The World According to Oatney

Obama flaws emerge too late for Hillary

NBC News political director Chuck Todd, who is probably one of the best nuts-and-bolts political minds in news television and print, has an outstanding essay on the state of the campaign for the Democratic nomination between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. Todd concludes that Obama is beatable-but it may be too late for the Clinton campaign to do it:

A victory in either Ohio or Texas will probably drive Sen. Hillary Clinton out of the race. Victories for Obama in both states will definitely end it.

[Obama]'s 10-0 since Super Tuesday, and remarkably, his smallest margin of victory came Tuesday night in Wisconsin.

That's right, Obama's 17 point blowout of Clinton in the Badger State was his poorest showing since Super Tuesday.

He's gone from a narrow pledged delegate lead (and overall delegate deficit) on Feb. 6 to a nearly insurmountable 150+ pledged delegate lead.

When you factor in superdelegates, he's still ahead by 80.

What's the end game? Fast-forward to Denver and picture Clinton accepting the Democratic nomination. Now, ask yourself, how did she get there?

The only plausible explanation is that Obama makes a series of mistakes that suddenly makes him unelectable. Is it possible? Yes. Is it probable? No.

Obama has many flaws and in recent days is showing that both he and the people around him make his candidacy extremely vulnerable. The revelation of Obama's troubling political past and ties to the radical Left in the case of himself and the people around him could rally the conservative base of the Republican Party in a way that John McCain has heretofore been unable to accomplish (that base may vote against Obama-and very deeply so-rather than for
McCain, and may be likely to view McCain as infinitely better than a neo-Marxist in the White House).

Todd confirms that Obama is not as teflon as some of his more thoughtful supporters would like to believe:

Obama could lose in November. In fact, even now, I'd argue that he's got no better than a 55 percent chance at winning the White House.

I actually think his chances are closer to 50% even. In spite of the difficulties with Barack Obama as a candidate, the gravy train of the Democratic base has left the station for any of his flaws to matter in a primary campaign. His followers view him as a political messiah (and a few as something more) and that kind of complex is hard to beat in a primary situation. The General Election, on the other hand, is quite another matter.

Labels: Presidential Election

posted by Deacon David Oatney @ 8:12 PM