NO MORE SOUTHERNERS! Pub or Dem! We need a break!
So you’re applying a regional test toward who the candidate should be? I disagree: I think we need to have no more “Must be southern!” rule.
Wait–our last candidate, Kerry, wasn’t Southern. Guess that this rule doesn’t exist after all.
Daniel
The “must be a southerner” rule only applies if you want to win the general election.l
I agree. I’m sick of hearing a Southern Accent in the W.H.
I guess the rest of the country disagrees. Let’s face it, Northeasteners are gun-hating, queer-loving, baby-slaughtering, godless, snooty moral relativists who belong in Canada or…France. You want some American Eurofag elitist to run this great nation, son? Has he ever fired a weapon? In war? Wait, he has? Hold on, lemme think…
But even then they felt obliged to find Kerry a Southern running mate. In any case, I was merely expressing a wish that we not have a Southern president (nor vice-president) for a while. Sick of 'em. It would be refreshing to have a Northeastern prez and a Western or Midwestern veep, or vice-versa, whatever. Just for a break.
I don’t care where the candidate is from, the gender or the party. I just want a competent president again.
I guess that just seems ridiculous to me. I want a competent president, an ethical president. I don’t give a shit whether the president is white or black, Jewish or Baptist, left-handed or right-handed, skinny or obese, Southerner or Yankee. I want the best president we can get, and screw the irrelevancies.
Daniel
I don’t care where the Prez is from either, but you have to admit the notion that there has to be a Southerner (especially on the Democratic side) because Southerners need to vote for one of their own, is very irritating. If it’s true, it’s even more irritating.
It’s generally accepted that a good formula for a winning strategy for the Dems is to find a moderate Southern governor with a Protestant religious affiliation that is publically affirmed. Being male and white would certainly help, though no one dares say that aloud. Mark Warner of VA fits this profile perfectly, just as Clinton did. Basically, find another Clinton, only without all the skirt-chasing baggage.
Why must it be a Southerner? Well, the drawl is “folksy”, you see. Fer some folks, it means yer personable and still got the common touch. It works like a charm fer Dubya, who’s shore to drop a few more “y’alls” in his speeches when he hits the Heartland and the Bible Belt. Mean’s yer our kinda people, see, and yah think like us and believe like us, and yer not gonna be pushed around by them big city libruls with their crazy godless ways into turnin’ yer back on the real 'merkuns. The folks how made this country great. That sorta thang.
Yeah, I do understand the logic. It’s patronising on the party officials’/primary voters’ side, and if it’s actually true that blocs of Southern voters won’t accept a Northerner, it’s also annoying for being true.
Yeah, I do understand the logic. It’s patronising on the party officials’/primary voters’ side, and if it’s actually true that blocs of Southern voters won’t accept a Northerner, it’s also annoying for being true.
I absolutely agree with both parts of this: indeed, my point is that any sort of regional rule, whether it’s “Must be Southern!” or “Must not be Southern!” is ridiculous.
It does seem that many voters in the South have the sort of rule that you describe, and that’s stupid. But when Northern voters have a “Must not be Southern!” rule, or even inclination, that’s equally stupid.
Vote for the best candidate, and screw the irrelevancies.
Daniel
You know, Tony Blair’s going to be available 
Seriously, it’s good that there are so many possible candidates.
I suspect they were just reacting to the ‘truism’ that we’re talking about, but I don’t know.
Gah!
This is why I stopped registering as a Democrat.
Gore? Kerry? ARE YOU KIDDING?!? Unless Biden comes with response to the plagiarism charge that’s shorter than a paragraph, he ain’t got a chance, neither. And is the party really stupid and short-sighted enough to nominate Hillary? Ain’t gonna happen, folks.
If you insist on looking to the Senate in 2008, and we still have significant presence in Iraq at that point, here are the best bets for recent Democratic Senators.
Akaka (D-HI)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Boxer (D-CA)
Byrd (D-WV)
Chafee (R-RI)
Conrad (D-ND)
Corzine (D-NJ)
Dayton (D-MN)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Graham (D-FL)
Inouye (D-HI)
Kennedy (D-MA)
Leahy (D-VT)
Levin (D-MI)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Murray (D-WA)
Reed (D-RI)
Sarbanes (D-MD)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Wellstone (D-MN)
Wyden (D-OR)
These are the ones who voted against Bush’s war powers in 2002. Anyone else who voted the other way? Not a prayer.
On the plus side for the Dems, they might end up running against McCain. If they are smart, no campaign material will fail to mention the “Keating Five”, which has at least as much currency as Biden’s plagiarism charge.
Actually, after LBJ and Dubya, I’m happy with “No More Texans!”
This is what I’ve been trying to tell the Republican nutjobs around here. Hillary has never said or done *anything * to indicate that she wants to be President. From what I’ve heard, it took some convincing by the NY Democrats to convince her to run for the Senate.
That’s a matter of interpretation.
Got an example for us to interpret, then?