Next Tuesday, the Presidential primaries come to Kentucky. For once, two active candidates will be on the ballot for one of the parties (the Democratic Party for those living in a cave). For some reason, Kentucky has long held the belief that they shouldn’t be involved in selecting presidential nominees since our primary is more than four months after the season opens and has always been done well after the nominee is decided. At least with two people still campaigning, my 13 hour day as a precinct judge may be a little more involved. Of course, I don’t know how many times I’ll have to tell a person they can’t vote in the partisan races because apparently 1100 Fayette county voters switched their party affiliation in 2008 (my guess is because they wanted to vote in the Democratic primary). I further guess they are unaware that December 31, 2007 was the cut off for switching your registered party and still voting in the primary.
One interesting thing came out of the election day training. There are six Republicans (McCain, Romney, Keyes, Huckabee, Paul, Giuliani) and three Democrats (add Edwards) still on the sample ballot. Apparently, all of them filed to be on the primary ballot and none officially withdrew. As a Republican who doesn’t really care that much for John McCain, I think that’s a good thing. It allows me to vote for someone else as a reminder that my vote for him isn’t automatic which is apparently happening already. McCain clinched the nomination with his win in Ohio. In the four races since then, McCain has failed to hit 80%, so over 20% of Republicans in those states still took the time to go to the polls and vote for someone else even though McCain can’t lose the nomination. And most of them weren’t wackjob Ron Paul supporters. Obama groupies have said that voting for their candidate will lead to great change for the country and make people who vote for him a better person. Since Obama’s platform is warmed over liberal Democratic rhetoric going back 30 years, that must mean voting for a black guy is what makes you a better person. Because of that, I will be voting for Alan Keyes. As far as I know, Keyes’ mother wasn’t white, so I will be an even better person than the Obama supporters. Obviously much better than Hillary supporters because voting for a woman is just silly.
The Republican primary is definitely pro forma since all the other candidates have dropped out even if they are still on the ballot. It’s the Democratic race that is fascinating because there is beginning to be some real hostility out there. The big news on that front is that a lot of people want Hillary to drop out. I don’t know why they think Hillary would quit now. She's only been planning this run for most of her lifetime. Since the Democrats routinely grab the new face over the retreads (Carter, Dukakis, Bill and now Obama never had a high presidential profile until they ran), it's really her only shot. The stated reason people want Hillary out is because she has no way of winning. That’s not really correct. She’ll never be able to get the 2,025 pledged delegates that she needs to win. However, Barak Obama only has 1,875 pledged delegates which means he needs at least 150 out of the 189 delegates in the last five primaries (thanks to stupid ass caucuses, those numbers may not be 100% accurate, but they’re basically correct). Since he’s not going to win Kentucky or get 100% of the vote in other states (Democratic primaries are usually not winner-take-all), I don’t see that happening. Therefore, neither candidate will win the Democratic presidential nomination without the Superdelegates (party leaders who aren’t “pledged” based on primary and caucus votes).
SIDE NOTE: Interesting reason Barak Obama has why he expects to lose Kentucky (and did lose WV) to Clinton. "What it says is that I'm not very well known in that part of the country. Sen. Clinton, I think, is much better known, coming from a nearby state of Arkansas." As opposed to Obama's Illinois. As the map shows, seven states border Kentucky. They are Indiana, Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia, Tennessee, Missouri and Illinois. Wait a minute? There's Illinois, but where's Arkansas?
Now, Obama is picking up Superdelegate pledges left and right, but that’s expected since everyone assumes he’ll win. Superdelegates are party leaders (which means they are politicians) who will eventually want something so if there is a President Obama, you don’t want him reminding you of your Hillary support when you come asking. Yet, Superdelegates may pledge their vote to a candidate, but they don’t actually vote until convention. That means if something bad for Obama were to come up between the end of the primaries and the convention, votes could change. Say a video of Obama smoking crack with a naked 12 year old was to surface. I can’t say from personal experience that such a situation would harmful to one's reputation (no, I really can’t), but it would probably cause him to withdraw from the race and guess who is standing there with a lot of delegates? I’m not saying that I think Obama has ever done anything like that (but there was a time I thought a sitting president would never risk his position by getting hummers from a chubby intern in the Oval Office), but it may not have to be that bad. If something else came up that made Superdelegates begin to think he can’t win the general election, who knows how some of them would react?
Would it really take that much to put doubt about Obama in Superdelegate’s minds? The media and party leadership have pretty much said the race is over with Obama winning. Normally, in a case like that, the party faithful rally to the anointed one. Why haven’t they done so with Obama? Since winning the Wisconsin primary in February, Obama’s only big wins were North Carolina and Mississippi where a large enough group of primary voters were black (34 and 50% respectively) and went 90% for him. In the same time frame, Hillary has won Texas, Ohio (by a lot) and Pennsylvania (by a lot). And when everyone is saying that the race is definitely over, she beats him 67 to 26 in West Virginia? It makes you wonder if some Democratic voters are beginning to think they jumped on the Obama bandwagon a little too early. It’s one thing to ignore West Virginia (God knows I try), but if Obama can’t pull Ohio and Pennsylvania in November, he’s in trouble. Plus, Obama’s core support is blacks and hard core liberals which are not likely to cross over to the Republican side. He’s simply not pulling the swing voters which is why polls show a lot more Clinton supporters than Obama honks saying they’ll flip to McCain if their candidate isn’t the nominee. Now this is all silly speculation because I doubt very seriously that the Superdelegates would give the nomination to Clinton when Obama has more pledged delegates. There will be a convention riot if that were to happen.
Plus, another reason Hillary isn’t leaving are the reports are that she is willing to take the Vice Presidency. If she can finish strong and finish 150 total delegates behind Obama, he might decide he needs to put her on the ticket to keep all her supporters on board. I’m not sure it would be that great an idea. Most political studies of voting patterns have shown that very few people ever make their presidential pick based on who the running mate is. Besides, Bob Novak says Michelle Obama won’t stand for Hillary being on the ticket. Two bitches on a campaign is one too many. Plus, she doesn’t want her husband dying from a suicide by six shots to the back. Still, even without the Vice Presidency offer, a strong Clinton finish means she would have some influence on the party platform. Not sure what she would put in there that Obama wouldn’t want since politically, they aren’t that far apart. If there is something, the last thing the Obama camp wants is to alienate Clinton supporters by pushing her to the side.
I can’t really blame Hillary for being somewhat angry about how everything transpired. Sure, everything was done in a cold, calculating way and purely for political gain, but Hillary played the political game that was supposed to put her into position to get the nomination. She stuck by her husband when his personal “habits” almost derailed his candidacy and second term. She dutifully moved into a more traditional First Lady role when it was apparent that her policy activity was harming Bill’s presidency. As a Senator, she sucked up (in a non-Lewinsky way, I hope) to all the Democratic constituencies. She set up a PAC to dole out campaign money to other Democratic candidates. She actually made an effort to work with Republicans so people would think she was a centrist even though she’s not.
So what happened to her? She’s losing to some guy who says he can unite the country even though he’s never shown an ability to work with the other party (or even unite his own). A guy who preaches change while running on the same platform as her (with no track record of getting much accomplished) and who has a rep for missing controversial votes or skipping work while claiming to be heavily involved. A guy who believes simply electing him will impress the world even though the world has proven they aren’t interested in that. She sucked up to Al Sharpton while running for Senate in New York, and then watched him endorse Obama. When the Senate votes to essentially condemn a Moveon.org ad, Hillary votes against it while Obama skips town to avoid going on the record. Yet, he still gets Moveon’s endorsement. She can’t even rely on the feminist movement which used to claim they wanted a female president. She can’t even brag about the Hamas endorsement since that went to Obama. Even the once pliant press who wouldn't think of asking her a hard question when she ran for Senate has apparently found their new star. When you have to use a defense of Hitler at Munich in an effort to defend Barak Obama and you do so willingly, some people might think you're in the tank for Obama.
Even worse, she can’t count on former officials who owe their start to being in Bill Clinton’s administration. Let’s face it. Bill Richardson and Robert Reich would still be nobodies if Bill Clinton had appointed them to his cabinet. Now Richardson is governor of New Mexico (and can claim to have been one of the worst candidates in the Democratic Presidential primary this year). As for Reich, he’s………well, he’s still a nobody, but at least he can claim to have been a cabinet officer although I would advise him not to mention that it was Secretary of Labor. No offense to the Department of Labor, but it’s not exactly a glamour position (can anyone name a part of it besides OSHA? I can, but I'm probably the exception). Look at the list of former Secretary of Labor and tell me who besides George Shultz is well known for government service (and his certainly isn’t for being Secy of Labor). Even though Elizabeth Dole is now a Senator, I still think of her as primarily having been Bob Dole’s wife (and the collateral damage from his Viagra use). Ditto with Elaine Chao who is married to Mitch McConnell. It’s a nothing job. But I digress.
If I didn’t dislike Hillary so much, I might actually feel sorry for her. Since I find her to be a cold, calculating bitch who routinely stabbed supporters in the back and pandered to some of the worst elements while trying to get ahead, I think the whole thing is rather funny.
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