I offer this in full respect for the candidates and voters.

Over the past few years, I’ve mulled over the idea that the candidate who wins the general election (not the nomination fight) is always the one seen as the most fun.  By “fun,” I mean not necessarily the person I find the most fun, but the person whom the electorate regards as the most buoyant to the national mood—the person who helps us feel better about ourselves (not always in positive ways).

2004 — Bush seemed more fun than Kerry.

2000 — a problematic election considering the recount, but I wonder if Bush wasn’t perceived as more fun than Gore

1996 and 1992 — Clinton clearly more fun than Dole or Bush the elder

1988 — Bush more fun than Dukakis, who lost his fun edge.

1984 and 1980 — Reagan more fun than Mondale or Carter

1976 — Carter more fun than Ford

1972 — This is a tough one, but I wonder if the side of Nixon that democrats saw as cheating, wasn’t celebrated by republicans and the swing voters.  McGovern = moral uprightness = no fun.

1968 — A weird year, but again, I suspect that Nixon, of all people, came off as more fun

1964 — Johnson more fun than Goldwater

1960 — Kennedy more fun than Nixon

Okay, just putting it out there. 

FWIW, I think that both Obama and Clinton, in addition to being better superior alternatives to any of the Republicans, are also more fun.

Though it’s tempting to think that the Clinton team wrote off all of the “states that don’t matter,” as Mark Penn’s blunder suggests, I think to the contrary, they assumed those states were in the bag all along.  “Why spend time and money on Red States?   Those voters will never pull the lever for black man named Barack Hussein Obama”—something like that.

The success of the Obama campaign, I think, arises out from seeing the country in a new light.  Senator Obama sees a wide spectrum of people fatigued by all of the partisan trench warfare.  Senator Clinton, alas, cannot escape the trench warfare, especially with all of the polarizing associations attached to her (unfairly or not).  The Clinton strategy seemed to have been this: we’ll assemble our usual democratic coalition behind a really smart, charismatic, and well-funded candidate.  It accepted the predominant understanding of the electoral map and where the democratic votes are.

Obama’s campaign, by contrast, reflects a different vision of the country, one where people are not as far divided as we might think.  (One poster at Koshttp://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/2/17/2729/99967 described Obama as a “dignified climbdown for Republicans,” which I think is a keen observation.)

There are legitimate reasons for Clinton (and Edwards) supporters to have questioned the wisdom of playing nice with the party of Reagan, Bush, and Rove.  Still, the mounting evidence suggests that the electorate feels cramped by life in the trenches and is ready to come out and try something new.

I have qualms about both Senators Obama and Clinton, though I would happily vote for either in November.  At this point, however, I find myself buying into the idea that voters of all stripes want to transcend the bitter red/blue divide, and that recognizing that fact represents not only a better strategy for the democratic party, but an important step for the entire country.  The success of the Obama campaign, I think, is founded on that crucial insight, and for that, Senator Obama deserves credit.