Saturday, January 26, 2008

South Carolina

South Carolina is voting today for the Democrats.

Wow what a mess this has turned into.

I thought the Republicans would be the ones to inject race into the process especially if Obama won. But Bill Clinton's done that. This from a Post article today:
In a round of morning interviews Friday, Clinton sought to smooth over controversy about the role that her husband, Bill Clinton, has played here this week, calling on all sides to tone down their rhetoric while acknowledging that the former president had gone too far in his criticism of Obama.

"He gets really passionate about making the case for me," she said on CBS's "The Early Show." "He said several times yesterday that maybe he got a little bit carried away."


And this:

By any measure, this has been the toughest and angriest battle of the Democratic campaign. Monday's debate featured personal attacks and acrimonious exchanges, and Bill Clinton drew fire from Obama and his campaign for what they said are distortions of the Illinois senator's statements about another former president, Ronald Reagan.


I actually watched a little of that debate and it was just painful to see Obama and Clinton go after each other. All I could think was just about everything is going in favor of the Democrats but somehow they will screw it up and allow a Republican to win the White House.

As for the Republicans, Florida seems to be do or die for Giuliani. See this article from the Post. Florida is really important because it is a winner take all primary and the winner will get 57 delegates. Right now McCain has a razor thin margin over Romney. Giuliani is in third. Romney seems to be getting some traction on talking about the economy saying he's run a business and he knows how to get things working. This must be like his fifth or six persona on the campaign trail so far. I wonder what he'll morph into next.

For the Democrats all three Clinton, Edwards and Obama will go on to Super Tuesday. I do have to say I find it hard to find a scenario where Edwards wins the nomination.

For the Republicans, Giuliani has to win Florida or I think he is done. I think with Giuliani out of the picture the majority of his supporters will probably go to McCain. It should be an interesting couple of weeks.

3 comments:

Ella said...

I know exactly what you mean.

I lived in DC area, outside of Old Town for 4 years. Unless you've lived there people have no idea about polotics and how it works at times.

Blessings,

Ella

Arthur Schenck said...

Trust Democrats to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Going into this primary campaign, there has probably never been a time when people were more ready to vote Democratic than in reaction to the mess this Bush has created.

But that was also true in 2004 and the Democrats managed to lose despite growing anti-Bush sentiment. Of course part of the reason Bush won in 2004 was massive vote fraud, voter intimidation and dirty tricks (including lies, distortions and smears). What makes anyone think the Republicans won't do all that again?

It seems to me, though, that Edwards does have a chance if people get sick of the Obama/Clinton war and vote for a sensible third choice. Or, the convention chooses someone altogether different on the 42 ballot or whatever.

But if Clinotn and Obama don't grow up and put the country ahead of their petty politics, I think you're right and we'll end up stuck with another Republican president next year.

Jason in DC said...

I agree with both of your comments.

I don't see a brokered convention as much as the news media would love to see it.

I also think that some of the tension between the Clinton and Obama campaigns is fueled by the media. After all they have to have some sort of a story. And I guess the campaign in and of itself is not enough for them.

But both camps need to grow up and see what they are doing before it is too late.