Well here's the thing. It was the Democratic parties in each state that decided to f*ck things up for themselves. The voters didn't make that decision; it's not like there were statewide referenda on the issue. So you have to find a way to honor the voters while not giving in to the state Dem parties. IMO anyway.

I think splitting the delegates in some manner is the best option.

I'd do that, and dock their total 2012 delegation 25% by breaking the DNC's rules. There has to be some penalty for fcuking with the process.

GOOD POINT'D!

Meh. It still seems like just standard procedure for a candidate to insist they're hanging on 'til the end. On the one hand, I think voters are sensible to hold all politicians to higher standards than they've been held to. On the other, it seems like Clinton's critics just specifically choose to pick on her for it.


I don't see any basis for people calling her a quitter either. But I haven't seen much basis for a lotta the complaints levied against her. Or more specifically, I haven't seen much basis for levying these complaints against only her but not other candidates who've done the same (but happen to only be from the other party).

The behavior of Hillary and Ron Paul =/= Standard procedure. You can't name anyone else who has been as stubborn as these two regarding not knowing when they're beat.

At least Ron Paul gets a pass for being so inconsequential he's not destroying his party over it.

I really think that you don't know very much about this. Not to be a douche or anything; but I think you're failing to realize the difference between a candidate claiming to hang around to the end, and a candidate actually doing so. Edwards, Dodd, Biden, Richardson, Kucinich, Huckabee, Romney, whoever else... they all dropped out when they realized that they had no path to the nomination. Yes, the rhetoric is always "I'm in it until the end," but the practical reality is different. Except in Clinton's case. She has no path to the nomination (do the math), and yet she is acting like she's a viable candidate. She isn't.

I mean, I know you like to stick up for Clinton, but you really need to spend more time paying attention to the dynamics and history of the race and the behavior of the candidates. People in the Clinton camp are even saying that it's time for her to drop out. Are they Obama partisans too? Sure, the ad hominem stuff is inappropriate, but that doesn't invalidate any real argument against her continued candidacy.

Its unfortuante that Ron Paul is this election's Ralph Nader. Although it looks like he'll get more than 11% of the vote IF he ran independent or some other party. The other thing is that most people I've met that like Ron paul aren't affiliated with any parties, either independent or not registered.

**wonders what will happen when the vote is only available on the internets**

I don't agree with that reasoning. Despite its importance, politics isn't something I feel should require anyone to follow along to such a detailed degree. In general, the conduct of the candidates concerns me less than the conduct of their supporting constituents and their critics. Political candidates are representatives first and people second.


Personally, I think Gore, Kerry, and a lot of those guys conceded well before I thought it made sense to. So I'm more apt to call all the candidates who've dropped out quitters (not that I do). The argument against her continuing is "she can't win". But what does she or her constituents gain by conceding? Even if she can't win, she may find losing one way to be much more preferable to losing other ways.

Heh. Well chalk another one, as I'm in one of the major parties and I like Ron Paul (just not enough to ever vote for him in any universe).

Obama has now surpassed Clinton in the superdelegate count as well.

As much as she and Obama are in competition, at the end of the day they're on the same team, and her continued campaigning focuses the attention of Democratic voters who support her against the man that will more than likely be running for president on behalf of her party. If she concedes now, she gives her team time to refocus and come together and prepare for the campaign against the other side, making her team's competition against the Republicans stronger - that is, if she cares about anyone but herself.

I don't think she does.

She might not feel that she can contribute to any opposition to the Republicans if she concedes. And it's pretty standard fare in politics not to care about anyone but you and your own. The political reality has always been that we're not really two parties, but groups that happen to have more in common with each other than with the rest (as unfortunate as I'd agree that is).

I mean I think Obama's quite possibly one of best things to happen to politics in decades. But he's still the anomaly, not the norm. And I think our political system has a very far way to go before one can justifiably hold up all other candidates to Obama as a standard, or before I'll dare to dream that we're all "on the same team". I do think all Democrats should generally work together, but there's a time for that and it's after the nomination.

If she concedes, she allows Obama to focus on the campaign against McCain instead of continuing to campaign against her. That, in and of itself, is undeniably a huge contribution to the Republican opposition.


I'll agree with this up to a point, but Clinton and Obama have 95% the exact same views on policy. They only debate the nitty-gritty. They're as much the same team as it gets.

But I get the distinct impression she'd rather our troops stay engaged in a war indefinitely rather than have anyone besides herself be the one to bring them home.

Mm. In fact, I think they are on the same side in that respect, as their differences are almost entirely in character, personality, and charisma. But this is where "candidates-as-representatives" comes in. I don't think it's really Clinton and Obama that are that dissimilar as it is their respective supporters.


I think that's unlikely, although given the way a lotta her critics feel about her, I can see why they'd think that.

What no comment about the massive win in West Virginia?


I figured there'd be moaning about make it stop or West Virginia jokes or something.


Still I'll be glad when she's vice president.

Ohhh, dreaaaaam weaver....

I've fully ran out of , which is good since the primaries are done in a couple of weeks.

This was a much bigger deal last night, especially since the GOP used Obama as the boogeyman in the campaign:

http://www.politico.com/blogs/thecrypt/050...l_election.html

I for one am Happy that we have three candidates talking about energy independence and the economy and gas prices.

Of course pre election they say a lot of stuff

The rest of the primaries are pretty foregone conclusions, so unless it deviates in some way, there isn't much to say.


Yeah, but 2016 is a long way off.

If a tree falls in backwoods West Virginia and nobody's there....

Fo Sho.

The only thing that made me was Clinton saying that the delegates needed to win included FL and MI, because DNC rules said so. I'm sorry, the last I heard, the DNC rules said those count.

Um... what do you call a virgin in West Virginia? Any girl who can outrun her brother.

pwned, I guess:

http://www.slate.com/id/2191402/

If she had really cared about democracy and our country, she wouldn't have died before the primary. Duh.

Now this is the kind of story you don't see every day:

http://blog.washingtonpost.com/thefix/2008...de_from_mc.html

Wow...

That is honestly the most difficult thing I've ever tried to wrap my brain around.

"In other news, a prominent member of the New England Patriots coaching staff came forward and said he was going to step down as he doesn't want to work against the NY Giants efforts to win a championship."

This actually gives me some respect for McCain - assuming that this guy doesn't get demonized in the near future.

I think that when you get past the political BS, McCain and Obama as people are probably a lot more similar in their outlook than their cheerleaders would have you believe. Sure there are significant policy differences between them, but I think that they're both reasonable people who are willing to listen to the other side.

Here I was kidding myself that voters might actually learn from their mistakes in the past elections. I'm just constantly amazed at how much people seem to despise Clinton enough to actually consider putting McCain in office. And once they do, it'd be Bush all over again, with people shrugging their shoulders after 2 years or so claiming, "Hey, we never saw it coming." (Would he possibly be worse than the current Bush? Probably not, but that's far from any comfort to me with the direction the country's gone in the last 8 years and the distance covered.)

And no, it's not about my defending Clinton. It could be any other candidate in her place, but she happens to make a really good target. It's about voters constantly allowing their prejudices to be manipulated towards altering the final outcome against their interests. And to be clear, I see it happening amongst Clinton supporters as well.

Hey, I'm a Republican in the first place...well, what I am used to be called a Republican. Anyway:

I'm supporting Obama because I do think he's the right guy to fix - or at least begin to fix - what's wrong with our country, big picture, and I can put up with a term or two of tax policy I don't agree with to fix the bigger problems.

I don't support Hillary because I think she's the wrong person to fix what's wrong with our country, big picture. I think her divisive "us against them" stance and unbearable stubbornness could make things worse during this fragile time in our country's history. She's not a healer, and there's no point in voting for someone who I don't agree with on the more negligible stuff if I don't have confidence they can get the big jobs done.

I see McCain as stalling for four years until their's a better option, but not exasperating the problem - a position I may reverse depending on his running mate selection.

Besides, two years or so ago I really respected McCain and the things he was saying about the war and about the nation in general...then something happened and he changed...and I guess maybe I'm secretly hoping his change is the result of him being under political pressure from the current administration that will be alleviated once he's the BMOC, and he'll go back to being that cool guy with sensible ideas.




ETA: Hobbes reserves the right to alter his opinion of any or all of the candidates listed above based on debates and things during the general election later in the year.

Well that's respectable. And, as much as I take completely the opposite view in a McCain-or-Clinton choice, I'd rather you vote for him in your estimation of the best needs of the nation than for her (or anyone else) by manipulation.


I went through the same in my assessment and impression of him over the past several years.


As is your right. Sometimes I think I'm alone in my opinions of candidates never changing before, during, or after they've sat in office. (I should amend this, since my opinion of McCain and Kerry did drop..)

I'm getting a kick out of the magic wall storyline.

BTW a friend just sent me this...gotta love the Onion.


Poll: Bullshit Is Most Important Issue For 2008 Voters

Went to the Obama rally in Des Moines last night...it was really cool to see 7000 show up for something like that when it's been 5 months since our caucus and it's another 5 months until the general election. General thoughts...the crowd was as typical Iowa as you could get. Mostly white, decent mix of young and old, etc. Because the event was outdoors, there were snipers posted in the surrounding buildings (you could see the spotters plain as day). That was weird. The speech was great. Covered alot of bases and got a little more specific about his platform. Nobody booed Hillary, although McCain didn't fair as well.

I was Hillary all the way until at some point in March it was clear she had gone batshit insane. But now I rally behind Obama, for many of the reasons sited in this thread, however, I don't think that McCain is what he is currently appearing to be. I think he's kissing some ass at the moment but if he ever got into office, I bet we'd see the more middle of the road mccain telling the GOP where to stick their fundy sh*t "MAVERICK!!!!!!"

Too close for missiles, switching to guns.

I kind of have a begrudging respect for mcCain if he is indeed playing the GOP like a used fiddle.

I used to respect McCain a lot more than I do now. He's also playing to the left, oops I mean the rest of the country, with his thing about getting us out of Iraq by the end of his first term.

He's gonna go Titanium-for-tat w/ Obama over Iraq and foreign policy, but I have a feeling he'll end up getting surprise 'd on the economy, causing him to lose the election.

The thing is, he's trying to play to his base with these "we don't talk to our enemies" comments, which are going to get him nowhere since a) that's what people do, and b) McCain recommended it himself. I definitely think McCain has the losing argument on that front. And the more he ties himself to Bush, the more he leads himself into town.

ya but he's also feeling like he has no choice with all of that talk of people not even coming out to vote if he was going to be the republican candidate. Again, I'm totally ghey for Obama, so I don't really care, I just think he's in a lose lose situation.

I remember really liking McCain a few years ago, and then he went all kiss-ass w/ the Bush administration after they steamrolled him last election, and I just lost a lot of respect for him as a person. I kind of agree with Hot Rod that he may very well have an Ace up his sleeve and, if elected, give the GOP the finger and say, "Look at me! I'm legalizing abortion and supporting gun control because I'm a CENTRIST!!!! WOOP, WOOP WOOP!!!"

I'm going to go ahead and .....disagree with you on that.

Well, at least Bush can babysit McCain's illegitimate black baby when he's busy running the country.

*insert baby smith picture here*

OH C'MON. Tell me you can't see him with a Planned Parenthood shirt and a bumper sticker on his Prius with a picture of Charlton Heston with that red circle with a line through it over his face.

If the bumper sticker has him drooling with a kind of empty look in his eyes, sign me up!


































There be my tasteless joke of the day. Tune in tomorrow when I make fun of burn victims.

I'm so going to Hell.

Well, warm the place up for me.

Because yesterday I was picking on Ted Kennedy.

I think you're going to a deeper level as the guy I'm mocking is already dead.

>.>