Democratic causues are pointless because they only pull in activists who have both the free time and money necessary to participate in the primary process. However, that isn't the case for most Americans, especially those who need a president. We need to understand how these people, who are the majority of the electorate, will vote.
Most of you Obama cultists would point to Obama's victories in states like Minnestoa, Georgia, Virginia and Missouri. But these aren't really significant states. None of those states are needed to win a general election. Moreover, you need to realize that winning Democratic primaries is not a qualification or a sign of who can win the general election. If it were, every nominee would win because every nominee wins Democratic primaries.
To understand electability, you have to ask a different set of questions than those that can be answered in a primary.
- Can Obama run a national campagin like Hillary? It isn't enough to organize activists and grassroots supporters at caucuses in insignificant states. You need to have a strategy to get 270 electoral votes. A successful campaign will not waste time with building an organization since party machines already exist. What matters is having a media strategy and making the best use of relevant polling data.
- Can the candidate withstand Republican attacks during an election and win? How will Barack fare when the Republican slime machine goes after him? Hillary has withstood their attacks and won bruising Senate elections in 2000 and 2006, neither of which was a Democratic year.
- Does Obama understand the nature of fund raising for a general election? Grassroots support is cute, but it can't pay the bills.
- Can the Obama assemble a team like Hillary's? Many of them have experience on national campaigns. That's because Hillary assembles her team, not based on loyalty, but based on performance.
- Does Obama have the killer's instinct necessary to win an election? He didn't raise $40M for his Senate election with an eye toward his 2008 run. Even if we can forgive his lack of 2006 fund raising prowess, he didn't have the cajones to hold onto whatever money he had in order to build a war chest.
- Would whites and Latinos be able to vote for an African American?
In sum, Barack is weak general election candidate who possesses none of Senator Clinton's trademark campaign virtues.
DISCLAIMER: This diary is a repost of another by the same title.