubble in some ways. When motivated, excited people form a movement, no amount of connections can stop it.

The party is fine. Clinton has already thrown everything and the kitchen sink to grasp the nomination, leaving McCain with less trash to rummage up. You wanna talk about finances? How about sheer will of the constituency? I doubt McCain could find enough supporters to run a lemon stand in some of the critical states he needs to win.

Not a big fan of HC.

But I can sympathize. All those years... building connections, gravitating towards the center, putting up with Bill... only to have the final, ultimate goal snatched abruptly by some phenomenal upstart playin by his own rules. Barrack Obama was unknown before his legendary 2004 democratic convention speech. Now he's the soon-to-be leader of the free world. Thats gotta hurt.

But then again, the presidency isn't about personal ambition. Hilary treated her voters as a means to an end. Its hard to levy the same accusation against Obama.

My point is simply that the sooner this "never ending Bataan death march to the White House" (thank you, Jon Stewart) is over, the sooner Obama can concentrate on beating the baggy old boxers off McCain.

As I mentioned was a possibility in another thread, Clinton's superdelegates are beginning to ask her to drop out and switching their endorsement to Obama - George McGovern being the latest. I believe this trend will continue.

I thought more about this tonight and believe perhaps the best thing would be to end this before the Rules and Bylaws Committee meets at the end of the month. Best for the party not to have to make a decision about Florida and Michigan. If Hillary were to drop out before the end of the month, a decision about Florida and Michigan would be moot.

As important- they can symbolically seat those delegates and smooth over things in that direction as well.




Gee Ted- there were lots of better choices in 2000 and 2004- but there were some folks that were dumb enough to vote for GW twice. You could have picked McCain in 2000 there dude- your party blew it then.

At least this time we don't have a single candidate even close to as bad as GW- the republicans managed to choose the worst president in the last 100+ years.

And you have to commiserate over McSame being a better choice? Oh well!

Just about every source of political analysis I've read from Europe is now predicting Barack Obama as president, and not without a certain amount of relish in some quarters. Its odd, but Hillary Clinton was for such a long time the left wing favourite to win, but now she is described with almost as much loathing as GW Bush is. I feel a tad sorry for her because I don't think she deserves so much rancor.

Be that as it may, some of the more astute analysts over here (the ones who never takes sides) are looking forward to what President Obama means for the rest of Planet Earth, and the sad fact is, they simply can't tell. Barack Obama is so vague that defining his future poliicies with any accuracy seems impossible. This worries me because I don't like 'uncertainties in Caesar', the next thing you know the Germans are sacking Rome.

One pundit made the daunting observation that Barack Obama may divide the nation just as easily as he appears to have divided the democrat party. The 'post racial' title being seen as the most problematic issue since obviously, when 90% of one racial group is voting for you, then your everything but 'post racial'.

Gender is another issue being raised. Obama is often refered to as representing a 'change', and several old school feminists over here have already pointed out that yet another man in the white house is not change, no matter what colour skin he has.

Other pundits dismiss all this as irrellevent claiming Barack Obama is the first sign of a new 'super tolerant America'. That scares me even more frankly. Tolerance is weakness. It might make you feel stronger but tolerance puts you at a disadvantage. In this particular instance it has meant that one ethnic minority has managed to impose its political will against the majority. If the white population of America voted 90% for John McCain, then there can be no doubt how that would be regarded... The question with all tolerance is what comes next? No one over here seems to want to hazard a guess about that

John McCain is not regarded as a likely winner by any one in Europe as far as I can see at this early stage. He hardly ever gets mentioned.

Sounds like the bloom is still on the Obama rose in Europe. And that's to be expected I suppose. But, Moif, you need to understand that nobody is really sure what an Obama Presidency would look like in a number of policy areas because he hasn't had to define himself in that regard. Up until now he's been involved in a beauty contest for the nomination. He and Hillary aren't much different on most of the issues so they've been fighting over who is the most attractive candidate to the Democrat Party. Little in the way of substance, hence the food fight analogy.

That will change in the coming months once the Democrats make their decision. That candidate will then be forced to define themselves and their stances on a variety of issues because each of them has stark differences with John McCain. Neither of them, most especially Obama has nearly the length of the record that John McCain has and it's going to take more than a catchy slogan and vaporous platitudes about "change" for them to defeat McCain. They can claim they'll "work across the aisle" and bring a new kind of politics to Washington, but McCain can point to his record of working with Democrats like Joe Lieberman, Russ Feingold and Ted Kennedy and producing results from that work. John McCain was instrumental in creating the so-called "gang of 14" which was a coalition of 7 Democrats and 7 Republicans that united to break the gridlock on the Senate approval of federal judges. As a result we ended up with some fine judges including two Supreme Court justices, both of whom Obama and Clinton voted against for nothing more than partisan reasons.

Right now you're not hearing much about McCain because issues aren't nearly as much fun to talk about as a food fight is. However, as we head into the fall, you'll be hearing a lot more on the issues. And, a lot more about John McCain.


Aquilla

Bof you and most others know I'm a Hillary supporter and why. It is my bias that encourages me to use every tactic to support my candidate so please stop complaining when I fail to cheer for Obama. Yesterday I had little time to respond because my wife is working on her masters and was waiting for the computer so I didn't clearly read your post.

After more than 16 looooong months since Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton announced their candidacies for the presidency, has the democratic primary come to an end?No!

Is Obama the nominee? If so, how did she lose?No and Hillary hasn't lost, the Democratic Party has lost it's nerve.

Is the party healthy, are its november prospects good?No and no! Half of the party will be disappointed.

Hillary Supporters: What's on your mind? Tell us your frustrations, let's talk it out.Hillary has won equally to Obama and even more so with Democratic voters, she has a better chance to win in the fall. The base argument is that the Afro American Democratic voters are immature and will revolt if they don't get their way verses that Clinton's support group will suck it up even though she has equally won, why won't Hillary voters revolt equally to Afro Americans? Obama has support 91% of African American voters and Afro Americans are a very small minority in America, these AA voters are the majority of his support followed by young ideological voters followed by highly educated voters. The group identified supporting Obama cannot elect the president alone and it will be very easy for the party to be broken into splinters if the party tries. There are millions of Democrats, Independents and Republicans that wouldn't pee on Obama if he was on fire. He is an empty suit with a standard speech that says he is not beholding to special interest groups and will work across party and race lines to find utopia, but all the Democrats and Republicans in the House and Senate are beholding to special interest groups so he is an empty suit. What will happens if someone challenges Obama on special interests support?

Here is the debate that will end Obama's AA backed nomination victory in the fall:
The seeds have been sown already to end the Democratic victory with the mention of a tax holiday on high gas prices. High energy prices and jobs are center stage in the working class (that isn't Obama's support group unless they are AA) and the Republicans only need to explain when, where, why and how it came to this point to win over these voters. The argument is that oil companies make too much money so we should take it away and give it to the working class and build green machines, or we should drill, do nukes, open natural gas exploration, clean coal, make gas from coal and oil shale and at the same time work towards a green machine.

Obama: I do not owe anything to special interest groups (including environmental lobby?) I will give you $1,000 tax credit to cover the $5 oil I will remove oil company incentives and direct them towards green energy. Fill in the blank ________years green will take over and you will work in a union green machine factory, be heating your house, providing electricity from the products of your labor and oil will be history.

McCain: The environmental lobby is responsible for high energy prices and the loss of many of your jobs. Natural gas in Mexico and Canada costs 20% of what natural gas costs in America so manufacturers are forced to move to those areas to meet bottom line profit. We buy oil and gas from Canada and Mexico where they are allowed to convert oil shale to oil and produce natural gas economically while we cannot compete, our money is exported to these countries and the Mid East because of the environmental lobby. If the US government took every penny of big oil's profit and took away all of their government support the price of gas would drop only a very small margin as Senator Obama argued against the gas tax holiday. As demand grows along with out population under Obama's plan no help for high gas prices will happen until the green machine is complete. Senator Obama are you controlled by the environmental lobbyists? Obama how many years will it take to make your green machine? Working class folks, can you buy an electric car, my guess is that you couldn't even afford an electric golf cart while paying $5 gas to go to work?

Aquilla

There is no 'still' about it. Obama always had his supporters, but Clinton had the broadest support here for a long time. Its only in the last few weeks and months that the the perspective has changed to favour Obama.

The trouble with the 'food fight analogy' is thats how we Europeans see all American politics, and the animosity generated during the last presidential election suggests the spat between Clinton and Obama is not an exception to the rule. This is what American politics is now. Those who care enough about politics to actually bother to vote are divided between two diametrically opposed sides who can never truly meet. I have a feeling that John McCains record won't count for anything. Barack Obama might not have the length of the record that you say John McCain has (I'm not contradicting you on that), but he has just as much 'record' as GW Bush had.

The object lesson from the last US presidential campaign, and this current Democrat party nomination campaign indicates (both to me and to those European political analysts I've seen/read) that apathy will remain victorious in US politics.

I've said it before, what America really needs is political reform to give people the chance to vote for choices which are more in line with their political views. The mere fact that you can say Clinton and Obama aren't much different on most of the issues indicates to me that your biased (though of couse I already knew that). Even with my meager understanding I can see that they are different enough that in my country they wouldn't even be in the same party.


editted to add a missing word (in blue)

Racial Battle Royale?

And mostly, I don't think Obama's/H.Clinton to blame for this. From what I've seen, he's tried to run a post-racial campaign, but when you have:
- White (and black) people looking to make history more than make a better country
- Political pundits spouting off about historical firsts when they have nothing else to say about the election
- Deranged reverends coming out of the woodwork and turning the National Press Club into BET on Sunday Morning...
- The unrealistic/unfair/naive expectation from the Black community that Obama was supposed to be a "black President for black issues"

then it becomes more and more difficult to get away from the issue of race.

EDIT: If America wants political reform, tell it to stop electing their 104 year old congressman or the one that just got out of jail on criminal charges. I noted the other day how Congress' Approval Rating is in the toilet yet most likely, the same incumbents will be reelected back with no threat whatsoever. It's sick. To an extent, the people have no one to blame but themselves.

How would that work, exactly? They can come but can't vote? How would that smooth things over?

Basically, if Michigan and Florida are allowed to participate after the DNC has said that they couldn't, there will be a major problem. There is no way to fairly account for the delegates that will satisfy Clinton. If it doesn't help her, she won't go for it. She was the only candidate on the ballot in Michigan and the reason Obama's name was on in Florida was because state law wouldn't allow him to remove it. There is no way that these states can be fairly counted, so how does one seat their delegates at all?

That is true. No matter what is predicted in the (interminably long) lead-up to elections, new faces and "novices" have done pretty well come election time. Bill Clinton came out of nowhere to beat a sitting president. GW, even though we knew his father, was an unknown, in a way. Jimmy Carter won out of nowhere.

Also hard to predict is their success. What foreign policy experience did Clinton have? He turned out to be very good at foreign policy (roll your eyes if you want to, Ted, but the rest of the world thought he was great). Carter - same resume, largely - and he didn't have such good luck. Bush Jr. - ran on promises of being somewhat isolationist and not meddling in foreign affairs, and he turned out to be a major meddler. And, against expectations, he didn't take the lead from his father, just 8 years out of office.

The point is that you are rolling the dice, no matter what. You almost never get what you think you are voting for. A candidate's party affiliation is, unfortunately, the best predictor of what you can expect.

You said a mouthful there. Right on the money. This Mich/Fla mess could really throw a wrench in the Dems machinery as the ugly fight will go public and could easily demoralize the party faithful and new converts. If HC quits, this all but goes away.





The Clintons did nothing but assume they would get exactly the support from black voters they have had for years, and had earned years ago at every level. But, blacks voted their color. Hillary got about the same percentage of the black vote as does a white, Repub male candidate in a typical pres general election. Think about that, my friend. Do not attribute some sort of high-minded, principled vision to the black electorate--they just voted their color, as so many blacks are easily more prejudiced and more Philistine than any whites alive today. Like Michelle Obama, for instance.

One of my kids' friends was in her public school classroom and a black classmate said to her that when Obama wins, white people would be slaves to blacks. I wonder where she heard that little ditty? Yep, that principled black electorate....

Blacks are in love with the concept of a black president and "getting even", just as so many women are knee-jerk in love with the concept of a woman president and "getting even". I am ordering more ammunition.

On the merits, Hillary was betrayed.



I was not aware such a wonderful string of words, tied together in such an interesting and insightful way, would be deemed a "personal attack". I guess I'll just have to endure NT's slings and arrows with a stiff upper lip.