The smartest sentence I've read all month is buried in the middle of this article. In weighing the candidates against one another, Dahlia advises us Democrats to bear in mind that:

"To be sure, the policy differences between Obama and Clinton may be meager. But there are differences of temperament and character that have nothing whatsoever to do with race or gender."[emphasis added]

That's true, and it's important. From everything I know about their temperament and character, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are nothing like each other. . . and they differ, now that I think about it, in ways that seem to explain how they hold on to their respective demographics.

The shorthand summation of Obama is that he's charismatic and cool. He's at ease in his skin, likes talking to people, and makes the whole electoral ordeal look almost insultingly easy. It makes perfect sense that his core constituent groups would be the young, the rich, and the well-educated. . . I'll be blunt and collectively refer to them as what they are: "the Lucky."

The shorthand summation of Clinton is that she's tough and tenacious: a hard operator for a hard time. She's working her ass off, against an opponent to whom everything seems to come easily, and it's an endless uphill fight. That's a story with natural appeal to the blue-collar workers and older women who make up Clinton's core base of support. . . let's just call them "the Unlucky" for short.

The Lucky and the Unlucky, as groups, are strongly inclined to distrust and dislike each other, especially when it comes to national politics. To win, a politician must please both of these groups simultaneously. . . which is almost (but not quite) impossible.

The safest solution, and the road taken by most politicians, is to try to look like someone who is both Lucky and Unlucky. Bill Clinton's campaign in 1992 is a good example of this technique.

For those few politicians who are unmistakably, undisguisably members of the Lucky (like John F. Kennedy) or of the Unlucky (like Richard Nixon), a different strategy is required.

The key to victory, for a Presidential candidate openly running as one of the Lucky, is to present a vision of optimism so powerful, and so compelling, that even the Unlucky find themselves infected by it. That's how Kennedy beat Nixon.

For a Presidential candidate forced to run openly as one of the Unlucky, by contrast, the only path to victory is to present a vision of the world so dark, so hopeless, and so twisted that it persuades everyone, even the Lucky, to abandon all hope of anything beyond mere survival. That's how Nixon beat Humphrey.

Obama is not real!!!~!

Lets’ talk about Obama judgment!

Obama says he had better judgment that Hillary, but lets’ consider his real estate purchase with Rezko and even a walk through with of the property with him, when he knew Rezko was under investigation by the FBI. When asked about this, Obama stated it was “Bone Headed”. Now I ask you does he have better judgment. Lets’ consider taking campaign contributions from Rezko after he knew he was under investigation by the FBI. ABC News did an investigation, and found that Obama had only given half of $150,000.00 to charity, when he had claimed that about $75,000.00 was all he received. After the investigation by ABC another $75,000.00 was given to charity. I guess this is another case of good judgment?

You be the judge!

Your argument is moot because Obama will have to drop out before the convention. His dirty history with Rezko is catching up very fast, and he is doing a great job of shooting himself in the foot. Obama is no longer getting a free ride, and he is being vetted by the press. He is in fact, an empty shirt, and a dirty one at that.

Yeah, unlike that pristine lily-white, I never did anything wrong, I am the only person that knows what the American people need, I am the only one who can be ready on day one although I have done nothing to prove it Clinton?

Yeah! That one!

Any woman who can a) have and raise a child while working full-time and working on children's and women's issues; and b) who can get up every single morning and continue to function, day after day, after what her husband put her through; and c) who has broken damned near every "ceiling" she's ever reached is definitely getting my vote. It always takes a woman to do it all.

And, BTW: She's done a h*** of a lot more than Obama, if you check out her record and don't keep letting the media feed you crap. Obama's considered a "dilettante by his own peers in the U.S. Senate -- too busy keeping his hands clean to take on "really" controversial issues (except of course in his speeches).

Good luck with eating on "hope" and "change" or paying your mortgage with them. That and $3.50 will get you 1 gallon of gasoline...

You must be male. Before you decide that she has done nothing, you must read up on her biography. Let me tell you about a woman:

1. Women live longer than men;

2. Women are able to perform many tasks at one time;.

3. Women are better witnesses because we pay more attention to details;

4. Women are able to handle pain better than men, hence, the reason why we were the ones chosen to give birth;

5. Women's ability to listen and hear is superior to men;

6. Businesses run by women are more successful than men.

All of that, together with her education, life experiences, and her love for her country, and it's people makes HILLARY CLINTON the best candidate running to be the president (mother) of our country.

I relate to the "unlucky" approach in planning yet I'm aware of the appeal of positive thinking in our society. Carter, Bush I and Gore all destroyed their Presidential hopes to some extent by rightly telling America we suffer from a malaise and need to turn down the thermostats and pay some taxes while Reagan, Bill Clinton and Bush rode waves of feel good optimism to power. Realist "unlucky" types are actually more conservative and tend to be right and more proactive in their diagnoses of problems but short of a depression, such as benefitted FDR, Americans just can't deal with that kind of reality and the necessary change. I think Edwards suffered from his basically dour and accurate portrayal of what is happening in our country and what needs to be done. Hillary although also a bit of an "unlucky" type is glassing over the problems of Iraq and our economy and trying to come across as a "lucky" candidate but I think policy wise (while weaker philisophically on foreign policy) she is in some respect stronger on domestic programs (such as her approach to health insurance though whether she could pass it is another question) than Obama. Obama doesn't have to gloss over the war becasue even as he criticises it he is shielded by his "lucky" optimis.

I want to get the young of our country involved in politics and I think the foreign policy portfolio is the most importan role of the President as Congress should be able to address the economic issues so I support Obama though I have tremendous respect for Clinton. The nominee should now be decided by the votes of the Democratic electorate and I would point out that it is not necessarily synonymous with the number of assigned delegates and certainly not superdelegates. I think Michigan and Florida need to revote..

make me cringe when i read their posts. Have you never heard the adage about two wrongs not equalling a right?

Due to the historical subjugation of women in a patriarchal society, there has been a backlash against men. Just because they treated women like crap and touted their "maleness" as making them fit to rule does not validate the argument that a woman's "femaleness" make her more fit to rule. Both arguments are tripe. I understand why women had to make such speeches in the face of a vastly sexist society, but the time has moved past that. and such rhetoric is suitable only to pass on in the FWDing spam universe to one's contacts that have lots of extra room in their inboxes.

I have heard similar arguments using race, religion, etc... Anything that one can prove has made a group historically downtrodden. They're all just strawmen. If people are so stupid in 2008 that they still believe that you can tell something immediately about something based on such superficial nonsense, well, i am lot more worried about humanity's continued existence than i was ten minutes ago.

Everyone is individual and should be viewed as such. If you vote for someone solely because they are black, white, asian, male, female, a particular religion or ideology- well, you're an idiot, a simpleton and you almost make ME feel stupid enough to try and stop people below a certain intelligence level from having the ability to vote.

Look, when it comes down to it, what do we really need from a president? The platforms they run on many times end up being moot because new legislature has to be approved and passed through congress. So when i look at who i want to vote for, i think about the things that the President can do that NOONE else can. I think about flexibility, intelligence and, above all, diplomacy. One reason Obama has many supporters- and ones who really can't voice the "why" of their support, i believe is because what is appealing are his communication skills- especially after 8 years of a guy who couldn't communicate AT ALL! Policies and programs play less of a part in elections than people would like to believe and ultimately are shaped by the behind the scenes players.

Bush's diplomatic skills are beyond nonexistent and we need someone in the white house who is able to communicate with others and not just point fingers and yell "evildoers". We need someone who is able to understand the subtlety of the complex situations that we as a global civilization with a global economy now have to deal with. Can Hillary do that? Can Barack? idk, but i know it surely doesn't have anything to do with their race or sex.

MERC318:

You must be male. Before you decide that she has done nothing, you must read up on her biography. Let me tell you about a woman:

1. Women live longer than men;

2. Women are able to perform many tasks at one time;.

3. Women are better witnesses because we pay more attention to details;

4. Women are able to handle pain better than men, hence, the reason why we were the ones chosen to give birth;

5. Women's ability to listen and hear is superior to men;

6. Businesses run by women are more successful than men.

All of that, together with her education, life experiences, and her love for her country, and it's people makes HILLARY CLINTON the best candidate running to be the president (mother) of our country.

And yet, somehow, men still run the world. How did that happen?

LOL! C'mon, lighten up.

trueconservative.

Thrasymachus,

You said:

"To be sure, the policy differences between Obama and Clinton may be meager. But there are differences of temperament and character that have nothing whatsoever to do with race or gender."[emphasis added]

That's true, and it's important. From everything I know about their temperament and character, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are nothing like each other. . . and they differ, now that I think about it, in ways that seem to explain how they hold on to their respective demographics.

“The shorthand summation of Obama is that he's charismatic and cool. He's at ease in his skin, likes talking to people, and makes the whole electoral ordeal look almost insultingly easy.”

I find your ‘Lucky’ versus ‘Unlucky’ summation just another exploitable set of stereotypes that at one stroke, insults constituents on both sides of this divide set up between Democrats by both camps, but justifying the dirty innuendoes of the Hillary Camp because ‘They Are The Unlucky’ and therefore have a RIGHT to be unscrupulous and downright dirty in their tactics. True. Obama and Clinton are very different people. To fault a man with natural high intelligence who respects people, and praise by default, someone whose intelligence serves her megalomania to win at all costs, as seen in her campaign tactics is laughable. She is not and never was a feminist who single handedly supported herself and her children. In no way did she live the plight of the single mother or underpaid female worker in any white-collar office or anywhere else. She is a woman who had the means to leave a philandering husband with her child and still keep putting hers and his money in the bank. For feminists who have struggled with harsh realities due to their life situations and gender to assume Hillary is and was like them is unfortunately, delusional.

How clever of you to come up with this ‘Lucky’ versus ‘Unlucky’ set of branding irons. What is needed in this political arena that we are all living through is more real intelligence and less buzzword, spin manipulation. I guess only ‘lucky people’ are friendly to their neighbors and people who are different than themselves. And your ‘Unlucky people’ must view intelligence and ‘ease’ with suspicion because as you imply..they are a bunch of losers who have a right to hate and despise anyone they think is better off..or got ‘a leg up’ in life. You have simply made and spun more stereotypes into the mud. ..And shown disrespect for those of either side of your branding iron.
A

Oh come now. You ever see a chick fight?

Thrasymachus, I like the supporter 'framework' you've drawn there. Definitely fits a lot of the demographic/psychographic splits we see.

Funny part is, the 'Lucky' people seem to be convinced by Barack's easy promises of change by hoping for the future - and the 'Unlucky' people, the people who need change & hope the most, actually don't agree they can get it from him.

The "unlucky" who are basically unemployed, underemployed, hanging on by their fingernails folks whose angst is real and understandable are also basically magical thinkers. The Hillarians contend that Obama supporters are cultists. Ironically, however, the Clinton base is mesmerized by the notion that times were good when Bill was president and, so, if Hillary were elected, those times will return. Not cultists exactly but certainly those seeking the services of the shaman.

Dude, your obama-induced-amnesia has made you forget just how good the times were eight years ago. Peace, the best economic growth rate ever, a balanced budget and a surplus, world-wide respect for America - which part of it was not good enough for you?

MERC318,

This race could use a lot less generalizing about gender (or race), so save your "woman are this, men are that" crap, its just silly and counter productive.

Yeah, we are over due to have a woman president, but not for any of the silly, overly generalize reasons you list.

Plus, I don't think American needs a "mother", that's just cringe inducing. And we don't need a father either. Just a leader.