Liberal College Kid

Well the vote is in, and once again I got it wrong…  Congratulations Hillary.
However, for those that think of the 2008 Presidential election as the Ballot Bowl, the results in New Hampshire should certainly make for an interesting run up to the next Democratic primary in South Carolina.  As of this writing, Hillary leads there by 8 points.

<Yeah, she should be smiling!>

The 2008 race is forcing Democrats to make uncomfortable decisions.  In the caucus state of Iowa I think two things combined to boost Obama over Hillary that didn’t exist in  New Hampshire.

First, the caucus creates a different kind of vote.  That is, the caucus is a public vote, where everyone present gets to see who you are voting for.  Democratic voters this year have their choice of a woman, an African American, a Latino, and a few white guys.  One can easily imagine how this could become the oppression Olympics in terms of what group is most deserving of a vote based on their minority’s past experiences.  In essence, voters are being asked if they would rather have the first female president or the first black president, not an easy choice.  It is especially a difficult decision when everyone else around you gets to see who you are voting for.  We have to ask the question, how much of Obama’s vote in Iowa came from people who wanted to be for a black candidate in front of others?  While this question and others like it make me extremely uncomfortable I think there may be something to this theory.  South Carolina is another primary state and Nevada is another caucus state.  If the results of those two follow New Hampshire and Iowa we will certainly have to give this theory some serious consideration.

Next, the caucus rules in Iowa require that people casting their vote for candidates who receive less than 15% of the vote switch to another candidate or not vote.  This means that lower tier candidates, which for the Democrats in Iowa included Joe Biden, Chris Dodd, Dennis Kucinich, Bill Richardson, and Mike Gravel all had to find others to vote for (except in just a few places where Biden and Richardson received more than 15% of the vote of those present).  We have to ask the question of who did the best when these candidates’ voters had to switch to candidates with more votes.  Kucinich was fairly outspoken in asking his voters to go for Obama as a second choice.  The rest of the candidates had to choose between Edwards, Clinton and Obama.  This election season both sides are talking about the need for change.  Clinton, clearly, represents not change but a return to the prosperous 90’s.  So, many voters likely moved to Edwards because of his emphasis on the middle class and to Obama based on their desire for change in Washington.

These two factors had no bearing in New Hampshire, though.  Women turned out in record numbers, but something else existed in New Hampshire that was missing in Iowa.  The New Hampshire vote was a primary, done in private.  No one to try and convince voters to change their vote, no one there to see who they were voting for.  This helped Hillary, more so than anyone else could have predicted.  Obama came into today projected to win New Hampshire by double digits, and left 3 points behind Clinton.  The exit polling didn’t show it though, early exit polls and even those later into the evening were showing Obama in the lead.  However, as the votes were counted it became clear that Hillary had won.

So why were the exit polls wrong?  If my theory holds true its the same thing that happened in Iowa: people want to be seen as voting for the African American.   Now its on to South Carolina for the Democrats where the African American vote is around half of the Democratic electorate.  Don’t think race will be a factor in this election?  Think again.

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OK, so I didn’t get it right last time… But that’s water under the bridge. Let’s talk NH.

New Hampshire is a very different state than Iowa with 65% listed as Independents. This means that they can vote in either primary, but not both. The two big candidates with Independents are McCain and Obama which, I think, has a lot to do with why they’re polling ahead of the pack.  Why New Hampshire should matter?  The fact that Independents have a choice in which party to cast their vote means that it may be a good predictor about which way Independents will vote nationally come November.  See, early primaries do matter!!  On to business:

Democrats:

1. Obama
2. Clinton
3. Edwards
4. Richardson
5. Kucinich

Its hard not to take Obama in this race. He polls well with Independent voters, he represents change, he looks strong coming out of Iowa, and to be honest the other campaigns just aren’t doing it for me. The Clinton campaign is struggling, slipping now to 29% in the last Reuter’s poll. Edwards also is not doing as well in New Hampshire as he would have liked, remaining in third place in the polling even after narrowly defeating Clinton in Iowa. Obama will take New Hampshire and the Clinton campaign will just have to hope that they can make some serious gains come Super Tuesday as the rest of the early primaries will more than likely go Barack’s way as well.

Republicans:

1. McCain
2. Romney
3. Huckabee
4. Paul
5. Thompson
6.Giuliani

McCain will take New Hampshire because voters are still convinced, no matter how many times McCain has supported everything Bush has done, that he is an Independent. A “maverick” as FAUX News has called him. McCain took New Hampshire in 2000 and he still has a strong presence there. He has also spent far more time and money in NH than he did in Iowa where he did better than expected. He has also now become somewhat of an underdog in the national race, which I believe will bring people out to vote for him. Romney beats Huckabee here only because New Hampshire doesn’t have the Evangelical vote that Iowa has. Don’t count Huckabee out of the nomination though. Right wing wackos who think the world is only 2000 years old have found their candidate and while Huck’s likely to finish third in NH he will likely rebound quite well in South Carolina.

As for the other candidates I think what happened to Kucinich is simply wrong.  Shame on ABC for excluding him from their debate.  This is not FOX, this is ABC and the fact that Dennis was left off the list of debaters tells me that ABC is endorsing candidates, not representing good journalistic view points and biasing the election.  I, for one, will not be watching any ABC news for a long time.

Paul will be interesting to watch in this race for New Hampshire.  This dark horse is likely to run on a Libertarian ticket once he’s out of the Republican race and that will cause some major headaches for Republicans, especially in Western states where much of Paul’s support lies.

Be sure and check back after the New Hampshire results for LCK’s analysis.  I know my predictions are a little on the safe side, it might be exciting to be wrong once again.

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I have never been the staunchest Hillary supporter. I love the idea of a female President, especially in a country where there are more women than men. My complaint about Hillary has long been her pro-war flair. She’s a hawk, and for my own politics that just doesn’t work. Her efforts on health care, though, make her an extremely viable presidential candidate and should she win the nomination I will throw my full support behind her.

Madame President? Ms. President?

Yesterday, just before the decider decided that his opinion should trump the American people’s by vetoing a bill that would fund embryonic stem cell research, Clinton made these remarks:

“So let me be very clear: When I am president, I will lift the ban on stem cell research.”
and
“This is just one example of how the President puts ideology before science, politics before the needs of our families, just one more example of how out of touch with reality he and his party have become.”

Rock on Hillary! The Democrats continually back down to Republicans, but Hillary really is a fighter and she’s taking it to the Republicans. We are living in an atmosphere where the will of the people is not being represented by our government. However, Hillary Clinton is right on with this issue. The Republicans insisting that a stem cell that will be disposed of anyway is more valuable than a sick person is proof that they “put ideology before science.” We used to value science for it’s great strides to make life better for people. Now, the Republican party is trying to run away from science by making claims that stem cell research means the destruction of human life. When did unborn beings become more important than people who are currently alive? Why don’t Republicans defend how precious the lives are of immigrants? Are they not one in the same?

Her second comment, puting “politics before the needs of our families,” is equally poignant. We are living in a political culture where the single most important thing is being reelected. Our politicians have learned that raising money is more important than representing the people that put them in office. Playing the game of politics instead of making steps to actually make and effect policy is something that both parties are guilty of, but no one is more guilty of this than George W. Bush. He has politicized religion to the point that he can make the claim that God is a Republican. Thanks be that Jesus was a liberal.

The Bush White House no longer cares what the public opinion is, nor do they care about the public welfare. The only things they are concerned with are protecting big business and not admitting that they’ve ever gotten anything wrong. Illegal wire taps, holding people without charging them of crimes, outing CIA operatives, firing US Attorneys for political purposes, the list goes on. The way the Bush administration gets by all these scandals is that by the time one reaches a tipping point there’s another scandal waiting in the wings. And of course, the President’s continued use of September 11th to defend his foreign policy and his illegal war in Iraq. Way to go Hillary, and thank you for acting like you just might be in touch with the rest of America.

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