As a life-long democrat, I will vote for HRC if she gets the nod. I simply couldn't pull the lever for McCain. But lets get real here, people. Many Obama supporters (voters) are new to the process or returning to voting after ignoring the electoral process for many years. Call that cult of personality if you want. The bottom line is that many of these people would not be voting AT ALL if it weren't for an inspirational figure like Obama. That's amazing news for the Democratic Party and they'd be wise to capitalize on it.

I haven't missed a vote since 1985. I won't miss it this year either. But can the same be said of the many voters driving the huge turnout we have seen in the democratic primaries? HRC may find democratic support fading in the general election. She just doesn't bring new voters out the way Obama can. She's perceived, by me and others, as business as usual.

I loved this. Very funny but pretty appalling too. I was one person who heard McCain speak about "100 years" in Iraq so calmly, totally unconcerned. I thought then, "you're going to hemmorrhage votes with that statement right there." All any democratic candidate has to do is tally the price tag for our occupation in Iraq for say 5, 10, 30 years etc.. Then say, "what's the price of our children's future?" It also doesn't help when the generals are asking for "pause" in the planned drawdown of troops now.

ncawley wrote:

"Again you write items in an article that are just not true."

_________________________________________________________

And you know this story is untrue...how?

ncawley also wrote:

"Alex, don't use your role of a journalist to spew these types of lies.Patti was not fired! Patti made the decision to become the on-road adviser to Senator Clinton."

___________________________________________________________

Patti chose first to forgo her salary for January and then take a demontion...that's what it was BTW.

ncawley wrote:

"I hope all people are not as illiterate as you are." (NAME CALLING MUCH?)

"Maybe you should visit the site of Hillary Clinton and get the facts, instead of trying to put this negativity into people’s minds.Let your candidate work for the presidency on his own, instead of writing trash like this to spew lies and negativity."

__________________________________________________________

Well, it seems like this story is being carried on every news outlet, not just this one, and the journalists are calling it as they see it: as a firing. Patti Solis Doyle lost her position as campaign manager...and was replaced by someone else, that is the one undisputable fact. The Clinton campaign is surely not going to admit that Solis Doyle was fired, especially since she has been in the trenches for them for so long. Personally, I can't fathom why Solis Doyle was fired. These challenges that the Clinton campaign are facing don't appear to be her fault at all.

You wrote:

"Good Luck Huck

Huckabee's a killer campaigner. He's got the same "it" that Obama and Bill Clinton have, just a natural gift for campaigning, even though it's unfortunate that he's got such fringe ideas. Still, he's going to make McCain look bad by campaigning rings around him. That's good -- the longer he can play the spoiler for McCain, the more likely McCain's going to get pissed off and do something reckless or regrettable -- Huckabee's wittier than McCain, too, so odds are he'll give good sound bite if he's able to pull off an upset and stick it to McCain tonight. Here's to making Mad John madder!"

_______________________________________________________________

I don't really see it quite that way. The GOP has assiduously courted over time very far-right elements to be a defining part of the GOP. Now it's biting them on the butt. McCain just doesn't have quite that record and he's now being cannabalized as a result. McCain knows he will win in the end but it has to hurt.

Huckabee isn't trying to embarrass McCain though, IMO, he's embarrassing the GOP. How? He's showing the world that the GOP really isn't a lock-step organization and has many members wih different perspectives. Huckabee has been excoriated by right-wing pundits for months. They sneer at his positions on issues and belittle him. And here Huckabee stands, taking on McCain in a very convincing fashion...particularly when the electorate is very conservative. The GOP has to suck it up. For 3 decades they've allied themselves with the deeply conservative religious right as a group they could always rely on to boost their candidates in elections. But Huckabee is their guy, not McCain.

Mike Henry, brought on by Patti has just tendered his resignation from HRC's campaign. IMO, he felt his player got the shaft. Thoughts on this latest turn of events?

Yes, I just heard of that too. I'm watching MSNBC. It will be very interesting to read the headlines tomorrow.

I thought it was most telling that Hillary dashed off to Texas long before any results came in. She didn't have a chance and knew the exit polls would refute some of her campaign's key swipes at Obama. Barack Obama won or ran close to even among Hillary's supposed core voters. Electability is a real problem for Clinton, and it gets worse, far worse in the general election.

As for Obama's speech, his lobs at McCain were spot on, especially the part where he criticizes the "100 years" reference and tells the audience not to give McCain 4 yrs in the White House. A strong start as a preview of the coming general election.

If you have been paying attention to the dissection of election results, you would know that Obama either won or ran close to even with HRC among voters who aren't black too. He ran away with these contests.

Another point: Fewer voters stated they would be satified with HRC as the Democratic nominee instead of Obama. My read is that her negatives are now sinking her among democrats, not just independents and republicans.