I like the story that Muskie’s decline started when Hunter Thompson dropped a bunch of acid and heckled him during a key speech. Probably not true, but a fine story nonetheless.
As an aside, why can’t Obama seem to close the deal?
Not unless there was some reason the Chicago Kid had been heavily favored over the Thriller Diller. It seems to me that Clinton is the heavyweight champ here.
Was there some expectation early on that Obama would knock Hillary out? I hadn’t heard of any, and if I had I would have laughed at the person who said it. In fact, it was quite a long time before I believed that Obama could actually beat her. And he has. She’s clinging to the ropes and lying in a puddle of blood, but the ref refuses to call the fight. It’s over for her. It has been over for her since Super Tuesday.
I am trying to think of a single even remotely reasonable scenario where Hillary gets the nomination and it doesn’t lead to a McCain victory and I got nothing.
I like the way Hillary is saying Obama outspent her 2:1 in PA, and uses that as a sign of his weakness. He spent more because he can raise more. Standard political spin.
Looking back in history, Bill Clinton wasn’t able to “close the deal” and get enough delegates to secure his nomination until June 1992, even though all of his opponents had dropped out. cite.
You expect Obama to do it when Clinton couldn’t even do it unopposed?
Even your own cite says that’s technically true, but Clinton had the nomination wrapped up soon after the NH primary. Also, I suspect the whole process was not so front loaded as it is now.
“Soon after” was “five or six weeks after” in the cite. And your point that the process wasn’t so frontloaded as it is now is germane to that - it was more, rather than less, compressed because it was less frontloaded. NH was on Feb. 18 that year. The primary season from NH to the end lasted 15 weeks; six weeks was 2/5 of that. 2/5 of this year’s 21-week primary season, from NH to the end, would have been 59 days after NH, which would have been in the week between TX/OH and Mississippi.
I’d like to see more data on this issue.
For instance, I’d rather see “if gets Obama/Clinton gets the nod, will you vote for him/her?” asked of the opposing candidate’s supporters. I suspect that as Obama is bringing in people who aren’t traditionally politically active, if he doesn’t get the nomination, they’ll simply go back to not voting rather than voting for McCain, whereas Clinton’s supporters strike me as more likely to be vindictive and vote for McCain.
[opinion piece]
But then their reasoning would be interesting too. Why would either candidate’s supporters turn to McCain? I suspect that Hillary has pissed off enough people and shown herself to be so egotistical and selfish and a bad manager that despite generally leaning left (and I’m not referring to hardcore democrats, more like independents who lean that way) they’ll view McCain as the lesser of two evils because while he may be supportive of bad policy, he seems like he’s not… evil.
On the other side, why won’t some of Hillary’s supporters support Obama? I’m not sure. Racism has to be an issue. And people are loathe to bring this up because they don’t want to get yelled at for calling Hillary supporters racist. And by no means am I saying that anyone who chooses to support Hillary is racist (just evil 
), when we’re talking about why Obama can’t shut out Hillary in a place with demographics favorable to her like Pennsylvania, it’s definitely an issue to some people.
[/opinion piece]
I’d like to see a poll that gives some depth to the issue.
5 weeks is “soon” compared to where we are now relative to the beginning.
But if we’re comparing time elapsed, we need to start the clock later in '92. NH’s was Jan 8 this year. That’s more than a month. But a lot of other states moved up, too, relative to '92. That’s what I meant by front loaded-- not just NH.
If we take 6 weeks from the NH primary, that puts us at Feb 19. So Bill had the nomination “wrapped up” by Feb 19 in terms of today’s primary calender. That was over 2 months ago.
The question being debated is not “why is Obama ahead” but “why hasn’t Obama been able to finalize the win?”
Early on? No. Now? Yes.
Other candidates have come out of nowhere to secure the nomination. But they have been able to wrap up the win before the convention. Why is this not the case with Obama? It may be the process the Democrats are using, it may be that Obama is not the shoo-in that most of the SDMB assumes he is, it may be that Hilary is a stronger candidate than most here would give her credit for, it may be some combination of the above or something else altogether. The fact remains that, by this point in the process, the nomination is secured by one candidate or another. But now, it is not. “Why is that” is a perfectly legitimate question.
Regards,
Shodan
Bill Clinton didn’t wrap it up until June in 92’ Obama is a new type of candidate, one the American public is not all 1–% ready for, but one that enough of us are ready for. The talking heads this morning stated that "Enough" Clinton supporters will vote Obama to put him over the top in November, postulating that after Obama and McCain’s first debate Obama’s national polling will skyrocket…
This is a tough bit of Jerky to chew for a lot of folks, that the US population would put a black man in the white house, but this is less about Obama and more about the paradigm shift he represents. Obama is not simply going to implode and let Clinton ride to the Nomination. Not by any measure of the imagination. Obama will take the nomination through continuing to do what he’s been doing, and that’s holding leads with among delegates and popular votes. Big party dems would not be leaning his way and coming out to endorse him if they thought he didn’t stand a chance to win in November. Democrats from Maine to San Diego to the plains states are standing behind Barack.
I’m fresh out of cool aid so there’s the brass tacks.
Yep. He closed the deal when he ran up the insurmountable delegate lead, and even when he loses a few later primaries, but keeps them close, he continues to close the deal.
It’s all about which sports metaphor you choose. I like the football one (I forget which doper made it–sorry). There’s two minutes left. Obama’s ahead by two touchdowns. He held Clinton to a field goal, and now he’s got the ball back with the clock running.
NY Times today:
So that’s the newest message from the Clinton campaign, it seems.
I guess it makes a modicum of sense. Since Clinton’s voters appear to be more fickle in terms of the eventual Democratic nominee, it’s not a completely ridiculous argument. If you take it too far though, you start drawing irrational comparisons like, McCain won the Illinois republican primary easily, does that mean he will win Illinois?
The key to the Clinton argument is that its entire validity and purpose for existence is in whether it is accepted by superdelegates. That’s the game now. She’s only targeting real voters inasmuch as they serve a purpose in getting supers to convert- ie popular vote, fundraising, etc. If the annointed ones determine that Clinton’s argument makes sense, then well that is the way they should vote. I am sure being politicians they will weigh the consequence of ill will if the popular vote is deemed to be naive or worthless by party insiders.
Personally, it feels to me like the current tightness is based on the race being about personality and gotchas at this level. Once we can draw a clear comaprison on issues, I find it hard to believe that Clinton voters will flee in the numbers that polls currently predict. Once McCain punches his first AP reporter all bets will be off and we’ll feel silly about arguing about this.
With some units held constant and others scaled. Anyway, it’s a pretty trivial side issue.
Here’s a color-coded U.S. map showing which candidate won which county, and by what percentage. It gives a pretty good idea of who’s strong where. Hillary’s particular areas of strength, geographically, are Appalachia and the Rust Belt. Plus areas with a lot of Hispanics and retirees. Obama does well pretty much everywhere else, although especially so in areas with heavy black populations.
Just looking at the map, it seems irrational to expect Obama to ‘close the deal’ in Ohio or Pennsylvania.
So, what constitutes ‘closing the deal,’ anyway? If Obama wins both Indiana and NC in 12 days, has he closed the deal, even if Hillary keeps on fighting? It seems to me that even a combination of a blowout in NC and a narrow loss in IN should constitute ‘closing the deal,’ but it’s unclear how the term is defined, or who’s defining it.
Don’t get me wrong-- I think it’s ridiculous to worry about him “closing the deal”. He hasn’t closed the deal because Hillary hasn’t dropped out. She can stay in as long as she wants-- it’s not his call. The Dems have two strong candidates, the slightly weaker of the two who still thinks she has a chance to win. It’s a slim chance, but enough of one that people are still giving her money and she’s still willing to spend it.
Man, that Appalachian effect is really distinct, isn’t it. You could predict Kentucky and West Virginia just like a weather forecast. What a fascinating map. It would be cool to see it given some adjustment for population.
If Michigan data was more reliable, I suspect I’d feel better about Indiana. In any event, Obama will be spending some significant time in middle Penn and southern Ohio during the general.
As long as Clinton has enough resources to stay in the race Obama will not have closed the deal, regardless of the fact that she can’t catch up without a miracle. Her whole tack now has to be arm-twisting. She has nothing else. Even if she loses NC and IN I predict she’ll stay in the race, because it’s no longer about the math for her. It’s about taking, by any means necessary, what she believes is rightfully hers from an unworthy usurper, and if she has to destroy Obama, and possibly the party’s chances, in the process, then so be it.
Man, I was listening to CNN yesterday and it was maddening. Their talking heads are so stupid. Every question was tilted so much toward spinning this as a Hillary victory of considerable substance. Not one person mentioned the fact that PA is probably the state that is most in Hillary’s wheelhouse. Second oldest population, appalachia, the fact her family is from there. The fact that she won by less than 10% is somewhat shocking, in my opinion. Yet the news continue to play it off as if she is now in the driver’s seat. I mean the moderator actually asked one of the pundits, “Is Indiana a must-win now for Obama?” For Obama??? are they serious?