This week on 7 Days, hear why renowned JFK speechwriter and headliner Ted Sorensen compares Barack Obama to his former boss and then get the smart scoop on Super Tuesday from Arianna, Mark Green and democratic strategist Bob Shrum.
Click here to listen.
At the Edge of Political History?
by Mark Green
For months, commentators have breathlessly said that this week's primary or caucus may be critically important...until next week's.
Next week has arrived. There's a good chance we'll be able to see the next four to eight years of American politics and governance Wednesday morning.
On the Democratic side, two evenly matched Democrats -- in fame, in money, in smarts, in grit -- are now ready to begin the long march of gathering delegates to Denver. Tit-for-tat spin and attack will now likely give way to hard numbers -- not the % of votes gained nationally (ask Al Gore if that's the decisive test) or the number of states won...but the number of delegates won toward the 2025 needed for the nomination.
In my view, there are now three major benchmarks for Clinton and Obama: First, can either gain, say, a 200 delegate advantage (counting super-delegates) out of the some 2,100 delegates committed by February 6? Because nothing succeeds like success, a small edge can swell into a larger one -- especially among Super-Delegates --much as it did for Ford over Reagan in 1976 and Mondale over Hart in 1984.
Second, who wins California? Delegates are more important than any one state, but California is still a Super-Sized win in the minds of headline writers, pundits and pols everywhere (with apologies to my New York neighbors.)
And third, do Obama and Clinton play nasty or nice going forward -- do they look like they're on a date (the last debate) or squabbling in front of the kids (pre-debate)? Do they, or can they, evolve into a ticket or exaggerate small differences over months of combat that play into the hands of a chosen Republican nominee?
Air America convened a panel on our regular weekend show, "7 Days in America," that had some special insights into these and other questions. Here are some excerpts -- or you can listen on-line to the entire program here.
SORENSEN, HUFFINGTON, SHRUM, GREEN PREVIEW SUPER TUESDAY!
On "7 Days in America" this weekend, political veterans Ted Sorensen and Bob Shrum got down to the real issues and angles of Super Tuesday with co-hosts Arianna Huffington and Mark Green. If you're tired of shouting heads on cable news programs, here are excerpts from this show.
· SORSENSEN on odds of a Clinton-Obama ticket...and Catholics to the back of the bus: "Oh, maybe 1 in 1,000." Why? "Well, just take a look at the two candidates and what their pasts and futures are: Obama is 46 years old. He would be eligible to run for president 4 years, 8 years, 12 years from now, at least. And accepting the vice presidency would be inconsistent, stamping him as number 2....And when they asked John Kennedy if he'd accept #2, he said, 'oh, the Catholic to the back ofa the bus?'"
· HUFFINGTON on what Thursday's debate meant for Obama and Clinton: "In terms of substance, to be 'right' from day one as opposed to so-called 'ready' from day one' - that was a pretty major moment for Obama...Also, the whole moment about the Iraq War was a very bad moment for Hillary. She can't basically be straight about it, and it's hurting her. If she had just said what John Edwards said - 'That was the wrong vote. Period. The end. Now Obama and I are now in the same place' - it would be over, but she can't do that...It's perpetuating that reputation about her that she can't be straight."
· HUFFINGTON on McCain's message in a General Election: "Actually, I can see, not just how he runs, but unfortunately I can see how he wins: Because Democrats, at the moment, are making all those noises again about running on the economy and are forgetting that after 9/11, every election is ultimately going to come down to national security. No matter how bad the economy is, in the end people vote their fears. And if John McCain can make people believe that he will be able protect them and keep them safer more powerfully, more successfully than Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama - that's really the campaign. And that's why Democrats can't give up on national security. They have all the cards on national security - we are less safe, Iraq is a debacle, Afghanistan is a debacle -- but we have to drum that home."
· SHRUM on the possibility of a close delegate fight through to the Convention: "Well, I don't know that if it's likely it goes all the way to the convention...My guess is that the more likely outcome is that it keeps churning through the primaries as it did with, say, Mondale and Hart, and it gets to the point where somebody just edges over. That's what happened with Reagan and Ford in 1976. I don't think it will go all the way to the convention, but I think for the first time in many, many years, it could."
· GREEN on likelihood of a Convention fight: "Obama is clearly coming on strong with activists and the young, like his 70-30 win at Moveon. But since there's a strong chance that no one comes out of Super Tuesday with more than a couple hundred delegate margin - and given that each contender is famous, funded and tough - why would either concede before a Convention? And if Obama has an edge among Moveon Dems, doesn't Clinton have an advantage with Democratic party officials they've been cultivating for years? And at a party Convention, wouldn't her machine have an edge over his Moveon?"
· SHRUM on a Convention fight: "Sure, and you take the nomination, I suppose, however you get it. But I would say that the example of what happened to Hubert Humphrey suggests that the worst way to get the nomination is to be handed it by a bunch of politicians regardless of the way people vote in the primaries. I think these primaries could end up being very, very close and at that point, I actually believe [Super Delegates] will make the decision, if they hold the balance of power, about who they want to run with."
· GREEN on Bloomberg: " Mike Bloomberg, of course, is the barefoot billionaire whose been urging himself to run for president. But I think the bubble has burst now that other major independents in the country - Arnold Schwarzenegger and Joe Lieberman, arguably - have both endorsed John McCain. And McCain, obviously, has pretty strong appeal to independents. Isn't the moment for Bloomberg gone if it ever was here?"