Letters to the Editor

• Electability?

  [Read the article: Clinton's nondenial on Obama pastor]
  [Read more letters about this article: Here]

  I think electability is a realpolitik question, meaning I think morality has nothing to do with it per se, other than a force to be understood. So this post will view the subject according to that.

  Right now each of the three potential candidates seem to have electability concerns. McCain is going to have problems creating just enough separation between him and the Bush Administration. Too much separation, and the fervent base will fade, too little and all the sins of the Bush years will be heaped upon him. The ailing economy, with a looming meltdown (this point can be expanded upon later) will be hard for him to shake off.

  The Iraq war is not going to be a plus. The screw up over Iran and al Qaeda will not help either, because it brings up quesitons of his age. My conservative girlfriend already thought McCain was a little too old. Now she's worried if some underlying cause like memory loss is at work. Not fair, but this is politics.

  Hillary is an interesting case. Her polling negatives are really high, but so are her positives. My concerns are that her campaign has not executed at the level that I thought it would and needs to. Obama should be in second place at this point with respect to delegate and popular vote. That's not a good indicator of the Hillary campaign's prowess if she's the one to go forward. I'm also concerned that the majority of things she's running on (ready on day one, govt experience, ready to be commander-in-chief) are all strengths of McCain. In fact he beats her on these topics unless she can discredit large pices of his history, and I think her own words may come back to haunt her. A fall campaign would really have to pivot on something like the economy. Healthcare by itself, I don't think is enough. I also think the financial activities of the Clintons in the last eight years could be problematic. They made some good money in a short time. I don't think they will get the benefit of the doubt on where the money came from. They will have to prove it came from books sales, and speechmaking, etc. Finally, there is this real pavlovian response in the RW base to Hillary. They will turnout to defeat her. It's not a reason not to vote for her, but it still needs to be factored in.

  Obama's problem is that he is new to the US Senate and he seems not to get much credit for his 8 years in the IL state legislature. As long as the Rezko trial continues, detractors will be able to say all the information hasn't come out. I think he still needs to publically disclose all of his taxes as well (reporters have seen them, but they are not publically available yet, as far as I know).

  I think Obama's change campaign also has to continue to make inroads into the well earned cynicism of older voters, and it is an open question of how well he will be able to do that. Just like Hillary, he should be beating McCain over the head with the Economy. At the moment, I would give the edge to Hillary in getting that message out.

  Finally, the Rev Wright could be a major problem, and we'll have to wait until PA to find out how much. I think people are wrestling with why Obama would stay in the church for 20 years if he didn't like those words. Once again, my girlfriend ponders this very point. At the moment, the RW noise machine views this as a golden opportunity.

  So, this post is too long already. The bottom line, is I'm not convinced any of the three candidates is on the road to easy street.

  Your mileage will vary.

  Permalink Thursday, March 20, 2008 09:12 PM