The new Primary Thread

[Imran Siddiqui]

Yeah, McCain is basically a tax credit for insurance and you can but policies on a "national" instead of "state wide".

[Ramo]

How many people do you suppose knows that?

[SlowwHand]

I would want to know, were I voting for Obama, who is VP will be.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Ramo
How many people do you suppose knows that?

People watching the debates, I'm sure. I believe he has mentioned it a few times when the issue has come up. And IIRC, he does mention it while on the campaign trail... especially when he sticks it to Romney about his health plan.

[Ramo]

To a greater extent than Obama?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Seems like it to me. Most people I know really have no idea what Obama really stands for outside of the agreed upon Dem ideas of universal health, War in Iraq bad, and Tax cuts for top 1% bad. They do know some specifics about Clinton (such as mandatory personal health insurance and her views on illegal immigration - I'm guessing knowledge on the later is why Hispanics are out in such massive numbers for her).

[Harry Tuttle]

Originally posted by SlowwHand
I would want to know, were I voting for Obama, who is VP will be.

[GePap]

I agree with imran that Obama does not really talk about issues, because his campaign has not been about any particular program or project, but "hope" and "inspiration" and "change." Hell, if you listen to Obama supporters, its not Obama's policies that they bring up, its how great and inspirational of a speaker, or how motivating and uplifting he is, so forth and so on.

I think that will be his great problem next week- inspirational speeches don't translate well into a 30 second spot. I mean, I just saw my very first campaign add of the year today from Obama (here in NYS) and it was not very good - very little about what he would do as president, mostly attempts to capture his performances and distill it into a TV spot. And it does not work that well.

[Ramo]

Clinton's to the right of Obama on immigration. See the drivers' license issue in the debates. Hispanics are turning out for her because of the institutional support she has lined up in that community and the power of the Clinton name. And Obama was the one who chose to make mandates a point of contention (a poor idea on both politics and policy IMO).

[Ramo]

Hell, if you listen to Obama supporters, its not Obama's policies that they bring up

Part of that's because there's basically no difference between Clinton and Obama on domestic policy. I think there's a bigger difference on foreign policy, but both candidates are pretty opaque here and so it's hard to make a convincing argument to that effect. The biggest issue for me is how many Senators a candidate can bring along.

[Bosh]

Hell, if you listen to Obama supporters, its not Obama's policies that they bring up, its how great and inspirational of a speaker, or how motivating and uplifting he is, so forth and so on.

Not really.
For me it was pretty obvious in 2002 that invading Iraq was a VERY STUPID idea. So for me checking if people agreed with invading Iraq back then is a good litmus test for general idiocy. It really wasn't that hard to figure out that invading Iraq was going to be a cluster**** and so being too stupid to figure it out back then is a good sign that you have no business running a superpower.

Hillary: voted for authorization, therefore stupid.
Edwards: voted for authorization, therefore stupid.
Obama: spoke out against authorization and clearly laid out the exact reasons why Iraq became such a cluster****, therefore a hell of a lot smarter than Hillary or Edwards.

No real contest there. There's a lot of other stuff too, but that's the main things for me. I like voting for people who aren't idiots.

Disclaimer: I voted for Kerry in 2004, but I was firmly in the "Kerry is a douchebag but I'm voting for him anyway" camp. If Hillary gets the nomination I probably won't vote for her, but not sure yet. Would have to think about it...

[Barnabas]

Can Hillary beat McCain?

[Imran Siddiqui]

Hillary: voted for authorization, therefore stupid.
Edwards: voted for authorization, therefore stupid.
Obama: spoke out against authorization and clearly laid out the exact reasons why Iraq became such a cluster****, therefore a hell of a lot smarter than Hillary or Edwards.

Hillary: US Senator
Edwards: US Senator
Obama: Illinois State Senator

It is easy to be consistant on the issue when you don't have to vote on it. Especially in the wake of 9/11 it was seen as politically shaky to vote no.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Barnabas
Can Hillary beat McCain?

It would be very, very close.

This is the electoral college map of Bush-Gore in 2000. It seems to me that the states Gore took (in blue) would all also go to Hillary (note: New Mexico and Iowa turned red in 2004, but are both trending Democrat right now; New Hampshire turned blue in 2004, but they really like McCain up there).

OK, so let's say Gore's winnings are Hillary's baseline. In 2000, Gore lost by 4 electoral votes. However, since then, the electoral delegates have been redistributed to reflect the movement of the US population out of the Northeast and Midwest and into the South and West. If Hillary wins all the states Gore won, she ends up 11 vote short, not 4. Where does she get 11 votes? Three possibilities suggest themselves:

1) Ohio - 20 votes. Bush -- and incumbent president with an approval rating over 50% -- only won this state by only a 2% margin in 2004. Shortly thereafter, the GOP in Ohio collapsed, mired in scandal. Ohio's a battleground state that tends to go republican, but with the implosion of the state party apparatus here the Dems can compete.

2) Florida - 27 votes. It's a state full of immigrant Hispanics and old people, two groups the GOP has pissed off mightily in the last few years. By any honest measure, Gore actually won it in 2000; Bush won it instead of stealing it in 2004, but that was largely on the strength of the Hispanic vote, and they ain't voting Republican this time around.

3) Kansas+Nevada+Montana - 13 votes. All traditional GOP states, but all trending Dem in rcent state elections. If that trend plays out on a national level, it puts her over the top.

Of course, she could take them all and win in a landslide. but a squeaker is much more likely.

[Guynemer]

Perhaps I'm just too cynical about my countrymen, but I simply can not envision the American electorate electing anyone other than a white man as President. Not yet, anyway.

Think of it this way:

If Clinton is the nominee, how many traditional Republicans will vote for her? How many traditional Democrats will vote against her? BIG advantage for the GOP there. How will traditional independants split? Likely a slight advantage to the Dems. How many traditional nonvoters will vote for her or against her? Certainly not many for her, probably a slight advantage to the GOP. How many traditional voters will stay home? Again, advantage GOP.

For Obama, the calculus isn't quite as bad. Again the GOP would win the cross-party-line vote, but not by as much. The Dems would likely do better with independents and picking up new voters.


I'd never have believed it before, but it appears that a black man has a much better chance of getting elected than a white woman. Nevertheless, I still wouldn't bet on Obama in the general were he the nominee.