Today's Plain Dealer quotes some precinct workers in Republican strongholds (Chagrin Falls, Hyde Park) who said they were surprised at the number of Democratic ballots they gave out. One said 70% of the voters rec'd Dem ballots, a figure she said is precisely the reverse of their usual R/D breakdown. Many individual voters admitted they voted for Hillary b/c they thought her nomination would result in a McCain victory.

To top it off, the Plain Dealer's own right-wing nut job columnist and jr. exec. editor (or some other bullshit title) Kevin O'Brien wrote his column today about what "we Democrats" should do for the country. It was tongue-in-cheek about how inclusive the Democratic Party is, so much so that it now includes him. He did not state explicitly that his vote went to Hillary (as opposed to Barack), but I'm sure it did b/c I know him well (I correspond with him regularly--when I'm not absolutely inflamed by him).

I say these things to temper the certainty that Hillary can hold the swing states. I think that is her very best argument (if she is able to say that she has found popular support in the swing states of OH, PA, and FL, among others), and if the superdelegates end up choosing on the basis of electibility, she's got a good argument there. But my post undermines it a little--who knows how much of her support has come from cynical Republicans? (although FL was not an open primary, and neither, I think is PA)

At any rate, this is yet another reason to condense the primary season a bit; such manipulative crossover voting wouldn't occur if the Republicans had the viable field they started with.

The funny thing is, Obama is not even a Gen Xer as many say he is. He's 46, the same age as me, and we are at the tail end of the baby boom. The official baby boom years: 1946-1964. I think Obama was born in 1962.

Anyway, I appreciate the sincerity of your appeal.

A month or so ago, I couldn't shake the feeling of conundrum. What on earth is going to happen, I would think. How is the Democratic Party going to get out of this. The superdelegates, the MI/FL fiasco, etc. Every scenario I painted in my head had some seriously unhappy campers.

But then Obama gained momentum in the subsequent contests--11 of them. Not that it wasn't sort of predicted, mind you. On Super Tuesday night, most experts predicted that Obama would win the next round of small states, that Hillary would suffer from loss of momentum, that TX and OH would even them back out, that PA would really matter. It's funny how it's all played out just that way, but what we failed to realize at the time is how the emotions and feelings got in the way of the analysis. So that many of us really got the sense that it was coming to an end, that it was coalescing, that the writing was on the wall for Hillary. What we forgot is that we were just in that one particular phase of the process, that very predicted phase.

So here we are again. Total conundrum.

I have vowed to step back a bit. My vote is done (OH), so it doesn't make sense to stay in the arena so much until the nominee has been chosen. I am disappointed in some particular choices made by the Clinton campaign in the recent weeks, esp. the bit about she and McCain having lots of experience while Obama just has a speech. Her "kitchen sink" strategy bothers me enormously. I like her less than when this whole thing started. But that having been said, I have heard others say the same about Obama. I went back and watched her on the Daily Show Monday night, and she said all the right things. He asked her if she was uncomfortable being in the role of having to put down the candidate of hope, and her reply was perfect--she emphasized that in fact she admires that very trait about Obama. I do not always see that instinct in her, but I know it's there. I am definitely one who is inspired by generosity rather than divisiveness, and I hope to see more of that. Given that her slightly more negative style seemed to have garnered more votes, I can't be too sure. But I'm hopeful.

Here it is again:

http://www.slate.com/id/2185831/pagenum/2/

That's all.

I think first of all that it's more important who wins the "purple" states, like FL and OH. So lets say it's clear that Hill is more popular in those. The thinking may go that b/c of bad blood b/t Clinton and Obama supporters, some of the non-nominee supporters--in my hypothetical they are Obama supporters--will stay home or vote for McCain. In a state more red or blue, this small number doesn't matter, but in a purple state, these voters matter.

Does that make sense? I'm not really sure I buy it. I think it breaks down everywhere, like for example, maybe Clinton's support wasn't as strong in OH as she thinks b/c of crossover or maybe Obama's supporters are less likely to cross over than Clinton's (some recent poll showed that) or maybe 10 weeks (b/t the convention and the national election) is long enough to heal all rifts and that number is negligible.