As much as our Democrats suck, the Republicans suck immeasurably more.
Democratic voters’ strong enthusiasm for their presidential contenders led to record-high numbers of primary and caucus participants for the party on Super Tuesday, while Republicans saw a spotty mix of increases and dropoffs for their own party’s presidential nominating contests.
Overall yesterday, some 14.7 million voters cast Democratic ballots in the 15 states holding primary contests — compared to just 8.9 million in the 2000 contests in the same states. Turnout for Republican contests in those same states was 8.9 million in both 2000 and this year.
While reliable turnout figures for the states that instead held caucus events Tuesday are harder to come by, anecdotal reports from Democratic Party officials strongly suggest a similar trend in those contests.
Kansas Democrats, for example, shattered turnout expectations for their caucuses Tuesday despite turbulent weather.
The only thing that can prevent a political realignment now is if the Democrats nominate a candidate that the people hate.
The poor Republicans. What I wrote last night:
i really think hate is a strong word for a woman who has gotten a ton of votes.
nobody in any of those surveys was asked if they hate hillary clinton.
this is the kind of thing that pushed me and a lot of other people to vote for her….being able to relate to another woman being trashed because she dared to want something…the same exact thing people have accused bill clinton of doing to obama….how dare he think its his turn…how dare he think he deserves this.
we have a long long way to go.
I don’t think it is a strong word. I use it all the time to describe how people feel about the GOP, the president, and the war. And these numbers from the latest NBC/Wall Street Poll, tell you all you need to know:
Find me a public figure with worse negatives. Aside from Bush, I mean.
It’s not personal, anna, it’s strictly politics. Clinton’s negatives are just astonishing. BTW, the same poll for poll for Obama:
If you break this down by region, congressional district, etc., it becomes even more stark.
For what it’s worth, I’ll probably vote forher, also (in Texas). BOTH candidates are awesome imo and both bring good things to the table.. as well as bad thing.. but i think the good outwieghs the bad
Personally, I’m a little tired of the insinuation that opposition to Clinton is because of her gender, as if it couldn’t possibly because she’s a corrupt, pro-corporate, pro-war, unprincipled, Republican-lite DLC senator who has spent the last seven years feverishly writing blank checks for George W. Bush.
You may be voting for Clinton because of her gender, but it does not follow that the rest of us are voting against her because of her gender. The bulk of the open sexism on the left is plainly pro-Clinton rather than anti-Clinton.
We do have a long way to go, but we’re not going to get there until the electorate can reject a female huckster with the same vigor they reject male hucksters.
I actually oppose her more because of her male friends than for anything she has done. A vote against Hillary is also a vote against Bill Clinton, Terry McAuliffe, Mark Penn, Paul Begala, James Carville, Harold Ford, Jr., Chuck Schumer, and a host of lesser known corporate shills that are destroying progressive dreams with all their might. I rarely even think about Hillary when I think about her candidacy. I think about how horrid it would be to have those assholes in power again.
Agreed. The Bill Clinton presidency sucked bigtime. I also voted against her because of her enemies, I just can’t bear to hear any more about poor dead Vince Foster. But I felt really bad to vote against her on that basis. It’s not her fault.
i could just as easily hold donnie mccurdle against obama or even joe trippi against edwards.
for every shithead hillary has on her team she also has some amazing people i respect a lot.
they all do.
every single politician brings good people and bad with them….look at nutter….i think his choice of police chief was brilliant….a lot of people are horrified.
i could name you 2 philly councilpersons i cant stand….but there are people on their staff who are incredible humans….a lot of people didnt like frank rizzo….but i know someone from his admin who is one of the most gracious intelligent persons i have ever known…in fact i named my puppy after her son…..i think fumo is an ass and a crook….but ask someone from the philly gay political community how much he has helped that community.
murtha….the antiwar movements hero….i dont want him in office another term no matter how he feels about the war….he is anti gay and anti woman….and dont let me get started on casey and rendell.
obama aint no prize….not to me….but ill be happy to vote for him if he is the nominee.
i still dont see the poll that asks do you hate hillary clinton.
i hated kerry….i voted for him.
she also might just be qualified for the job.
Hillary is first and foremost a pragmatist and yes she has compromised with the devil to get closer to the things she wants done.
There’s opposition and there’s trash-talk. I don’t think all opposition to Clinton is gender-based. Hell I oppose her quite a bit myself.
But huckster? It’s funny that you use that word because it’s a word that comes to my mind when I listen to Obama — a politician who talks pretty and votes to enable the war-mongering just like the majority of his colleagues.
I don’t hold it against him any more or less than any of his colleagues who do the same, like Clinton. Basically he’s a politician and politicians are hucksters. The electorate buys what they are selling. When I hear Dems vilify Clinton at a level beyond that thrown at the Repubs, I think sexism, as I would think racism if Obama were being held to a different standard in this regard. Maybe it’s something else but what?
When I hear Dems vilify Clinton at a level beyond that thrown at the Repubs…
And when have you heard that? Please give examples — even better, links.
In a diary to the right called “Obama Fathered a White Child” which assumes with no evidence that HRC is responsible for reprehensible phone calls “The Clinton’s are the most right-wing bunch of thugs ever to smear the name of the Democratic Party with their presence.”
And all over Daily Kos…
Sorry it’s taking ages to post since my Internet is going in and out and I have to go pick up my daughter from a class, but I can show you more tomorrow when I have more time and better connection, if you seriously haven’t seen any of it.
heh! I just looked again and it’s called “Obama Fathered a Black Child”. I hadn’t read the diary carefully — the poll in question wasn’t actually pushing an out-of-wedlock narrative. See that’s what I mean though, it suggests that Clinton is pushing that narrative.
When I see Barack Obama sworn in as our President next January I’ll whisper a sincere prayer of thanks. Our “nightmare” will be over. Hate Radio and Fox Cable will no longer dictate the political narrative.
As an American citizen who grew up in Europe I was constantly amazed in recent years at how much the American public bought into the fear-mongering and hate-mongering by the Republicans. To say that these Republicans suck is an understatement.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/6/204538/7526/59/451499
I’m with you, Anna. The Robin Morgan piece spoke right to me. Maybe it’s my age. I am very tired of this crap. I voted for Obama in our primary but it could have easily gone the other way. Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton are two sides of the same mainstream Dem coin. All the campaign back-and-forth between Obama and Clinton have been he-said-she-said bullshit on both sides. (Edwards supporter, here.) But every time I read or hear Obama supporters talking trash about Hillary Clinton I am more inclined to vote for her. I loathed Bill Clinton’s presidency and thought pretty poorly of Hillary Clinton’s health care initiatives in the 90s, but she has a solid liberal record in the Senate and that’s where she should be judged. She was an early target of swiftboating tactics that rage to this day and Democrats should be defending her. Hate is a strong word.
I read that Morgan piece and was embarrassed to be female. It was all half-truths, no facts and emotion. If I’m honest with myself it almost made me want to not vote for any female ever again, kind of like the NOW-NY letter did.
I had assumed that we, as women, had come very far. To be told that I should vote for Clinton because it’s historic, it’s time or it’ll send a message is just so wrong to me on so many levels. I don’t know many women who voted (will vote) for Clinton because they like her policies. They say the above and quote that Morgan piece or that atrocious Steinem op-ed, meanwhile saying strange untruths like, “Obama is a huckster” or “Obama is vague” and I’m left wondering, “Well, how hard is it to click a link or watch a video and learn something when you’ve taken the time to type out this emotion-based diatribe in favor of a candidate who won’t keep her word, says anything to get elected and has similar stances on issues as person you’re slamming?”
What can I say, Fabooj? I think it’s in part a generational perception about feminism. I don’t think every woman should vote for Clinton to send a message or whatever. But it’s a very powerful and resonant argument for some of us of a certain age.
Sure we should be looking at candidates’ policies. But emotion is always a powerful motivator. And when two candidates seem just about identical in their policies, how else can we make a decision? As BooMan has astutely written, we can look at the people who surround and advise the candidates. But most people don’t have that information, don’t spend their time on blogs.
from the redundancy desk: lieberman too. only now, he won’t be sucking at the dem convention. what took them so long?
when’s he going to change parties, before or after the convention?
h/t jane at fdl
lTMF’sA
If there is any political party that can screw this up between now and November………
so obviously i know nothing. but boo, can i offer this?
spelling out the word “hate” and putting it in a link to a “hillary doesn’t look good, but only to a not-majority” poll seems…much like a republican tactic to me. there are better ways to say, “obama is a better dem choice b/c he polls better in the general, so we should support him.” every time you use strong words like “hate” and associate it with hillary, you only advance the project republicans have sustained for so long, one in which no woman ever achieves this power.
and, i hope i won’t be saying a lot of “i told you so” a few months from now, when “blah blah CUNT blah” is replaced with “blah blah NIGGER blah.” that’s the other reason i think we should all be fact based and sober as we diss each other’s candidates. disagree? hell yes, we’re democrats. repeat/propagate rethug memes as we do so? not so much.
if they can do it to her, they will do it to him, just as they did it to xtian southern white man Edwards, who somehow became a commie trial lawyer homosexual DFH overnight, despite his conservative voting record. that’s how our SCLM works; no democrat can ever truly “win.”
just my 2c.
and am i reading those wrong, or are those polls from 12/07? a lot has changed since then, cf NH/the tweety effect.
Somebody break out the tiny violin. Some of the comments in this diary are really pathetic. It’s hardly sexist to point out that half the country REALLY doesn’t like one of the democratic candidates, regardless of what gender that candidate might be. High negatives is high negatives.
Meanwhile, in Obama country, they asked their supporters to make small contributions to “match” Hillary’s $5 Million dollars she loaned to her struggling campaign. So far they’ve exceeded $6 Million in a day. (Click link for an current total in their fund raising drive.)
Unprecedented in US campaign history. And I don’t think it has anything to do with the gender of the candidate. There’s something more going on here.