Will John McCain Do Better Than Barry Goldwater?

Politically, the situation in the field is this: Obama has gained a 7-point margin over John McCain in the last three days (50%-43%) and he seems to be a Democratic candidate not weakened at all by the long battle in the primaries. At least, this seems to be the effect of Hillary Clinton's endorsement of Saturday: now 81% of Democratic voters say they are ready to vote for him.
That means he should easily win in November: he will need only to keep the blue States where John Kerry prevailed in 2004, and win in states like Iowa, Colorado and New Mexico (look at the map on top of the page): that would make 273 votes in the Electoral College, more than the "magic number" of 270. In Iowa and New Mexico a few thousand votes more (or, a few thousand votes LESS in the Republican column) will suffice. Colorado has been leaning Democratic in recent years, electing several smart politicians like governor Bill Ritter and senator Ken Salazar.
This, however, is a conservative forecast: polls give him good chances of winning in Ohio and Nevada, creating a very large majority in the Electoral College for a Democratic President who will have strong Democratic majorities in Congress (the party should pick several seats in the House, and Democrats are on the brink of a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate).
During an American Presidential campaign everything can happen, but John McCain will have a hard time in convincing voters that the main issue should be terrorism, or Iraq, and not the economy. The gasoline at 4$ a gallon is simply political poison for him.

Will Clinton Do What Reagan Did in 1976?

In the end, numbers prevailed and all the talk about a convention fight in Denver proved to be just that... talk. Hillary Rodham Clinton will suspend her campaign and endorse Senator Barack Obama on Saturday, which was her only possible choice after Democratic members of Congress urged her to leave the race and allow the party to coalesce around the nominee. Now, the problem is: what will Clinton do in the Fall?

I suspect that the rumors about her becoming Vice president are nonsense: if she is really serious in asking the n. 2 position on the ticket, Obama will be dead serious in refusing it. Not because of her sometimes vicious attacks during the primaries but because an Obama-Clinton ticket would not have credibility vis-à-vis the voters: it would give them the feeling that everything was simply a show and that, in the end, every nasty political fight can finish with tarallucci e vino (if you are not familiar with this Italian motto, send me an email, and I will explain). There are all chances that Obama will pick up someone with experience, and possibly a military background, to stand up to McCain when things will get tough after the conventions. 

The real issue, then, is whether Hillary will indeed campaign for Obama in the Fall, or not. There is one precedent: the 1976 long contest between Gerald Ford, the incumbent President who had entered the White House because of Richard Nixon's resignation after Watergate, and conservative rising star Ronald Reagan. Reagan fought to the bitter end and this solidified his name recognition, and his relationship with the party, opening the path to his easy nomination 1980.

In the campaign of 1976, however, he stayed home in California, and his presence at political events was perfunctory. Ford asked him to play an active role, at least in some swing states were he was popular, like Ohio and Mississippi, but Reagan declined.Of course, nobody can say what would have happened had Reagan campaigned vigorously, but the numbers are there: barely 11.500 ballots more in Ohio and 15.500 in Mississippi would have been enough to tilt these states to Ford, and create a majority for him in the Electoral College. Carter would still have had a plurality of the popular vote but Ford would have won 272 electoral votes and with that the White House (a scenario similar to the one of 2000, when Gore easily won the popular vote but Bush got more electoral votes).

So, the real question is: how hard will Clinton work in the Fall, to convince her supporters that a democratic victory in 2008 is indeed necessary? I suspect that 85% of them will vote for Obama anyway, but the traps on the road to victory in any American presidential election are more than land mines in a Cambodia uncleared field.

"The math is controlling. This race, I believe, is over”

After Hillary Clinton's victory in West Virginia, former Governor of Colorado Roy Romer, said that he endorsed Obama because "The math is controlling." And indeed it is so: the race is over, comments by Howard Wolfson, Clinton’s communications director, notwithstanding. Wolfson said Tuesday: “I think superdelegates who have been moving toward Barack Obama in the last week are going to wake up tomorrow and say, ‘I’m a little concerned about the fact that our nominee, presumptive nominee, can’t win West Virginia. I’m a little concerned that he can’t win Pennsylvania or Ohio, or Michigan, or Florida."

Well, Wolfson might be correct, but up to a point: Superdelegates are cold-blooded politicians and they know that a Superdelegates' coup d'état handing the nomination to Hillary would fracture the party right in the middle, with all young people and all African Americans (the two most loyal constituencies this year) simply walking out (and may even supporting an independent candidate). Not to mention the fact that Clinton should convince NINETY-ONE PERCENT of the Superdelegates still uncommitted today, to snatch the nomination.

The fact that this scenario is a fairy tale doesn't mean that the problem of working class male who tend to vote Republican doesn't exist, as we pointed out earlier this year in several posts. However, the electorate of the two parties strongly polarized in the last 8 years, and most Democratic voters, even unhappy with Obama, will come back to the fold in November. The real issue is not how many of them will defect, but in which states: Ohio, Colorado, New Mexico, Wisconsin and Nevada are states where a handful of ballots changing side can deliver the victory to either candidate. And prevailing in those swing states is crucial to winning an Electoral College majority.

Lost in The Media Buzz About "Hillary's Comeback..."

In the media storm about Ohio, Texas, and a politically-born-again Hillary, the newspapers overlooked a significant poll by the respected Cook Political Report. The poll, published on Tuesday, shows that in the hypothetical general election match up, Obama holds a nine point lead over John McCain, 47% to 38%, with 15 percent of voters undecided or supporting others. This reverses the result of similar polls conducted in December, when McCain led 44% to 37%, and substantially increases the advantage Obama had in January (45 to 43, a statistical tie).
Apparently, each candidate is able to win among his own party members by equal proportions. McCain won among Republicans and those independents who lean toward the GOP by a 64-point margin, 77-33 percent, Obama won among Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents by the same 64 points, 74 to 10 percent. Obama, however, has a significant lead among "pure" independents, those who don't love either party: 11 points, 46 to 35 percent.
Obama leads McCain among women by 20 points, 51 to 31 percent. McCain leads among men, but only slightly, 45 to 43 percent, again a statistical tie. Twelve percent of men, and 18 percent of women, are undecided. Obama leads McCain significantly among 18-34 year olds, 58 to 27 percent. Things are closer with 35-49 year olds and 50-64 year olds, with McCain leading 43 to 42 percent and 38 to 36 percent. Predictably, Obama leads in every region except the South, where McCain leads by 9 points, 47 to 38 percent.
We should remember that, before Reagan transformed politics in America, Democrats were the normal majority and Republicans could only win if Democrats were split, or if Republicans could win over the majority of Independents. Democrats today are not divided over any issue or set of values, and self-identification with the party recently jumped to 41.5%, the highest total on record in decades. Just 31.8% of voters consider themselves to be Republicans. The partisan gap—a 9.7 percentage point advantage for the Democrats—is by far the largest it has ever been. Even if the fight for the nomination between Obama and Clinton goes on, pollsters find no issues barrier blocking a Clinton supporter from voting Obama in the general election, or vice versa. Republicans' slim hopes therefore depend on McCain's long-standing appeal to Independent voters, but the state of the economy will probably push this constituency toward the Democrats, too.

This campaign is for the Democrats to lose

Only ONE state has switched sides in this map drawn according to the 2004 results: Ohio. That would be enough to give Democrats a majority.

As you may recall, a few days ago Marco Polo made a few calculations about the Electoral College (the machinery that assigned the Presidency FOUR TIMES to the losers since 1824). We predicted an easy majority of 273 votes for the Democratic candidate -whoever he or she is- and a possible majority of 298 Electoral Votes, throwing in two winnable swing states such as Nevada and Ohio.
Today, the much-respected Rasmussen Reports offered its evaluation: "If the Presidential election were held today, the Democratic candidate would be poised to win 284 Electoral Votes. That’s 14 more than the minimum needed to capture the White House. The Republican candidate could expect to win 216 Electoral Votes while 38 more would be in the Toss-up category." It appears that 284 is very close to the midpoint between our two forecasts, the low one of 273 and the high one of 298 Electoral Votes. Rasmussen gives as "winnable" by the Democrats even states like Virginia, where they won for the last time in 1964.
As everybody knows, the magic number to enter the White House is 270 (What will happen if each candidate gets 269 votes? Be the first to send the right answer and win our prize). A simple truth: in 2008, the campaign is for the Democrats to lose.

Independents and Reagan Democrats: do they matter?

There is much talk, these days, on Independents and "Reagan Democrats," and about which of the potential candidates will have more appeal to them in November.
Apparently, the pundit class is not interested in looking more in depth into the issue, which has been throughly analyzed by political scientists and pollsters. One problem with the theory "You can win a Presidential Election only convincing the independents" is the fact that Karl Rove (above in a mock-photo, courtesy of About.com) won many an election doing precisely the opposite, that is polarizing the contest to the extreme. Jonathan Rauch of the National Journal, for example, points out that, "Bush-era Republicanism was all about suppressing the center and mobilizing the extremes, on the (correct) assumption that conservatives outnumber liberals. It worked, for a while, because of 9/11 and because the Democrats unwittingly cooperated. Forced to choose between the Republican Right and the Democratic Left, independents leaned Republican or just stayed home."
Rauch is correct in saying that "It worked, for a while," but this strategy is not a consequence of 9/11: it was advocated by Barry Goldwater as early as 1960, and put in action by Ronald Reagan in 1980. Reagan ran on the same platform of Goldwater in 1964, and won because a combination of different factors: the split in the Democratic traditional base after 1968, the hostages in Iran, the rallying to the conservative cause of a small number of intellectuals previously Democrats, and last but not least his personal appeal: it is well known that Americans liked the guy, much less his policies.
In the long run, however, the traditional support for the Democrats by workers and low-income families remained strong, as Larry Bartels of Princeton demonstrated. Contrary to the opinion of Thomas Frank in his much-hyped What's the Matter with Kansas?, Bartels maintains that less-fortunate Americans do vote Democratic, the problem is that they often don't vote in numbers large enough to win (here). It is well known that 90% of millionaires do vote, while individuals with an income under $30,000 often skip the ballot box (maybe, voting on Sunday, or making Election day a holiday would improve the turnout of those who must take 2 or 3 jobs just to stay afloat).
Therefore, a strategy that doesn't antagonize independent voters but counts primarily on the democratic base is perfectly reasonable. The trouble is that Democratic candidates really don't have an economic platform appealing to workers and low-income families: anybody is aware of Clinton's, or Obama's, proposals to save from catastrophy the millions of American families that lost, or are about to lose, their home in the subprime mess? Are they talking about reregulating the financial sector in any meaningful way? Obama is an inspiring orator, but platitudes about "change" will not rally displaced workers behind him in Ohio.
Politically, this year the situation in the field is this: a Democratic candidate not too weakened by a long battle in the primaries can easily win in November. It will need only to keep the blue States where John Kerry prevailed in 2004, and win in states like Iowa, Colorado and New Mexico (white or pink on the map): that would make 273 votes in the Electoral College. In Iowa and New Mexico a few thousand votes more (or, a few thousand votes LESS in the Republican column) will suffice. Colorado has been leaning Democratic in recent years, electing several smart politicians like governor Bill Ritter and senator Ken Salazar. For good measure, one can bet that Nevada and Ohio are winnable in 2008, creating a large majority in the Electoral College for a Democratic President who will have reinforced Democratic leaders in Congress (the party should pick some seats in the House and in the Senate as well).