Turning Things Around

Amid a mass of bad sports analogies, the networks have all decided that a) Clinton is turning things around because b) Obama can’t “close the deal”, and yet c) Obama can’t really lose. So what is really happening here?
First, the bad sports analogies department: this has been likened to a tennis match where Obama gets to match point (NH, OH, PA) and just can’t put her away, revealing a fatal weakness in his candidacy. Boy, talk about missing the big picture, tennis analogy-wise. What we have is a three set match where they split the first two (IA, NH, SC, Super Tuesday) and then Obama got s service break in the third, with his run of victories in February, which gave him a clear lead. What Obama has failed to do is break her again, but she hasn’t broken back and we seem to be at 5-4 with him serving in North Carolina. A decisive win there and this is over. Well, in the sports analogy sense and the theoretical sense. It ain’t over until the votes are cast at the convention and the Clintons are not going away. They will fight until the last vote, using Michigan and Florida as their ultimate weapons to keep things going until the convention.
Does it matter? Can she win? The expert analysis seems to be in three similar camps:
1) She’s a long shot, but if she can win Indiana, keep NC close, then win big in Kentucky and West Virginia, her momentum (and his slide) could turn things around. Many people have doubts, but the super delegates just might consider her the better choice.
2) It’s over, Obama will be the nominee, the Clintons refuse to accept the reality. They can fight as long and hard as they want, Obama will win NC, wiping out most of her delegate and popular vote gains from PA and he will have wrapped up the delegate lead and popular vote heading for the convention and the super D’s will fall in line very quickly to end the bloodshed.
3) Even the Clintons know it’s over, the campaign is designed to destroy Obama, with Hillary really aiming at 2012. This is the theory James Clyburn espoused this week and there is some merit to it, although the Clintons probably still think they have a chance at victory, the destruction of Obama’s chances are the one thing they know they can do. After all, it’s one thing for Republicans to attack Obama with partisan ads, it’s quite another to pepper those ads with quotes from HRC and Bill, both attacking Obama and praising McCain.

I tend to lean toward number 3, but I also think there’s a fourth scenario which no one is talking about. The first thing is to keep this going as long as possible, the PA victory was big for that, bringing in money and some campaign credibility. A decent showing in NC combined with a win in Indiana and the stage is set. Let’s call this the “deus ex machina” route to the nomination – an external event makes her the obvious candidate to everyone. In a saner world, her astounding pledge in the PA debate to use our defense umbrella to respond to any attack by Iran on Israel, Saudi Arabia, or any other friendly nation in that region would have been a huge story. In our silly society, it passed by quietly. Obama gave a more reasoned, less militaristic response. Combine that with her vote on the Lieberman-Kyl amendment and you have the warrior Hillary, set to pounce on Iran. The external event is a simple one -- we attack Iran. This week saw a string of accusations, not just from the Bush administration, but from assorted military leaders, regarding Iran’s attempt to destabilize Iraq militarily. The groundwork is being laid. We know McCain is on board, and Hillary has given notice that she is ready to fight as well. When the bombs fly, Obama will be left in a terribly awkward position and HRC will emerge as the only one ready to take on McCain in the battle for Commander In Chief. This isn’t over by a long shot.

How Hillary Wins

In David Brooks’ column in the NY Times this week (where he used the wonderful phrase “the audacity of hopelessness” to describe HRC’s campaign) he said she has about a 5% chance of getting the nomination. I’m not sure we can measure it quite so precisely. I do believe there are a number of hoops she needs to jump through and more important, I don’t think she has any control of the situation at any point. In other words, I don’t believe she can win the nomination, she has to hope Obama loses it – a possibility, which, based on the Wright insanity, does exist.
The path is somewhat simple – first, win Pennsylvania big. By big, I mean over 15%. If she wins by less than ten, it will impress no one. If she wins by 12 or 13, it’s a solid win, but no indication of underlying trouble for Obama and it will look like the Rendell machine just did its job well. But if she wins by 17 or 18%, then Obama’s numbers among white voters will look like they did in Mississippi and that will be all the media will talk about for the next two weeks. The question, asked constantly, will be “is Obama’s campaign collapsing”? The next step would be winning North Carolina and Indiana, leaving the impression that Obama is done. Then she wins almost all the remaining primaries and although she doesn’t catch him in pledged delegates, she can go to the super delegates and say “this is why you were created – we have a candidate who won early but who is collapsing late, based on information early voters didn’t have; now for the sake of the party, you have to pick the only candidate with a chance of winning, which is me.”
It all sounds possible and logical. Unfortunately, there are a few little problems. First, the most recent polling data seems to indicate that Obama has weathered the storm of Rev. Wright – although the Clintons are going to keep seeding those clouds. Then the NBC/WSJ poll had ominous news for Hillary, as her negatives are climbing along with his and her positives are dropping sharply; nearly 18% of her own voters don’t view her favorably. But for the sake of argument, let’s assume that the electoral results are exactly what Hillary needs them to be. Then she gets to try and convinces the SDs that they should join up with her to overturn the delegate vote – which is where the real problem for her shows up. You see, back in 2007, the Clinton campaign was pushing the inevitability of Hillary’s nomination to super delegates, basically telling them to get on the bandwagon before it leaves town and they will remember who was with them and who wasn’t. There’s nothing very unusual about this, although it did rub a number of people the wrong way. Many joined up, others resisted. We are now left with those who resisted, which may not be the audience the Clinton campaign wishes to deal with again. The other reason super delegates exist is to have office holders and politicians help make the decision from a political point of view; that is, who would be best for the ticket (or more specifically, for me)? That is where Hillary runs into big trouble. You see, back in the 90’s, Bill was useless to the party. He raised money, but he had no coattails at all, and everything he did, every stance he took, every person he consulted (Dick Morris, most notably) was about his own future. He left the party in shambles, losing both houses of Congress, and destroying many careers. These pols don’t forget that and see Hillary – especially given her scorched-earth campaign – as the same. Then there’s the supporter problem. In the NBC/WSJ poll, 28% of Clinton supporters said they would vote for McCain over Obama, while 19% of Obama supporters returned the favor. This might look like an advantage for Hillary, but many Obama supporters aren’t going to vote for McCain, because they aren’t going to vote at all. Let’s face it, the SDs overturning the pledged delegates would arouse a fury among the hard-core Obamaites, mostly black and young – two groups notorious for not voting. The Clintonites who desert Obama, mostly older, but many blue-collar types as well, will still vote – they may vote McCain, but they will then vote for other Democrats. So if you’re a super delegate, who would you rather have, a candidate with a slightly better chance of winning the White House, or one who makes it more likely that you and your colleagues win? If you don’t know the answer to that question, you are not a politician.
All in all, things do not look good for Hillary. I think Obama’s collapse (which doesn’t seem to be happening) would have to be so complete that it would seem like an obvious decision to go with her. Where there’s life there’s hope, and the Clintons don’t go quietly, so we can look forward to months of nastiness.

What Obama Must Do

Last night’s victories by Clinton should scare the Obama camp, especially combined with dramatic shift over the last three days in Presidential tracking polls, where Clinton has regained the lead. Her attacks on him have worked, especially combined with her all out “soft” campaign on late night shows, morning shows, and her constant whining about how she’s being picked on.
It is time for Obama to take action on two fronts.

1) Attack her at the heart of her argument – she is not ready to be commander-in-chief. It’s simple really, and he has started it.
“Hillary Clinton claims that her experience makes her the one you want in the White House when a crisis comes up. But that moment will require decisions to be made, and for all her alleged experience, she has been terrible at making decisions on issues of war and peace. In 2002, she voted with John McCain and George Bush to authorize the war in Iraq – she had a decision to make and made the wrong one. In 2007, she voted for Iran an resolution backed by George Bush and John McCain, a vote Joe Biden described as ‘stupid’ – she had a decision to make and made the wrong one. Like John McCain, Hillary Clinton has experience, but like McCain, her lack of judgment makes her a dangerous choice for commander-in-chief.”

2) Clinton has been making the rounds of the morning shows talking up the possibility of a Clinton-Obama ticket. This will be a key part of her strategy, since she know that a brokered convention, which she will need to get the nomination, will need to get Obama and Obama’s supporters on board before they can give Clinton the nomination. It is imperative that Obama eliminates that possibility and makes it an either-or choice. Here is what he should say to his supporters:
“Hillary Clinton has been going around talking about the possibility of a Clinton-Obama ticket. Let me be absolutely clear about this – I will not accept the vice presidential nomination under any conditions. To do so would betray the principles of change this campaign has been built on. I have no intention of being the third wheel on Bill and Hillary Clinton ticket. We – you and I – have come too far in this journey to end up in the back of the Clinton bus”

Pointless Predictions

Today is not-quite-super Tuesday and my junior pundit’s license demands that I make some kind of prediction about the results. This is something resembling a guess, educated only by polling data, which has been, to put it kindly, less than reliable. The problem with polling in primaries has always been about predicting turnout. In most cases, the likelihood of getting an accurate sample in an extremely low-turnout election is small. In this case, there is a whole new wrinkle, polls have to try and guess not only the turnout, but the very composition of the turnout, since that seems to be key to the results. Historical turnout numbers and demographic composition has been blown away in this election, leaving pollsters with numbers that are next to useless. Once in a while someone gets it right. This is probably sheer luck, rather than a superior methodology. Survey USA has had the best luck so far – in particular, getting Wisconsin sort of right. But there is no guarantee that they will be more accurate tonight than anyone else.
Having said all that, all I have to judge is polling data and I will fire a few bullets in the general direction of the moving target. I figure VT goes to Obama and RI to Hillary, ending the streak. Which brings us to the big two – OH and TX. A clue about the results can be found in where the candidates are going to be tonight – HRC is in OH, Obama in TX. This tells me that both camps expect her to win OH – if Obama thought he was about to win it, or even had a 50-50 chance, he would be there, since it is a more valuable place to be for the fall campaign. The polls seem to have turned around late for Clinton there, possibly based on health care, possibly on the Canadian NAFTA nonsense. Or maybe it’s just a parallel to the other big states, where Obama closes in the polls, then falls short in the end, as Hillary voters return to the fold. In any case, I expect a Clinton win there, maybe by a sizable margin.
A quick comment on the Canada story: is it unreasonable for Obama’s economic advisor to say to the Canadians “look, for the campaign, we have to be evenhanded about this, but there are no extra standards we will propose that you guys don’t already meet, so clearly you have nothing to worry about”? Of course, no one can say that publicly, since Mexico and folks in border states (like Texas) will get very nervous. It’s all silliness, but then, so is much of what we hear these days. Anyone who trusts Clinton more than Obama on changing trade deals is a fool – the Clinton Administration’s biggest accomplishments were trade deals and it’s hard to believe she is that far from the economic policy of the administration she is so proud of.
As for Texas, who knows? One thing is almost certain: Obama will win more delegates there. The system and the allotment of delegates by district will help him. Given the way this campaign has gone, a Clinton primary win there (as opposed to caucuses) wouldn’t surprise me. Her final numbers in most of the big states have exceeded her polling numbers and it may go that way again.
If Hillary wins OH and TX, it will be a big night for her, with much celebrating and a story line of “she wins the big states where more people get to vote, therefore she is the better candidate”. (This story will last about 48 hours, which is when Obama wins North Carolina and everyone realizes that despite Hillary’s two big wins, Obama actually widened his delegate lead this week. At that point, look for a number of notable names (Bill Richardson among them) to move to Obama.)
Edit: I misread the electoral map, NC is on May 6th, not March 6th. Mississippi and Wyoming are coming up in the next week and Obama can recover with those.