Why McCain Might Win

Here's a recent article from Newsweek, positing that Hillary may be held responsible for handing McCain the presidency in 2009:


"Why McCain Might Win" by Michael Hirsh

He can sit back while the Dems tear each other to shreds.

Mar 14, 2008

Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama show few signs that they're aware of it, but the general election campaign has already begun. And appropriately for the eve of St. Patrick's Day, the pair have begun to destroy each other like the two crazy Irish cats of Kilkenny. The upshot is that both of them are already losing the general to John McCain. By the time the Democratic convention rolls around in August and the nomination is finally awarded, the battle may already be over.

Obama's advisers point out, rightfully, that the Clinton campaign started this downward drift toward mutually assured destruction, Democratic-style, with its now infamous "red phone" ad before the critical Ohio and Texas primaries. Subtly but with devastating impact, the TV commercial raised questions about Obama's preparedness to be commander in chief. The Obama campaign responded by effectively branding Hillary Clinton a liar about her own record. "As far as the record shows, Sen. Clinton never answered the phone either to make a decision on any pressing national security issue—not at 3 a.m. or at any other time of day," top Obama adviser Greg Craig—a former close friend of Hillary's—wrote this week in a widely circulated memo.

Winning elections is about setting the agenda and, while creating a positive image of oneself, negatively defining one's opponent in the minds of the voters. This is happening for McCain—having Obama defined as unready and Hillary as lacking in integrity—without his having to lift a finger. If the current campaign keeps up—and there's every sign it will—it's likely that by summer irrepressible doubts about both Dems will have been lodged in the minds of the electorate.

That's no small thing. Especially in this age of terror and economic uncertainty, voters don't want doubts. They will want to pull the lever for the most trustworthy candidate. And who's making himself seem trustworthy? Why, John McCain, of course. Next week he's off to Europe and the Mideast to confer with "leaders I have strong relationships with," as he put it to reporters the other day.

We have been here before, most recently in 2004. Within days of his securing the nomination on Super Tuesday in March of that year, John Kerry became the victim of a vicious Karl Rove-orchestrated plan to paint the Democrat as a flip-flopper. The bewildered Kerry, and his even more clueless advisers, Bob Shrum and Tad Devine, failed to respond for months, while their candidate was relentlessly tarred by the GOP attack machine. "Wait until the fall," one Kerry adviser responded sagely when I asked why they weren't counterattacking more. But by the time the Democrats gathered in July for their convention, the GOP-inflicted image of Kerry had taken hold. That's why the Swift Boat attacks against Kerry's war record in August were so powerful. So many voters already saw him as a waffling wimp that, despite his clear heroism and uncontested Silver Star in Vietnam, they easily bought into the slander. In the last six weeks of the fall campaign Kerry finally changed course and came out swinging, but by then it was far too late.

A similar process is underway now, but the Republicans don't need Karl Rove this time around. Both the Clinton and Obama camps do worry about the consequences in the fall, and Obama's advisers hope, wishfully, that the Clintonites will stop the bloodletting that they began. The likelihood, however, is that the Hillary camp will only step things up. She knows that while he leads in pledged delegates, by winning most of the big Blue states she has racked up a big lead in the potential electoral votes any Democrat will need to win in November. As Marie Cocco of the Washington Post Writers Group wrote the other day, "In this sense, Pennsylvania is where Obama's back, and not Clinton's, is up against the wall."

And so let us return to our St. Paddy's Day sermon. Children who are familiar with this nursery rhyme already understand more, perhaps, than the two leading Democratic candidates for president. To wit: "There once were two cats of Kilkenny/Each thought there was one cat too many/So they fought and they fit, and they scratched and they bit/Till excepting their nails and the tips of their tails/Instead of two cats there weren't any."

© 2008

Why Clinton Should Get Out of the Race, and Get Out NOW

On the days leading up to the March 4th primaries of Texas, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Vermont, it was made known that, regarding the delegates needed to clinch the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama desired to make knockout blows.

Clinton needed a K.O. just to catch up to Obama’s delegate numbers, and Obama wanted a K.O to convince Clinton to bow out of the race gracefully.

Neither candidate got what they hoped for. Clinton won Ohio and Rhode Island. Obama won Texas and Vermont.

(A quick tangent: To those who hadn’t heard, after all the results were tallied in Texas, Obama ultimately won more delegates than Clinton. The fact that this has not been widely publicized proves that the “The Press Loves Obama” myth is indeed a myth. If the Press truly loves Obama more than Clinton, they would have reveled in Clinton’s decisive losses in all the primaries after Super Tuesday. But as decisive as Obama’s wins were, the Press downplayed Clinton’s losses. An Obama-loving press would’ve focused more on how badly Clinton lost in those primaries.)

So now back to my original argument: Since neither candidate got their K.O., we are left with the “facts on the ground.” And those facts are: Obama has more delegates that Clinton. More importantly, Clinton genuinely has no hope of getting close to Obama's delegate numbers in the upcoming primaries. This is why we’ve heard so much from the Clinton camp about refocusing on states of Florida and Michigan.

Before the primary season began, Michigan and Florida wanted to change the dates of their primaries, the Democratic National Convention refused to allow this. So it was agreed by the Democratic candidates, including Obama and Clinton, that delegates in Michigan and Florida would not be counted.

But now the Clinton camp wants those delegates to count, and the Obama camp rightly points out that this is tantamount to changing the rules of the game in the middle of the game.

In my opinion, Clinton should get out of the race, and get out of the race NOW. Because while Clinton tries to drag the Democrat race into “overtime,” McCain, who clinched the Republican nomination on March 4th, is fine-tuning his strategy, gathering steam and momentum, and gathering money for his presidential run

And so while Obama and Clinton are exhausting each other, and draining campaign money on each other, McCain is getting a huge head start on tooling up and tricking out his Republican machine.

No matter how weak you think McCain is now, or how strong you think Clinton or Obama will be, don’t forget that the powerful Republican machine was able to hand George W. Bush a decisive win in 2004.

So all the Clinton camp is doing is weakening the eventual Democrat candidate, while the Republican candidate gains strength.

Run for the Border! The Vermont Border...

Has anyone else noticed that Vermont, the state many people consider to be a Democrat haven, has the lowest gas prices in all the northeast? And the property taxes in Vermont rural areas are much lower than taxes in NY rural areas.

I don't see why we should be so fearful of Democrat majority in rural upstate NY.

I know Darrel. I honestly believe that if any one person can bring new hope, promise, and prosperity to the North Country, that person would be Darrel Aubertine.

Obama, Paul Net Most Military Donations

Did you see the recent article in USA Today about which presidential candidates are receiving the biggest military donations?

Click here for the full article.

For Democratic candidates, America's soldiers are donating the most to Barack Obama. For Republican candidates, it's Ron Paul. It seems significant that these two candidates are calling for an end to combat in Iraq.

I wonder if our soldiers in Fort Drum are endorsing Obama?

"Experience" is bait set out by the Clinton campaign, and Democrats are biting.

Words can lift a people, words can inspire a people. Eight years of Bush have made Americans believe that a President must be an action figure.

Perhaps one of the factors that should determine our vote is which candidate is a motivator that can inspire the people of America.

Barack far surpasses Hillary as a motivator. Make a nation hopeful again, and the work and innovation will get done by the people.

When Barack calls people to action, people WANT to provide results.

Hillary’s words just make Americans want to sink deeper into their armchairs.

Promises of Universal Healthcare

Hillary promises “universal healthcare” without providing essential details behind her plan. I believe absolutely that if she becomes President, her version of "universal healthcare" will not be what Hillary voters expected. It will be a huge disappointment. Hillary’s version of "universal healthcare" will have horrendous short-comings -- short-comings that she knows about, but isn’t telling people before Election Day. Hillary is one of the highest paid politicians on the health insurance lobbyists’ payroll -- how “universal” do you think her healthcare will be?

In my opinion, Obama -- who is NOT one of the highest paid politicians on the health insurance lobbyists’ payroll – has a very doable healthcare plan for Americans. And Obama recognizes that the only way to universal healthcare is to approach it incrementally. Hillary wants voters to believe that universal healthcare can happen in one fell swoop on Day One, but that - given the government’s longstanding loyalties to the health insurance industry - would be impossible.

Obama recognizes that his healthcare plan will be an “under the radar,” but effective first incremental step towards TRUE universal healthcare.

To Jefferson County Democrats: Please help me understand.

My Republican friend called me up this morning. He had already checked the Jefferson County primary results: “Looks like the Democrats in your county played right into the hands of the Republicans.” He explained that Clinton had garnered more than 70% of the votes. All I could do was shrug, and agree with him.

So Jefferson County Democrats, I need a little help understanding your vote for Hillary: You knew that McCain would be the Republican front-runner. And you’ve learned how the average American voter thinks, after the voting results for the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004.
So please, explain to me how Clinton will have any realistic chance of defeating McCain in a presidential race.

Your ultimate goal was to keep a Republican out of the White House, right? Well, have you never played chess? Never played billiards? As you know, good strategy means, before you make a move, you anticipate your opponent’s reaction to your move.

For months now, impartial political strategists have been making it known that if the race is between Obama and McCain, there’d be no way to stop Obama. These were impartial political strategists – am I the only Jefferson County voter who watches C-SPAN?

And when I say “opponent” I don’t just mean Republicans. Based on the 2000 and 2004 election results, “opponent” for Democrats should also mean the swing voters of America’s heartland.

The “Anti-Hillary for President” revolution has been decades in the making. Ever since Hillary was a blip on the political radar, millions of Americans have enthusiastically put their money and passion into burying her.

(Don’t ask me why Hillary inspires such hatred. But if you thought Swift Boating John Kerry was ugly, it will be nothing compared the Hillary smear machine. I know Hillary has thick skin, but I’m making an additional point here: what good will it do this country to go through a second Clinton hate-a-thon? It will bring out the absolute worst on all sides, and the country will be the worse for it. Think the Starr Report for Hillary. Think mainstream-ized misogyny. This country is suffocating in partisan politics, and a Hillary vs. McCain campaign, and a Hillary win, would only drag our country deeper into partisan purgatory.)

But beyond preventing the prolonging of Republican rule in the White House, Jefferson County Democrats need to provide concrete evidence explaining why Hillary is a better presidential candidate than Barack Obama.

I read a Letter From the People in today’s Watertown Daily Times with the headline, “Sen. Clinton attentive to North Country issues.” Yet the writer did not produce a single concrete example of how Clinton has been attentive to the North Country. Please Jefferson County Democrats, please provide me with examples of Hillary bringing prosperity to the North Country.

Hillary voted for the Iraq War. Are there military families in the North Country that feel her vote wasn’t in the best interest of the sons and daughters of the North Country?

If you plan to respond, please abstain from saying it is time America had a woman president. I could not agree more that having a woman American president is past due – but having Hillary as our first woman president will establish an ugly precedent: Imagine your young daughter asking her guidance counselor, “What are my chances of being President like Hillary Clinton?” And the guidance counselor responds, “Well, it depends on who you marry, whether your husband is a popular former President. We certainly haven’t had any woman Presidents who won the Presidency on their own merits.” I’m not saying Hillary has no merits apart from Bill, but how do we stop future generations from making that generalization?

So please, someone help me out. Explain your vote for Hillary. I’m not a Hillary hater - she’s been a decent ambassador for NY - and I don’t necessarily think Barack was the best of the Democrat presidential candidate lot -- I thought Joe Biden was the Democrats’ best choice to handle the Iraq War.

I just need an explanation why – considering what we’ve learned from the swing voters of America’s heartland, and considering all that we know about Obama, Clinton, and McCain – why did you believe voting for Hillary would ensure a brighter, prosperous future for America?
And I’m not saying a brighter, prosperous future for the Democrat Party; I’m saying a brighter future for our country.