Thursday, February 14, 2008
New York looks at Super Tuesday and beyond
LOOKING AHEAD by Wally Dobelis
Where to begin. La Vida Es Un Sueno, as Calderon de la Barca intimated, and it is true. We live in a dream, or multiple interlocking dreams. The political dream world brings us daily developments, crises, resolutions, and closings, enough to make a dramatist’s head spin. The dreams shattered, dreams deferred and fortunes lost would give a modern Euripides a full cycle of plots out of one presidential campaign period. We have all turned into pundits and savants, soothsayers if you please, offering forecasts that fit our fancies, as befits our forever adolescence.
Start with Super Tuesday, February 5, when 21 Republican and 22 Democratic state primary voters chose their presidential candidates. On the Republican side, McCain ended with 707 delegates, Romney had 294, Huckabee took 195. To win the GOP candidacy race, one needs 1191 delegates.
Seeking support, McCain went to deliver a dynamite speech on February 7 at the American Conservative Political Activity Convention, proclaiming his agreements with CPAC on birth control, abortion, gun rights, judicial appointments, national security and government spending. He had to defend himself against accusations on campaign finance control, climate changes and immigration policies, the Bush tax cuts, and defending his dubbing of some conservative leaders as agents of intolerance. The ranks of his opponent continue to be formidable. On the Conservative internet, Ann Coulter has turned from Goldwater Girl to a Hillary Girl, snowballing all the accusations into a blanket declaration that McCain is a Liberal and a Democrat, and soothsaying that a Hillary presidency will unify Republicans, to overthrow her four years later, for an everlasting GOP paradise thereafter, while a McCain presidency will turn Republicans into midstream patsies in four years, leading to 30 years of subsequent Democrat rule. Club of Growth, the tax cut people, consider the Arizonian’s record tenuous. James Dobson of Focus on Family will not vote, if McCain wins. On the air waves, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham continue to deny McCain’s Conservative credentials. McCain has objected, pointing to an 83% rating from the American Conservative Union, sponsor of the conference.
But, right there at the CPAC, like a thunderbolt, instead of an expected clarion call from Gov. Romney for Conservatives to close ranks behind him, the 2nd-ranking GOP candidate announced that he is withdrawing and urging all Republicans to unite behind McCain in the interests of destroying terrorists, stopping the intra-party warfare and concentrating on defeating the Democrats in November 2008. Romney had apparently done the calculus that after spending $40M of family money ($87M overall) his eventual defeat was inescapable.
What to do? The sudden Republican dilemma was obviously wrenching, even to the schadenfreude-prone observers – it put the nation at risk, not just the demoralized GOPians. The whackily charming populist Huckabee, a creationist, hated by the radio hosts even more than McCain, who refuses to withdraw, is the Republicans’ unlikely remaining major candidate, overwhelmingly winning Kansas two days later. But reason prevailed at the CPAC, and the convention turned into a triumph for McCain, who in the coming weeks would have had scary setbacks until the eventual national primary vote victory. Now he can look forward to an easy summer 2008 Republican national convention in St. Paul.
The Democrats have not had a similar resolves, with Hillary and Obama splitting Super Tuesday’s 22 state primaries, the big states bringing the delegates count to 1045 in the Clinton column, vs. 960 for Barack, towards the magic number of 2025. The week after Super Tuesday Obama won four more states, narrowing the gap. The Texas and Ohio vote on March 3 will not resolve, and the elected delegates’ deadlock is expected to continue until the Denver nominating meeting in August 2008. The fact that Obama’s campaign raised $37M in January/February against Hillary’s $17M is causing some concern.
Consequently, the 20% of super-delegates, some 800 appointed Democratic party leaders, mostly Congresspeople, will be in control of the Presidential candidacy, and the contenders will have to convince them of their potential in winning against McCain. The internecine warfare will continue, giving the Republicans more ammunition.
This puts the potentially incipient Bloomberg candidacy theorists in an interesting position. We have already surrendered a New York candidate, Giuliani, and Hillary is not a shoo-in. Could the Mayor of our fair city give the more rabid political Conservatives a viable anti-McCain candidate to back, a practical businessman with Liberal /Democratic background and a record of accomplishments, not exactly acceptable for the Christian social Conservatives, but anyway…? Which party would the “Nader effect” impact more? Would this drain a potential Hillary candidacy more that that of Obama? Would Bloomberg be crazy enough to create the third party, a billion dollar endeavor, and risk the social consequences? The odds are against it, but speculation is a major American sport.
You can find more of Wally Dobelis’ columns on http:/dobelisfile.blogspot. The actual title of Calderon's 17th Century Oedipal comedy about Basilio, King of Poland and his son Sigismundo is LaVida Es Sueno, and the iimprisoned prince's Hamlet-like song translates as:
What is life? A frenzy. What is life? An illusion
A shdow, a fiction, andut dreams, and the greatest gain is petty.
For all of life is a dream, and dreams are nothing but dreams.
Where to begin. La Vida Es Un Sueno, as Calderon de la Barca intimated, and it is true. We live in a dream, or multiple interlocking dreams. The political dream world brings us daily developments, crises, resolutions, and closings, enough to make a dramatist’s head spin. The dreams shattered, dreams deferred and fortunes lost would give a modern Euripides a full cycle of plots out of one presidential campaign period. We have all turned into pundits and savants, soothsayers if you please, offering forecasts that fit our fancies, as befits our forever adolescence.
Start with Super Tuesday, February 5, when 21 Republican and 22 Democratic state primary voters chose their presidential candidates. On the Republican side, McCain ended with 707 delegates, Romney had 294, Huckabee took 195. To win the GOP candidacy race, one needs 1191 delegates.
Seeking support, McCain went to deliver a dynamite speech on February 7 at the American Conservative Political Activity Convention, proclaiming his agreements with CPAC on birth control, abortion, gun rights, judicial appointments, national security and government spending. He had to defend himself against accusations on campaign finance control, climate changes and immigration policies, the Bush tax cuts, and defending his dubbing of some conservative leaders as agents of intolerance. The ranks of his opponent continue to be formidable. On the Conservative internet, Ann Coulter has turned from Goldwater Girl to a Hillary Girl, snowballing all the accusations into a blanket declaration that McCain is a Liberal and a Democrat, and soothsaying that a Hillary presidency will unify Republicans, to overthrow her four years later, for an everlasting GOP paradise thereafter, while a McCain presidency will turn Republicans into midstream patsies in four years, leading to 30 years of subsequent Democrat rule. Club of Growth, the tax cut people, consider the Arizonian’s record tenuous. James Dobson of Focus on Family will not vote, if McCain wins. On the air waves, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and Laura Ingraham continue to deny McCain’s Conservative credentials. McCain has objected, pointing to an 83% rating from the American Conservative Union, sponsor of the conference.
But, right there at the CPAC, like a thunderbolt, instead of an expected clarion call from Gov. Romney for Conservatives to close ranks behind him, the 2nd-ranking GOP candidate announced that he is withdrawing and urging all Republicans to unite behind McCain in the interests of destroying terrorists, stopping the intra-party warfare and concentrating on defeating the Democrats in November 2008. Romney had apparently done the calculus that after spending $40M of family money ($87M overall) his eventual defeat was inescapable.
What to do? The sudden Republican dilemma was obviously wrenching, even to the schadenfreude-prone observers – it put the nation at risk, not just the demoralized GOPians. The whackily charming populist Huckabee, a creationist, hated by the radio hosts even more than McCain, who refuses to withdraw, is the Republicans’ unlikely remaining major candidate, overwhelmingly winning Kansas two days later. But reason prevailed at the CPAC, and the convention turned into a triumph for McCain, who in the coming weeks would have had scary setbacks until the eventual national primary vote victory. Now he can look forward to an easy summer 2008 Republican national convention in St. Paul.
The Democrats have not had a similar resolves, with Hillary and Obama splitting Super Tuesday’s 22 state primaries, the big states bringing the delegates count to 1045 in the Clinton column, vs. 960 for Barack, towards the magic number of 2025. The week after Super Tuesday Obama won four more states, narrowing the gap. The Texas and Ohio vote on March 3 will not resolve, and the elected delegates’ deadlock is expected to continue until the Denver nominating meeting in August 2008. The fact that Obama’s campaign raised $37M in January/February against Hillary’s $17M is causing some concern.
Consequently, the 20% of super-delegates, some 800 appointed Democratic party leaders, mostly Congresspeople, will be in control of the Presidential candidacy, and the contenders will have to convince them of their potential in winning against McCain. The internecine warfare will continue, giving the Republicans more ammunition.
This puts the potentially incipient Bloomberg candidacy theorists in an interesting position. We have already surrendered a New York candidate, Giuliani, and Hillary is not a shoo-in. Could the Mayor of our fair city give the more rabid political Conservatives a viable anti-McCain candidate to back, a practical businessman with Liberal /Democratic background and a record of accomplishments, not exactly acceptable for the Christian social Conservatives, but anyway…? Which party would the “Nader effect” impact more? Would this drain a potential Hillary candidacy more that that of Obama? Would Bloomberg be crazy enough to create the third party, a billion dollar endeavor, and risk the social consequences? The odds are against it, but speculation is a major American sport.
You can find more of Wally Dobelis’ columns on http:/dobelisfile.blogspot. The actual title of Calderon's 17th Century Oedipal comedy about Basilio, King of Poland and his son Sigismundo is LaVida Es Sueno, and the iimprisoned prince's Hamlet-like song translates as:
What is life? A frenzy. What is life? An illusion
A shdow, a fiction, andut dreams, and the greatest gain is petty.
For all of life is a dream, and dreams are nothing but dreams.
# posted by Wally Dobelis @ 2:34 AM 
