My mood is better, though not exactly more hopeful, than last night.
Dodd and Biden are officially out. There doesn’t seem to be any word yet on whether or not they will endorse another candidate before the nominee is chosen. Both Kucinich and Gravel, according to ABC’s rules, will not be participating in Saturday night’s Democratic debate in New Hampshire. I imagine that they will probably drop out pretty soon, as well. Since Richardson will be at the debate, it seems like he is still in. And Edwards has declared that he’s going to give it his all in New Hampshire. Personally, I think that he’s putting on a bit of a happy face. Though I’d love to keep believing, and though I certainly hope that more optimistic Edwards supporters are right, I don’t really see any probable way for Edwards to win, anymore. In any case, the Saturday night debate, with its narrowed field, will probably be the debate that I wanted to watch all along. Only coming a little too late.
I want to leave this as a mostly open thread, but I will say a few other things:
Lamentations of Clinton and Romney’s demises are grossly overstated. In my view, both of them are still very viable candidates who could walk away with the nomination. In fact, among the top five Republican contenders, I think that only Thompson can be ruled out entirely. As for Huckabee, all of the shock and praise are far too premature, and the explanations for how he won the vote are just plain delusional, though it would be foolish to keep pegging him as a guy who can’t win this thing.
Whether or not Obama wins the nomination, I think, is going to come down to how quickly Richardson and Edwards drop out. Though there are strong rumors of an Obama-Richardson pact, Richardson probably won’t formally endorse anyone until the nomination is decided. His ties are too close to Clinton and he has too much to lose. But I do think that his voters will be naturally inclined to defect to Obama over Hillary. If Edwards does decide to drop out when it can still make a difference, he will probably throw his support to Obama. If he were to endorse Hillary before a nomination is announced, I would just about die in shock. In any case, I think that a large portion of Edwards supporters would also naturally defect to Obama, and that along with this new momentum, it would be more than enough to push him over the finish line.
Whether or not I want him to get the nomination, though, is still pretty up in the air. I both like and dislike Obama and Clinton equally, and for different reasons. Whose list of pros and cons is the most defensible, I haven’t yet decided. I’m leaning very slightly towards Obama at the moment. But. If Edwards is still technically in it, come Feb. 5th, there’s a possibility that I will vote for him, anyway. If not, I guess that I’ll have to make a choice.
But that’s enough amateur punditry from me. Now I’d like to read a bit of amateur punditry from you. Go for it.
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Well, I’d vote for Hillary if she were to take the nomination, no doubt, as I still like her much better than any of the candidates on the other side. That said, I think she’s a very polarizing figure, and have this suspicion that come election day, she’d bring out the Clinton-haters in droves just to vote against her. I wish that weren’t the case, because I feel like her campaign has been portrayed badly in the media. When will people get it through their heads that what she’s wearing is irrelevant? Ugh.
In general, I’d love to see Obama get the nod, with Edwards a very close second. Those two are guys I’d feel good voting for, rather than the usual “lesser of two evils” type of voting.
I did my own musings on my blog this morning, but I’d like to add that I’m personally having a hard time making this decision on who to set up camp with because I agree with the top three candidates on so many things. I can’t find any good reasons to differentiate them.
Clinton – too entrenched
Obama – not enough experience
Edwards – somewhere in the middle. I don’t think one term in the senate is enough experience, but I’m not sure how much is!
That said, I agree, it’s too early to count out Clinton. I think the worst thing would had been for her to win. With this loss, she’s gonna rally the troops hard…and with NH being on the East Coast, maybe more troops will show up.
I’m sad that Biden’s out, mostly because he was good for a chuckle in the debates.
The way the Iowa Democrats conduct their caucus leaves some really fascinating data. It showed that Hillary is basically either someone’s top choice, or no choice. She is the only top candidate who doesn’t have a decent amount of support from people who caucused for someone else. I have no idea why.
Dunno how I feel about Huckabee getting the nom. On one hand.. wtf, people actually dig that guy? On the other.. a baptist minister in the White House? I have to believe that the non-crazy people of this country will not allow that to happen, especially after 8 years of Jr.
I’m absolutely pissed (though not at all surprised) that ABC cut Kucinich. It’s not the first time.
I think he’s the only true progressive running and I feel like we won’t see any change coming from the moderate front runners. I really hope he doesn’t drop out. Long shot or not, it looks like he’s the only chance for progress this country has.
Well. I not only strongly dislike Kucinich (among other things, he has genuinely suggested that he would choose white supremacist, woman-hating, “let’s leave the poor to die” Ron Paul as a running mate, and there’s absolutely no excuse for it whatsoever), but at this point . . . I think that I have a better chance of securing the nomination. And I imagine that they wouldn’t allow me to participate, either. Also, ABC claims that he was aware of the rules in advance, and it makes total sense to me that this would be true.
But I guess we’ll have to agree to disagree on that one.
As I’ve said here before, I think that we (Democrats) have a great batch of candidates and I can see myself in the general election voting for any in the top four–but in the primary I’m still going for Edwards and I don’t think that the media narrative is all that convincing that a strong second place victory spells doom for him.
I would like to address the idea that one of the other commentors brought up–that HRC is the most divisive–I think that if you look at the Republican track record and the conserve biased media, you’ll find that they can smear anyone (look at how humm-drumm Kerry was) and how we now have a verb “to swift-boat” which means to take down through dirty-tricks, lies, and hypocrisy–a decorated veteran speaking for peace was defeated by a chicken-hawk draft-dodger son of privilege and somehow Kerry is the coward? That’s the narrative the press picked up on PRECISELY BECAUSE THE REPUBLICANS MAKE ANY FIGURE “DIVISIVE” AND SUSPICIOUS–so today they might see Obama, defeating the evil HRC, as “not so bad” but by next week he’ll be Barack Hussein Osama again and the nooses at Jena will look like mild racists assaults. Now, I’m not saying that that is valid reason to NOT vote for Obama!!! I’m just saying, that whoever the nominee is, we have to come up with and support a strategy that shows what the hate-mongering bigots are really doing. When Harold Ford Jr. in Tennessee was running for Senate (and I was living in TN at the time) I was truly shocked at the blantant and hidden racism perpetuated by the Republicans–jungle music, adds with black people smoking crack and how soft on crime he’d be, an ad about how he visited the Playboy Mansion in which a blonde white women talks all sexy-stupid to HFJ implying that Ford was just another black man out to conquest (and satisfy–almost as scary to Republicans as the interracial sex the idea that white women might like sex with a black man) white women. We’re gonna have some seriously bad race-baiting come out in 2008 and we’d better prepare (whether its Clinton/Richardson or Obama/anyone) and the shift-boating is part of the Republican handbook now–as its been for decades–but I don’t think that HRC is more divisive nationally than Obama–perhaps less so than my man Edwards because he’s willing to talk about class which is the dividing line that is rarely talked about because the Republicans shout back “commies” or “class-warfare is bad, we’re all Americans” when in reality, class is highly relevant and the lack of a discussion about class plays into the Republican narrative of willful ignorance and self-reliance to a flaw perfectly.
peace
I love Gravel, personally. Love! However, I’m realistic to know that his chances are insanely slim. I haven’t yet made a decision as to who I would vote for, even though the media seems to be pushing Obama and Clinton quite a bit. I’m still not as up on my politics as I would like to be. What a disgrace.
My husband once talked to Mike Gravel on the phone.
He works at a call center, and a couple of weeks back a call came through, and the dude on the line starts going into a spiel, and my husband said that RIGHT AWAY, from his voice alone, he could tell that it was Mike Gravel. It turned out that he dialed the wrong number. But then Gravel introduced himself and told my husband about how he was running for president and said that he hoped he could count on my husband’s support. Since Gravel had already been disappointed by the fact that my husband wasn’t in Iowa, he didn’t have the heart to tell him that he’s an immigrant and can’t vote :) Also, Gravel said he’d fire the person who gave him the wrong number.
Not really relevant at all, but when it comes to Gravel, that’s kind of all I’ve got!
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