Tit for Taft.

[allhatnocattle]

For the last 4yr.s I've lived in a Liberal riding. Nothing changed for me last night. Former local radio celeb, Dave Taylor is still my MLA. Unfortunately, neither Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama were on the ballot, a disappointment for many, I'm sure. Dave Taylor handily beat the well financed PC Candidate, former CNN reporter Art "scud-stud"

Comments

[mijopo]

That means that the Democratics, regardless of who wins, will be deeply divided heading into a Presidential election.

I don't think so. The Dems. certainly won't be divided any worse than the Republicans are right now, what with Rush Limbaugh, Coulter and company screaming and yelling that they'd vote Hillary before they'd vote McCain. Romney and McCain were dividing the Rep. party a lot more than Obama and Clinton are dividing the Dem. party. They're relatively indistinguishable from a policy perspective and that they're both minority candidates gives all the Dems. a warm fuzzy.

Republicans pretty much own the economic side of the American monopoly board and with that becoming a major issue I can see them pulling ahead with that.

No way, not after the Clinton years followed by the Bush years. The only reason Bush stayed in in '04 was because he kept beating the terrorist drum. People are mostly unimpressed with Rep. handling of the economy and the Republicans will have to do a lot of scrambling to avoid getting blamed for the mess the U.S. is presently in. If this election is about the economy, HC would have the best chance, not McCain, who has openly admitted that he's not too strong on economics.

How is someone supposed to run a campaign on that?

Well, he seems to have figured out a way so far, no?

[suitablyemoname]

There's the Nixon plan, too. Part of why the Republicans have done well since the 1960s is because of the total reversal of fortunes in the South, which went from being solidly Democratic to solidly Republican, and has stayed that way ever since. You'll notice that since Kennedy, all of the Democratic presidents have been Southerners, although it would be silly to say that's the only factor at work here. Still, going by this metric, since neither Hillary nor Obama are Southern, neither of them can win the election, and it goes to McCain by default. The spoiler is that Obama's black, which might change this dynamic considerably--however, if McCain picks Condi Rice [and he may well do so], he'll give him a run for his money there.

It's true that Hillary or Obama could pick a Southern running mate, but that's what John Kerry tried to do, and that didn't turn out so good.

By the way, the best way to keep the party from dividing? Whoever wins asks the other to be their Vice-President. They do agree on most issues, and they compliment each other beautifully. The problem there is that neither of them has experience in an executive branch, and neither of them has any military or foreign policy experience, either. (Which is why you hear names like Governor Sibelius being suggested as possible running mates.)

[mijopo]

The spoiler is that Obama's black, which might change this dynamic considerably--

Why do you think it would change it? Southern white Republicans would be less likely to vote for a black Democrat, no?

[suitablyemoname]

Southern white Republicans are (in my view, at least) equally unlikely to vote for a woman. Southern black Republicans may well be mobilised to support a black candidate, though.

[mijopo]

Southern white Republicans are (in my view, at least) equally unlikely to vote for a woman.

Quite possibly, but that doesn't explain why Obama's selection would change the dynamic.

Southern black Republicans may well be mobilised to support a black candidate, though.

Southern black Republicans???? You think all three them will vote for Obama or just one or two?