Obama has succeeded in separating the wheat from the chaff in the Democrat party.
We hear about these groups of disaffected Hillary voters who are resolved not to vote for Obama. A full 59% of Hillary voters in the West Virginia primary said that if Obama got the nomination, they would either vote for McCain or not vote at all. Obama and the DNC are desperately trying to unite the party, and though intra-party squabbles are usually ironed out by November, this year is without precedent. One cannot assume, as they say, that past experience is an accurate predictor of future performance.
Many Hillary Democrats seem to be taking a serious, principled stand in opposing Obama. It is not that they like McCain. They just think Obama would be very bad for America. After 8 years of George W. Bush, you would think party loyalty would prevail at all costs. But you would be wrong.
We have the PUMA (Party Unity My Ass) Party.
This is where we come in, PUMAs. We will fill the role that the superdelegates have abrogated. It is our job to say “no”. We do not want to lose in 2008. We do not want another four years of Republican rule. We want 4 years of intelligence, competence and courage in a time of what will surely be a very critical time in our nation’s history. Terrorism is still out there. There are two wars going on. Our military is stretched so thinly that our national security is compromised.
Now when was the last time you heard any Democrat talking about this being a critical time to win the wars and keep the country safe from terrorism? You hear it when Joe Lieberman speaks. You heard it when Zell Miller spoke at the 2004 Republican Convention.
Frankly, they think Obama is a cupcake who isn’t up for the job.
Now is not the time to put a love object in office, a weakling who will be entirely dependent on his power elite enablers.
Hillary supporters think their girl was tough, experienced, and smart enough to handle this. And it is not just Obama’s lack of fortitude. They really dislike his elitist, condescending attitude towards voters.
Barack Obama is a ruthless campaigner who has brought out the worst in the political system but no matter how far he has come, he is a failure. He has failed to live up to core Democratic principles, He has failed to respect the voters. He has failed to disguise his contempt for average, hard working American men and women. And because he has failed in so many ways to appeal to the electorate at large, he will fail the ultimate contest. He will be a failed presidential candidate.
The Swingcrats think the Harvard guy is a little out of his league too.
Our time of crisis is now. We are here to prevent the chance of an inexperienced, confused person from taking the highest office in the land.
Other Democrats are concerned about Obama’s cavalier dismissal of fundamental American Constitutional rights as quaint anachronisms of a simple people.
We have heard a candidate adopt an incredibly elitist message and tone toward the average American, a tone that no pragmatic and experienced candidate would ever adopt, and a message that has rightly offended many of us. This candidate has suggested that economic stress causes rural or working-class Americans “cling to guns and religion,” implying that embrace of 2nd Amendment rights or practice of faith was a symptom of something wrong with people rather than affirmed values they choose to have. The candidate refused to seriously retract this statement, instead saying it was “something that everyone knows is true.”
And this has been a pattern: when an error in judgment or association came to light, the candidate has condescendingly explained to the public, often in lengthy monologues, why he was actually right all along, implying that is was everyone else who made a mistake or didn’t understand the nuances of his enlightened thought on the subject.
McCain is hearing from a lot of Hillary Democrats.
Asked about Democrats who are not yet sold on Obama, [Campaign Manager Rick] Davis offered an intriguing comment: We have seen significant uptick in calls from states that have those voters. They have a lot of people who want to play with us.” Later in the conversation, asked if he could be certain these individuals would really vote for McCain, he responded, “they’re talking about endorsing us, so I think they’ll vote for us.” Asked which states they were getting the calls from, they said all over, but specifically mentioned Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Maryland. “In almost every state, there’s a core that’s starting to build, and we’re putting names on paper.”
All of these reasons why Democrats won’t vote for Obama are also exactly why Republicans will vote against him. Anything can happen by November, but Obama seems to have awakened the patriotic Democrats who actually love their country, who understand that the presidency is a job for a grownup, and who really do not like having their beliefs and intelligence insulted. Those American Democrats may join with the American Republicans in opposing Obama’s anti-American, racist, arrogant bid to control their beloved country.
Also find Bill Dupray at The Patriot Room.
He seems to believe that he simply doesn’t need them.
He got through the primaries mainly on activists (read college kids and unions) at caucus states and then due to the way delegates were allocated by the Dem rules where they overloaded past loyal Dems congressional districts compared to others within a state it fell right into his base of Black/elite-egghead/college kid urban concentrations.
Even in states he lost to Hillary by wide margins he rounded up a number of delegates way beyond his vote proportion.
Since most of the Black voters and elite types are already registered, he is going to have to rely on a massive voter registration campaign for young college kids to carry the day for him.
But can he offset any loss due to loss of Dems within his own party?
If he is going to have to spend a lot of time just to get Dem voters back it will hurt his reach for the independents which are the group that essentially put McCain in the race.
This was not a sudden shock to the Hill voters in the slow bleed primary they had, so their conviction may be much stronger to oppose him than many would want to admit.
Hill has only suspended her campaign and I look for a high likelihood of back room deals and fire works at their Denver convention.
It is fascinating to see the left react to their own tactics being used against them, by other leftists. All of the sudden, they start sounding, well… not like leftists. It is as if they suddenly awoke and realized that they are just as much of a target as conservatives are. They also do not like these tactics being used against them it seems.
To that I say Join the club.
They still do not quite get it and project some onto the right. Pan Metron’s blog (the 2nd Ammendment quote) suddenly realized “blaming “rich white peoople” for all social injustice” is wrong.
Even more so:
Did not others mention that this was happening? Any question of Obama is racist to these “surrogates” and this surprises the writer.
Then we have the programmed projectionism:
Well… Cannot expect them to fully wake up and question their leaders and tactics used by both parties, but there is hope. Now, getting rid of the Supreme Soviet style “super-delegates” would help and more and more on the left are waking up to the nightmare of this process.
In closing, I do have to ask where this defense of civilian gun ownership and traditional values suddenly came from. Is there a “silent majority” in the Democrat Party who will just not vote Republican because of the pre-programmed hatred of the “R”? Maybe. Of course, it would be differrent if the Republicans were not “Democrat Lite” and really were conservative. In the end though, being faced with the prospect of either a “moderate ‘maverick’ Republican” or a dyed in the wool marxist seems to have many on the right and left asking similar questions.
In the end though, Hillary voters may just not vote for President as conservatives just did not vote in 2006 for congress (congressional sections left blank but the rest filled out).
realclearpolitics.com lists the electorial college leaning of Obama 272 and McCain 266 but 120 are actually toss ups (mostly favoring McCain). I can see why McCain wanted 10 town hall meetings. That’s about how many toss up states there are. The big difference here is Obama is listed as having support in Ohio and Bush won Ohio. If everything stayed the same and McCain won Ohio, then McCain would win the election.
Greg,
On the left-winged pro-Hillary sites, the comment sections are citing polls where McCain beat Obama by about 8 points.
Link: http://noquarterusa.net/blog/2008/06/10/thread-2-barack-obama-condones-coordinated-internet-harassment-by-his-thugs/#more-3031
It is down in the comments section. It is interesting to see the open hostility the pro-Hillary people are facing from the pro-Obama people. Wide rift there as the pro-Hillary people seem to have more in common with McCain.
Obviously these are polls things are close in the electorial college votes, but I’m guessing it will boil down to Ohio. Ohio was really split last time with Bush winning Ohio by just under 119,000 votes out of just under 5,600,000 votes. That’s barely a 2.1% difference. The close states (under 5%) then were Wisconsin, Iowa, New Mexico, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania
Nevada, Michigan, Minnesota, Oregon and Colorado. Most of the ad money went to 15 states with the majority of money centered around the great Lakes and Florida. I imagine the same thing will happen as the other states are either strong Republican or strong Democratic.
Did anyone expect the Democrats to carry that state whether it was Obama or Clinton ?
When polls are cited besides the results trends should be noted. Obama is trending up, McCain is trending down.
In 2004 Ohio was the key, 60,000 votes could have swung it. I believe that the referendum on Ohio’s ballot concerning gay marriage convinced at least 60,000 people to vote for Bush. When/if gas hits 5 dollars per gallon the present occupant of the White House and his party will take the blame.
Yes John… You finally said something correct. If gas hits $5/gallon, the present admin will take the blame even though it was the Dems who voted against any and all logical measures to drop it. Too many also forget that people like Gore demanded gas be taxed to that same price and the left thought that was a good thing. Maybe it was the “tax” thing.
However, looking at the pro-Hillary sites above, I would contend that your “Obama is trending up” is incorrect. I would also contend that the animosity (and outright hatred) the “Obamazoids” (as a LEFTIST groups call Obama’s version of Paulbots) display to anyone who opposes them will continue to alienate moderate Dem voters. As I said above, it is interesting to see the Dems react in shock when the same idiotic attacks they hurl at conservatives are used on them.
when you have as many people who are hillary supporters screaming about the hatred of the democratic party you know its bad. we see alot of people at my work, they talk politics, very strong opinions all around, but the most ardent are the hillary supporters. they feel she got the shaft, which she did by her own party. we all love to hate hillary, but it was sort of sad to watch. there are alot of people who can’t stand obama but are not happy to vote mccain, that lets the door open for ron paul. i really don’t know where he stands on anything but he could throw a wrench into things. the thing that got me was a good friend who voted kerry last time, and is a die hard dem says she couldn’t stand anyone the dems had except for edwards. the democratic party is swirling and turning and they are making a mess of the presidentail race.
Republicans will be punished for high gas prices only if the voters have been totally tuned out to the efforts Democrats have taken to drive the price up these past two years.
The only way we will suffer at the polls for the failure of Democrats to permit ANY new supplies of energy from reaching America’s consumers is if we are dumb enough to stay silent on the issue.
“Democrats have a plan to lower gas prices…join Democrats who are working to lower gas prices now.” – Then-Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), Press Release, April 19, 2006