When I agree with anything that Karl Rove says, its time for a sanity check.
???????????
OK, check done. I am sane. The world is coming to an end.
Mr. Rove made the statement that Hillary Clinton will acquire the nomination of the Democratic party, and will lose to the Republican candidate.
I do believe that one will follow the other, but I don’t buy the premise that Hillary being the party nominee is a foregone conclusion.
Surely, the Democrats know that registered Democrats alone will not win the election. The fact that certain Republicans will vote Republican regardless of the candidate, is as sure as the same thing happening on the left side. This means that counting on disgruntled Republicans to back Hillary is not possible (There is certainly no shortage of differences in the Republican candidates).
And what of the independent voters? I haven’t seen any polls targeting that part of the voting public. It is unsure where those votes will be cast, but in the past, independent votes tend to swing to the middle.
Is Hillary capable of swinging to the middle? It is not certain. The only thing that can truly be said is that while in Congress, her stands have been cautious. Cautious can be good, because if the sitting president had been cautious, this country would not be in Iraq, in the middle of a war with no winners.
On the other hand, Hillary voting for the war in Iraq was just another of those cautious decisions, made to enable her stay in the favor of the majority at the time. Although she has said the vote was a bad one, it was said quietly, in a place where it wasn’t largely reported. Is this the behavior of a leader? No, it is the behavior of a politician.
That caution is, and will be, a two edged sword, cutting the wrong way for her if she attains the nomination, as surely as being stubborn (some would say steadfast) has been for George Bush.
It’s time for the Democrats to wake up, (and this won’t be popular with the women out there) particularly women, as knowing where to fight battles is at least as important as any other aspect when in a war. A woman in the top spot is not a problem, the problem is this woman – not because of qualifications, but because of simple popularity.
Let’s not kid ourselves for even one moment – a popularity contest is exactly what this is.
[tags] Hillary Clinton, Democratic nomination, Karl Rove, prognostication, political party, election cycle, popularity [/tags]