What does Clinton's victory in Pennsylvania mean?

I was taking a few days off when the long-awaited Pennsylavania primary took place, now that I'm back in the thick of things and as I listen to the political pundits, I wonder about the interpretation of Clinton's victory on Tuesday. 

Let's first say a few words on the breadth of her lead over on Obama. A month before the primary, the Senator from N.Y. was way ahead of her opponent in the polls, probably by more than 20%. As the campaign progressed, Obama managed to narrow the gap but he has not managed to close it completely. There has been much talk about this: 

-  does this mean that he does not have what it takes to win overwhelmingly the support of the working-class whites (a critical majority of Democrats in Pennsylvania as well as in Ohio, which Obama also lost to Clinton in March in a very similar scenario)? 

-  did he suffer from his comments on the "bitterness and clinging attitude" of the Pennsylvanians? For the debate on class that has followed read the Lexington column in The Economist.

-  should we see it as a proof of Clinton's strength? 

Only one thing is certain : the show goes on. Next stop : Indiana.  

After spending three weeks lowering expectations (at first they were counting ona double digit lead and she then claimed that even a small lead would prove that her candidacy was extremely strong since she had been out-spent one to three by Obama), Clinton now claims that this is a decisive victory and she is trying to use it to push her agenda : seating the Florida and Michigan delegates at the convention. This would allow her to argue that her pledged delegate count is extremely close to Obama's. In so doing, she will try to present the final result as a virtual tie (= a quasi tie ) and thus make her I-have-experience-and-am-electable case to the superdelegates and allow them to support her en masse without seeming to disregard the so called popular vote. This is the only solution for her to win the nomination.  

This is an entertaining and somewhat relevant critcism of the campaign rhetoric of Clinton : 

In the first segment Hillary Clinton's speech is compared to the character Tom Joad in The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck (an excellent novel in which the Depression is not only the backdrop but the central theme of the story. 

Did you notice how the Clintons and their supporters are wooing the superdelegates and insisting on their special position as arbitrators and moderators, more capable of making the right decision for the party.

Meanwhile on the Republican side, John MacCain is already campaining in the South and he has been touring African-American areas, he has been refining his economic policy package. The Democratic fight is providing him with a unique opportunity to get ahead in the national campaign.

What's the "bitter-gate"?

Pennsylavania will be voting on April 22 and the stakes are very high for Obama and Clinton. Although Obama has the lead in delegates, Clinton might have a the shadow of a chance of making a comeback if she proves very strong in the last primaries and manages to convince the superdelegates that she is a stronger candidate to send to the November election.

Not much had really been going on lately but a massive row has emerged after comments made by Barack Obama during a private fundraiser in California became public. 

He said that many Pennsylvanians had lost out on the recent economic boom and for the last twenty years local industries have been in decline, and jobs have been lost. "And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations".  

This short quotation has been commented over and over again since April 5. To most, Obama sounded elitist and seemed to be looking down on working class whites who were religious, pro-gun etc..

  Some have said it should be understood in the wider context of what Obama said that night. 

Hillary Clinton has used it in an ad targeted at this much sought after voting block : the white working and middle class Pensylvanians ( visit the French blog on the American presidential elections to see the video)

The controversy goes on and people start wondering about Obama's candidacy. Listen to what Mitt Romney, one of the former Republican candidates for the nomination had to say for instance : 

Dan Schnur, a former advisor in John McCain's 2000 campaign, has just published an excellent commentary on Barack Obama's remark. This is an excellent analysis of the underlying assumptions that inform comments on the seemingly non-strategic support of the Republican Party by blue-collar workers.

This is basically how Dan Schurn's argument runs : 

Left-wing commentators have often presented the fact that the white working class usually voted for the Republicans as something that needs explaining : Republican economic policies are most often not going to better their plight so why do they vote against their "class interest"? Why does middle America make their choice on social issues such as abortion, gun rights and same-sex mariage? For the Democrats this choice makes no sense. 

Are they being lured into voting on those issues instead of on health care and economic policies by manipulative Republican demagogues? Or is it because, unbeknownst to the Democrats and the educated elite, people really care about these issues and are not obsessed with their economic hardships? Are the Democrats being so blinded by their liberal bias that they forget to question their own values and only try rationalise the values of others. 

The full article is really worth reading and appears to me as the best commentary on what the "bittergate" reveals about the Democrats. 

Clinton under fire.

Dear students, 

It's been some time since I last posted on the blog, I've been quite busy with my research project recently.

This is only a very short summary of what's been in the news lately. 

Clinton has been ridiculed for her overblown account of a visit to Bosnia. She was making a point on her foreign policy experience and credentials, she recalled landing in Tusla under sniper fire and running to cover. The media did some fact checking on this event and have since been running over and over again a video of the welcome ceremony on the airport tarmac : there was no sign at all of immediate danger, and even less of bullets flying in the air.

Here is a video from NBC presenting this event Followed by political analyst Tim Russert's comment on the state of the Democratic race : 

Of course, there is no end to the youtube mocking videos of this blatant exaggeration. But Hillary Clinton has tried to minimize the entire contreversy and has even joked about it. 

How can Hillary Clinton win the nomination?

Obviously she will need decisive victories in Pennsylvania (April 22), Indiana and North Carolina (May 6) and the following contests ( West-Virginia, Nebraska, Kentucky, Oregon, Puerto Rico, New Mexico, Montana and South Dakota). However it is virtually impossible for her to be ahead in pledged delegates (people elected by the Deomcratic grassroots to sit and vote at the convention) when the primary season ends mid June, due to the proportional distribution of delegates in the Democratic primaries. If Clinton wins most of these contests she will be able to claim momentum and victory in some of the essential "big states" and she will narrow the gap to a virtual tie. In that case she can really make a claim to the super-delegates.   

Indeed, the only way she can win the nomination is by garnering a significant majority of the 800 or so  super-delegates (party members and elected officials who automatically get to sit and vote at the convention). 

But to do so, she needs to convince them that they can and should go against the "popular vote", which is slightly infavour of Obama and likely to remain that way. Obviously this does not go down well with the Democratic voters who will feel disenfranchised if the party bigwigs decide of the outcome of the nomination regardless of their choice. The risk is that many of the Obama supporters (the young, the educated whites and the Blacks) will feel betrayed and decide not to vote in November if Clinton is the Democratic candidate, out of spite they might even turn to John McCain whose appeal to independents is undeniable. By choosing Clinton over Obama the superdelegates may well jeopardize the chance of the Democrats of taking the White House back from the GOP. 

However a similar argument might also work to the advantage of Clinton : the superdelegates should choose the most "electable", i.e. experienced candidate and she has tried to paint Obama as too inexperienced for the job, untested and offering huge potential for attacks from the Republican candidate, and all this might be true. The Clinton camp have harshly attacked  superdelegates that turned to Obama. A well-known Clinton supporter has accused Bill Richardson who endorsed Obama  last week of being a Judas. Isn't Clinton sending a strong message to the superdelegates who might be thinking of flipping : don't mess with us or we'll mess with you.  

The core issue comes down to this: what is the role of the superdelegates? 

Should they confirm the popular choice and simply give a clear majority to the candidate with the most pledged delegates in order to ensure a smooth convention? 

Or should they act as the Democratic wise men and take into account the so-called electability of the candidates and make their choice in conscience? 

Some Democrats have been calling for a mini-convention in June, where all the superdelegates would convene, discuss and make a choice. This would clearly put the decision making into their hands and would end the suspens and allow the winner to launch a national campaign against John McCain. Will they stand the pressure of making such a difficult decision under public scrutiny.  

For in-depth coverage on this issue : read or listen to NPR's coverage. 

Obama's campaign : getting massive press coverage.

Sen. Obama strikes again : he gave a well-thought out, brilliantly written and historically referenced speech. As he had previously done in his victory speech after the South Carolina primary, and after the Iowa caucus even earlier on. 

Obama gave an uplifting message that is clearly meant to go straight into history books alongside other great speeches such as that of John Fitzgerald Kennedy on religion or civil rights activists calling for unity and peace within the American people.  

He started by referring to the American Constitution both as the touchstone of the American government (the aim of which was "to form a more perfect union") and as a document resulting from political compromises and  tainted by "America's original sin". 

I hope my second year students from Cergy remember the several articles in which slavery is referred to, albeit not in a straightforward manner : 

-  art. 1, section 2, paragraph 3 referred to the 3/5th compromise ;

-  art 1, section 9, paragraph 1 granted a moratorium on importation of slaves until 1808.

-  art. 4, section 2, paragraph 3 offered provisions for the future Fugitive Slave Act. 

I believe this opening remark places Obama in the great tradition of William Lloyd Garisson who exposed the Constitution ("our present national compact") as  deeply unamerican and evil per se ("a pact with hell"). Obama does not go quite that far but presents the Constitution as a text that makes a promise of liberty and justice for all that it was at first unable to uphold.  

The Union has been in a state of being perfected ever since, be it through a civil war, pamphlets, protests and a massive civil rights movement. He places his candidacy in that tradition of fighting for a more perfect union, for an America that lives up to its ideals: he pledges himself to continue "the long march of those who came before us". This type of rhetoric clearly makes him a great American ; his speeches are meant to be historic, possibly opening a new era of race relations in the US. The rhetoric of "perfecting the Union" is instrumental in making Obama appear as the heir to the great American reformers who, far from being un-American have tried to make the country live up to its ideals, as they are written out in the Declaration of Independence and which are universally accepted. Obama does not want to change America, he is no revolutionnary, he is appealing to his fellow-citizen's sense of idealism and quest for perfection. His aim is to help America keep its promise to itself. 

He then goes on to interpret his personal life story as a typically American narrative, and moreover as a story that could only happen in the US. Thus, I believe he is truly American not because of how he came to be but because of the way he tells his story. 

In his next section he explains why Jeremiah Wright's sermons are both unacceptable (they contribute to digging the racial divide) and understandable ( the pastor and people of his generation have been genuinely oppressed and carry with them the rancour created by discrimination). Barack Obama then treads a delicate path, trying to balance rejection of the hostile rhetoric of the pastor with the recognition of how Jeremiah Wright has changed his life and made him a Christian. He compares him to an uncle that you love but who also embarasses you because of his prejudice. 

The last part of the speech is a commentary on the need to "perfect the union" in regard to racial relations. There are unsolved issues that need to be dealt with now in order to reunite the American people. He highlights the fact that the consequences of centuries of oppression can still be felt today. 

And he then acknowledges the plight of poor whites which must also be addressed to guarantee appeased race relations in America. Many of them resent the Black community for living on welfare and benefiting from affirmative action policies. The lack of understanding and hatred is thus on both sides and to end his speech Barack Obama tells the story of a poor white girl whose mother lost her job to cancer and who helped her mom by living of the cheapest kind of food for one year.  Now a grown woman, she is an organizer in the Black community of South Carolina for the Obama campaign for she never saw the Black community as the cause of her problems and wants to make life easier for all American children living in poverty. This epitomizes Barack Obama's understanding of social problems in America : he is trying to solve the problems of poverty beyond the racial paradigm : this is how the Americans will make their union perfect. 

However the question that is now up in the air is : will this speech be enough to overcome the Jeremiah Wright contreversy? The remarks of Obama's pastor have been in the news and all over youtube, will the problem go away or come back to haunt him later in the campaign (it will not play well in the national campaign if he gets the nomination due to the "anti-patriotic" content of his sermons)?

Bill Richardson, the Hispanic candidate to the Democratic nomination who dropped out after losing several primary contests has now endorsed Barack Obama.  What does this endorsement mean ?John Harwood gives a short answer to that question. 

Richardson worked in the Clinton adminstration, so his shift to Obama, is a powerful disowning of Hillary Clinton, her role in her husband's administration and her candidacy for 2008. Bill Richardson is also the governor of a swing state : New Mexico. One may wonder how his support to Obama will play out in the general election (reminder N.M. voted on February 5 and went very narrowly to Clinton). 

Listen to the entire Bill Richarson speech,  see how he describes the Hispanics' current plight and interprets Obama's message on race as one that applies to that minority as well as the Black community. 

Will this endorsement have any influence on other super-delegates and more importantly on the Hispanic vote in the general election? 

Do you remember Bill Richardson's television ad during the primary campaign?

What is "McCainism"?

NPR has an excellent coverage of John McCain's maverick profile within the GOP and what it might mean for the Republican Party as a whole and for a possible McCain presidency. What will the Republican base make of his foreign policy commitments to the war in Irak with his wish to reform the American immigration policy and his stance on campaign funding ( on the latter issues he parts way with the Republican orthodoxy)? If they are disappointed with these proposals they are likely to stay at home.
Maybe his new message will attract new voters to the GOP : that is probabaly what he is aiming at.

Obama on race

The racial issue has been a strong undercurrent in the Democratic campaign since Barack Obama announced his candidacy. And it has emerged from the deep waters regularly.
The Black community at first raised doubts about his commitment to the community because of his post-racial rhetoric and his Kenyan origins set him apart from the people whose forbearers toiled under slavery. Now he might appear as somewhat "too Black", for belonging to a church led by a fiery proponent of Black pride, Rev Jeremiah Wright.

This is the beginning of his speech on race. You can access the rest of it via youtube or watch the entire speech on the NYTimes website or else read the transcript.
He has clearly once again positionned himself as an American leader making a historic speech.

The GOP coalition: what's new?

To what extent is John McCain able to keep the Republican coalition together?

Remember that since the 1980s the force of the GOP has rested in the union of the two branches of American conservatism : 

1. traditional conservatives : proponents of fiscal restraint, small government, States' rights, emphasis on individual liberty and responsability (freedom of speech and gun rights). 
2. the evangelical branch of the GOP, emphasizing moral issues (abortion, gay rights) and extending their interest to fighting against poverty, and other global issues such as defence of the environment, social justice...

Sen. McCain is a true traditional conservative ( meaning 1) and has in the past antagonized the evangelical voters by calling their leaders such as Jerry Falwell bigots (=people that have such a strong feeling about something that they are unwilling to listen to others) and extremists. Before Mike Huckabee the former baptist pastor cum governor of Arkansas ended his bid for the White House, the GOP primary clearly reflected this divide within the party.

Today the questions are : 

1. Are the evangelicals losing ground in the GOP? 
2. Where will the evangelical vote turn to in November? 

I believe that the 2008 GOP primary has proved that the relative force of the evangelical voting block might be waning. But more importantly the primary has shown that the evangelicals do not rule the party even though they represent a huge force when they decide to back someone that already has the confidence of the first type of Republican voters. Indeed Bush's candidacy was made extremely powerful by the militancy of the "value voters" added to the numbers of traditional conservatives. 

For John McCain to win the election in November he needs either the support of the evangelicals (this could be acheived by the choice of Mike Huckabee as running mate : the latter has made clear that he would accept such an offer in an interview with NPR) or the vote of the independant voters. I believe it would be difficult to court both voting blocks simultaneously, except if Hillary Clinton is the Democratic nominee. On the other hand, if Barack Obama is his opponent, John McCain will have to fight very hard for the independants that are quite attracted to the Senator from Illinois. In that case it might be in his interest to turn more decisively to the right wing of his party?

Where will the evangelical vote go in November? For some people the value voters will inevitably turn to the Republican candidate, but for Clyde Wilcox, professor of government at Georgetown University, McCain may not be able to rein in the evangelicals. In that case, these voters might stay at home or even vote for Obama or maybe even for Clinton. 

  Listen to the excellent NPR coverage and interviews on the subject. 

Before making any brash decisions, I think McCain is waiting to have a clear idea on who his opponent will be in November, in order to devise the most efficient strategy to win the election.