#24 Obama has clinched, says AP

Online news reports from the Associated Press indicate that Barack Obama--the first term Democratic senator from Illinois, with little domestic policy experience and no foreign policy experience; with a difficult construct from his erstwhile connection with the Rev. Jeremiah Wright and the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago; with no military experience and a strongly-stated but ill-defined anti-war position about Iraq; with problems appealing to blue collar white voters--has clinched the Democratic nomination to run for president.

How can someone with so much going against him have a chance, one has to ask.

Well, someone with fewer qualifications won twice, another can answer; and we all know how george w bush has done.

Luckily, Obama is smarter than dubya, has better people working for him than dubya has, and is apparently less greedy than dubya's vice president and handlers have been.

Seriously, folks, Barack Obama may or may not become a good president, but the one we have now is an unmitigated disaster. dubya's policies (as I've tried to show in posts 19, 20, and 21) have been bad for America and for most Americans. That's why, today, dubya's approval rating stands at 28%. There should be exclamation points after that sentence. Let us remember that in any given presidential election, 40% of the voters will vote Democratic regardless of the candidate, 40% of the voters will vote Republican regardless of the candidate, and 20% of the voters are the folk the two candidates are actually fighting over. Thus it is that 30% of core Republicans have forsaken dubya (the 40% of total voters who "always" vote Republican minus the 28% of total voters who still approve of the job dubya's done; that's the 12% of total voters who normally vote Republican who think dubya's not doing well, divided by the 40% who normally vote Republicans regardless of who the nominee is). I don't apologize for the math. Math is important in this election, very important. It's almost a Sesame Street scenario: "This election has been brought to you by the number 270."

John McCain may already have won back some of that 12% but he starts behind Obama--behind virtually any decent Democrat--mathematically. And today's news indicates that Obama actually is polling ahead of McCain, even before the Democrat has received enough delegates to be nominated, and months AFTER McCain had garnered enough delegates to become the Republican nominee.

Barring a large number of racist individuals who are keeping their racism to themselves (and there may be a large number, but if they don't admit it we won't know until November), Obama should be favored to win. Can he lose it? Sure. By screwing up, or by being screwed up, either by another guilt-by-association as with Rev Wright, or by misspeaking (which McCain is more likely to do than Obama is), or by Hillary not rallying her supporters behind Obama. These are possibilities, but Obama's campaign is so well organized and he and his supporters are so articulate the odds favor their not screwing up badly.

Picking the wrong Vice President candidate is still a major possible screwup, however. Hillary should not be chosen. Not chosen. No. Hillary should be promised a position in his cabinet should he be elected. Secretary of Health and Human Services would be perfect for her, and would give her a chance to push for universal health care with what we hope will be a significant majority in both the House and the Senate. A significant point on the side here is that NY has a Democratic governor who will then appoint a Democrat replacement for her in the Senate. The Democrats cannot afford to lose Senate seats by appointing to the cabinet senators from states with Republican governors.

Similarly, Bill Richardson could be a strong possibility for Secretary of State. God knows , and so do many voters, that he has international policy experience, both from his service in the UN and from his subliminal negotiations abroad.

I still come back to Ted Strickland (my #1 choice), Bill Nelson, or James Webb (my heart-on favorite) as VP candidates. Their three states are tossups, and the presence of any one of these as VP candidate on the ticket could move his particular state into the Blue column in November.

Next time: where the electoral votes stand in June, with five months (less, by the time I post) to go.

--triton--