Posted on 05/12/2008 7:46:51 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
"I HAVE a much broader base to build a winning coalition on" than Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton has told USA Today.
She cited an Associated Press article "that found how Sen. Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."
"There's a pattern emerging here," said Hillary. "These are the people you have to win if you're a Democrat in sufficient numbers to actually win the election. Everybody knows that."
The Democratic Party can't win with just "eggheads and African-Americans," Paul Begala added helpfully.
What Hillary and Begala are saying is politically incorrect, but it is also patently true. Hillary was describing what may now fairly be called the Hillary Democrats -- aka the ex-Reagan Democrats who did not vote for Obama and may defect to John McCain.
If Obama can win over these voters who gave Hillary big victories in Ohio and Pennsylvania, he is the 44th President. If McCain does not win a goodly slice of these Democrats, he will lose.
Who, exactly, are the Hillocrats, half of whom said in the exit polls from North Carolina and Indiana that, if she loses the nomination, they will stay home or vote for McCain?
They are white, working- and middle-class, Catholic, small-town, rural, unionized, middle-age and seniors, and surviving on less than $50,000 a year. They are the people most belittled by the condescending commentary of Barack behind closed doors out at Sodom on the Bay.
"You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, (where) the jobs have been gone now for 25 years. . . . And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
In 40 years, two Democrats have won the presidency, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, and both did so only after connecting with these folks.
People forget. In 1976, Carter ran as a Naval Academy grad and nuclear engineer, a born-again Baptist and peanut farmer from Plains, Ga., who, in Philadelphia, talked about preserving the "ethnic purity" of the neighborhoods. Clinton first ran as a death-penalty Democrat.
It was Ronald Reagan who cemented the GOP hold of these Nixon-Agnew New Majority Democrats, who are now headed back home.
And it was George H.W. Bush and Lee Atwater who turned a 17-point deficit as of Aug. 1, 1988, into an eight-point lead Bush never lost on Labor Day -- by eviscerating Michael Dukakis on the social and cultural issues: Dukakis' veto of a Pledge-of-Allegiance-to-the-Flag bill, his opposition to capital punishment, his pride in being "a card-carrying member of the ACLU," his weekend furloughs for convicted criminals like Willie Horton.
Bush lost the presidency in 1992 when, under fire, he retreated from the social and cultural issues and sought to win on foreign policy, and on the economy, where his approval rating was 16 percent.
In 1992, cultural, social and moral issues could have derailed Clinton, which is why James Carville told the War Room to stay laser-focused. "It's the economy, stupid!" Bush and James Baker deemed social and cultural issues unworthy of a President. And so it was that George H.W. Bush ceased to be President.
His son did not make that mistake.
Since Pennsylvania, Barack has recognized this deficiency and sought to portray himself as a reflexive patriot who enjoys a bottle of Bud just like the next guy, a kid raised in poverty by a single mom, who turned his back on Wall Street offers to fight for steelworkers laid off when their mills closed in South Chicago and moved to China.
McCain, a war hero and POW, is a natural for Middle Pennsylvania and Middle Ohio. His problems, however, are these:
He is failing to energize the Republican base, one-fourth of which is still voting against him in primaries. On the great populist issues of 2008 -- outsourcing of American jobs to Mexico, Asia and China, and the illegal alien invasion -- he stands foursquare with K Street -- for amnesty and NAFTA -- and against Main Street.
And like Gerald Ford and Bob Dole, McCain recoils from cultural and social issues. He berated Tar Heel Republicans for linking Barack, the Rev. Wright and local Democrats, and denounced a conservative talk show host who introduced him for mocking Barack's middle name.
This may solidify McCain's standing with his core constituency, the liberal commentariat. But these folks will depart in the fall. And the Republican base and the Hillary Democrats had better be there, or McCain will do what moderate Republicans nominees do best. Lose gracefully.
Keep an eye on West Virginia. The votes Hillary gets, and the way she gets them, may provide a road map for how the GOP can hold the White House this fall, if they are not too squeamish to follow it.
Yes.
McCain, square up your quarters, appreciate your supporters, lay waste to your political enemies with extreme prejudice.
Nothing else will do.
Naah, Pat B has a sluggard’s eye for politics.
Mad John has tow serious options:
Reform, Reform, Reform, he has yet to embrace that idea, he should, in that he has tons of credibility.
The Southern Strategy coupled with National Security, that would devestate Obamao, McCain does not have the guts to run it though which leaves:
Attack Obamao through surrogates, while remaining above the fray, mouth Populism, let the worker bees tear Obama down, then hope no one notices that a tired man is on the verge of being elected..
OK, sometimes Pat doesn’t get things quite right, then other times he hits it completely out of the ballpark - this is one of the later.
times don’t change. or, they do in weird ways.
remember the sixties “moral majority”?
now, the white trash racists are for hillary.
whatta laugh.
Good analysis by Pat. As I have pointed out a million times, PA and Michigan will likely go for McCain against Obama, based on the history of racial animus between blacks and working class whites in both states (wish I had the old R. Crumb “City of Brotherly Love” cartoon to post here). He will also come close in NJ, and could win if he courts the non-black ethnic vote (Koreans in north Jersey, Indians/Chinese in central Jersey, Hispanics in Passaic/Essex/Union/Hudson Counties) successfully.
John McCain is an idiot. This is the worst election of all time. McCain ought to just get it over with and make Hillary his veep.
Who would think that a Wellesley and Yale-educated Fembot would become the candidate of the Pabst-swillers and rollers-in-hair/mumu crowd.
yep, the times are a changin’.
Pat leaves out the real dynamic of the '92 and '96 elections: Perot took a ton of votes from GHW Bush and Dole, allowing Clinton to win with 43% of the vote in '92, and 48% in '96 when Perot helped him again.
Sorry, since when are Hillary Dems and Reagan Dems the same thing? That’s sort of like saying a VW Beetle with a Rolls kit is the same thing as a Phantom limo. Not exactly.
Buchanan and Gingrich are the only two commentators on the current political landscape I can connect with.
I don’t always agree with Pat Buchanan but I do 90%+ of the time.
He’s made a few political mistakes but I would vote for him in a second before I would McCain. His biggest problem is that the media has Newted him too. They’ve tried to make him appear too extremist.
I would be enthused voting for a guy like Pat. I’ll be holding my nose voting for McCain.
Or, vice versa.
The moral majority was the eighties with Jerry Falwell, wasn’t it?
btt
“McCain ought to just get it over with and make Hillary his veep.
Or, vice versa. “
I could never vote for Hillary with McCain on the ticket.
: D
Yes, founded in 1979, and a powerful political force throughout the eighties.
I know that I won't.
Persons of good conscience will not either despite the alternatives.
Button down the hatches folks. We are in for a rough time.
Thanks. Sums up the history of race relations in the Philadelphia area since the 19th century.
In many cases, the Reagan Dems are the same folks as the Clinton Dems. The Dems who voted for Reagan in 80-84 over issues like bussing, affirmative action, crime, and the cold war (especially if of eastern European origins) went back to the Dems and voted for Clinton, Kerry, and Gore in places like Michigan, PA, NJ, and New York. Now, they have voted for Hillary in the primary, and will likely vote for McCain in the general since Obama is the nominee.
Hey Pat...Well DUH!
Democrats who may vote McCain
The Chicago Daily Herald | May 10, 2008 | Ed and Linda Colaprete
Posted on 05/11/2008 8:15:01 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2014637/posts
repost - How to Keep Alive a Bleeding S&L -
the billing records and why Vince and McDougal had to go
The Great Whitewater Fiasco | May 2008 - orig 1994 | Professor Martin L. Gross
Posted on 05/12/2008 8:15:11 PM PDT by doug from upland
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2015083/posts
All about Wright, the right and race
The Pharos Tribune | May 12, 2008 | Brian Howey
Posted on 05/12/2008 1:41:50 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2014930/posts
McCain, square up your quarters, appreciate your supporters, lay waste to your political enemies with extreme prejudice.That's like saying "Obama, abandon your leftist views. Speak up for America and individual liberty."Nothing else will do.
Not gonna happen.
Either thing.
Obama is a committed leftist and McCain is a committed suck-up to all liberal causes.
McCain is the most extreme example of a huge flaw in Republican politics: trying to get the leftist press to "like" you by sucking up to this or that liberal cause. In McCain's case, he's made a career of it, and often won praise from the press for doing so.
But in November, the press is going to drop him like a hot potato and all his decades of sucking up to liberals is going to be for nought.
It's been said before: The evil party and the stupid party.
And we've never had a more stupid standard bearer for our (mostly) stupid party than John McSuckup.
Buchanan and Gingrich are the only two commentators on the current political landscape I can connect with.Wow. That's pretty frickin amazing. Actually, Buchanan is more readable this year than previous years. He's generally downplayed his animus towards Israel and towards our efforts in Iraq.
But Gingrich... Global Warming Gingrich... wow. You gotta get out more.
West Virginia was one of the handful of states that Jimmy Carter won against Ronald Reagan.
Yes. Buchanan probably meant the Great Silent Majority which was the term coined by Nixon
A little FResearch, and here ya go:
LOL!
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