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Did Obama hit a wall?
There is some talk that Obama hit a wall. Maybe. He also may have run out of time. Before Super Tuesday the consensus was that it will be difficult for Obama to erase such a large gap.
This consensus was mostly correct in the large states. For example, he
did not erase the entire gap in two key states: Massachusetts and
California. However, a substantial number of individuals voted early in
California, and Obama was behind by 30 points
in Massachusetts three weeks ago. He made a lot of progress. Moreover,
arguably, these states are where the "not enough time" logic held the
most sway. That said, there simply is not yet enough evidence to
adjudicate between the "wall" interpretation and the "not enough time"
interpretation of the Super Tuesday results.
There will be
enough evidence by March 4th, when Ohio and Texas vote - especially if
Obama performs well in the coming month (Louisiana, Nebraska,
Washington, Maine, DC, Maryland, Virginia, Hawaii and Wisconsin). If
Obama wins in Ohio, and makes inroads among the Latino voters in Texas,
then it will look like the Super Tuesday results suggest that he really
did not have enough time. If he fails to sway Ohio and Texas voters
then the Super Tuesday results suggest he hit a wall.
Comments (5)
The last thing that Sen. Obama needs is time. The more voters check him out not on the basis of his rhetoric but on the basis of his actions the more troubling they will find him. You do not have much real claim on being effectively anti-Iraq War when you support people like Joe Lieberman in the primary and when you behave as follows:
William Finnegan wrote May 31, 2004, in The New Yorker:[7]
"The left in Illinois, as it happens, is monitoring Obama for similar trimming toward the political center. When his speech at the antiwar rally in 2002 was quietly removed from his campaign Web site, activists found that to be an ominous sign. It is traditional, of course, for politicians to tack to the center after winning a primary, hoping to attract swing voters. Earlier this month, when major newspapers (including the Times) and leading Democrats (including Illinois’s other senator, Dick Durbin) began calling for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld as a result of the Abu Ghraib prison-torture revelations, Obama criticized the Administration's Iraq policy, but added, 'I have no doubt about Donald Rumsfeld’s sincerity.' Deciding Rumsfeld's fate, he said, should be left to President Bush."
Where Dr. Martin Luther King called us to our better selves by pointing out that if we applied our values we would behave better Sen. Obama panders to our worst selves by informing us that he knows that we did these bad things from sincerely-held good motives.
February 6, 2008 11:45 AM | Reply | Permalink
"You do not have much real claim on being effectively anti-Iraq War when you support people like Joe Lieberman in the primary"
Stop the lies. Clinton supported Lieberman too. It was standard party solidarity, and nothing more.
It's really annoying that you Clinton supporters to keep making the bogus argument that somehow Clinton is more anti-war than Obama. She voted for the war, he opposed it. She has agreed that torure might be acceptable under some circumstances, he has not.
I know those facts are inconvenient, but it doesn't give you the right to consistently, shamelessly misrepresent them.
February 6, 2008 12:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
I wonder if the whole momentum argument is misplaced. What may have happened is that Obama got most of the Edwards vote. No trend, no gradual shift that Clinton then halted or reversed. Just a one-time change in the dynamics of the race.
February 6, 2008 12:19 PM | Reply | Permalink
Hindsight will be 20/20 I'm sure. I think Clinton came into this race with way more name recognition so the more time people have to decide the more accurate their judgment will be. I'm leaning towards the ran-out-of-time hypothesis but time will tell.
I think the results of Virginia and Wisconsin will be particularly interesting as those are swing states so one candidate dominating the other in either of those states would be indicative of a real advantage in November
February 6, 2008 12:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
"The more voters check him out not on the basis of his rhetoric but on the basis of his actions the more troubling they will find him"
Quite so. See e.g. how he avoided having a picture taken with the SF mayor Newsom at the time the latter started performing gay marriages.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/02/05/BAM5US1B5.DTL&hw=Newsom+Obama&sn=002&sc=510
There are dozens of such examples (see e.g. Krugman's blog), but the crowds of enthralled supporters would not hear any of this, the Repubs badly wants to run against Obama (see Rove, Kristol, Morris etc. cheering for him)and the MSM happily goes along. Unless you're right, and someone starts seeing what's behind the hope-mongering front, we're heading for a bad November.
Hopefully Clinton and her supporters have more fight left in them. The false front has to be penetrated - if Clinton will not do that, McCain certainly will
February 6, 2008 12:37 PM | Reply | Permalink
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