John Edwards has endorsed Barack Obama for President. They both gave great speeches with no small amount of praise for Sen. Clinton as well. Both stressed the need for unity against the Republicans this fall.
I would support an Obama/Edwards ticket more than an Obama/Clinton ticket, but I don’t think Edwards will wind up on the ticket. Something tells me Obama is going to have a lot of pressure from the party to put Clinton on his ticket in the interest of unity.
Sen. Obama lost West Virginia by a hefty margin, but his superdelegate gains over the past week and change basically negate the gain for Sen. Clinton there. He’s still right where he was; poised to win the nomination. It does however draw more attention to the problem Sen. Obama has in Appalachia. I don’t think this will be enough to lose the election for him, but does concern me quite a bit.
I’m hoping that Edwards’ endorsement can help with that problem in Kentucky, though I’m doubting that will be the case. I do expect it will pull some more superdelegates into the Obama column. I’m also wondering if we should be watching for an Elizabeth Edwards endorsement of Sen. Clinton in the next few days.
Endorsements or no, Sen. Obama’s lead is nearly insurmountable at this point. I think he’ll win in easily in Oregon and South Dakota, with a closer victory in Montana. Sen. Clinton will win Kentucky and Puerto Rico by a large margin and may challenge for the popular vote win once Florida and Michigan are added. I do think Florida and Michigan will have their delegations seated. While they knew the rules and I vehemently disagree with changing them now, the party can’t stand the fallout from not having Florida and Michigan at the convention.
One other thought on West Virginia: Obama really should have thanked his supporters there. I was disappointed that there was nothing from the Obama campaign after the contest. It would have sent a stronger unity message for him to have spoken a few words, even if it wasn’t in a rally environment.
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Probably Edwards wants the VP spot. He wants to go to Washington to do his work. He was the VP choice by Kerry, and he was hoping to be presidential nominee this year. He’d be a great VP, and he’d help bring in lower income voters. Clinton will fade as time goes by. Dems will rally around an Obama/Edwards ticket.
Has anyone considered that in some of these states where there is open voting that Republicans voted for Hillary to stop Obama? After all right-winger Rush Limbaugh has been exhorting people to do just that in Texas and Ohio. Who knows how that affected things in Pennsylvania or other States where one can sign up as either to vote in a primary?
Billary’s arguments that she is winning states that one has to win in a general election has several flaws:
1. you can’t immediately transpose results from a primary to a general election, especially from states where Obama never campaigned
2. all those republicans that voted for Hillary will vote for McCain
3. wanting to influence the rules comittee and having people on it like Harold Ickes clearly Hillary supporters is a problem
4. Puerto Rico citizens can’t vote in a general election
What is wrong with this country? Apparently no one has any morals anymore. Obama has lied to us time and time again stating that he does not take money from lobbyist. It is a proven fact that he has and does take money from lobbyists and that he has lobbyists working at the top of his campaign. What does it say about us when people no longer look at the moral character of a candidate? I am totally disgusted with anyone who supports obama and that includes Edwards. Apparently being a chauvinists today is still acceptable. Hillary is and always was the best choice for the democrat party.
I’ll address the rest of your comment later, Sam. I’m getting ready for work but I wanted to address this “chauvinist” comment.
Why is it that when people vote for Clinton they are voting for who they think is the best candidate, but if they vote for anyone else they are voting *against* the woman?
Clinton supporters can’t seem to accept that she *isn’t* the best candidate for a lot of Americans, so they seem to have to attach some other reason they aren’t voting for her.
I have seen a TON of comments and poll results regarding race as an important issue to some of the people voting (they vote for Clinton by a large margin). I haven’t seen ANY regarding gender as an important issue. It isn’t about sexism or chauvinism. We just think Obama is the better candidate.
Clinton lost my support when she got bought out by the health care industry and now wants to force everyone to buy health care that they still can’t afford. It’s a little like fixing homelessness by legislating that everyone must buy or rent a home.
Sallie, I think Edwards would make a great VP, but Obama has to tread carefully in who he chooses so as to lessen the blow to Clinton supporters if he doesn’t pick her. It is clear that a lot of her supporters don’t see it as the best candidate winning, but rather some sort of sexist conspiracy to keep a woman down.
Carol, I agree 100%, and we have seem the impact of Operation Chaos in some states. It was definitely a factor in Mississippi, and may have given Clinton her small margin in Indiana.
All your other points are right on the money.
Obama needs a female VP to seal the break in the party. Senator Clinton would be the *weakest* person to fill that spot.
Dean, I think if he picks a woman other than Clinton the same people calling Obama and his supporters “chauvinists” will act like jilted lovers having the “new girlfriend” trotted out in front of them.
Completely irrational but from the pro-Hillary blogs I’ve seen lately, rationality doesn’t seem to be a strong point.
I think he’ll pick Clinton, but I don’t want him to.
A non-Clinton female choice that would be good might be Kathleen Sebelius but I don’t know enough about her yet.
I just can’t see an Obama/Clinton ticket. What is their shared message? Are there really that many Clinton supporters who would rather vote for McCain than Obama? I think it would dilute his message and alienate a lot of people. I, for one, would be disappointed. And would Clinton really settle for the second-place spot like that? Not to mention the fact that Obama probably does not want the husband back-seat driving through his presidency.
An Obama/Edwards ticket would be better, but I think still unlikely. I think he’ll choose a less obvious running-mate — maybe female, but I don’t think that he necessarily needs to. Most female HRC supporters are probably not likely to vote Republican in any case.
I’d much prefer Edwards as Attorney General. He’d put the most recent run of them to shame.
I’m not sure that would give him the vehicle for his focus on poverty, however.
I promised Sam a response on the lobbyist money issue.
Basically, Obama doesn’t take money from federally registered lobbyists. Lobbyists that work for lobbying firms have to register. Obama’s campaign checks the contributions against that database and rejects anything that comes from a lobbyist.
The limitation there is that lobbyist family and friends can certainly donate money to the campaign, and those lobbyists can certainly funnel money through friends to get it into the campaign. There is no way to stop that because listing all of a lobbyist’s family and friends would be an invasion of privacy.
He has returned large sums of money that have been discovered to have come from lobbyists. He means what he says when when he says that lobbyists aren’t going to own his campaign. According to the Associated Press, 90% of his donors contribute $100 or less and 41% have donated $25 or less. His campaign is about the people, and that is one of many reasons he has my vote, my time and has received money from me. I wouldn’t contribute otherwise.
Honestly, I don’t think Hillary supporters will support McCain if she’s not on the ticket. I can’t see hard core democrats supporting a clone of Bush. I can, however, see them staying home or voting for Nader.
I’m fully aware of the consequences of not seating FL or MI. But, honestly, they broke the rules and knew the consequences. I don’t think it’s fair if they do seat the delegates. They do need to send a message to other states who break the rules. I think it will happen more and more if states see that they can get away with it. I know it will be bad for the Democrats if they don’t seat the delegates, but a line has to be drawn.
I think an Obama/Richardson ticket would be the best choice. Two minorities. Richardson will definitely help get the Hispanic (Clinton) votes. Richardson has so much to bring to the table, a big one being experience, which Obama lacks. I don’t think McCain would be able to beat this ticket.
I know you’re really rules-oriented, Janny. But exceptions have to be made in politics.
Clinton is right when she says 2.3 million didn’t go to the polls because they thought their vote wouldn’t count. Granted, that isn’t what she said when she signed onto the DNC stripping their delegations.
Fact is we can’t have a nominee without counting everyone who voted for one.
I differ from the Clinton supporters in that I don’t think MI should be seated as-voted, and I don’t think it will make a difference as to who the nominee is.
This is about beating the Republicans in November. I’ll certainly support seating MI and FL to get that done.