Probably every kid in the history of the planet has had their mother say to them at least once: don't wish too hard for something, you just might get it. Well, the leadership of the Democratic party really, really wanted to get rid of Hillary Clinton and make Barack Obama their presidential candidate. They worked for it. They paid for it. Now they have it.
In so doing, they tossed overboard the candidate who might have the best chance of bringing the White House back under Democratic control and replaced her with someone whose vulnerable in a number of ways. Clinton, for all the arguments against her, showed an ability in the primary season to carry the big states anyone will need to win in November. McCain carried most of the big states in the Republican race and would probably be competitive in places like Pennsylvania and New Jersey -- but this isn't a GOP sort of year, you know?
There was a recent study that showed Clinton going into November with 300 likely electoral votes, with only 270 needed to win.
Compare that to Obama. I think a lot of Hillary voters would rather vote for the Illinois senator than a Republican who will keep the Iraq war going. Some will go for McCain, but probably not much. The numbers, though, are a lot tighter in the looming November matchup. Among big states, Obama in the primaries won his home state of Illinois and North Carolina. In Ohio, which shapes up as the main battleground state again, he was creamed by Clinton.
Plus, in the popular vote early polls, Obama is either tied with McCain or holds only a slight edge. Historically, favorable press generates a big early boost for the Democrat candidate. If this is it, then it's not much.
The funny this is, this almost worked in reverse. Hillary Clinton had a strong finish to her campaign, winning most of the states in the past two months. That was helped along somewhat by an effort by radio host Rush Limbaugh, who urged his mostly Republican listeners to vote in the Democrat primaries for Clinton, in order to keep her campaign alive and prevent Obama from concentrating on the general election campaign. The swing of voters just might have put Clinton over the top in Indiana and Texas.
Theoretically, if Limbaugh and some of the radio hosts who joined in might have propelled Clinton to the nomination and given McCain tougher competition. Limbaugh will consider his gambit a success because he kept the divisive Democrat campaign going longer than it might have -- and he'd be right. But it also might have been suicidal.
The moral of the story: don't try to rig the system. You could get burned.
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Remember how months ago I predicted that Clinton would get ripped when she went down? Not anymore. A strong close to the campaign might have re-established some respect for her.
Probably not enough respect to be given the vice-presidency, however. The whole notion of Hillary being there to pat Obama on the head and say "There, there. Mama's here to save you" just won't go over well.
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There is a way for McCain to win this election in a runaway and maybe change the GOP's flagging fortunes in Congress. Of course, Obama might take that way, too, and help increase the congressional majority to one that's cloture-certain. Whoever makes the case best will win the White House.
That'll be the subject of my next post in a couple days.
