That wouldn’t at all surprise me either, in fact I expect it. Obama will just have to win enough votes in enough other demographics to overcome that likelihood. 
All I’m focussing on right now is Clinton’s assumed lead in Pennsylvania (up into the 20s) being whittled away to a margin by election day so small (if a winning margin at all) as to put paid to her claims of greater electability. If she doesn’t win PA by a blowout, over at least 15 percent, it’s all over.
There have apparently been a bunch of Republicans crossing over to register as Dems in PA. That means conservatives are probably planning to to tamper with primary and vote for Hillary as an attempt to sabotage the party. I think Hillary will still win big in PA, not with Dems but with Republicans afraid of Obama.
Little reported fact: Hillary was actually on her way to Serbia, but insisted on stopping in Bosnia to “ask for directions.” I assure you, no male president could get caught in such a situation.
Peggy Noonan of the WSJ got an email with the best first hand account of the Bosnia scene:
Damn that democracy!
Stuff like this happens all of the time. My mom leans Republican as a voter, but maintains a Democratic registration because in her town in Pennsylvania the Democratic primary is the de facto general election for local races, and she’d like to actually have a say.
There are lots of towns in the rural part of the state just as Republican in local makeup, but with lots of Democratic leaning voters living there.
It would be mighty hard to measure the impact of all of this, especially in a state like Pennsylvania that keeps such a lid on things with closed primaries. If the Republican field were open and my mom crossed over to vote there, you’d likely
consider this a Democrat crossing over to vote Republican, instead of a Republican leaning voter hoping to have a say in the presidential election.
I have no doubt there are some voters hoping to game the system, especially since the Republican contest is decided - but I think it might be a lot less than you think for the reasons I described.
It’s not really democracy, though, is it? It’s not an election, it’s a private party’s nomination process. It’s not the same as actually electing someone for public office. I can start my own party and have a primary in my basement with me as the only voter. There is no “democratic” right for anyone else to come vote in my primary. Same here.
I wasn’t even making a value judgement about the crossing over in this case, for that matter, just noting that it was happening and stating that I expect Hillary to win by a large margin because of it.
Whatever. The rules are set - and results flow from them.
Personally, I’d look at the demographics of Pennsylvania and the fact that Obama has been very unsuccessful in appealing to these - that’s your answer. In a state that is more conservative and elderly - even among Democrats, a reformist liberal with strong youth appeal either has to work for these votes or lose. And he’ll lose.
Pennsylvania is very strange politically. Our major division within the state isn’t so much Republican/Democrat as it is Philly/Pittsburgh. The Democrats, as a rule, tend to be conservative enough that the differences in-state between Ds and Rs is relatively minimal (our most popular governor in the last 20 years was a pro-life Democrat!), but the regional differences are killer. Take Rendell (please!)…in his 2004 primary against Bob Casey (our current Senator and that pro-life Democrat’s pro-life Democrat son), Rendell only took Philadelphia, the ring suburb counties of Philadelphia, and the Lehigh Valley (the next rung out from the ring suburbs). Everything west of about Chester County was Casey country. Rendell isn’t terribly popular outside of the Philly Sphere-of-Influence.
Will Casey’s endorsement make much difference in PA?
I’d agree with you, and add divisions for Erie and Scranton/Wilkes-Barre.
Also, as much as Democrats can occasionally be pro-life in Pennsylvania, it has always struck me how often they are pro-gun outside of Philly and downtown Pittsburgh. Pennsylvania is likely the most pro-gun state in the union politically - there are more NRA members there than any other state than California, and California has a much larger population. In addition to this, hunting is still ingrained into many people’s lives.
Well, it could definitely help. I doubt it’s going to make enough of a difference to flip the win/lose expectations, but, for instance, Scranton/Wilkes-Barre (NE PA) is a Casey stronghold…and it’s also, prior to this, strongly pro-Clinton (her family is from the area originally). I don’t know how much of a difference that’s going to make, but it should nudge things in Obama’s favor a little and help make up that gap a bit. Also, Philadelphia is strongly pro-Casey as well, but it’s also a major Rendell stronghold. I think what the Casey endorsement is really going to do is help cancel out some pro-Clinton pols’ endorsements and maybe even things up a little. Remember that keeping the gap below 8-9% is an Obama victory here. Clinton set the bar herself two weeks ago at 20%. Anything under that is less than a blowout on her part. And anything in the single digits isn’t even a victory, in spirit, for her because the proportional delegate distribution won’t be enough to give her any kind of pledged delegate lead over what it is now.
There was a thread recently, something about if you could change something about your political party, what would it be? I jumped on the “Dump Gun Control” bandwagon, because it’s really a loser proposition in states like Pennsylvania (the first days of doe and buck season are de facto school holidays here, f’rgoshsakes!). There are millions of people who in most other political positions would be best served by the Democratic party who vote Republican almost exclusively because of the gun issue.
I’d say that one’s pretty much taken care of itself. There are three factions in the Democratic party these days vis-a-vis gun control: those who don’t support gun control; those who, all other things being equal, would like to see more gun control, but think it’s less important than a few zillion more pressing issues; and those who’d actually like to see the party take a pro-gun-control stand.
These days, the third group is smaller, probably much smaller, than both of the first two. Eight years of Bush has reordered priorities considerably, and pushed a lot of Dems from the third group into the second.
The lefty netroots, taken as a group, have very little enthusiasm for gun control, and they draw heavily from the demographic that used to give gun control most of its support: educated, upper middle class background, urban/suburban professional types.
Aside from the D.C. gun law case that was recently before the Supreme Court, I can’t remember when’s the last time I’ve read anything in the newspapers about gun control, one way or the other. It’s practically disappeared from view as a movement.
Word on that. I know very few liberals who actually care about the issue. I think, all things being equal, a lot of them would rather see fewer guns than more guns but it’s not much of a legislative priority, or even much of a topic of conversation. I think the gun culture’s image of liberals sitting around plotting about taking people’s guns away has very little basis in reality. I know lots of bleeding heart liberals. They talk about Iraq, UHC, how much they hate Bush (the number one topic of conversation), Global Warming, GLBT issues and the religious right, but gun control only ever comes up in passing after the latest school shooting and never very earnestly.
There are a lot more single-issue voters who are pro-gun than single-issue voters who are pro-gun control. It’s a losing proposition and I think the democrats realize that. I hope so.
However, I know Obama is scaring away a lot of his potential crossover with his extreme anti-gun stance. I say extreme because his desire to ban all “semi-automatics” would ban what I would guess to be 60-70% of all guns - maybe more.
I don’t know if he realizes this, or if he’s under the wrong impression of what “semi-automatic” means, as the media uses it as a scare word.
Probably the best thing (for us) and the worst thing (for her) to come out of this incident is that it lays the field open to a myriad of parodies like this one. Not that her reputation didn’t already precede her, but there’s nothing worse to have your name become equivalent to fabrication/hyperbole (just ask Gore, who was unfairly branded the same rep, which he could never really shake).
Is Hillary Clinton the next Chuck Norris?
Can I ask for a cite without making it sound like I’m doubting you? I didn’t realize that Obama was talking about banning all semi-automatics. That’s even more extreme than I would expect.
Unless, like you said, either he or the media is misspeaking.
Wonder how he will react if the Supreme Court rules there is an individual right to bear arms? Think of the campaign fodder - “Barack Obama wants to overrule your rights!”
Regards,
Shodan
http://www.ontheissues.org/2008/Barack_Obama_Gun_Control.htm
I assume that site is objective, but I’ve read the same thing in multiple places to back it up.
It says “ban sale or transfer” of them, which would grandfather the current ones. Not quite as extreme - but that makes it more dangerous rather than less because it’s a tiny bit more likely to be practical.
Yes, but it also says that came from the answer to a questions posed on the IL State Legislative National Political Awareness Test Jul 2, 1998, fully 10 years ago!
If you look at what he’s done with regard to that issue (nothing), and what he says now about how he would handle legal gun ownership and supporting the 2nd Amendment vs how he would seek to control crime committed with guns, you’ll find a very different message.