Hudsonjoe's partial list of right-wing garbage does a nice job of showing the utter facade of the ideas that

a) Hillary is running a "Rovian" or "republican" dirty-style campaign. I must have missed all those time she called him Hussein during the debates

b) somehow the right-wing wasn't going to be as partisanly ugly against Obama as they'd be against Hillary. Because we all know how nice they were to non-Clintons like Max Cleland and Kerry.

As I was deciding which candidate would get my support in the Democratic primaries, I heard folks make this argument against Hillary Clinton:

She is divisive. People hate her. If we nominate her, the right wing will be foaming at the mouth and use the dirty tricks of the 90's, so she should not get the nomination.

More recently, I have heard Obama's supporters make similar claims. i.e. Hillary can't bring the country together because so many conservatives hate her. Barack can bring the country together. In fact, this idea of "unity under Obama" seems to be one of the most powerful arguments in his favor, after his inspirational oratory.

I think in the last few days we are seeing what the right wing is going to be doing to candidate Barack Obama. Radio personality Bill Cunningham attacked Obama as a 'Chicago Hack' and repeatedly used his middle name. Afterwards he disingenuously claimed that he meant nothing by it. Hogwash. Of course Cunningham and the others who are doing this intend to inflame racism and suspicion of Muslims, and imply that by virtue of his name, Senator Obama has some connection to "our enemies in the Islamic world." A Republican member of Congress appeared on MSNBC earlier this week, and attacked Obama's patriotism because Obama does not wear an American flag lapel pin. Host Dan Abrams immediately pointed out his hypocrisy given that the congressman himself was not wearing one. Now, McCain distanced himself from Cunningham (but, so far not from Rep. Jack Kingston), but this is not going to stop the 'haters' like Cuningham, like Rush Limbaugh from proceeding to cast these aspersions on Obama.

So, I ask you, can Obama be the messenger of Hope and bringer of unity, if these hateful right wingers are going to impugn his patriotism at every turn? They will point to the misinterpreted 'no-hand-over-his-heart' photo, gleefully display the picture of Obama wearing the garb of his father's homeland, crow about the flag lapel pin, and on and on. Even if McCain distances himself from this at every turn, it will not matter. The public will be barraged with these hateful messages and lies. How, then, can we Democrats get our positive message out and win the election? For all those who are excited about Senator Obama's message of Hope and Unity, please be prepared to have to fight a very different battle: a battle over lapel pins and patriotism. I've already found myself telling people that Obama is not a muslim (in response to the infamous email going around) and then doing my best Seinfeld "not that there's anything wrong with that."

We Democrats may want to wage a campaign about Hope and Unity, but I fear "the right wing freakshow" has a very different battle in mind.

I do not present this as a reason why we should not nominate Obama. I rejected this argument when I heard its corollary against my first choice candidate, Senator Clinton, and I reject it now. I do want my friends who do support Obama to be ready for the kind of campaign we are going to have. Those who chose Obama because they wanted to avoid a 'dirty' or divisive campaign need to know the politics of America in a post-Bush/Cheney world won't allow it. Prepare for battle.

apologies if this comes out twice--seem to have lost the first response

"I am not implying that Clinton is "unpopular" only that she will not be the winner of the popular delegate selectio"

I'll accept that's what you meant, though you should be more clear. too many Obama supporters talk as if she's running out of pure ego based on six votes she's gotten. I don't think nearly half the voters, and more than half the party should just be dismissed. If you are as concerned about party unity as you say, I'd think you'd agree. Calls for her to drop out is dismissive and at least as "divisive" as her staying in

"Pelosi, Dean and many others to reiterate that superdelegates are never intended to overturn a viable winner of the popular primary elections"

a) None of the people you cite were around when SDs were formulated

b) they are in fact there to potentially overturn a viable winner, say if sometime between winning the primaries and the convention some revelation was to be made harmful to the candidate (I don't say this is worry with Obama, just pointing out the fallacy of this notion)

c) one's definition of a "viable winner" is important here. Obama will fail the sole specific definition of the winner by not getting the required number of delegates. So if you say he should get it anyway because he has "more" delegates, you've already changed the definition of winner. One could quite logically make an argument based on how much one "wins" by. By where one "wins" . By how one wins (caucuses skewed by demographics, proportionality, etc). By popular vote versus popular delegate. Should Obama be the nominee if he has a larger number of delegates but a few number of actual people who voted for him? I'm not saying this will happen, though it's far from a mathematical impossibility

"however, let's assume that the Richardson story is accurate."

Why? Why work off of an assumption that casts somebody in a completely negative light even though there is no evidence of it and the various citations of its alleged occurrence all describe it differently? How about if we assume Obama doing dirty deeds with Renzi--should we start with that premise? Of course not.

"Assuming she loses on popular delegates"

Again, your definition of "losing" isn't mine. Losing means not getting the magic number. Both lose. How about "assuming" she wins the popular vote-then what? The whole "assumption" argument is silly and why she shouldn't drop out. If all you are left with is "assumption", how about we actually finish the thing and know what happens?

"how is her splitting the Dem base from the inside different from Nader's outside attempts"

How is Obama running when Hillary was the confirmed front runners, thus "splitting" the dems--who by a majority preferred Hillary--any different? It's silly. A campaign, by definition is "splitting" the party. You don't want a "split", run a monarchy, not a democracy

even more silly comparing someone who garnered, what 2 percent of democrats to someone who has garnered 50 percent. You trivialize her campaign and the 10 million people who voted for her--hardly "unifying"

"Do you think that Bush v. Gore was decided correctly? Why or why not?"

. It's irrelevant. One is a Presidential election, one is a party nomination. One has an electoral college, one does not. One has superdelegates, one does not. One has its own set of rules, one has a completely different set of rules. How many caucuses in the Bush-Gore election? When did a small group of people decide during Bush-Gore that the votes of California and NY just wouldn't count arbitrarily? There is no comparison.

If you need an answer, you can safely put down any self-righteous indignation. I take a backseat to no one in my contempt for that debacle. But it just doesn't matter.

I think in a party nomination process, it's perfectly fine for the party, in a close nomination (which so far this is) to take into account

a) popular vote versus popular delegates

b) where votes were won

c) how votes were won

d) whether delegates are won by pure demographics

e) whether delegates are skewed by proportionality

f) whether delegates are won by people in the party voting for the party

g) age and chances to run again

h) combining a ticket

etc.

In a not-close election, no. When the democratic voters have spoken clearly, that's it. But so far we don't have that position. We have a leader who will not get the magic number. We have a leader who has less than a 5 percent overall popular vote lead. We have a leader who actually isn't leading in registered members of the party he is meant to represent. We have a leader who has done exceedingly well in caucus states, partially due to demographics only, and less well in primary where one person-one vote rules (see Washington for the clearest example of this). We have a leader whose delegate vote is skewed higher by demographics only (young people more likely to caucus, upper income more likely to vote in caucus, blacks voting monolithically--which I have no problem with but I"m also not blind to). We have a leader who has done very well in states that will not vote democratic but less well in swing states. We have a leader who hasn't won many very large states.

None of that is to say he shouldn't be the nominee, just that so far he hasn't automatically earned it. He very well may by the end. But it should go to the end.

And I'm probably more objective than most on this having neither an all-for-Hillary agenda or anti-Obama agenda. I've supported him financially since he announced (prior to his first victory), will happily pull a lever for him should he be the nominee, and in fact have already pulled one of my allotted levers for him in NY (we're vote for multiple delegates).