Followup/counterpart to this thread. As Iowa approaches, Clinton seems to have lost some of her aura of “inevitability,” opening the door to serious discussion of alternatives. Who will the nominee be? (Not, who do you want it to be.)
FTR, I still think it will be Clinton, and the next relevant question is who will be her running mate.
I thought so too until the last week or so. Now, I think the Oprah Effect will give it to Obama.
I think Hillary is still the most likely candidate because if she wins Iowa, I think she takes the whole enchilada, while other two major candidates may still lose despite winning Iowa. And the IA race is far from over. For example, the Des Moines Register just endorsed Clinton. This may stem Obama’s momentum just enough to give Hillary Iowa.
a) Clinton has been the so-called “prohibitive favorite”. Some of what you’re seeing now is the “Oh no not Clinton” contingent lining up behind Omama, and it was inevitable that that was going to coalesce somehow. The people who don’t like the favorite but whose first choice stayed buried back in Tier 2 or Tier 3 are making their 2nd-best selection now.
b) On the other hand, a lot of people who might have liked Obama and said so earlier but who did not think he had staying power are probably hopping on board because apparently he does. Not that there’s not a lot of overlap between this and factor “a” above, but yes it does have to do with Obama as Obama. He’s a great orator; I wish he had another term behind him before doing this but if he wins the nom he’s totally got my support.
c) If he wins the nomination, he will have damn well earned it. Clinton has a long-distance strategy mapped out and has the resources to pursue it. More than any other candidate in the field, she can afford to lose some early contests and even become the nationally-polled 2nd or 3rd choice and still beat her way back to the front. She’s got the war chest for it, and if the lead is owned by Obama she suddenly becomes the “Oh no not Obama” candidate. Her strength is that she’s a true policy geek; she’s not flashy and will probably never inspire devotion but she seems to be quite good at this being-a-politician thing. She’s my first choice. She, too, is going to have to earn it though: it’s already obvious that she’s not going to walk off with it sans effort.
d) As long as most Dem-inclined voters feel as I do, that they could live with either candidate, a fairly long season of relative uncertainty probably won’t hurt the ultimate nominee. And either of them should be able to knock off any of the Republican candidates, so I’m predicting that this time next year either President-elect Clinton or President-elect Obama will be planning their first term.
e) Neither Edwards nor any other of the remaining candidates is going to collect enough delegates to look like the likely nominee at any point in the process.
I’m not so sure about Edwards. At first blush, he seems like Johnny Underqualified. But against the Political Wife & the First-Term Senator, that’s not such a huge strike now. And he’s been the strong populist voice since his run in 2004. He may pull off a win in one state’s caucuses & give Obama a real run.
That, or someone outside the mainstream-media-anointed Glamourous Three (say, Resume Richardson, Experience Biden, or Real Grade A Democrat Dodd) surprises us in a caucus at the last minute, & one of the glamourous three has to be the challenger to him. Perhaps in a year we all look silly nattering on about Bubba’s wife, a Ken doll, & “the token black senator.”
:sigh:
Clinton was declared the winner a few months ago. They did it by stressing how she was the big leader in raising money. That does not translate to votes like they thought. it would. The voters are afraid of getting served another dish of what Bush was cooking up. She has been too close to the war and the corps making money off it. Nafta was a program in her husbands administration .
I like Edwards. I would respect Biden more if he just didn;t make stupid little gaffs. Kusinich is my choice but I could live with Edwards .
I like Edwards. He seems to be the only one who wants real political and economic reform, the type of reform that is not regressive. I do think Clinton will get the nomination, and I will happily vote for her. I will happily vote for Obama if he gets the nomination, but I don’t think he will.
Dodd failed to register for the Delaware primary. This after failing to register for the New York primary (under the assumption that it’s Clinton’s state). While I admire what he’s doing to fight telecom immunity in the Senate, I don’t think he has a chance for the presidential nomination.
One reason to lean towards Hillary is that she has the support of the triangulated, centrist, Republican Lite leadership, the kind of guys who rush to say “Hey! We’re pro-business too!” She will draw money from the hedge-betters, Republicans who donate to the Dems, people who have wet dreams about Joe Lieberman winning the Dem nomination.
So she can take some hits and remain viable, she could probably lose one, two, or more of the earlist primarys, but so long as she doesn’t get totally creamed, she remains in contention, which gives her the option of wearing down the opposition, and getting the “Oh, to hell with it! Hillary!” vote.
And all the while, there will still be some asstards calling her a “socialist”! :rolleyes:
Four years ago at this point, John Kerry was in third place behind a seemingly unstoppable Howard Dean and a typically uninteresting Dick Gephardt. It’s foolish to think anything is decided at this point.
Of course, Hillary is not Dean. She’s been around a lot longer, so it’s not going to be easy to change her story at the last minute, and she’s not making many mistakes. But the media’s biggest bias comes into play here–they want a compelling story, and it just isn’t that interesting when the frontrunner runs away with it. A lot can happen between now and the convention.
Still, I’m putting Hillary at even money. I’ll put 3:2 on Obama and 9:1 on Edwards. I don’t think anyone else has a reasonable chance at this point, though Huckabee’s remarkable late surge means I might be wrong.
We’re talking about the Dem nomination here.
I know; I’m just using the Huck’s late surge on the other side as an example of why, say, a Richardson surge is unlikely but not impossible.
I don’t think there is the same potential for a Richardson surge as there was for Huckabee. The Republicans have an uneasy alliance of tax cutters, libertarians, evangelicals, and hawks. The evangelicals felt left out and rallied behind one of their own. I don’t see a similar Democratic faction that would rally behind Richardson.
I think Hillary would be better off with a Edwards-Obama-Clinton finish in Iowa than an Obama-Clinton-Edwards finish. She needs Edwards to stay viable and dilute the anti-Hillary vote. Certainly Hillary has to be encouraged by the Des Moines Register endorsement. On the other hand, they have a knack for betting on the wrong horse. With this being the last practical week for campaigning, unless something happens I would say by sheer inertia that Hillary gets her butt handed to her in Iowa. Same thing in New Hampshire. The true test is what will happen when Biden, Dodd, and Richardson bow out. Will they turn the tables for Obama, or for Edwards? I can’t see them jumping to Hillary’s side. Right now I estimate the odds this way:
Obama 60%
Clinton 35%
Edwards 5%
Atrios’ quick summary of the Dem candidates:
That was yesterday. Today, Krugman gave the long version of Atrios’ Obama and Edwards descriptions.
Obama’s doing much better than I would have expected at this point but I still think he’s peaking and is going to fall behind. A lot of Obama’s strength comes from his personal charisma which makes him a powerful candidate in Iowa and New Hampshire where a candidate can literally meet and talk to every voter. But Clinton’s strength is in her organization and that’s going to count more in big states like Florida. And Clinton’s worst enemies will concede she’s not incompetent or prone to panic - her “war room” will already be making plans for how to come back from behind if Obama takes the lead.
Clinton will win because of her superior political machine. I think if this contest were in a year or two then Obama might have a national mechanism in place but its too early for him. I like his charisma and his youth but Clinton despite her missteps recently is still going to win. the other candidates are basically all there to fight to be her running mate. Edwards is too much of a populist and no-one seems to know or care about Richardson.
I don’t think the Anybody-But-Hillary contingent is very strong in the Democratic Party, they are mostly Republicans. The Dems are blessed with a very deep field, and anyone of the four top candidates could be nominated and then be supported of the vast majority of Democrats. I am leaning toward Edwards in the primary, but I would have no problem voting for Clinton or Obama in the general election.
I’m curious who you consider the top four. Clinton and Obama seem to be competing for the lead with Edwards a distant third. The other candidates are so far behind it’s only a statistical matter who’s in fourth place. To paraphrase this week’s issue of Time magazine, if you’re reading this post you’re only one percent behind Christopher Dodd in the 2008 presidential race.