Back to the Horse Race

When I started this blog, I mostly planned on talking about the horse race -- specifically to argue against the conventional wisdom which is that Clinton was somehow still in it. The appearance of the Wright videotape derailed those plans. But just one week after the first bombshell, there appears a new article on Politico which spells out the argument I had originally intended to make. Though I must confess that Alex Koppelman on Salon is not wrong to argue that the groundwork for the argument had been laid down earlier.

One might think, however, that the Wright videotape changes the calculus. Before Wright, the argument was very simple. Obama had an insurmountable lead in elected delegates, which is the best measure of the will of the people. (I'll make a post about this later, but popular vote is a bogus measure). For Clinton to get the nomination, the superdelegates would have to side with the candidate who had LOST by that measure. In order to do so, they'd have to have a good reason. And that could really only be something new on the scene which suggested that Obama is unelectable.

Well, the reaction to the Wright video could potentially be seen as exactly that sort of event. The polls moved sharply against Obama over the last week, pretty much across the board. Tracking polls showed Clinton either ahead or gaining on him. State polls moved against him, with even North Carolina showing a dead heat -- potentially devastating since North Carolina should be a pretty safe bet for Obama.

For the first time there are real electability questions about Obama. But I think this just puts the superdelegates into an even deeper bind, as I argued in a comment I posted at Marc Ambinder's site:

The shift we are seeing now should not be read as momentum for Hillary. It's a movement away from Obama reflecting the sustained hits on race, some of which originated (intentionally or not) with the Clinton campaign.

And that's what leaves the party with a serious dilemma. If the damage to Obama turns out to be permanent, it's a reflection of the fact that racism in this country continues to be quite powerful. Turning to Clinton under these circumstances is a failure of hope and courage -- because it's a pure concession to the baseness of American political life. This needs to be underscored. Clinton has utterly failed to make a positive case for herself. If she gets the nomination at this point, it's based on the negative case that she's immune to the problems Obama confronts, problems which reflect badly on the nation, not on Obama.

It's notable in this regard that both McCain and Huckabee have come out against these attacks on Obama based on the Wright connection, while Clinton and other wise heads in the democrat party have remained silent. A choice to go with Clinton to avoid the Obama problems along with this deafening silence on the part of the democrat party would portray the democrats as a party that does not have the courage of its own convictions. When push comes to shove it did not challenge the race-based attacks on Obama, and instead bought into the landscape as is by nominating the 'safe' candidate.

The democrats might win this cycle just because the economy is very sour and there's a general mood to oust the incumbent party. But in the long run, the democrats position themselves to remain the minority party. Quite simply, they will still be seen as not standing for anything. The rhetoric on equality and opportunity and fairness will have been unmasked as being 100% empty. They'd deserve to lose the generation just now coming of age. And I expect they would.