Wisconsin exits.
Hope I’m not stealing Peggy’s thunder, but…
Here are CNN’s Democratic exit polls, and here are their GOP exits.
Worth noting in the Democratic race: While Clinton and Obama nearly split the overall Catholic vote, 50 percent (Hillary) to 48 percent (Barack), Clinton won the weekly-Mass-attending Catholics, 52 percent to 44 percent, while Obama took the less frequent Massgoers, 52 percent to 48 percent. Obama won the overall churchgoing vote–frequent and less frequent alike. Protestants who attend services weekly broke for Obama, 60 to 40. Less frequent Protestant churchgoers also preferred Obama, 55 percent to 45. Sure, Wisconsin favors Obama in a lot of ways (obviously), but what happened to Hillary’s pillars of support? Can she recover from this rout without trouncing Obama in Texas and in Ohio? And how likely is that outcome?
In the GOP “contest,” McCain won the overall Protestant and Catholic vote. Huckabee won the very frequent Protestant churchgoers while McCain won all the other churchgoers (Protestant and Catholic). And everyone else. When is Huck going to concede?
Huck believes he can win North Carolina, but Senator Richard Burr endorsed McCain months ago.
Perhaps Huckabee is waiting at least until the Texas results, although most of the major endorsements (esp. Senators Hutchison and Cornyn) have been for McCain.
Perhaps he is waiting for Dandy Don Meredith to personally sing “Turn Out the Lights, the Party’s Over”.
There will have to be some major movement in the primaries on March 4 if Hillary is to have a chance. Unless she is awarded the Florida and Michigan delegates. I do not believe that Obama’s numbers will continue into the general election. We are in unchartered waters here notwithstanding some shaky polls. It seems clear that the country is not ready for a female president. It will surprise me if the country is ready for an African American. Mark my words. In a year when the democrats should score a rout, they may end up botching it as in the last two presidential elections.
The FL and MI delegates won’t be seated–unless the DNC is intent on tearing the party apart. The truth is we’ve been in uncharted waters for quite some time now. Obama has been steadily cutting into Clinton’s base–female and lower-middle-class voters. Even the Latino vote is favoring him in some polls. In WI, and probably in OH and in TX, Clinton’s base is eroding. Are the nearly 50 percent of WI women voters who broke for Barack not ready for a woman president? Or have they simply decided that Obama is the better candidate?
” Earlier in the primary contest, when comedian Chris Rock quipped on “Saturday Night Live” that Barack Obama was more disadvantaged than Hillary Clinton because “everyone loves white women . . . except other white women,” he might have been channelling the mid-20th century philosopher Simone de Beauvoir. ”
http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/3500
Obviously, they are not ready for a woman candidate. Are you?
Further, as some commentators noticed an overwhelming number of white men voted for Obama. Which increased astronomically with John Edwqrds out of the race. How clear can it get?
“It seems clear that the country is not ready for a female president. It will surprise me if the country is ready for an African American.”
Is it at all possible that the country IS ready for a woman president, but that they are not ready for it to be Hillary Clinton?
No, Unagidon. Haven’t you been paying attention to Bill’s instructions?
Obama looks like he’s on a tear. He has made inroads into what have been seen as Hillary’s core voters. Whether that will continue in TX and OH remains to be seen, but I expect it will.
Bill, I won’t argue with your strong convictions on women candidates, but I don’t think it is the woman candidature that’s the issue here; it’s the Hillary Clinton candidature. She might have won against every other candidate (Biden, Richardson, etc.), but Obama is formidable. I think voters see in him someone who has the capacity to break out of the paralyzing partisanship that besets DC. His line last night… “good ideas go to Washington to die” probably resonanted with many people. Given his “authenticity,” in contrast to Hillary’s experience and reputation (not so good), I can see why voters go for him. His great challenge will not be the contest with McCain, but actually governing this country. I was (and am) of the view that Hillary could do that and am not that sure about Obama. Nonetheless, if he’s the candidate in November, I intend to vote for him. I haven’t seen this contest as white woman v. black man, but charisma v. experience. Now it looks like we will get charisma and hope that his intelligence and more limited experience will carry the day.
I was struck, once again, last night by his “preaching” style. It certainly has the cadences of black baptist. Is it possible that that has become “normative” civil religion preaching style? Are even Catholics attracted to it–and even inspired by it–as reflected in Grant’s data showing the Catholic vote moving toward Obama? And Grant–as long as the exit polls are not your personal exit polls, it’s okay!
No, not my exit polls, although that would be fun–just cribbing from CNN.
I actually will argue with Bill’s strong convictions on women candidates, mainly because I find their most common manifestation on this blog–as accusations of misogyny–a serious encumbrance to our discussion of the candidates. Certainly there are citizens who will vote against Hillary because she is a woman, just as there are people who will vote against Obama because he is black. I doubt many dotCommonweal readers fall in either camp. The problem with the way you conduct yourself in these threads, Bill, is that whenever you encounter resistance to your pro-Hillary positions, you more or less call your opponent a woman-hater. It does nothing to serve your cause.
Beware, beware: we ARE living in interesting times!
I thought the NPR piece on the Florida/Michigan delegates this mornin gwas quire instructive on both the Hillary flip/flop and current options.
Question: how many threads will we have before Texas/Ohio and post Democratic debates?
However, you try Grant, you will not define me. I have cited many prominent women who are more pronounced than me on this. Peggy, we do not know if they are just Hillary’s negatives. She is our first serious woman candidate who has gone this far. And remember what Chisolm said about people objecting to her gender rather than her race. Grant will conveniently bypass that. My guess is many on this blog have no idea, Peggy, how strongly you feel about this. You are more restrained than I because you know how easily you could be marginalized. I have been educated in this. But you, Peggy, have the battle scars.
Grant, it has always been clear to me that you have an extremely shallow view of the gender conundrum. What is worse is that the very discussion sharply unnerves you. Nemo judico in causa sua. The encumbrance is in your view. I do not deny that others here are uncomfortable or object. After some heavy battles I have changed to agree with the many marvelous women who have raised my consciousness on this.
We are living in a world in which females are still being traded on the international scene and Africa gets no coverage in the media where valient women there are doing historic things considering the opposition. The people on the street, including my mother, do not think a woman should be president.
Consider the words of Shirley Chisolm again.
Gene Palumbo sent along this piece by Charles Peter on Obama’s experience:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/03/AR2008010303303.html
Peter’s offers an example of Obama’s modus vivendi in getting through the Illinois state legislature a law requiring the videotaping of police questioning suspects. Peter’s makes a good case for Obama’s legislative skills in a state legislature.
But does it match up with Hillary’s experience–good and bad? And does it show his executive abilities? Running the country with the bureaucracy that is the U.S. government is admittedly a task that no one has the “experience” for.
The most impressive executive experience I see Obama having is running this campaign for president. Can we agree that Clinton and Obama both have experience, but of different sorts? I have thought Clinton had the more salient experience and that’s a reason to favor her. But if she’s not the nominee, than we’ll never know whether that experience counted for running the White House. And we will have to see if Obama’s experience has prepared him for the presidency.
“No, Unagidon. Haven’t you been paying attention to Bill’s instructions?”
If it doesn’t come from the Magisterium, I usually don’t pay any attention to it.
http://obsidianwings.blogs.com/obsidian_wings/2008/02/obama-actually.html