With Barack Obama's Saturday sweep, are the Democrats headed for their own version of Bush-Gore 2000 in which the candidate with the most popular votes ends up losing?
Using the latest available tallies from CNN and Time, my calculator shows Obama ahead of Clinton by 168,721 votes of 15,854,593 cast on Super Tuesday and in New Hampshire, South Carolina, Nebraska, Louisiana, Kansas, Washington, Nevada and the Virgin Islands. (He won in Iowa, too, but the popular vote there is a mystery.)
If this trend continues, as it may very well do, Hillary Clinton could lose in the popular voting but win the Democratic nomination as a result of what 796 Super Delegates decide, just as George W. Bush moved into the White House in 2001 based on what nine members of the Supreme Court ruled.
In a year of strong feelings, would such a situation lead to a contentious convention like the one in 1968 that tore the Democratic Party apart and led to the election of Richard Nixon by less than one percent of the vote in November?
I was there as an alternate delegate in Chicago to be tear-gassed by the police of Democratic Mayor Richard Daley, which, to my lasting shame, led to the decision to vote for Hubert Humphrey but not campaign for him, as did others I knew.
Over the years, Democrats have found many ways to lose elections they might have won. Will we find a new one this year?
Showing posts with label 1968 election. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1968 election. Show all posts
Sunday, February 10, 2008
Friday, July 20, 2007
Mismatch: Romney Tackles Obama
Now that his defecating dog has been laid to rest, Mitt Romney is on the offensive, trying to soil Barack Obama. He’s way out of his league.
Seizing on a bill Obama supported in the Illinois state Senate with a provision for age-appropriate sex education, Romney pounced.
"How much sex education is age appropriate for a 5-year-old? In my mind, zero is the right number," he said.
Obama swiveled to let Romney fall on his face.
"We have to deal with a coarsening of the culture and the over-sexualization of our young people,” he told a reporter. “Part of the coarsening of that culture is when politicians try to demagogue issues to score cheap political points.
"What we shouldn't do is to try to play political football with these issues.”
The wire-service story went on to report that in 2002 Romney told Planned Parenthood he supported “teaching of responsible, age-appropriate, factually accurate health and sexuality education” in public schools.
Obama’s football analogy is apt. In 1968, a Republican governor observed that “watching George Romney run for President is like watching a duck trying to make love to a football.”
It’s beginning to look like a family tradition.
Seizing on a bill Obama supported in the Illinois state Senate with a provision for age-appropriate sex education, Romney pounced.
"How much sex education is age appropriate for a 5-year-old? In my mind, zero is the right number," he said.
Obama swiveled to let Romney fall on his face.
"We have to deal with a coarsening of the culture and the over-sexualization of our young people,” he told a reporter. “Part of the coarsening of that culture is when politicians try to demagogue issues to score cheap political points.
"What we shouldn't do is to try to play political football with these issues.”
The wire-service story went on to report that in 2002 Romney told Planned Parenthood he supported “teaching of responsible, age-appropriate, factually accurate health and sexuality education” in public schools.
Obama’s football analogy is apt. In 1968, a Republican governor observed that “watching George Romney run for President is like watching a duck trying to make love to a football.”
It’s beginning to look like a family tradition.
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