What would it take?

Ok, so I could argue that the fundamental premise of my prediction was right and that Obama “theoretically” won both contests and it is, as every news outlet is saying, over. But, the math is the math and Hillary won Indiana fair and square.

I mean, what kind of person would be if I were to ignore an undeniable mathematically-based reality? Well, actually I would a member of the Clinton campaign and a pretty high up one at that.

So, now that the writing is on the wall in 40-foot high burning letters and Hillary is preparing to take the red pill, the only really fun topic to talk about is what would it take for Obama to lose. I mean, sure you could come up with some kind of crazy thing like someone finding pictures of him watching the superbowl with Osama Bin laden or finding out that he’s in cahoots with the joker to poison the water supply of Gotham City.

But let’s get real, since Obama probably isn’t a super villian there are really only a few realistic scenarios in which one could imagine him losing this thing. My own personal favorite is kind of lame from a “oh my god he’s burning the American flag”  perspective but would be just as devastating. It’s simple. It’s plausible. And, it comes down to 4 simple words:

Hot.

White.

Blonde.

Girl.

How fast do you think Obama’s numbers would sink if there was even some kind of plausible evidence that he’d had an affair with some “America’s sweetheart” looking chick from Minnesota. Could you imagine?

Right now, Obama has been able to soothe (to a point) older white America’s fear of the angry black man’s secret plan to somehow take over the country although, admittedly, it was getting a little shakey with ol’ crazy Rev. Wright. However, this would do it. Definitely.

And you know what? I’m not sure it would just be the white folks who would have an issue with this either. I bet Obama’s support among black women would sink like a rock as well.

Either way, as fun as this is to talk about, there is absolutely no factual basis for this and I am sure if it were even a remote possibility Hillary would have found it by now and used it about 3.5 seconds after she had the pictures.

For the rest of us, lets just hope that the only person Obama ever hung out with when he was in Minneapolis was Prince.

Yes John and Hillary, we are that dumb (and prediction time!)

Ok, let’s say you have this friend, we’ll call him Fred. And, let’s say that Fred is a super nice guy who just happens to be addicted to heroin. Now, Fred knows he’s addicted to heroin and he really is trying to stop but at the moment, well, Fred’s feeling a little itchy because his dealer got picked up for shoplifting lollipops at Target and he hasn’t had a fix in a couple of days.

So what kind of advice do you think we should give Fred. Should we:

a.) Tell Fred to go to stick out the withdrawls, go to rehab and for God’s sake brush his teeth?

b.) Tell Fred to sell his grandmother’s china to get one more fix from the new dealer down the street who Fred’s never met but doesn’t quite think is a cop but possibly could be a cop since he drives and unmarked lincoln and has a buzz cut and a mustache?

Well, this is pretty much what this whole gas tax vacation is about. In this case, unfortunately, we are Fred and John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are our friends. Now, John and Hillary really really want us to like them so they are probably our co-dependent stripper girlfriends in this scenario. And, because John and Hillary want us to like them so much, they are going ahead with the grandmother’s china idea.

Barack Obama is our nice guy friend who has his own life together but, for some reason, still puts up with our shit even though we stole his grandmother’s tv and sold it for, you guessed it, heroin. He’s telling us to go to rehab.

Anyway, the gas tax vacation idea is a bad idea because it is an extremely temporary solution to an extremely long-term and complex problem. Not only will it take revenue away from the government in the form of $9 billion but it’s not really going to save you any money.  You can read a nice little experiment on what it would take save a $100 on gas here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/05/05/one-mans-quest-to-save-10_n_100218.html. But I will save you the time reading and just say that if you want to save $100 in gas money, be prepared to drive 979 miles per day all summer. Enjoy!

So what’s it gonna be Fred? Do we listen to the stripper girlfriend who’s standing there eating peanut butter out of the jar and wearing one of our shirts or do we listen to our buddy who’s grandma hasn’t been able to watch Murder She Wrote in three weeks? 

I guess we’ll find out today in Indiana and North Carolina.

Finally I am going to do a little something different since trying to be right all the time gets boring. I am going to go out on a limb and predict what I would like to see happen rather than what the conventional wisdom (read: polls) say is going to happen:

Obama wins both. It’s over.

The only rationale I can supply for this is a huge black and early voting turnout in Indiana and North Carolina. And the “state next to the state” effect that Illinois will have on Indiana. 

 

 

 

Return of the Scary Black Guy

As far as I am concerned, there has been so much written about Jeremiah wright that I am reticent to even bother. But I did find this interesting from a columnist in the Chicago Sun-Times. I will add that he is a white guy and he got a wicked response for saying something that, frankly,  is pretty accurate.

I’ve seen this happen so many times in politics where black candidates are involved that I’ve lost track. An opponent has trouble attacking the black candidate, so they find somebody connected to the candidate and attack them. I can’t say why this is more prevalent with black politicians unless it’s that the black experience has produced more fringe players who can be used for this purpose. Plus, there’s always Farrakhan.

Then the opponent starts in with the disavowal game. Will you now disavow this black person who is of some stature in the black community to prove to us that you really aren’t one of “those” black people?

And now that Obama has provided the disavowal, left with no choice by Wright’s latest display, the reaction is “too little, too late.”

The amazing thing is in that same paper, another columnist pretty much echoed his point by saying that Obama had perhaps distanced himself “too late.”

My own question (and this point has been made but just seems to keep getting lost) is that why aren’t all white candidates held up and made responsible for everything that their pastor has said or a religions leader has said?  For example GOP candidates still go to Bob Jones University every election to pay homage at a school which dropped their prohibition against inter-racial dating in 2000.

Why hasn’t Hillary Clinton been asked to repudiate her pal and Bill Clinton’s spiritual advisor Billy Graham who said (and who has later apologized when caught) that Jews control the media and are ruining this country and AIDS is a punishment from God?

Perhaps it’s because white people don’t make other white people responsible for what someone has said or done just by a virtue of knowing them. If we were really to make Bill and Hillary accountable for the misdeeds of their various cohorts throughout the years – people who have been sent to prison by the way, there wouldn’t be enough Rev. Wright clips on all of YouTube to drown out the noise.

What’s wrong with this image

Honestly, I am not sure what this says about Fox news or about the level of education that they require from their assistant producers, but next time I recommend that they don’t just google “Douglas” and throw the firs thing that looks “old timey enough” on the screen.

Morons.

This is what a president sounds like

I am not sure if this will help or hurt Barack Obama but it’s the most honest speech I have ever heard from a national politician.

Dear black folks, I am sorry

Ok, is it just me or did Hillary Clinton’s apology to ‘the black community’ ring just a little bit hollow? Call me a psychic friend but I am guessing that her advisers probably sat her down in a room and there was a conversation that went a little something like this:

“Um, Hillary, you know that thing that you have been doing that Bill started in South Carolina where you basically just dismiss Barack Obama’s entire candidacy by painting him as ‘the black candidate?’ Yeah, well that’s really kind of starting piss people off. I mean, everybody is kind of pissed about it and, well, black people are reeeeallllly pissed about it. Apparently, they just went 9 out of 10 against you in Mississippi and pretty much erased any gains you made with Ohio, Rhode Island and Texas. So, um, seeing as how no democrat will ever get elected to the presidency without a strong turnout from African-American voters, we’re really gonna need you to make a speech or something to, um, well kind of say you’re, um, well, you know, you’re ah, well, you’re sorry.”

And then, after Hillary killed that guy and they dragged his body away (I am guessing on a plastic tarp, but that’s really just a guess) she apparently took his words to heart. Of course, she was probably eating his heart that she pulled out of his chest like the bad guy from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom while she did it, but the important thing was that she listened.

So yesterday, like a boyfriend who isn’t sure what he did and really doesn’t feel like he should be in trouble but who desperately wants to get laid again sometime this year, Hillary trotted out a nice big fat apology to all of the black folks who were offended by some of her campaign tactics, and to all the folks who didn’t like Hurricane Katrina and to all of the folks who were pissed that they tried to replace Arnold with that younger, cuter red-headed white kid during the last season of ‘Diff’rent Strokes.’

Ok, I made that last one up, but still, if it would have gotten her one more percentage point of the black vote in Philly, I have no doubt that Hillary would have stood up there and sang ‘Boogie Wonderland’ by Earth, Wind and Fire if they’d have asked her too.

Frankly, I am not sure what is more insulting, being told that the black guy who is campaigning better than you is just winning because he is black or being pandered to because someone finally realized that, oh yeah, your vote isn’t just a commodity to be taken for granted.

Either way, the Clinton campaign has now done their best to make this a race between blue-collar whites (read: poor) against black and once again the people who stand to gain the most from this are the old white guy and all of his rich friends.

Thanks a lot Hillary.

Keith Olbermann for V.P.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22425001/vp/23601329#23601329

One last note about Ohio (ok, and Texas too)

There’s even a chance that Hillary could win the state but actually lose in the delegate count similar to what happened in the Nevada caucuses. Of the Buckeye State’s 141 delegates at stake, 92 of them are apportioned by congressional districts in a way that favors Obama. You can get a pretty nice round up of the daunting mathematics she faces in trying to gain ground here.

Also, the “Texas Two-Step” which is what the Obama campaign has been calling the Texas primary-caucus system definitely seems to be in favor of Obama since he is undefeated in caucuses this year.

There have been several stories that have gone under the radar recently of the Hillary campaign’s poor management of delegate counting and complete ignorance of the individual states’ primary systems. It would be cruelly or perhaps laughably (depending on where you sit) ironic if the candidate who has been running on experience and competence ended up losing because her campaign couldn’t master something that you could find out from any high school civics class.

The streak ends tomorrow

Ok, so I had a great February. No, I don’t mean me personally. After all, the weather sucked, I probably gained like 5 more pounds and I am pretty sure that my two front car tires, which were already as bald as I am, now have nails in them and need to be replaced. C’mon surplus!

Seriously, of all the months they could have added an extra day to, February woudn’t have been my choice. Not by a long shot.

But, as far as the democratic primary prediction game goes, I was en fuego all month. Really, I couldn’t be stopped. Hell, I couldn’t even be contained and the only thing better than being so right was watching Hillary Clinton suffer defeat after defeat while trying to pretend that it wasn’t happening. Hmmmm, who does that reming me of? Hint: His name rhymes with Porge Mush.

And since I am so proud of my February record, lets recap the smackdown I laid out at the begining of last month:

February 9
Louisiana primary (Obama, Huckabee) CHECK
Washington caucuses (Obama, McCain) CHECK
Nebraska caucuses – democrats only (Obama) CHECK
Kansas caucuses – republicans only (Huckabee) CHECK

February 10
Maine caucuses – democrats only (Obama) CHECK

February 12
Maryland primary (Obama, McCain) CHECK
Virginia primary (Obama, McCain) CHECK
Washington, D.C. primary (Obama, McCain) CHECK

February 19
Wisconsin primary (Obama, McCain) CHECK
Hawaii caucuses – democrats only (Obama) CHECK

Unfortunately, it all comes to an end tomorrow and I have to admit that it looks like I am going to tank this one big time. Let’s look at how wrong I am going to be:

March 4
Ohio primary (Obama, McCain)
Rhode Island primary (Clinton, McCain)
Texas primary (Clinton, Huckabee)
Vermont primary (Clinton)

Not only does just about every poll but Zogby (woooooorrrrrrrthlesssss!!!!) disagree with me on just about every state for the democrats except Rhode Island, they also say that, after tomorrow, the only people who will be seeing Mike Huckabee are the ones laying their hands on their tv set so he can cure their gout.

While I am really tempted to make updated predictions for March 4th (Obama wins big in Texas!!! – ok, couldn’t resist) frankly, it wouldn’t be sporting. However, I will make one big prediction that will be right no matter what comes from the voters tomorrow …

it ain’t over yet.

Over the past two weeks, Hillary has been able to turn a Rudy Guilian-like ad campaign and an Obama misstep on NAFTA and turn it into real results. Add to that a cool $35 million raised by her campaign in February and it all adds up to Pennsylvania meaning something. I predict tomorrow HRC will finally congratulate Obama on a win after having won one of her own – finally. I also think that she will announce a full out effort to make Pennsylvania the final battleground because of its proximity to Ohio and the almost embarassing (and possibly election-fraud inducing) love that Pennsylvania’s governor has for her.

If Hillary can turn a win in Ohio into a win in Pennsylvania, she will then try to erase her delegate deficit by getting Florida and Michigan seated. Finally, she’ll ask the super delegates to do the rest. It’s a scenario that I don’t even find improbable much less impossible anymore. An argument that she essentially ‘won’ all of the battle ground states (Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio) and the utter disdain that Hillary voters have for Obama supporters might convince party leaders that they have a better chance with her at the top of the ticket in November.

These are the democrats after all. They never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity. Especially when it’s an opportunity to win the presidency and lock-up the party loyaly of the next generation of voters.

The problem with early momentum

Early leads often appear “insurmountable”. Clear, consistent trends lead to “foregone conclusions”. Neighbors of a murderer often comment “he seemed like such a normal guy – this is such a shock.” Friends and relatives of heart attack victims have been known to comment: “she was so healthy – we never saw this coming”. These are reasons the current political trends are concerning for the Democratic Party.

When prevailing public sentiment indicates one direction, look the other way. And don’t get hit by the bus.

What are the current indicators, trends, majority opinions, predictions, or other things that we can see at the moment?

1. Democrats are showing up at the polls in droves – 14.6 million democrats vs. 8.3 million republicans. Pundits seem to think this is good news for the democrats. It could be, but usually isn’t. It’s a historical trend, with only two notable primary seasons where the 3:2 ratio/rule did not hold true: Clinton re-election in 1996 and Gore in 2000. (Numbers here.) Most notable in all of this, the Democrats are very excited about their candidates, while the Republicans clearly are not.
2. Democrats are raising more money than the Republicans. This is actually interesting, as the Republican Party is typically viewed as having deeper pockets than their Democratic counterparts. But it only matters if the Democrats don’t waste it all attacking one another in Primary Elections. But it still is interesting.
3. At least 6 different polls show or have shown that Obama beats McCain in the General Election. OK. Polls also showed Obama beating Clinton in New Hampshire, and that certainly didn’t work out according to the numbers. Polls are inherently unreliable, and yet the media continues to forget this fact 14 seconds after acknowledging it each time they re-learn it. The gum on my shoe has more memory recall than many of these political pundits.
4. The super-delegate safety valve in the Democratic Party looms as a large concern. As I wrote previously and as many outlets are also beginning to report, this is a potentially devastating problem for the Dems. Not so much a trend, but the Republicans have to be giddy at the prospect of the Democrats undermining their constituency by going against the popular vote to accede to prevailing wisdom (see item 3 above) and select the candidate with the best shot at beating the Republican nominee. This leads to disenfranchisement and low turnout and an easy path to victory for the Republicans.

If I were a hard-core democrat, I’d be very concerned about each of these developments. But I am superstitious, and each of these things concern me, as I don’t think four more years of Republican leadership is what this country needs. Let’s take a quick look the whole problem in a bit more detail, because that’s when concern really starts to grow.

As stated, the Democrats are showing up at the polling places and caucus sites in big numbers. Part of this is due to anger with the current administration, part is historical trend, and part of this is no doubt due to the magnetism of Barack Obama. He has shown a strong ability to pull the younger demographic, while Hillary consistently pulls the 59+ crowd. They fight for the middle age ranges. As far as race goes, Obama has proven he can win the white vote with victories in the south, midwest, west, northeast. He has great pull among African-Americans, and has shown he can win in the midwest. He has also shown he can pull the moderate vote. Clinton resonates with women, but not as consistently as Obama with the African-American vote.

If the super-delegates push the tally towards Clinton, I don’t expect Obama’s core following to simply fall in line behind her. I don’t think there will be a dream ticket with Obama on the undercard. These voters will either stay home in November, or jump ship to a moderately conservative McCain. Either way, not good for the Democratic Party.

McCain’s chances greatly improve against Clinton, as he will be able to capture the moderates and independents as well as those who simply want to keep the Clintons out of the White House. This coupled with disenfranchised Democratic voters will cause McCain turnout to skyrocket.

The Democrats need to address the national campaign sooner rather than later. Howard Dean, DNC leader, has said as much recently. Dean indicated a candidate will emerge in February or March, or they will have a sit down. In the meantime, the DNC can run counter-McCain ad campaigns, but don’t really have a message to rally around other than “don’t vote for another Republican who sounds a lot like the current president”.

Obama and Clinton continue to rack up big campaign donations to fight against one another. Their public positions have really become much more civilized and a bit more unified. In their debates and speeches, they are focusing on their differences on issues rather than taking one another’s words out of context and twisting them. That’s what the ad campaigns will be for. This is a waste of time and money.

The Democrats need to capitalize on this early momentum and grow it. Otherwise, as the saying goes, past performance will not be an indicator of future success.