The Huffington Post’s Sam Stein reports that supporters of Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton who comment on the pro-Clinton blog Taylor Marsh got ahold of an email list and have been emailing demanding, even angry, emails to superdelegates — and there are signs that some superdelegates are now very unhappy campers:
As the Democratic primary nears its long-awaited conclusion, undecided superdelegates have been drowned under a sudden deluge of angry, sometimes vicious emails from Hillary Clinton supporters urging them to not fall in line behind Barack Obama.
The letter writing campaign picked up steam late Thursday evening when several superdelegates confirmed that a coordinated effort had been launched, apparently independent of Clinton’s campaign, to raise last-minute concerns about Obama’s candidacy and present the specter of voter defections should the Illinois Democrat become the nominee.
[UPDATE: Marsh has responded to the HP piece with a long post of her own blasting the report and stressing that she had nothing to do with what her readers decided to do. It begins:
I in no way have anything whatsoever to do with the narrative being pushed in Sam Stein’s post over at Huffington Post. Stop.
Whatever my readers are doing is their business. I am in no way involved. Stop.
Read it in its entirety. FOOTNOTE: Marsh has been a contributor to the Huffington Post herself.]
Back to the Huffington Post:
In more than dozen messages sent yesterday evening and shared with The Huffington Post, supporters of Clinton emailed a laundry list of political and exceedingly personal attacks on Obama’s candidacy, including criticisms of his prior associations and claims that he, not Clinton, had played the race card. The letters underscore the high emotional pitch of the late stage Democratic primary as well as the utter conviction among many supporters of both campaigns that their candidate is solely worthy of the nomination.
So have the letters made many superdelegates see the light and decide to announce that they’ll support Clinton — even though Clinton at this point isn’t ahead in the number of pledged delegates, the popular vote, campaign funding collections or even (by ABC’s recent claim) superdelegates?
Not quite:
Such campaigns targeting superdelegates have mostly been avoided out of fear that the party officials would react negatively to outside pressure. And at least four superdelegates on the receiving end of yesterday’s emails suggested that they did more harm to Clinton’s cause than good.
In one exchange, Donna Brazile, Al Gore’s campaign manager and a stalwart of the Democratic Party, responded with frustration to a writer’s threats of defection. “Honestly, this is the 9th email today,” she wrote before 8:00 pm. “So I believe you’re ready to not only destroy Roe versus Wade, voting rights, civil liberties and civil rights. Perhaps adding trillions more to the deficits through non-stop tax cuts to the wealthy and 100 more years in Iraq. Yes, please join Rush and McCain asap. The train has left. Catch it.”
The Clinton campaign did not return a request for comment as to whether it was behind the email campaign.
That last sentence means the Clinton campaign (a) is trying to figure out how to defuse this without alienating its committed supporters (whom students of politics could consider need to be committed for sending less than respectful emails to superdelegates who are their last hope), (b) doesn’t want to give this more publicity, (c) tacitly supports the effort.
Stein gives readers a bit of feedback on how some superdelegates are reacting to this new form of abusive political spam:
At least two other party insiders wrote the Huffington Post expressing concern over the scope (”I’ve received emails like this for weeks but tonight it started in mass) and negativity of some of the Obama attacks, including one red-state Democrat:
“I spent my entire life in the two reddest states in the entire U.S. so please excuse me if I fail to discern the nuances of the arguments sent my way this evening in what appears to be an orchestrated campaign to intimidate the remaining unpledged delegates by threatening to leave the party and vote for a third Bush term if I and others like me don’t vote for Sen. Clinton,” wrote the exasperated superdelegate. “I have been uncommitted throughout this campaign because I wanted to see how the candidates performed in a variety of settings. I am proud of them both. But I am horrified by this effort to threaten votes for McCain if super delegates don’t vote for Sen. Clinton. I have received hundreds of emails from both sides - but I can say without exception that I have not received a single email from an Obama supporter that threatened a vote for McCain if I didn’t support Sen. Obama. You really ought to be ashamed.”
–Paul Begala raised eyebrows by saying “”Obama can’t win with just the eggheads and African-Americans…” (OOPS! There goes the Humpty Dumpty vote..)
–Clinton supporters are flooding superdelegates with threatening emails. They seem to forget that politics also involves trying to persuade, not just intimidate.
Bill Clinton often talked about wanting to build a “bridge to the 21st century.”
But, increasingly, the Clinton camp seems as if in terms of common sense political coalition building, it’s trying to burn its bridges in the 21st century.
A Gallup analysis of exit-poll data finds Democratic Senator Barack Obama’s support among white voters if he runs against GOP Senator John McCain is about the same as Senator John Kerry’s was in the 2004 Presidential election:
Barack Obama’s current level of support among white voters in a head-to-head matchup against John McCain is no worse than John Kerry’s margin of support among whites against George W. Bush in the 2004 presidential election.
Much of the talk following Tuesday’s Indiana and North Carolina primaries has focused on just how electable Obama — now the highly probable nominee — will be in the general election. The Clinton campaign has argued that Obama’s weaknesses among white voters and blue-collar voters will hurt him against McCain in the fall.
But it appears that the way Obama stacks up against McCain at this point is similar to the way in which Kerry performed against Bush in 2004 within several key racial, educational, religious, and gender subgroups. That is, the basic underlying structure of the general-election campaign this year does not appear to be markedly different from that of the 2004 election. This conclusion is based on an analysis of exit-poll data from 2004 compared to the Obama-McCain matchup in 4,000 Gallup Poll Daily tracking interviews conducted during the first five days of May.
Lawrence O’Donnell, writing in The Huffington Post, says he has talked with a “senior” Clinton campaign official who told him Senator Hillary Clinton will quit the Presidential race by June 15. Fact or not?
A senior campaign official and Clinton confidante has told me that there will be a Democratic nominee by June 15. He could not bring himself to say the words “Hillary will drop out by June 15,” but that is clearly what he meant. I kept saying, “So, Hillary will drop out by June 15,” and he kept saying, “We will have a nominee by June 15.” He stressed what a reasonable person Hillary is.
Everything about our conversation implied that he had already had this reality-based discussion with Hillary.
O’Donnell says, in essence, that the official told him Clinton will continue to campaign, get as many delegates and votes as she can, and then make her pitch to superdelegates. But she knows the math.
Yes, Clinton spokespersons publicly seem to be lost on gravity-free planet Clinton, but privately they know the end is near.
This is the kind of report that will likely be denied by top campaign officials (if it was meant to be official it would be by a named spokesman). But when people write something with such specificity, it is almost certainly sourced.
By June 15th. It’s truly impossible hard to believe Clinton would risk her long-range political future by battling tooth and nail all the way to the convention — particularly if a parade if Superdelegates starts marching towards Obama and party elites are itching to start the campaign against GOP presumptive nominee Senator John McCain.
CNN just showed Senator Hillary Clinton at a campaign appearance, gearing up for the upcoming West Virginia primary — and the subject comes up: with the number of pledged delegates, the popular vote and fund-raising against her, why won’t she quit her battle with Senator Barack Obama for the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination?
The New York Daily News has an article detailing the reasons why. And a key reason, the paper says, is her camp’s feeling that Obama has little appeal to white collar voters:
While the case for Hillary Clinton to stay in the race is shakier than ever, one ugly reason for staying in could be found Tuesday amid the ruddy, sun-kissed Hoosiers who cheered her on to victory at the Indianapolis Speedway.
With Clinton posing alongside pioneering Indy speedster Sarah Fisher, there were almost no African-Americans to be seen. Many in the white, working-class crowd were simply not ready to back Barack Obama….
Such feelings leave Clinton and the Democratic Party in a tough spot. With the largest number of remaining delegates now being party insiders, they have to decide if Obama can overcome enough of that antipathy - essentially deciding if enough working-class whites will back away from the black candidate, whether because of the false Muslim rumors, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright flap or old-fashioned racism.
The paper reports that this need “gives her a reason to stay in the race.”
So how long is it likely to go? According to the Daily News, it’s likely Clinton will fight on all the way to the convention, unless there is a truly massive outcry for her to leave:
Two separate sources in the Clinton orbit insisted Tuesday night it’s now more likely Hillary will pursue her quest until the August convention in Denver - unless party leaders rise up en masse and publicly tell her it’s time to stop. The math, after all, remains solidly in Obama’s favor.
“I can think of no reason why it would not go to the convention now,” one top Hillary Democrat predicted. “Why should she get out?”
And then there’s a section that could be a red warning flag:
Some insiders still want to make sure no new bombshells will explode around the freshman Illinois senator.
Will there be new allegations surfacing? Perhaps in original, blind sourced reporting on the Drudge Report? If those surface, look for fingers to be pointed at the Clinton campaign, even if it’s not the source.
He could slip and stumble some more, her polls could continue to be strong, and once the party decides what to do with Florida and Michigan, his lead in the popular vote will be very narrow,” an insider said.
A top Democratic source with insight into Bill’s and Hillary’s states of mind says the Clintons are convinced that a Democratic presidency is all but certain no matter how messy the fight for the nomination.
In that scenario - which the Obama side and some Democratic elders worry is wishful thinking at best, delusional at worst - there’s no downside for Hillary doing whatever it takes for as long as it takes.
The problem is the meaning of “whatever it takes.” If it’s via a continued campaign aimed at driving up Obama’s negatives so they can convince Superdelegates Obama is unelectable, it’s likely to received a lot more poorly by party bigwigs than it would have been two weeks ago.
If Clinton plays out her campaign based on issues and makes a graceful exit, the Democrats have a chance at unity. If her campaign remains an aggressive negative campaign, complete with eleventh hour negative campaign ads, it could backfire with some superdelegates and will make the Democrats’ attempts to unify their fractured party even more difficult — not to mention negate any possibility of a “Dream Ticket” which more and more seems like an In Your Dreams Ticket.
FOOTNOTE: Just how bad was the political news last night. GO HERE and look at the photos that show how poorly Bill Clinton serves his wife when he stands by her side after a defeat.
Cartoon by John Darkow, Columbia Daily Tribune, Missouri
So now that the North Carolina and Indiana primaries are over — ending in split decision wins — who are the winners and losers in Tuesday’s primaries? Is it just Senator Barack Obama (who won North Carolina) or Senator Hillary Clinton (who narrowly won Indiana)?
Is it that clearcut? Here’s our take:
WINNERS:
Senator Barack Obama for winning a victory in North Carolina that went beyond the conventional media wisdom that was building — that he could lose there.
Senator Hillary Clinton for surviving by winning Indiana and keeping her candidacy alive, although some insist it is now on life support..and the batteries are almost dead.
Conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh for his reprehensible “Operation Chaos” campaign to convince voters to use their precious right to vote to sandbag another party that appears to have worked in Indiana. Data suggests it had an impact.
Senator Barack Obama for not being able to end Clinton’s candidacy with two solid wins (this could change if the final Indiana vote changes).
Senator Hillary Clinton for not just losing to Obama in North Carolina while aides talked about her gathering momentum, but for starting out Campaign 2008 with a good chunk of black voter support and ending the night with shockingly low black voter support (remember that at the beginning of the campaign Obama had a problem getting African Americans to vote for him and against a Clinton).
The Limbaugh “dittoheads” who felt the precious vote for which so many have died should be tossed away to sabotage another political party, as if democracy in a time of national crisis were some cutesy game (and we add in this category any Democrats who also played the same game crossing over in Republican primaries).
THE BIGGEST LOSERS:
The Superdelegates who will either have to act soon…or later…to put an end to the contest and face the possibility that, no matter what they decide, half of the committed Democrats won’t vote for the candidate they opposed (which some feel means they should be committed).
Political pandering: By most accounts of the talking heads and experts, Clinton’s embracing of the gas holiday tax and dismissive comment that she didn’t have to listen to economists didn’t do her much good and probably hurt her.
To read some excellent analytical live blogging on the night’s voting GO HERE.
What happens next? The media and weblogs are filled with tidbits about a night that could have been a “game changer,” but not what Clinton had in mind.
My own view is she should run her campaign against John McCain. She will win West Virginia and Kentucky by huge margins.
She might even challenge Obama in Oregon.
What she should not do, imo, is run against Barack Obama. If there is a path to the nomination for her, and I doubt there is, it won’t come from attacking Obama now.
CBS News has projected that Senator Hillary Clinton will win the Indiana Democratic Presidential primary — a result that means the evening of the North Carolina and Indiana primaries ended in a split decision for what increasingly appears to be a split political party:
Clinton pulled off an Indiana win in what was a virtual must-win Midwestern state. With 50 percent of the votes being reported in the state, she was leading Obama 55 percent to 45 percent.
Obama’s win mirrored earlier triumphs in Southern states with large black populations: Georgia, Alabama, Louisiana and South Carolina among them. With 14 percent of the votes in North Carolina being reported, Obama was leading Clinton 63 percent to 35 percent.
CBS News exit poll results show that most voters in both states made up their minds a while ago. Only 17 percent in Indiana and 14 percent in North Carolina decided in the last three days. Twenty-four percent in Indiana and 18 percent in North Carolina decided in the last week.
Late deciders backed Clinton in Indiana by a margin of 62 percent to 38 percent for Obama. In North Carolina, Obama won late deciders by a much smaller margin of 49 percent to 48 percent.
And the important issues?
As it has been throughout the Democratic primaries, the economy was the most important issue in both states with 65 percent of voters in Indiana describing it as such and 60 percent in North Carolina. In Indiana, 50 percent of voters said Clinton would be more likely to improve the economy and 46 percent said that Obama would. In North Carolina, 52 percent said that Obama would be more likely to improve the economy and 42 percent said that Clinton would.
Nearly half of voters in both states said the situation with Obama’s former pastor Reverend Wright was important in their vote, while half said that it was not. In Indiana, 48 percent said that it was important and 49 percent said that it was not, while in North Carolina, 48 percent said the Wright situation was important in their vote and 50 percent said that it was not.
What happens next?
The Obama camp will point to his big North Carolina win and the rocky patch he has endured the past few weeks and suggest it shows he can handle anything. That spin is already going out.
Expect to the Clinton side to discount North Carolina without flatly coming out and saying Obama won in a state with a large black vote. Expect to hear the words “demographics” and fill in the vague word yourself.
Also, expect the Clinton campaign to signal ASAP that it intends to play hardball since Clinton did not get a double win tonight.
Clinton delegate honcho [Harold Ickes] tells The Page that his camp believes 2,209 — not 2,025 — is the magic number of delegates needed to clinch the nomination because they’re counting Michigan and Florida.
“I know the Obama people like to use the smaller amount. We don’t even like the implication of it, much less the amount. It implies he doesn’t recognize Florida and Michigan. We don’t see how he can do that politically…So our target is 2,209 and we think Hillary is in a good position to get there.”
This is called changing the goal posts. AND:
Also repeats his calling card to supers: “We don’t know enough about Senator Obama yet. We don’t need an October Surprise. And (the chance of) an October Surprise with Hillary is remote.”
So it could boil down to whether Superdelegates will allow the up-until-now conventional wisdom on the delegate count to be changed and to tilt to a candidate because the other side suggests there could be an October surprise.
FOOTNOTE: The total picture will be far more clear once the votes are completely tallied.
The latest Gallup Daily Tracking Poll provides the most vivid red flag warning yet for Democratic Senator Barack Obama in his battle with Senator Hillary Clinton for the 2008 Democratic Presidential nomination: presumptive GOP nominee Senator John McCain now enjoys a six point lead over Obama and only a one point lead over Clinton.
This will be a welcome piece of data for the Clinton campaign that has had as its strategy Obama not being electable (and many analysts say to make Obama that way):
John McCain has moved to a six percentage point, 48% to 42%, lead over Barack Obama in Gallup Poll Daily tracking of the general election, while he edges out Hillary Clinton by only one point, 46% to 45%.
The ongoing turmoil in the Democratic race — with neither candidate able to sustain a winning streak in the primaries and animosity seemingly mounting between them — seems to be benefiting McCain and hurting both Democrats. Last week McCain had fallen three points behind Clinton in the preferences of registered voters for the general election, and only tied Obama.
Although both Clinton and Obama have lost ground to McCain over the past week, the current results may be particularly troubling for Obama in trying to combat Clinton’s assertion to superdelegates that she would be the more electable of the two candidates in November.
This is McCain’s largest lead in a tracking poll:
The current six-point margin for McCain over Obama is the largest lead McCain has had over either candidate since Gallup began tracking general election preferences in early March. The gap between Obama and Clinton’s percentage of the vote when both are pitted against McCain is also the largest since the general election tracking began.
The bottom line: the contest is not benefiting the Democratic party, as some have claimed — and Obama has lost a host of support since his former pastor decided to extend his 15 minutes of fame into several long public appearances.
The question: can Obama stabilize his campaign in time for the important upcoming North Carolina and Indiana primaries?
For months it has been a “given” that Senator Barack Obama was way ahead in North Carolina — in some cases by double-digits in the polls — and that rival Senator Hillary Clinton didn’t have much of a chance to win the state’s Democratic Presidential primary, and create eleventh hour “Big Mo” in their battle for the Democratic presidential nomination. New polls suggest it may now be time to retire that “given.”
What’s going on among the Democrats now clearly is on two levels: the votes and the primaries on one level and the appeal to decision-solidifying Superdelegates on another. The political context is changing rapidly for Obama and not to his advantage.
Obama has a big problem: the latest Rasmussen Poll gives Clinton a two point lead — but indicates a TEN POINT DROP in Obama’s polling since Obama’s former Pastor, Jeremiah Wright’s press conference.
In the race for the Democratic Presidential Nomination, the Wright impact is especially evident. Clinton now has a statistically insignificant two-point edge over Obama, 46% to 44%. However, that represents a ten-point swing since Wright’s press conference. Before Pastor Wright appeared at the National Press Club, Obama led Clinton by eight points.
In Indiana, Clinton leads Obama by five points. In North Carolina Obama leads. Rasmussen Markets data shows Obama continues to be the favorite for the Democratic nomination, but expectations have slipped significantly in recent days. Currently, the frontrunner is given a 74.4% chance of winning.
A bevy of new national polls, plus surveys in Indiana and North Carolina — which hold key primaries on Tuesday — suggest that Hillary Clinton is closing the gap since her campaign-saving victory in Pennsylvania last week, and that the controversies dogging Barack Obama are having an impact.
In a national Fox News/Opinion Dynamics poll, Clinton leads Obama 44 percent to 41 percent. The Illinois senator is viewed unfavorably by 42 percent of all voters, up 9 percentage points since February. Clinton’s unfavorable rating is still slightly higher than Obama’s, but it has dropped slightly. And by 10 percentage points, Democrats now view Clinton as likelier than Obama to beat presumptive Republican nominee John McCain. Democrats gave Obama a 4-point edge last month.
The Clinton campaign’s strategy to raise doubts about Obama’s electability is clearly succeeding, but not only due to the two Clintons’ at-times-Rovian-style negative campaigning. Three other contributing factors are Obama’s political bungles, his former Pastor’s insistence on a controversial high profile that sucks the air out of Obama’s daily media coverage, and Clinton’s increasing enthusiasm as a campaigner (which many analysts are noting). The Globe continues:
In a national NBC/Wall Street Journal survey, Obama’s lead has narrowed to 46 percent to 43 percent, and his unfavorable ratings have also risen. In March, 51 percent of voters viewed him positively and 28 percent saw him negatively, but in the new poll 46 percent view him favorably, but 37 percent negatively.
In a national New York Times/CBS poll, Obama leads 46 percent to 38 percent among Democrats, but 51 percent say they believe he will be the eventual nominee, down from 69 percent a month ago. And 48 percent of Democratic primary voters said they believe he would be the strongest candidate against McCain, down from 56 percent a month ago.
And in a Quinnipiac University poll, Clinton runs stronger than Obama in match-ups against McCain in the general election swing states of Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Florida. Clinton would get 49 percent to McCain’s 41 percent in Florida, leads 48 percent to 38 percent in Ohio, and 51 percent to 37 percent in Pennsylvania.
It’s clear that Obama knows he has a problem.
This morning he went on the Today Show (VIDEO HERE) with his wife Michelle — a husband-wife damage control appearance that was reminiscent of when then-Governor Bill Clinton went on 60 Minutes with Hillary Clinton in 1992 to be grilled by Steve Kroft amid allegations of (pre-Oval office) infidelity.
Last night Michelle Obama went on CNN. And on Sunday Obama will enter the Lion’s Den and be on “Meet The Press” with gotcha! journalist Tim Russert.
But Obama’s immediate concern is likely North Carolina. The vibes coming from polls aren’t good ones. And, if he loses there, the ugly and divisive Democratic party race will likely get uglier and more divisive as Clinton moves in for the political kill and Obama pulls out all stops to stabilize his campaign.
A survey of 571 registered likely voters in North Carolina’s May 6 Democratic primary shows Sen. Hillary Clinton having moved from a double digit deficit in an InsiderAdvantage poll taken in mid-April to a two point lead over Sen. Barack Obama in this telephone survey, conducted April 29. The survey was weighted for age, race, gender, and political affiliation. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.8%
Prior to his appearance on Fox News Network’s “Hannity & Colmes,” on which the poll was released, InsiderAdvantage’s Matt Towery noted: “The shift has come almost entirely from white voters age 45 and over. There was a small drift of African-Americans back towards Clinton, but not so significant as to establish any trend.
“I believe when all is said and done, Obama will likely carry North Carolina; or if he loses the race, it will be by just a few points.
“Our polling generally does not indicate the eventual compression of black voters that Obama usually enjoys just before Election Day. If that happens, my guess is that he will pull this out. However, this poll is clearly an indication of reaction to the latest statements by his former pastor; and it forces Sen. Obama to split resources between Indiana and North Carolina.”
Even with the pollster’s hedge, the bottom line is that this is awful news for the Obama campaign. Narrowing polls are one thing in NC; Clinton pulling ahead is another. Perception helps sculpt reality. And news stories down the line show an Obama campaign that is on the defensive and a Clinton campaign that is taking advantage of it…and the polls show some results. A WRAL news poll doesn’t show Clinton ahead — but, once again, the TRENDING in the polls is clear:
A WRAL news poll released Wednesday shows Barack Obama’s double-digit lead over Hillary Clinton among Tar heel Democrats is eroding.
Mason-Dixon Polling & Research Inc. surveyed 400 likely Democratic voters Monday and Tuesday. The results show Obama with a 7 point lead over Clinton, with 9 percent undecided. The poll has a margin of error of 5 percentage points.
“Right or wrong, it’s the Wright phenomenon for Obama,” said David McLennan, a political science professor at Peace College.
McLennan said Obama’s former pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, is dragging down the Illinois senator. Wright has made comments such as suggesting that the AIDS virus was invented by the government to destroy “people of color.”
“It is a media-driven story. Wright is very controversial. He makes controversial statements. He gets people fired up, but it’s not one of the top issues in the polls,” McLennan said.
Note again that polls are all over the place — and for confirmation of this, GO HERE to Pollster.com and see the graph of various polls. Obama partisans will say “Well, those polls are flawed because others show him well ahead!” Clinton partisans will pooh-pooh polls showing Obama in the lead, say they don’t count and point to the one showing Clinton ahead. But it is the trending of recent polls that needs to be watched — even though the graph that charts various polls shows Obama ahead.
THE BOTTOM LINE FACT: Both campaigns will have to pull-out-all-stops for the political ground war. An Obama win in NC would give him a cushion against his broken momentum and Clinton’s likely win in Indiana. A Clinton win in North Carolina would be considered an upset and ensure a tooth-and-nail battle right up to the convention and bolster Clinton’s argument that Obama has some electability problems, even though she has some of her own.
In reality, both Democratic candidates increasingly seem to be damaged political goods, but McCain is burdened with his anchor-like tie to President George W. Bush — a tie that could become increasingly toxic once the Democrats stop politically disemboweling each other and turn their focus instead on the Republican candidate. McCain’s Bush ties are a bigger sticking point with voters than Obama’s relationship with his pastor.
HERE’S A CROSS SECTION OF WEBLOG OPINION ON THE POLLS:
“One must question how Clinton would stand up in a campaign against McCain. Her argument is that she would draw more of her opponents’ core-voters. But Obama does something that Clinton no longer wangles: he mobilizes new voters. The Clinton camp wants to take a slice of McCain’s pie, while Obama wants to bake his own.”
“And this is precisely what Clinton seems to want to prevent with her war of attrition. She has never offered a new perspective - only tried and tested ones. That was supposed to be enough. But then came Obama, who turned her into a zombie-candidate. If you’re not attractive enough, one must paint your opponent as even uglier. Unfortunately, Obama has begun to display certain Clintonesque properties - the bitterness of the primary elections has left its mark, transforming he, too, into a political zombie.” Read the rest of this entry »
Readers of the Moderate Voice and WORLDMEETS.US won’t be surprised to hear that people in Europe find this election to be particularly baffling. But the post-Pennsylvania death-lock that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are presently engaged in has only served to make the apparent chaos even more pronounced.
“Republican candidate John McCain must be radiating with joy. … From one state to another, millions are spent in a fratricidal struggle that will last until June. Perhaps even longer if the outcome of these primaries ultimately depends on the “super-delegates” and their obscure machinations. What a windfall for John McCain, that atypical Republican, the outsider septuagenarian who is now credibly “presidential!”
“One has to admit that from this side of the Atlantic, it’s hard to comprehend an American presidential election. The candidate (he or she) matters more than the program. Charisma is more important than political commitment. You “support” one candidate or another as if you were a “fan” of a pop singer or a football star.” Read the rest of this entry »
April 26th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
There are signs of what could be a shift in the news media conventional wisdom: for the first time in months, some key pundits are hinting and even saying that Senator Barack Obama could lose the Democratic nomination to what has long been described as a seemingly-impossibly behind Senator Hillary Clinton.
These kinds of cracks in the conventional wisdom often signal the beginning of a major shift, totally negating what earlier conventional wisdom steadfastly suggested “had” to be true.
The catalyst: Clinton’s win over Obama in Pennsylvania. Even though it was expected, the recent bad publicity surrounding Obama on several fronts, his campaign being on the defensive, the unrelenting push by Clinton on several fronts, and the realities of how American politics works in the 21st century have started to change some media thinking.
I’m beginning to think Hillary Clinton might pull this off and wrestle the nomination away from Barack Obama. If she does, a lot of folks—including a huge chunk of the media—will join Bill Richardson (a.k.a. Judas) in the Deep Freeze. If the Clintons get back into the White House, it will be retribution time, like the Corleone family consolidating power in “The Godfather,” where the watchword is, “It’s business, not personal.”
Not that anyone will be sleeping with the fishes with Hillary in the White House, but with the Clintons it’s business and it’s personal. Just think of all the scores to settle, the grievances to indulge.
Clift details how the Clintons were often at odds with Washington officialdom, which never liked them anyway. She notes how now some conservatives are cheering for her…and not only because they think they can defeat her. She is winning some fans due to her all-encompassing push to win no matter what. She writes:
Now the burden is on Obama to win the next round of primaries on May 6. He has said publicly that Indiana could be the tiebreaker, a prediction he could come to regret. If Clinton can win Indiana, hold Obama to single digits in North Carolina, and then run up a big margin in Kentucky on May 20, where she’s leading in the polls, she could overtake Obama in the popular vote. “We have to win big and lose small,” says an aide. Obama may yet discover his inner Rocky and recast himself now that the media is turning on him. It’s hard to be the next new thing for 15 months, which is how long he’s been running. And it’s time enough for Hillary to win ugly, if that’s what winning takes.
Barack Obama is winning, so why does it look like Hillary Clinton is having all the fun?
Senator Obama has been thrown completely off his game by a combination of political attacks (some fair, some foul), a toxic eruption (the volcanic Jeremiah Wright was a gift from the gods to the Clintons and the G.O.P.), and some pretty serious self-inflicted wounds.
You can almost feel the air seeping out of the Obama phenomenon. The candidate and his aides are brainstorming ways to counter the Clinton death-ray machine and regain the momentum. They need to generate some new excitement and enthusiasm, and they need to do it soon.
Despite all the new voters who have been brought into the process, Democrats are filled with anxiety about their prospects in November. A nervous operative told me on Friday: “If we lose this election, it would be like Johnson losing to Goldwater.”
Herbert notes that part of what’s going on is the polarizing nature of the campaign, anger among Democrats but there is a constant:
Their message varies, depending on whether it’s in public or behind the scenes. But the mantra is roughly as follows: Obama won’t win! He can’t win whites. Jeremiah Wright! He can’t win women. He can’t win Hispanics. He’ll lose Jewish voters. Farrakhan! We’ll nuke Iran.
The share of Clinton voters who have been telling exit pollsters that they will not vote for Senator Obama if he wins the nomination is inching toward the red zone. At the same time, there is growing resentment of the Clintons’ tactics among Obama partisans, especially the young and African-Americans.
While he doesn’t say Clinton could well win, the hint is there:
Hillary Clinton may be behind, and she may lose. But she is now widely seen as the tougher of the two candidates, the one who is more resolute, who will fight harder and longer (and, yes, more unscrupulously) to achieve her desired ends.
An edge in toughness is hardly a good quality to cede to your opponent.
….Some Democratic officials who were worried about having Senator Clinton at the top of the ticket in November are now expressing concern about Mr. Obama. Mrs. Clinton’s bar-brawl tactics have raised her negatives sharply, but they’ve also raised doubts about Mr. Obama. Is he a fighter? Is he tough enough to take on the G.O.P.?
One of Senator Obama’s favorite phrases is “the fierce urgency of now.” There is nothing more fiercely urgent for him right now than to reassure voters and superdelegates that an Obama candidacy will not lead to a Democratic debacle in November.
Some Democrats and Obama supporters in general are likely to dismiss Clift’s and Herbert’s columns as them taking the Clinton and/or Republican themes hook, line and sinker. That’s the modus operandi for partisans on both sides: question the motives of those who dare criticize your candidate.
But that’s clearly NOT what is happening here.
What’s happening is that Obama has long said he wants to change the political culture, a goal that many independent voters as well as many Democrats and Republicans would find highly laudable. But you can’t hope to change the political culture unless you’re in a position to change the political culture.
It’s sort of a Catch 22. Obama is going to have to show — and show soon — that his campaign in ideas, tactics, and energy can function in America’s polity — the polity as is. Not the polity as he and others might wish it to be. That means being more nimble, making the case for his candidacy, countering any Clinton charges, effectively answering lingering reservations that constituencies he is having problems with may have about him.
The bottom line reality that he’s facing is that just as Hillary Clinton is not entitled to the Presidency because she’s a Senator and a former first lady, Obama is not entitled to the nomination because his message is hope and change. Even when you do an job interview you have to aggressively overcome lingering objections.
Obama has to do that — and quickly. Because these two writers are now writing sentiment that is lingering “out there” and may increasingly be out there. If it goes “out there” enough so Superdelegates are concerned at a time when Obama doesn’t perform as well as he hopes in upcoming primaries we’ll see what we have seen so much when Campaign 2008 began last year:
The conventional wisdom will be revealed to be not so much conventional wisdom as to have been flavor of the day wisdom — a flavor that could change totally a day later.
April 22nd, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Senator Hillary Clinton got the Pennsylvania Democratic primary victory she needed so she could press the case that she should continue in the race because rival candidate Senator Barack Obama could not close the deal after vastly outspending her.
But her victory margin (a 10 percent margin, at this writing) most certainly means that the increasingly ugly battle for the Democratic party nomination will go well into June…and perhaps all the way to the convention.
Clinton ran a campaign of negativity unprecedented for a modern political primary. And the increasingly raw fissures in the Democratic party show no sign of receding: if anything, her victory means they will likely accentuate. Meanwhile, it is a fact: Obama has not been able to win over voting blocs that seemingly remain his stumbling blocks.
And what next? Obama is favored to win North Carolina. If so, will the Clinton camp argue that a win there doesn’t matter? And what about Indiana? It’s likely to become a prime battleground — perhaps one of the most important primaries of this looooooooong primary season. How did the Pennsylvania voting shape up? CBS News:
The Pennsylvania Democratic primary shared many of the same vote characteristics of other primary states this season - with Clinton winning her core base of union members, less educated and lower income voters and rural voters, and Obama winning voters with more education and income, and black voters.
What made Pennsylvania different, however, is the consistency of these traditional gaps as well as the appearance of some new divides. With intense media coverage of Obama’s recent statements regarding small town voters, and a consistent characterization of him as an elitist both by the media and by the campaigns of Clinton and John McCain, these pre-existing social divides grew larger in this first contest since the story broke.
In the primary Clinton received 71 percent of the vote from white members of labor union households, leading Obama by a striking 43 points. In contrast, Clinton won a smaller proportion of the white non-union vote, still besting Obama by 57 percent to 43 percent. This union vote is in stark contrast to the union vote in Ohio, one of the most recent and similar contests. In Ohio Clinton received 67 percent of the white union vote, and 62 percent of white non-union vote. This demonstrates a more polarized electorate by union status in Pennsylvania than Ohio.
This pattern of division repeats itself among other groups that have been important in past contests. White Democratic voters making less than $50,000 a year supported Clinton with 66 percent, compared to 58 percent support from those making over $50,000 a year. Obama received 24 percent and 42 percent respectively.
There was a 19 point preference gap between the less educated and the more educated in Pennsylvania primary voting. Clinton won 75 percent of the vote from white Democrats with a high school diploma or less - three times Obama’s vote among these voters - compared to 56 percent of those with more education.
Meanwhile, each candidate gave their own (predictable) spin on the election results. Clinton said the tide was turning and America deserved a President who wasn’t a quitter (TRANSLATION: She ain’t getting out until she runs out of money or feels it’s fruitless to stay in.) Obama noted that his campaign started way behind (TRANSLATION: He didn’t do as badly as it seemed he would do but it was not a good night for him). But the voting results really mean this:
“Hillary Clinton appears to have done what she needed to do in order to keep her campaign going on into Indiana and North Carolina and possibly well beyond that,” said CBSNews.com senior political editor Vaughn Ververs. “For Obama, this loss stems some of the sense of inevitability of his campaign and increases the pressure on him to regain the momentum.”
April 22nd, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Several news organizations are now calling the Pennsylvania primary: and it’s a win for Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton over rival Senator Barack Obama. The question now: how big will the win be and will it be a big enough win to impress Superdelegates?
Sen. Hillary Clinton has won the Pennsylvania primary vote as expected, ABC News has projected.
Clinton has led polls in the state, and her win now fuels questions about why Obama hasn’t been able to sew up the nomination, despite having more money, having won more states and having a lead in the popular vote and pledged delegates, according to ABC News’ delegate scorecard.
The pressure was on Clinton today to win by a large margin.
“Hillary Clinton needs a clear and convincing victory today in Pennsylvania if she wants to continue on in this nominating process,” Democratic strategist Tad Devine told ABC News this morning.
April 21st, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Today is likely to be a day of highly-watched final polls surfacing in the Pennsylvania Democratic presidential primary but the latest Zogby poll underscores a trend: undecided voters now seem to be breaking for Senator Hillary Clinton, who most polls now show poised to defeat Senator Barack Obama:
The final weekend before tomorrow’s important primary election in Pennsylvania was good for New York’s Hillary Clinton, as she made a definitive move toward victory over rival Illinois’ Barack Obama, a fresh Newsmax/Zogby daily telephone tracking poll shows.
She gained two points over the past 24 hours as Obama lost one point, and she now leads 48% to 42%, the latest polling shows. Meanwhile, the undecideds dropped by two points. Her edge was three points yesterday but had wobbled within a tight margin. Clinton’s advantage is still within the margin of error, but she is close to getting beyond it as Election Day looms.
Trending is everything in polling, and the trends in Zogby have been for Clinton.
Zogby believes Clinton could win the 10 point lead she and her campaign hope to get to boost her campaign in remaining primary states and add weight to her argument that she is the candidate who has the best chance of winning vital big states in the general election:
A big one-day of polling for Clinton. If a 10-point victory is the pundit-driven threshold she needs on Tuesday, it looks like she can do it. This does not look like a one-day anomaly—undecideds dropped to only 5% in this latest single day of polling, and they are breaking Clinton’s way. As I suggested yesterday, if white and Catholic voters, who still are the biggest portion of undecideds, actually vote, Clinton will have her double-digit victory. Just today alone, she polled 53% to Obama’s 38%.
She had big pickups of support in the western region, among voters 50-65, and among women. She has tightened Obama’s lead among men and she maintains her Catholic base. For the first time in our poll, Clinton climbs into double digits among African Americans.”
The trending now in polls clearly is against Obama. While it’s always possible that there could be are result far different from the polls and a dramatic upset — we have already seen that several times in Campaign 2008 — just looking at the list and graph at Pollster.com now show a changed picture. Here’s the latest chart that takes into account all of the polls — showing a much bigger gap than just a few days ago between Clinton and Obama with Clinton on the ascent:
UPDATE: To show you how many contradictory bits of info have to be factored in, read this from The Politico:
An historic spike in Democratic voter registrations in Pennsylvania could help Barack Obama cut into Hillary Clinton’s vote in Tuesday’s primary, robbing her of the big victory margin she needs to justify continuing the primary fight.
The changing party demographics also are contributing to an overall bluing of the Keystone State that could dim Republican John McCain’s hopes of competing there in the fall.
A county-by-county analysis by Politico suggests that the hard-fought primary between Obama and Clinton has accelerated an ongoing partisan shift in Pennsylvania that could soon move it out of the battleground presidential states and ripple across congressional races this fall, as well.
…In Delaware County, a Philadelphia suburb once home to a storied Republican machine, nearly 14,000 voters have switched their party affiliation to Democratic since January compared to just 768 who became Republicans.
Those party-switchers now represent about 7 percent of the roughly 2 million Democratic voters expected to turnout Tuesday, said Madonna.
A poll of those switchers and new registrants released by Madonna last week found that Obama was the preferred candidate for 62 percent of them. Clinton insiders said they are also bracing for the same 60-40 split among newly registered Democrats.
Well here we go. Pennsylvania is the next potential moment of truth. Though the truth is that the moment of truth has probably already passed.
An interesting take here on the Obama campaign in Philly - is it such a bad thing if they alter the way things have been done in the past ?
A Clinton fundraiser sits in my kitchen and reveals that the money is still flowing in BUT small sums mainly from individuals giving as little as $25 a time. It’s not enough to be viable.
Approaches to Clinton people with access to sources of money are coming now from the Obama folk. The vultures are circling.
But the bottom line is: polling trends (at least THIS time Monday morning) do not look good for Obama. One argument being made by his supporters is that the polls don’t take into account all of the new and young voters. Perhaps. Tomorrow will determine if that’s an accurate statement or wishful spin.
April 20th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Is the Pennsylvania primary vote only about that primary? Or is more — even more than who gets the Democratic nomination — at stake? Andrew Sullivan writes in his latest newspaper column:
Even after all the hype, this week’s vote in Pennsylvania will be a watershed primary election.
This isn’t because it could determine whether Hillary Clinton’s campaign continues on its brutal, nihilistic path towards the destruction of the most promising figure in the Democratic Party since Kennedy.
It isn’t because it’s been an age since the last primary vote and every nasty toxin in American culture has been drawn to the surface by the Clinton poultice.
It isn’t even because Pennsylvania is an indisputably important and large state that any Democrat needs to win in November.
It is because the Clintons have turned Pennsylvania into a microcosm of what they think the general election will be in November.
And the Clintons are running as the Rove Republicans. If they fail to destroy Barack Obama as effectively as Karl Rove — George W. Bush’s master of the dark arts — destroyed Al Gore and John Kerry in 2000 and 2004, with tactics just as brutal but even more personal, then they will have driven American politics to a critical point. They will have shown that the paradigm that has reigned in US politics for at least two decades has been shattered.
That’s what is being tested this week. It may be the most important vote in America until the final one, in November.
Obama has been pummeled by a Democrat in ways never witnessed in a primary campaign.
April 19th, 2008 by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief
Within days of the crucial Pennsylvania Democratic Presidential primary, the Gallup Daily Tracking poll and and one other shows Senator Hillary Clinton is showing signs of “Big Mo” (momentum) — and that rival Senator Barack Obama’s campaign may be sagging.
Trending is what you really need to look for…and some of the new polls aren’t good news for Obama.
Gallup Poll Daily tracking shows that Hillary Clinton now receives 46% of the support of Democrats nationally, compared to 45% for Barack Obama, marking the first time Obama has not led in Gallup’s daily tracking since March 18-20.
These results are based on interviewing conducted April 16-18, including two days of interviewing after the contentious Wednesday night debate in Philadelphia and the media focus that followed. Support for Hillary Clinton has been significantly higher in both of these post-debate nights of interviewing than in recent weeks. The two Democratic candidates
