New Hampshire: Clinton Even With Giuliani, McCain, Romney

The Raz poll comfirms the Survey USA which has Mitt and Rudy neck-and-neck with Hillary. The GOP is in an upswing in NH recently. I think it is due to (1) NH being up close and personal with the candidates (2) the Moveon ad about the general and (3) Signs of improvement in Iraq. Lets hope the situation in Iraq continues to improvement.

Prejudice goes both ways. For example, the Yellow Dogs of the South rejected sKerry due to him being from Massahole. Catholic voters in WI, Mi, and Pa did not vote for George W Bush because he was too Texan for their tastes.

George W. Bush’s New England roots notwithstanding, he was viewed as a Texan first, second and third, and he carried New Hampshire in 2000 (as you mentioned) with 48%, and then improved his performance in southern NH (the Boston suburbs)to get 49% statewide in 2004, which fell just short of winning. I think that if Fred Tgompson is the GOP nominee he can be competitive in NH irrespective of his Southern roots. Remember, Westerners Nixon and Reagan did better in New Hampshire than just about anywhere else, and Midwesterner Ford also did very well.

“Dole only needed Perot’s support and supporters, and he would’ve beaten Clinton in almost all the states that Dubya carried in 2000.”

Had Dole gotten Perot’s votes in 1996, he would have won with exactly 270 EVs (with PA giving him the narrowest victory). If you gave the Dole + Perot 1996 % to Bush and subtracted the Buchanan 2000 % from it, and gave the Clinton 1996 % to Gore and subtracted the Nader 2000 % from it, you would be able to predict the 2000 presidential election results in just about every state (the only outliers IIRC being LA, AR and WV going to Bush and PA going to Gore).

But that hypothetical assumes that EVERY single Perot voter would switch to Bush with Perot out of the race. While I'm fairly certain Perot drew more GOP crossover votes than Dem crossover votes (in spite of his claims that he drew equally from both parties), but there are also a great deal of Perot voters that would have stayed home or voted for Clinton if Perot had not been in the race. If was to guess, I'd say that at best, only about 60-65% Perot voters would have switched to Dole with Perot out of the race.

Bottom line: Had it been a two way race between Clinton and Dole, I think Bob Dole still loses. He did do pretty good under the circumstances and made it closer than people expected, but even in a two-way race I don't think he defeats an incumbant President. He was too old, too dull(yes Dole has a wonderful dry sense of humor but I'm pretty sure the MSM worked to bury it during the election season), too establishment, and too tied to a safe, rural midwestern electorate that was in the GOP's pocket no matter what. His choice of Jack Kemp for V.P. seemed like an excellnt pick at first (in fact many Republicans had "dreamed" of "rising star" Kemp going on to the Presidency since the Reagan years), but he too, fizzled, and lost a debate to Albore of all people. GOP Senators from "safe" states don't win, and Dem Senators from "safe" states don't win either. I'm sure you can hypothetically come up with a way Kerry won in 2004 if he had carried Ohio and done some other things differently, but the bottom line is, both he and Dole still lost.

If Fred Thompson put an end to this pattern he'd be the first Presidential candidate since Warren Harding to do so. Harding, incidentially, had the advantage of running against Woodrow Wilson fatigue and spent the entire campaign season shoring up votes with his "return to Normalcy" platform of throwing out the Dems. He had the wind at his back because people were sick and tired of Democrats after 8 years of Woody. This year, the GOP has the opposite problem, we have to win in spite of "Bush fatigue" after 8 years of "Republican" control of the white house.

Incidentally, every single one of these "Fred wins nationally" scenarios automatically assume his opponent is the Hilderbeast and he benefits from massive GOP turnout and her polarizing figure. Although Hillary is way ahead of the rest of the RAT field, my father (who is also a FDT supporter, BTW) doesn't believe Hillary will get the nomination precisely because the Dems know she is so derisive and unelectable.

He envisions Howard Dean and the RAT leaders putting together an emergency "Stop Hillary" plan where Obama, accepting that he cannot get the nomination (and Hillary will NEVER choose him as veep), drops out at the 11th hour and throws his support and delegates to Edwards in exchange for a major role in the Edwards administration. With Edwards and Obama's numbers combined, they narrowly overtake Hillary in the delegate count with her having all the big urban states and the Edwards/Obama team gets all the delegates from the rural Midwestern and southern states, giving Edwards the nomination.

Edwards is another RAT nominee in the mold of their previous successful candidates, Clinton and Carter (folksy southern "populist" who embraces socialism but campaigns as "moderate", and I do believe he would win such an election due to Bush fatigue.

"But that hypothetical assumes that EVERY single Perot voter would switch to Bush with Perot out of the race. While I'm fairly certain Perot drew more GOP crossover votes than Dem crossover votes (in spite of his claims that he drew equally from both parties), but there are also a great deal of Perot voters that would have stayed home or voted for Clinton if Perot had not been in the race. If was to guess, I'd say that at best, only about 60-65% Perot voters would have switched to Dole with Perot out of the race."

I think it would've been higher than that. Perot could've played the statesman and did the right thing, but he chose not to.

"Bottom line: Had it been a two way race between Clinton and Dole, I think Bob Dole still loses. He did do pretty good under the circumstances and made it closer than people expected,"

I disagree. He underperformed what he should've. And while Dole didn't "open it up" on the campaign trail as he should've, it ultimately wasn't him that lost the election. Part of it was Perot, but the biggest part of all was he and Gingrich blinking in the face of the '95 Gov't shutdown. Clinton was toast after '94 and we were clearly in charge -- for a whole year, but after that, Clinton was in the driver's seat. We should've run him out of Washington on a rail like a low-rent Carter, but we failed to take out the trash. Even if we had gotten someone else to run other than Dole, the end result, given the dynamics, would've been precisely the same.

"His choice of Jack Kemp for V.P. seemed like an excellent pick at first (in fact many Republicans had "dreamed" of "rising star" Kemp going on to the Presidency since the Reagan years), but he too, fizzled, and lost a debate to Albore of all people."

Kemp's timidity and nicey-nice conduct against two ruthless campaigners was nothing short of embarrassing. He made Dan Quayle look as brutal as LBJ.

"GOP Senators from "safe" states don't win, and Dem Senators from "safe" states don't win either. I'm sure you can hypothetically come up with a way Kerry won in 2004 if he had carried Ohio and done some other things differently, but the bottom line is, both he and Dole still lost."

Kerry needed a Dem Sec of State in Ohio to aide and abet rodent fraud. They have one now. But again, let us not forget, most Presidents in the past century get reelected, and they were both challenging incumbents. The only ones who lost (who were able or willing to run a 2nd time) were because of only two reasons, a substantial 3rd party challenger preventing them from winning (Taft, 1912; Bush, 1992) or the economy (Hoover, 1928; Carter, 1980). I disregard Ford because he wasn't even able to win once (although had the election been held a month later, most pundits believe he would've prevailed, since he had already closed the wide gap by the election).

"If Fred Thompson put an end to this pattern he'd be the first Presidential candidate since Warren Harding to do so. Harding, incidentially, had the advantage of running against Woodrow Wilson fatigue and spent the entire campaign season shoring up votes with his "return to Normalcy" platform of throwing out the Dems. He had the wind at his back because people were sick and tired of Democrats after 8 years of Woody."

We almost dumped Wilson after a single term in 1916, as he barely won (and he outright lied about his position on the European War and getting America involved). Wilson wasn't even the President by the end of his 2nd term, his new wife was (after his stroke in 1919).

"This year, the GOP has the opposite problem, we have to win in spite of "Bush fatigue" after 8 years of "Republican" control of the white house."

Partly, yes, but having a rodent Congress with even larger disapproval numbers evens the score to a degree. Also, remember that Clinton fatigue should've resulted in a landslide win for Dubya in 2000, and that didn't happen, either. Going by the popular vote, you could say Clinton got a 3rd term. All Fred has to do is pull a Gore, albeit in the same states Dubya did, and he'll win, or he could simply duplicate Dubya for that matter and get fewer votes than Hillary and still win (and since the EV votes have changed from 2000, he'd win by a wider margin in the college).

The great thing about Fred, and why the media is so terrified of him that you see hit pieces daily about how "unimpressive/lackluster, etc" he is is because this is a candidate without any guile whatsoever. He is exactly who he appears to be. Honest. I think that will have enormous appeal to the public.

"Incidentally, every single one of these "Fred wins nationally" scenarios automatically assume his opponent is the Hilderbeast and he benefits from massive GOP turnout and her polarizing figure. Although Hillary is way ahead of the rest of the RAT field, my father (who is also a FDT supporter, BTW) doesn't believe Hillary will get the nomination precisely because the Dems know she is so derisive and unelectable."

Anyone legitimately tries to stop her, and there will be hell to pay, you better believe it. She ain't in the Senate today because she wants to serve the people of New York. The whole thing was a sham for her to be present in the public eye until which time she would go for the Presidency. Know why she didn't run in 2004 ? Because she knew Dubya wasn't going to lose. We're talking about one of the coldest, most calculating individuals in politics today (I dare say even more so than her husband, who at least enjoyed pressing-the-flesh, eye-to-eye campaigning -- I think she views it as an unfortunate and distracting aspect in the way to getting the power she craves, and it tends to show in her stiffness). Where there's a similarity between Fred and Hillary, it is this, they are both running because they know they will win their respective primaries. If there was even the slightest possibility they wouldn't, they wouldn't be running. It's that simple.

"He envisions Howard Dean and the RAT leaders putting together an emergency "Stop Hillary" plan where Obama, accepting that he cannot get the nomination (and Hillary will NEVER choose him as veep), drops out at the 11th hour and throws his support and delegates to Edwards in exchange for a major role in the Edwards administration. With Edwards and Obama's numbers combined, they narrowly overtake Hillary in the delegate count with her having all the big urban states and the Edwards/Obama team gets all the delegates from the rural Midwestern and southern states, giving Edwards the nomination."

For a general election, that might appear smart, but if they turn on Hillary like that, there will be a major-league bloodbath. Hillary would not sit idly by and let that happen. Any Democrat that does not fear her is very stupid or naive. I'll tell you I can imagine she'd order political hits more readily and coldly than her husband.

"Edwards is another RAT nominee in the mold of their previous successful candidates, Clinton and Carter (folksy southern "populist" who embraces socialism but campaigns as "moderate", and I do believe he would win such an election due to Bush fatigue."

Edwards is a phony, an empty suit, and a pathological liar. His one-term wonder win in a jinxed seat was a fluke (and he couldn't even carry NC to help Kerry -- and he didn't want to run for a 2nd term because he also knew he couldn't win over Dick Burr). I think Obama would be much more formidable, although he is even more leftist than Hillary, but doesn't have the negatives (mainly because most people don't know his extremist record, let alone incredible verbal gaffes ("10,000 people died in the Kansas tornado !" (12 died, IIRC) -- they just see him smiling with Oprah and think he looks like a nice, pleasant man).