Decision ‘08

That’s What I Said!

Here was my official write-off of Hillary Clinton on March 8th:

Every analysis I have seen indicates that Barack Obama will lead the delegate race going into the convention. This holds true even if Hillary gets a do-over in Michigan and Florida. And the Democratic Party simply cannot afford the long-term alienation that would result from passing over the first African-American to lay claim to a major party’s nomination for the presidency.

It simply cannot happen. All the other analysis is dead weight. This is the only fact that matters. The black community would not forget, not would it forgive, such a slight. And rightly so. I hate identity politics with a passion…but facts are facts.

Bottom line - there is a lot of drama yet to come - but Barack Obama will face John McCain for the presidency in November. Count on it…

Here’s Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen in yesterday’s Politico:

One big fact has largely been lost in the recent coverage of the Democratic presidential race: Hillary Rodham Clinton has virtually no chance of winning.

Her own campaign acknowledges there is no way that she will finish ahead in pledged delegates. That means the only way she wins is if Democratic superdelegates are ready to risk a backlash of historic proportions from the party’s most reliable constituency.

Unless Clinton is able to at least win the primary popular vote — which also would take nothing less than an electoral miracle — and use that achievement to pressure superdelegates, she has only one scenario for victory. An African-American opponent and his backers would be told that, even though he won the contest with voters, the prize is going to someone else.

People who think that scenario is even remotely likely are living on another planet.

And that’s that…

UPDATE 03/23/08 1:59 p.m.: More from Mark Halperin:

1. She can’t win the nomination without overturning the will of the elected delegates, which will alienate many Democrats.

2. She can’t win the nomination without a bloody convention battle — after which, even if she won, history and many Democrats would cast her as a villain.

3. Catching up in the popular vote is not out of the question — but without re-votes in Florida and Michigan it will be almost as impossible as catching up in elected delegates.

4. Nancy Pelosi and other leading members of Congress don’t think she can win and want her to give up. Same with superdelegate-to-the-stars Donna Brazile.

5. Obama’s skilled, close-knit staff can do things like silently kill re-votes in Florida and Michigan and not pay a political price.

6. Many of her supporters — and even some of her staffers — would be relieved (and even delighted) if she quit the race; none of his supporters or staff feel that way. Some think she just might throw in the towel in June if it appears efforts to fight on would hurt Obama’s general election chances.

7. The Rev. Wright story notwithstanding, the media still wants Obama to be the nominee — and that has an impact every day.

And there’s seven more where that came from…

18 Responses to “That’s What I Said!”

1 Bob from Ohio Says:
March 23rd, 2008 at 6:58 pm
Maybe she can’t win but she is not going to quit. Period. All these pro-Obama press articles will just make her dig in.

When she loses, she will then accept McCain’s VP offer. To really get revenge.
2 Chris J. Breisch Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 7:05 am
Have you read/seen/heard about the Hillary attack memo from the Obama camp?

People don’t do attacks like that when they feel they’re in a position of strength. Obama realizes that he needs to act quickly to keep the nomination from slipping away.

The funny thing here is that two years ago, I said that Hillary would never be the Dem nominee. I even said it a year ago.

Right now, I have no idea. I just know that burying her at this point is beyond premature.

Bill Richardson this weekend was pathetic. And I always liked him. I really hoped that he’d run for President and be a strong candidate in the Dem nomination process.

“Someone needs to drop out of this race for the good of the party. Oh, by the way, I support Obama.” (paraphrased of course)

I don’t mind political maneuvering so much, but could you be a little less transparent about it?
3 Ryan Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 10:11 am
Bob: No way. The GOP base hates her guts and they don’t love McCain’s either. That would be a surefire way to sink his nomination. Of course, if Hillary did that, she’d probably regain (in a bizarre and perverse way) a lot of the respect she’s lost with the Democratic base.

Chris: No way. There is no story in which Obama loses the nomination short of something really crazy, like actual criminal activity or homosexuality or something. The math just isn’t there.
4 Bob from Ohio Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 10:25 am
Ryan, the GOP base, at least as indicated by the pundits and bloggers, did not back McCain and he won the nomination. He did this by putting together moderates and independents.

Sure, some of the base won’t vote for McCain/Clinton but the gain in independents, white women and some Democrats will be worth it.

Plus, I think to increasing numbers of the base, Clinton does not look as bad as comapred to Obama. The Wright videos went off like an A-Bomb among the right.
5 Sean P Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 11:03 am
One of the other reasons Hillary is toast is that part of her strategy for winning the nomination is to make Obama unelectable — and at the same time, her strategy for avoid a convention fight is to make Obama her VP nominee. And nobody on her staff sees the problem there?
6 peter Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 11:20 am
I think you are more likely to see Britney Spears appointed the next head of the World Bank than a McCain - Clinton ticket.
7 Chris J. Breisch Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 1:01 pm
Ryan, you’re insane if you think that.

I will give you that Clinton’s has a harder, but not impossible task of winning if the thing goes 15 rounds. Obama has an easier, but no easy, task of winning if it goes 15 rounds.

However, each can deliver a knockout blow to the other in the next few weeks. And, right now, Clinton looks like she has the edge in being able to deliver the knockout blow. There’s a three step pattern for each.

What Obama needs to do to deliver a knockout blow:
1) Avoid getting trounced in Pennsylvania
2) Win North Carolina
3) Work with the DNC to agree to something with MI and FL that limits Clinton’s wins there.

Clinton’s knockout blow is pretty much the exact opposite.
1) Trounce Obama in PA
2) Win NC
3) Work with the DNC to agree to seating the FL and MI delegates.

First, why are these knockout blows?
The three things destroy the chances of the other to convince the PLEOs they should switch.

In Obama’s case, it shows 1) resilience from the Wright issue, 2) ability to maneuver politically, 3) the ability to recover from a huge earlier mistake (more on that later).

In Clinton’s case, it gives her a string of wins going into the convention, probably gives her the edge in popular vote and shows to the PLEOs that Obama hasn’t done anything since Wright.

There’s no doubt about it. NC is huge. It probably is huger than the issue with MI and FL, because NC will likely end up deciding what to do about MI and FL.

Right now polling is very close in NC, and it’s a state that Obama really should win. But he’s been in freefall there lately. This is why the knockout blow is easier for Clinton. If she dominates in PA (as expected), that will make it that much more likely that she can sneak out a win in NC. If she wins in NC, she likely runs the table for the rest of the primaries, and probably by progressively bigger margins (momentum has a way of doing that). If she has that kind of momentum going into the convention, she can demand from a position of better strength that MI and FL delegates get seated. And she’ll win that demand.

And the PLEO’s will look at her string of victories, look at her momentum, look at her outmaneuvering of Obama on the MI and FL issue, look at the fact that she didn’t blow it like he did, and they’ll turn to her nearly unanimously. It will be all over but the shouting.

But for Obama, doing anything positive in PA (a win and it’d be over right there), helps him in NC, and probably IN, and maybe elsewhere. That would destroy any momentum Clinton has and allow him to work behind the scenes to do something with MI and FL that doesn’t hurt him much.

I said earlier that I thought Obama’s inexperience had led him to make some mistakes in this campaign, but no fatal ones yet. I may have misspoken.

I think he’s made three huge mistakes in this campaign, and one was way back in 2007. The combination of them may be fatal.

1) He elected to abide by the rules in FL and especially MI, not even appearing on the ballot there. This let Clinton get easy victories in both places. But he forgot he’s dealing in politics. Politicians don’t care about the rules. They care about winning. By skipping out there, he basically stated that he didn’t think that those states would be important come Denver. This was a huge miscalculation on his part, and politicians are not usually forgiving of miscalculations of that magnitude.
2) I don’t believe his campaign realizes the significance of NC. Otherwise they’d be scrambling to do more damage control there to get his numbers back where they should be there. He should realize that if he loses NC that he’s probably not going to win any more states. Once again, politicians like winners. He’s not going to look like a winner going into the convention having lost the last several primaries in a row.
3) I also don’t believe that his campaign still realizes the importance of MI and FL. It seems they believe either that it’s resolved now, or if they ignore it, the problem will go away. It isn’t and it won’t. Clinton’s people are busy whispering one word over and over to anyone with any kind of voice in the DNC. “Disenfranchise”. That’s a word that sends terror up the spines of Democrats, particularly with regard to FL. They’re going to win MI in the general, regardless, but if they seem to be seen as not caring about the FL voters, they know they can kiss FL goodbye (and with it the Presidency, most likely) in November. Obama needs to find a gracious way to accept some portion of the FL and MI delegates that doesn’t break his momentum or give PLEO’s a reason to switch. He should’ve done that already while he was still in control of the conversation. If he loses big in PA and loses in NC, it will be Hillary controlling that conversation and not him.

I think that NC may decide everything.
8 Chris J. Breisch Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 1:03 pm
Hmmm, I’m not the only one that sees the importance of NC:

http://time-blog.com/real_clear_politics/2008/03/the_importance_of_north_caroli.html
9 Chris J. Breisch Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 1:09 pm
Wow, Real Clear Politics is reading my mind today.

http://time-blog.com/real_clear_politics/2008/03/quote_of_the_day_22.html
10 Ryan Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 2:42 pm
Bob: Interesting points. I still think there’s no way McCain would ever pick Hillary, but your arguments as to why it wouldn’t be the end of the line for him are fairly reasonable. It would be interesting if Lieberman Part II could get away with it. Or if Hillary would accept second banana.

Chris: No way he loses in North Carolina. That happens only if the aformentioned crazy/criminal/homosexual thing happens. He will win NC comfortably. And Florida and Michigan have been dealt with. Those delegates will be seated by a magnanimous and victorious Obama.
11 too many steves Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 3:06 pm
This, from the Halperin quote, really bugs me:

“7. The Rev. Wright story notwithstanding, the media still wants Obama to be the nominee — and that has an impact every day.”

Since when does what “the media” want matter? Especially in the context of the Presidential candidate nominee of the Democratic Party? And this “want” has an impact every day? So, then, Hillary is correct when she complains of bias against her and in favor of Obama?
12 Bob from Ohio Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
Or if Hillary would accept second banana.

McCain is 71 and has had cancer.
13 Mark Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 6:56 pm
tms, always dangerous when you try to get in someone else’s brain, but I think what Halperin was getting at was the media’s favoritism towards Obama colors their coverage…so yeah, I think Hillary IS right when she says the media favors Obama, probably…though I can’t say she didn’t have it coming…
14 too many steves Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 7:10 pm
LOL, good point! I’m a conservative and I like Obama a whole, whole lot better than Hillary. I would go so far as to say liking Obama over Hillary is sort of a “duh” proposition; at least that is with the public Hillary of the Bill Clinton presidency and her 2008 nomination campaign.
15 Fargus Says:
March 24th, 2008 at 8:41 pm
But if the tables were turned, you can’t tell me that the media wouldn’t be writing Obama off as dead in the water.

I agree that Clinton catches a pretty raw deal in the media sometimes, but this is one way that that’s decidedly not the case.
16 Chris J. Breisch Says:
March 25th, 2008 at 7:04 am
Obama leads in NC by a single point, well within the margin of error. To say that there’s no way he loses there is to engage in fantasy.

Interesting post about Obama’s current lead in the popular vote. Another point that I’m sure Clinton’s camp will bring forth at the DNC.

http://www.theneweditor.com/index.php?/archives/7783-The-Power-of-Cook-County,-Illinois.html

Someone else that agrees with me re: Hillary.

http://www.talkleft.com/story/2008/3/24/154226/008
17 Ryan Says:
March 25th, 2008 at 7:40 am
Chris: Obama’s lead is one point in one poll - and it’s PPP, which is not the world’s most reputable pollster (ranked 21st in SUSA’s last report card). The last SurveyUSA poll had a margin of 8, which is what I take to be the margin until someone I trust releases a new poll. We could go around quoting Rasmussen and Zogby to each other until we’re blue in the face, but since those two polling outfits are uniformly wrong about everything, we may as well pick out the ones who actually do this with some measure of success. Besides, that poll was taken at the high point of the entire Wright snafu, so it’s not trustworthy for that reason either. To claim that one poll shows Obama winning in a state by one point makes it possible for Hillary to win the nomination is to engage in fantasy.

TMS: Of course what the media want matters in some practical sense, in that they get to shape the entire campaign. Do you really think McCain’s comeback and subsequent winning of the Republican nomination wasn’t aided by the fact that the media quite simply adore the guy?
18 Ryan Says:
March 25th, 2008 at 1:33 pm
Chris: New PPP has Obama up 21 points in NC. We can either agree to throw out PPP and call it an 8 point margin or we can go with 21. Either way, I’d say your hypothesis is looking grim.