February 6, 2008

     "The opera ain't over 'til the fat lady sings," is a phrase coined by San Antonio sports reporter Dan Cook.  He was talking about an NBA playoff series between San Antonio and Washington in the 1970s.  But he could have been talking about Campaign 2008.

 

     Republicans could hear her getting ready to sing Super Tuesday night, standing just off stage, perhaps, practicing a scale or two.  John McCain isn't the nominee, but he's way ahead of Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee, who surged surprisingly back to life with support from evangelical Christians in Southern states.  He won five, including Georgia, a biggie.  Nobody thinks he's going to win (nobody I've talked with anyway), but lots of people were wondering out loud if McCain should choose him as his running mate.  Evangelicals have never had one of their own on the ticket;  it might energize them.

 

     I don't know where Mitt Romney goes from here--down and out, quite possibly.  McCain won the big states--California, New York, and so on.  If momentum means anything, and it often does in politics, he's well on his way.  Romney may simply have taken too many positions on too many issues to be credible by the time voters went to the polls.

 

     The Democrats?  That's a real race.  Proportional representation, of course, makes it harder to roll up landslide majorities.  So Clinton won California, but Obama will get delegates there, and she'll get some in states he carried, like Missouri.  They're fairly close in delegate count and can look forward to a Louisiana primary and Nebraska caucus this weekend;  Maryland, Virginia and D.C. primaries, next Tuesday;  and two big states--Texas and Ohio, March 4th.  If the fat lady hasn't found her voice by then, we might be headed for something we haven't had in years--a contested, multi-ballot convention.  I went to my first convention in 1960 and I've never seen one.

 

     Now that would be really something.  Delegates caucusing in this corner and that;  pundits pondering.  And what about Michigan and Florida, the two states the party punished by saying they would get no delegates because they scheduled their primaries early, in defiance of party rules?  Would they show up?  Could they play a role?

 

     There are enough plots and subplots here for several operas.  I can't wait.

 

    

February 4,2008

 

     It will be the most super Super Tuesday ever.  The term came into use back in the 1980s--the Democrats had eleven contests in 1984 (the Republicans had unopposed president Ronald Reagan, of course). The Dems had twenty-one contests in 1988;  the Republicans, sixteen.  But this is the biggest:  twenty-three primaries and caucuses for the Democrats, twenty-one for the GOP.

 

     The Democrats will be choosing 1,681 delegates, 42% of the total, 83% of the majority needed to win.  The Republicans' numbers are similar--1,014 delegates, 43% of the total, 85% of the majority needed to win.

 

     The rules differ from party to party and state to state.  In California, the biggest prize, the Democratic primary is open, independents can vote in it.  The Republican primary is closed--registered party members only, please.

 

     Will Super Tuesday decide the nominees?  Maybe.  It's more likely to pick a Republican than a Democrat.  That's because the Republican contests are often winner-take-all.  In California, again, delegates pledged to a candidate are winner-take-all by Congressional district, except for a few who are running statewide, but they're winner-take-all, too.  The Democrats use proportional representation;  if you get at least 15% of the vote in the district, you get some of its delegates.  It isn't always very proportional, though.  In a four-delegate district, you could get more than fifty percent of the vote, but still only two of the delegates.

 

     Handicapping?  Hillary Clinton is favored in New York, her sort-of home state.  Polls have her ahead in other biggies--California and Illinois, for instance.  But Obama is believed to be gaining in many.  His recent flurry of endorsements--Edward and Caroline Kennedy, Maria Shriver Schwarzenegger, the governor's wife in California--surely won't hurt.  Voters who still don't know much about Obama may think--hey, with folks like those behind him, he must be okay.

 

     On the Republican side, Mike Huckabee insists he's still in.  He won Iowa with strong support among Christian evangelicals, and there are plenty of those in some of the Super Tuesday states--Alabama, for instance.  But Huckabee has shown little life since Iowa.  The GOP race now seems a two-man affair also, with John McCain, whose campaign was moribund last summer, favored over Mitt Romney.  Some conservatives can't stand McCain--wrong on immigration, on campaign finance reform--but he does seem to be the frontrunner this week.

 

     And if no one wins, it goes on, of course.  Maryland, Virginia and the District of Columbia vote next Tuesday;  Ohio and Texas, March 4th, and so on.  Ain't we got fun?     

January 30, 2008

     Now they are four.  Sort of.  Kind of.

 

     The Republican race is between Mitt Romney and Florida winner, John McCain, and the early betting is on McCain.  Technically, Mike Huckabee and Ron Paul are still in the race, but they're not doing much and they are not getting and won't get much news coverage.  And coverage matters.  You can't shake enough hands in the twenty-plus states that vote next Tuesday to make a difference;  it comes down to news coverage and TV ads, mostly.  And it's a two-man race.  Republicans like order, like to have a nominee, and probably dislike primary scuffling more than Democrats.  So there's a good chance Super Tuesday could decide it.

 

     The Democrats have a two-person race, too.  Technically, former Alaska Senator Mike Gravel hasn't withdrawn (unless I missed it, and I might have) but he's not campaigning and doesn't matter;  it's between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

 

     That's harder to pick.  Clinton was in the field first, organizing.  But Obama is hot, coming off South Carolina.  And I think Bill Clinton annoyed a lot of voters by going negative against Obama.  Can candidate Clinton get ex-president Clinton to shut up?  We'll find out.  And who'd be in charge in a new Clinton White House anyway?  And would he still be romancing interns?  Or would it be her turn?  Hard questions all.

 

     The late Molly Ivins, a gifted political reporter, used to say that American politics was the best free entertainment the world has ever known.  She'd have loved this one.  I miss her.    

January 28, 2008

     I don't think endorsements matter much.  Maybe a trade union's, if it can turn out its members.  Or a governor's, if he has a good organization in his state.  But mostly not.  But when three Kennedys endorsed Barack Obama Monday, that may have been special, the exception that proves the rule.

 

     Why?  Because it was emotional, more than political.  Because three people who remember the Kennedy legend--the kid brother, his son, the murdered president's daughter--all compared Obama to JFK.  They said Obama reminded them of Kennedy, of those hopes, those times, the belief that a political movement really could change the country and the world for the better.

 

     The hand-held signs the packed crowd waved didn't say Obama, they said "Change."  And the crowd didn't chant Obama's name--well,once or twice, maybe--they chanted things like "Yes, we can."  Edward Kennedy was young back then;  he's the white-haired, liberal lion of the Senate now, needing to wear glasses for his speech, but he reminded the mostly young crowd--the event was at a university--of the spirit of the sixties, the hopes of change.  And change,of course, did happen.  The Civil Rights Act, the Voting Rights Act passed.  Legal segregation vanished.  End of racism?  Of course not, but change for the better, for sure.

 

     And when Obama spoke, he talked of change.  He didn't promise it;  he told the crowd, and the other crowd watching on TV, that if they joined him, all of them together could make change, transform the country, maybe light up the world.  And listening--he gives a very good speech indeed--listening, you could believe.

 

     I don't know if he'll win the nomination;  I don't know if he'll win the presidency.  But listening, you could believe.  And if you think, as I do, that American politics has been shabby and unpleasant in recent years, that belief was a welcome shock.

 

     Robert Kennedy used to end his stump speech in 1968 with a quote from George Bernard Show: "Most men see things as they are and ask why.  But I dream things that never were, and ask why not."  Listening to Obama, you could dream again.  A fine feeling, for a change. 

January 27, 2008

     Onward!   For the Republicans it's on to Florida this Tuesday.  Former New York mayor Rudy Giuliani has been campaigning there, ignoring the earlier states.  But his poll numbers have been dropping and Florida may end up like South Carolina--a battle between John McCain and Mitt Romney.  But it'll be a different kind of fight.

 

     The states McCain has so far won, like South Carolina, are states with open primaries--primaries, in other words, in which independents can vote, and they've voted for him..  Florida's primary is closed--only registered Republicans can play.  Will McCain do as well with that electorate?  We'll find out.  If he wins, he'll head into Super Tuesday, February 5th, on a real roll.  If not, it'll be wide open, with McCain and Romney battling it out, unless Giuliani wins, which seems unlikely.

 

     The Democrats head straight into Super Tuesday and the game, of course, has changed.  In Iowa and New Hampshire you can--in fact you have to--do retail politicking--twenty people in a coffee shop or a living room.  That won't work in big states with many markets--California, New York, Illinois and so on.  Campaigning in those states is mostly by TV spots and depends more on how much money you have than on how many stops your plane or bus can make in a day.  Free media--news coverage--matters too.

 

     The Clintons know this, of course, so it was no surprise to find Bill Clinton attacking the press for unfairness toward his wife in the days before the South Carolina vote.  What may have been a surprise, though not to those who know the couple, was his emergence this past week as a full-fledged co-candidate. He took over the last few days in South Carolina;  she moved on to other states.

 

     And that raises a question for voters:  how do they feel about a co-presidency?  If he's a co-candidate, wouldn't he be a co-president, too?  As columnist Frank Rich noted in the New York Times, "Any Democrat who seriously thinks that Bill will fade away if Hillary wins the nomination...is a Democrat who, as the man has said, believes in fairy tales."

 

     And of course there'll be more and more press scrutiny of the former president and what he's been doing since he left office, scrutiny which might help or hurt the Clintons depending on what it turns up.

 

     Anyway, stay tuned.  Boy, is it ever not over.      

January 24, 2008

     The Democrats vote in South Carolina this Saturday and it's probably fair to say that if Barack Obama loses, his run for the presidency is done.  So the stakes are high and, not by coincidence, the campaign has gotten ugly.

 

     Bill Clinton, who had been campaigning the way a dignified, white-haired ex-president might be expected to campaign, has turned into his wife's attack dog, a role the vice presidential candidate usually plays in the general election.  Obama's consistent opposition to the war in Iraq is "a fairy tale."  Not true, but hey, it's a campaign.  Obama's doing a hit job on him, or was it his wife, and the press is out to get him too.  "Shame on you," he lectured one reporter.  Well, maybe, Mr. President, it ought to be shame on you.

 

     On the trail, Clinton (the ex-prez, not the candidate) talks a lot about his record, about what "I've" done or what "we've" accomplished.  If the quotes I see in the papers are accurate, he sounds a lot like a man running for a third term.  And maybe, of course, he is.

 

     No one really knows how anybody else's marriage works, or doesn't work, and certainly the Clintons have always operated as a team.   Mrs. Clinton talks a lot about her experience, though the one policy initiative she was most publicly involved in--health insurance, proposed  during her husband's first term--was, of course, a disaster.  Who would be calling the shots in a Hillary Clinton administration?  We don't know;  it's fair to guess it would be some kind of partnership, but who would be in charge?  Good question.

 

     One other thing rankles a bit--the impression the Clintons project that they're entitled to another lease on the White House.  The fact is, it's not a family franchise the way Buckingham Palace is for the Queen.  We've already had twenty years of Bushes and Clintons being in charge.  If we elect Hillary, will Jeb be waiting in the wings?  I don't know about you but I'd  like a new name--Smith or Jones, maybe.  Or Obama or McCain, come to that.

 

          

January 20, 2008

Nevadans and South Carolina Republicans have sounded off and the race in both parties is still wide open, though some candidates are limping a bit. One--California Congressman Duncan Hunter--has dropped out but that's okay because most folks probably never knew he was in.

Otherwise? Hillary Clinton won Nevada but not really. The New York Times reported that Barack Obama actually wound up with one more delegate than Mrs. Clinton, which only proves that caucuses are complicated things. A really meaningful test will come next Saturday, when South Carolina Democrats hold their primary. That may be something of a make or break state for Obama. Roughly half the primary voters, maybe more than half, are likely to be black and if he can't score well among them, he could be in real trouble down the road. Good news for Clinton in Nevada: she did well among Hispanics in the first state in which they were a sizeable chunk of the electorate.

The Republicans? Bad news for Mike Huckabee, who won in Iowa with the backing of evangelical Christians. There are plenty of those in South Carolina, too--about 60% of Republican voters, according to the exit polls. But while Huckabee got four in ten of them, about a quarter of them voted for McCain.

It must have felt good for McCain, winning in the state that wrecked his candidacy eight years ago. But there is a caution flag out for him, too. The states he's won--New Hampshire and South Carolina--held open primaries; independents could vote. They were a big plus for McCain, whose margin with them was sometimes better than with Republicans. The next big test is Florida on January 29th, and that's a closed primary; only registered party members can vote.

So, onward. The Democrats face South Carolina and then both parties will vote in Florida. Will anyone have a lock on the nomination before the Super Tuesday slugfest February 5th? Beats me.

January 18, 2008

We haven't had one of these in about forever, but a multiballot convention might be possible now. It really might.

The Republicans have had four contests so far and three different winners--Mike Huckabee in Iowa, John McCain in New Hampshire, Mitt Romney in Wyoming (he won eight delegates, no big deal) and Michigan. This adds up to no front runner. It's unlikely that this weekend's events--Nevada caucuses for both parties and a South Carolina primary for the GOP--will change that.

South Carolina did McCain in in 2000. A stunningly dirty campaign featured a rumor that he'd fathered a black child. The McCains do have a black daughter, as it happens, but they adopted her from an orphanage in Bangladesh. We should all hope that the negatives will be less nasty this time and that the McCain camp will be quicker to label lies for what they are.

So, on Sunday there probably still won't be a GOP frontrunner and it's entirely possible there'll be no frontrunner heading into February 5th, when Republicans hold primaries and caucuses in 21 states.

The same thing could happen to the Democrats. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton split Iowa and New Hampshire; Michigan and Wyoming were Republican events. And who knows? Even February 5th might not produce a clear frontrunner. This raises something political reporters recently have only dreamt of--an actual, contested convention, with the nominee not chosen on the first ballot. I mean, what if Fred Thompson does well in South Carolina? What if Rudy Giuliani is rewarded for planting all those palm trees in Florida? Wouldn't that be a treat?

The Republicans' last multiballot convention was more than half a century ago, in 1948, when New York Gov. Thomas Dewey was nominated on the third ballot. The Democrats' last one was four years later, in 1952, when Illinois Gov. Adlai Stevenson was nominated, also on the third ballot. It is only fair to note that both these nominees lost--Dewey to Harry Truman and Stevenson (twice) to Dwight Eisenhower.

No one, of course, wants to emulate 1924 when the Democrats took 103 ballots to nominate John Davis, who wound up losing to Calvin Coolidge anyway. But it would be kind of fun, don't you think, to hear Charlie, or Katie, or whomever saying, "And as we prepare for the fifth ballot, there seems to be movement toward...." Be different anyway.