What if she honestly believes that she would be a better candidate in the general? Some of the polls bear that out I believe. And that’s now … Obama is likely to slip off his pedestal a little down the road.
All delegates, including those elected in primaries and caucuses, can vote for whomever they please.
They wouldn’t only lose black voters because of this, either. The Democratic party would lose a ton of support among independents and young voters, too. They won’t leave because of race, but because it looks like party insiders are subverting the will of the people. These voters might not vote en-masse for John McCain, but there’s a very real risk that they won’t vote at all, leading to a McCain victory in the fall. If the Clintons pull that stunt, their legacy will viewed less fondly than Ralph Nader’s.
There is precendence for this, too.
Back in the 1990 Texas gubernatorial race, Republican Clayton Williams lost to Democrat Ann Richards, even though he was initially ahead in polls by more than 20 points.
The turning point was a number of racist and misogynistic jokes Williams made to a bunch of reporters on his ranch just weeks before the election.
(I remember this election. At the time, I was a die-hard Republican. However, I was so disgusted by Williams that I refused to vote for him.)
I’m not suggesting that Obama would do anything at all similar to this, but stranger things have happened in politics.
Northern Piper, I think you and Manda Jo in the post above yours have it about right.
Also, contrary to others’ contentions, it’s not that blacks are voting for the black man simply because he’s black, rather it’s blacks are voting for a viable candidate who happens to be black. That Obama is the first minority who has a real shot at the presidency is a source of pride for many blacks, and that definitely has an impact on the numbers, but if race is all it’s about with blacks then Jesse Jackson and, dare I say, Al Sharption would have gone much farther than they did during their respective forays into the presidential nomination process. Most black folks simply either didn’t take them seriously, or never considered them worthy of their vote.
Anyone who seriously believes Al Sharpton would ever have carried more than a small percentage of the black vote or that blacks are voting for Obama solely because of his race willingly cleaves, regardless of any evidence to the contrary, to the misguided notion that blacks have something akin to a racial hive mind and are therefore monolithic on all issues directly or tangentially related to race, which is patently false, not to mention ridiculous.
Sorry for the hijackery.
**Burundi ** makes a very good point in post 23 as well.
To answer the OP’s initial question, she can’t, if you consider forcing a subversion the rules SHE ORIGINALLY AGREED TO as cheating, which I do.
This “anything can happen” talk is all ridiculous, not as an argument in general, but as an argument for this particular situation.
This is the first time in a long time that Democrats have had such a good chance of taking back the White House from Republicans while also getting a big Congressional majority. While to some extent this primary has helped the Democrats — voter registrations and attention on the candidates, etc. — it is beginning to wear thin with people. If this is taken to the convention, the Democratic candidate will have two months — two months, people! — to campaign against McCain. That’s not enough time for a country this size.
Hillary is simply being a dick. And so are her enablers.
Then win the damn primaries by promoting yourself. Don’t try to win by demanding delegates get seated from a state where your opponents name wasn’t on the ballot. Don’t try to seat delegates based on “fairness” when you were more than happy to strip them of votes back before you thought they could help you. Don’t imply that your opponent can’t be trusted with a 3am phone call.
Her team seems to be spending their time trying to find ways to twist facts and data to support her getting the nomination, instead of just plain old getting folks to vote for her in bigger numbers.
It’s bizarre seeing an American politician (or at least her supporters) seemingly being all wink-wink, nudge-nudge about the political process.
Like, “you know how this turns out, tovarish, and isn’t it better for you simply to play along in the meantime? Much healthier that way.”
It isn’t Clinton’s fault that the convention is so close to the general election. Blame the Democrat party for that. Also, Obama has, to some extent, already been campaigning against McCain. I dislike Clinton as much as the next person, but her staying in the race doesn’t seem like a fair criticism to me. She still does have a slim chance of winning the nomination (Obama could always pull a Clayton Williams). It’s her tactics of tearing down her opponent instead of building herself up that bother me.
Blame whomever you want. I don’t give a shit about blame. Blame the Republic party for all I care.
Therefore, if she wins, it’s even worse. She’ll have to scramble like the dickens to build an effective national campaign, and given what she’s done with the primary campaign — having all the time in the world — there’s little hope of that.
Irrelevant. If she wins it, something could happen with her in September. That’s a non-argument. (Also, your link doesn’t work.)
What bothers me is her tactic of tearing down her party, and even her nation if necessary to position herself better. For the Clintons, it has always been about them.
Thank you for pointing this out. I’ve had a number of people, directly or indirectly, say to me, “Oh, well I’m sure YOU’RE voting for Obama…because…you know…” :rolleyes: The idea is absurd for all the reasons you’ve pointed out already.
Even then, the pride issue is more about the fact that there’s a black man who is probably the best candidate out there. Not just that he’s a viable candidate, but the best choice. I don’t think there’s any room for affirmative action in the Oval Office. If there were a white (or female or Laotian or Neptunian) candidate whom I thought would do a better job as president and benefit the country more than Obama, that other person would still get my vote.
Clinton is running because she still thinks she has a chance of winning. While incredibly slim, she does still have a chance. For the most part (highly debateable regarding Florida and Michigan), she is running within the confinds of the system that is in place. If she still believes she has a chance at winning and believes she will be a better president than Obama, shouldn’t she stay in the race? I don’t think she’s purposefully sabatoging the democrats although that may be a side effect. Should party loyalty trump everything?
I can’t stand her. I think she’s more divisive than Bush was when he ran. Her campaign tactics are despicable, and I think it would be incredibly bad for the country if she somehow wins. I just don’t think she can be criticized for staying in the race. Then again, I’m also the type of person who doesn’t see a problem with third party candidates running when they have no hope of winning.
Thanks, I don’t know what happened there. It was the infamous comment that Clayton Williams made in the 1990 Texas gubernatorial election when he said (when comparing the Texas weather to rape) “as long as it’s inevitable, just relax and enjoy it”. It is referenced in the wikipedia page on him. Clayton Williams - Wikipedia
Hey, anything CAN happen, right? Like Obama going the way of Bobby Kennedy.
Not everything no. But it should trump personal ambition — especially when four more years of Republican governance is at stake.
That darn Manda Jo - faster typer, and pithier wordsmith - said it better than my rambling post. 
Once, and he hasn’t done it yet. He needs 2026 delegates and he does not have them.
Here’s one way one pundit thinks she can win:
*Lost in the excitement of Barack Obama’s coronation this week was an inconvenient fact of Tuesday’s results: Hillary Clinton netted approximately 150,000 votes and is now poised to finish the primary season as the popular-vote leader. In some quaint circles, presumably, these things still matter.
Real Clear Politics keeps track of six versions of the popular-vote total. …
If you believe that the most important precept in democratic politics is to “count every vote,” then the sixth category is the most inclusive, and here Clinton leads Obama by 71,301 votes. Of course, this includes the Michigan result, where Sen. Obama had removed his name from the ballot. So while it may be the most inclusive, it may not be the most fair.
The third and fourth counts - the ones which include Florida - seem more fair. Here, Obama is clinging to a slight lead of 146,786 votes (257,008, with the caucus estimates). However, with Puerto Rico, Montana, and South Dakota remaining, he will almost certainly finish behind her in these counts, likely by a few hundred thousand votes.
But could Clinton take over the lead in all of the popular-vote tabulations? Quite possibly… It is this looming prospect which explains the tremendous pressure Obama partisans and the media are putting on Clinton to drop out of the race. They want her gone now because they understand that she has an excellent chance of finishing as the undisputed people’s choice.
Would it matter if Clinton were the undisputed (or even disputed) popular-vote winner? That’s hard to say. The question is, matter to whom? The superdelegates will determine the nominee and there’s no telling what will sway them. They have no objective criteria from which to make their decisions. But if they were to deny the popular-vote champ the nomination, there is a real question of whether Democratic voters would reconcile themselves to the decision. As it is, much of the talk about Democratic defections in November has been overstated.
Partisan voters almost always come home after their candidate loses. The problem arises when a candidate’s supporters believe that their guy (or gal) didn’t lose. Expect the chorus calling for Clinton’s withdrawal to grow louder over the next week, with people insisting that she has no “path to victory.”
Clinton’s path is both obvious and simple: Win the popular vote and force Barack Obama and his cheerleaders to explain why that doesn’t matter."*
If Obama wan’s HRC to drop out all he has to do is get 2026 delegates. Neither should drop out until they do. To do otherwise is unfair to the electorate.
Hillary cannot win the nomination at this point. Which is why it is so frustrating for many of us that she refuses to accept this fact. And the more she goes on about Michigan and Florida and “winning” the popular vote, the more desperate she seems. Delegates and delegates only determine the Democratic nominee and there is no scenario left in which she wins a majority of them.
Looking at the math, neither candidate has 2209 or 2025 or however many votes someone decides is needed to win.
So, for the sake of argument, let’s say things continue to wander aimlessly until the convention, and neither candidate wins on the first ballot. At that point, maybe you have a lot of super delegates start thinking “why the hell are we still here? Why didn’t Obama finish her off while he had all the momentum.”
And maybe a few of the Obama delegates from places like Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky and Texas start thinking “I voted for him on the first ballot, but geez, he lost in my state, so maybe I should vote the way my state did.”
On the second ballot, Obama loses a few votes, and Hillary gains a few. Let’s say neither has a majority after the second ballot.
At this point, all the pundits and the party bosses and Democrats running in every other race this fall start thinking “the momentum is shifting. The Republicans will have a field day with this. What do we do now?”
Obama did not lose Texas.
Just wanted to let you know that whenever I see the phrase “Democrat party” I give zero credibility to any points being made in the post. It’s "Democratic Party" and the other phrase is used by Republicans in an attempt to be derisive.