Sometime in the next few months, either Clinton or Obama will become the Democratic party nominee to run for president.
I’m wondering what people think about the future political careers of each one, assuming a failed bid for the nomination this year.
Will Clinton be able to successfully run for president in 2012 or 2016? Will Obama?
My initial feelings are that Hillary could hardly find a time to run that is more favorable than now. If McCain becomes the next POTUS, she’s got a potential chance in 2012, but if Obama becomes POTUS, she will never sit in the Oval Office.
I think Obama could manage to run again in both 2012 and 2016, but by 2016 his youthful appeal will be gone, which I think has been a big advantage to him this year.
It appears that McCain only got 75% of the votes in the Republican Primaries of North Carolina and Indiana, despite Huckabee (who got roughly 10% in each state) dropping out of the race two months ago.
I think that this means that both Clinton or Obama can defeat McCain in November. McCain can’t seem to energise the Republican voters. (I assume he is trying…)
EDIT: This means the Democrat who does not get nominated this year will probably have to wait untill 2016 for another try.
If Obama wins, then will we hear the “Grandma Hillary” jokes (like we hear jokes about McCains age)?
I think, in today’s environment of total media oversaturation, it’s hard to mount a campaign that goes this far and then do it again in four years. If Hillary’s “Campaign Inevitable” strategy had worked and Obama quit after, say, a loss South Carolina, I think he could have run again in 2012. But over the last few elections you’ve seen few candidates who were able to get any traction in making a second shot. Edwards got overwhelmed by Clinton and Obama this year, and Kerry wouldn’t have had a prayer even without the “stuck in Iraq” thing. Clark dipped his toe in this year, but didn’t bother entering. Gore couldn’t bring himself to try again in 2004 or this year. Lieberman bombed in 2004, although why anyone thought he ever had a chance, I don’t know. In 2000, McCain quit in March - and remember, that campaign didn’t start as early as this one did; New Hampshire voted in February - and he endorsed Bush in May. This campaign has been in high gear for a much longer amount of time.
Clinton’s argument this year was that she was battle-tested and nobody would find any new dirt on her. That was apparently true, but unhelpful, because people just get sick of politicians after a while. And for her, her personality was a bigger problem than the dirt anyway.
Clinton’s spent much of her political capital in this bid, probably precisely because it’s her last shot.
Obama’s been very cautious not to step on any feet, though obviously he’s done so by accident a couple of times. He’s gained national name recognition, and cultivated a lot of good will among voters and politicians alike. If McCain should win and Obama makes another bid in 2012, I expect he’ll be the party favorite then.
It’s not just that he’s young, but he has different ideas about how things should be run with the willpower to stick to his principles. That resonates more with this voter, at least, than his age.
I think Hillary wants to be POTUS, but only if she gets it now. She doesn’t want to wait until 2016. Fortunately for the country I don’t believe she’ll ever be President. She’s pretty much sealing her fate with her current actions. No one is going to want to go through this with her again in eight years. I believe her sole reason for becoming a Senator was so she could make this run this time for POTUS. She doesn’t want to be Senator, so having to go back to that job when she feels the presidency is rightfully hers, is going to be a big let down. I predict she’ll sail off into the sunset when her senate term is up. She’s done.
Obama says he wouldn’t try again for POTUS if he didn’t make it in this time. I don’t know if I believe that, but since he’s going to be President this time we won’t have to worry about finding out.
I think that in general a candidate’s best time to run is the current election.
There are just too many variables in play to predict how elections four years or more from now will shape up. This is practically an eternity, and there are endless ways in which a candidate will be irrelevant by then. As a candidate, I would fight hard for the current election. Sure, if I lost it may end up that I would be a viable candidate in the future, but I would never bet on a “lets not run now, but plan for a future election” strategy. Just too many unpredictable things can happen. Also, I think losing an election is a pretty good accelerator of irrelevancy (nobody likes a loser!).
Which is why even though my current preference is for Obama to win the democratic nomination and the presidency, I certainly wouldn’t expect Clinton or McCain or any other potential nominee to give up easily. I’d expect anyone at this level to be too ambitious for that, and they are all entitled to fight as hard as they want for this since it is very likely going to be their only real chance.
How much of the vote in WV and KT do you think Obama would get if Hillary dropped out today? Most people studying this have said that Obama would actually lose to Clinton even in that case.
I would have to say that if Hillary doesn’t get the nomination (which I can’t see how she could at this point) she is pretty much done wrt a bid at the White House. Even if she by some miracle DOES get the nomination but manages to lose to McCain I think her political goose is cooked, at least as far as being President is concerned.
Obama on the other hand…I think that if he loses the nomination to Hillary due to some underhanded convention shenanigans and assuming Clinton loses, I think he would be in an excellent position to be the automatic front runner in 2012 and depending on how a McCain administration goes to win. If Obama wins the primary but loses to McCain in the general…well, I think he will be in a very unfavorable position at that point wrt running again. That doesn’t mean he couldn’t…but most people who lose in the general election don’t do well in subsequent elections. The only one I can think of that lost and later won is Nixon. I suppose it would depend on why he lost and by how much.
Either way both candidates pretty much have to look at this as do or die…because there is no predicting how things will progress or who will catch the publics eye next…or what screwups or skeletons in closets might come out at a later date.
I think if McCain loses he’ll be back, ready to roll in the next election…and the one after that. And the one after that as well. He’ll keep trying until he makes it…or dies. White house or bust!
I think this is a very false assumption–if I was a Republican (which I am not) I wouldn’t bother voting right now either. Why–McCain has the nomination. Just because he only won x amount of the vote is meaningless in my opinion. His ability to energize the Republican voters is untested at this time.
I believe Obama can beat McCain, but I am not so starry-eyed that I don’t see that lots of reasonable people will vote for McCain. I do like the odds of Obama winning that contest, but don’t fall into the fallacy of the last two elections in which nobody on this board thought GWB could win–and yet he did.
I think if Obama were to lose this time, he wouldn’t be back in 2012 or 2016 or anytime. To my understanding, Michelle Obama is being gracious and backing him up in this run, but isn’t terribly thrilled personally about the family being in the spotlight for eight (well, nine or more with this damn primary season) years. She’s going along with her husband because she really feels that he can do great things for the country, but she more or less wishes someone else were running who had the kind of potential and talent for it, and who could persuade Obama that he didn’t NEED to run to fix the last eight years of malfeasance and mismanagement.
So, yeah, Michelle appears to have mixed feelings about the whole thing, and, while she’s playing devoted wife and future first lady to the hilt, she’s rather not be having to. I think she’d be an influential voice to nix a future run if this one doesn’t work out.
Are you implying that the Hillary supporters of WV and KT are voting (may vote) based on race? :eek:
I thought only Pubbies did that.
Or are you implying that, even with her dropping out, her name is still on the ballot, and that there are enough folks who aren’t paying attention to the news who will vote for her?
However, I was interested in voting for some of the local ballot initiatives too, and it would have been enough to drag me off my couch, even if McCain had the nom tied up back before Feb 5.
And that likely is the case here too, I am not privvy to if there were other issues on the Indiana or NC ballots. Also in Indiana as I understand it you can cross party lines and vote the other side. And with Limbaugh’s urging I understand that there was some of that cross party pollination going on. So I guess my point is that seeing only a certain percentage of republicans voting for McCain in an uncontested primary has no bearing on his support in the presidential election–and you can’t extrapolate anything of value from the observation.
As for Hillary in this scenario, it depends a lot on how much she supported him in the election campaign. If she really reversed course, and got behind him all the way she might still have a shot on the electability issue. (She could say she lost the nomination due to poor planning, and is now smarter.) If she sits out the race, she could be blamed for Obama’s loss and she’d be over with.
I may be more cynical than reality can support, but the impression I have is that most people tend to focus more attention on the large, national level elections than they do about stuff on the state and local levels. Which seems absolutely idiotic to me, because you’re more likely to be able to make a personal difference on the local level than in the larger arenas.
