You have heard that a long drawn out battle with Hillary Clinton is to John McCain’s advantage. This may be true, but I am going to show you the downside as well.

The pro’s

We all know the general advantages for the GOP of a protracted Democrat primary season. Briefly, here are most of them:

1. Both Obama and Hillary spend more money on each other.
2. Their efforts to win will damage them both, revealing weaknesses the GOP can use later.
3. It divides the Democrat party further, and will leave lasting scars and even defectors who won’t vote for the “other” if “their” candidate does not win.
4. It is damn entertaining to watch these crazy clueless folks scramble around trying to look important and qualified. The name calling within the party is an extra perk as well.

But few people have mentioned or discussed what the downside is for this process to go on well into the summer, perhaps even all the way to Denver in August.

The Con

Cover for Obama’s positions…

Currently, McCain has the luxury of staying mostly out of the fray, avoiding that which drags one down into the gutter… i.e., day to day politics. Obama and Clinton are doing that work on each other, and Howard Dean jumps in from time to time just to remind us how lucky we are that he never became President. During this time, McCain has time to regroup, gather some advisors and formulate good positions and plans for the ‘General’, and time to generally look “Presidential” by making statesman like trips and speeches around the Country.

Oh- and make money.

But while all of this is happening, a very quiet and somewhat dastardly advantage for Obama is playing out beneath our radar.

Due to the nature of the situation, Clinton and Obama need to obviously focus on each other right now. However, don’t think for a moment that this will bring out ALL of the necessary information that the public needs to focus on in order to make a solid decision in November.

Put another way, Obama is a mysterious and relatively unknown factor in politics. He is of course a first termer. He avoids the media like the plague, excepting softball shows like The View and other tabloid garbage that endears candidates to idiots but protects them from the serious scrutiny which can cause real political damage.

This long and drawn out primary is giving Obama “cover”. He is not being attacked by the right yet as that would show presumption as to who the nominee will be. Of course we know he will probably win, but at this time, McCain is taking the high road and letting the process continue on the left unchallenged for the most part.

By letting this process go until August, Obama and the Democrats may, then, be stumbling into an advantage that they have not perceived yet. Or, better put, those in the political world may be aware of this advantage, but the majority of the voting public are not.

Obama winning in a close contest at the Convention will be big news, and will draw huge media attention. But even more important to him is the fact that a shortened General is to his advantage. It gives the GOP less time to tear him down on inexperience, and expose his far far left leanings. Two months is not enough time to paint this man into a liberal box, not when you are having to contest the din of the wave of hype from the first black man ever to be nominated, in a close nail-biter that was just decided in August.

This wave of hype and short General just might make it impossible to make a common sense case against Obama, because much of America will be high on the concept that “A black man made it, we are vindicated for our prior sins now!!!”

Howard Dean, our friend…

With all of that said, Howard Dean just might be the GOP’s best ally right now. As screwed up and emotional as this man is, he might be right (for us anyway) to suggest this contest between Clinton and Obama should end sooner than later. He has suggested June, or July latest, in order to help his party. But I think it helps us more than it helps the Dems.

I am sure all of you conservatives will be thanking Howard Dean if he gets his way. Keep him and his wish in your prayers!

“The Audacity of Rationalizing”

Obama’s Mistakes

In a speech given today in Philadelphia, Barack Obama finally proved he is fallible. While many other pundits and sites will be talking about some other more obvious problems with Obama’s forlorn attempt at being as powerful with a speech as Lincoln, or MLK, I am going to target some of the more difficult to spot concerns.

1. Conditional Hypocritical Patriotism

Who is this man?

Is this possibly the man who does not like to put his hand over his heart during the Pledge of Allegiance? Is this the man who will not wear a lapel Flag Pin? Is this the man who feels it is to jingoistic and disingenuous to act patriotic in a celebratory manner?

Well then, what the hell is he doing surrounded by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8… yes EIGHT… US flags during his speech on which his political career will pivot?

2. Rationalization of Behavior

This excerpt from the speech really set me off:

“Did I know him to be an occasionally fierce critic of American domestic and foreign policy? Of course. Did I ever hear him make remarks that could be considered controversial while I sat in church? Yes. Did I strongly disagree with many of his political views? Absolutely - just as I’m sure many of you have heard remarks from your pastors,

Some of you might think, reading that headline, that what you will get here are election strategies, talking points, issue debates for the General Election with Obama or Clinton (most likely Obama)…

But if you have come here for that, you will be disappointed. I am going to make the presumption, for the sake of argument, that McCain wins. What you are going to get from me today is HOW Conservatives WIN with McCain once he is IN office.

Without question, the far right is taking their “my ball and I am going home” strategy to the max, and talk radio is trying hard to claim victories in States like Virginia where, in fact, both the far right AND talk radio are insisting that the close “on your heels” performance of Huckabee was a ’sign’ of their dominance. But, in reality, while both groups can claim that their constituency did have something to do with that outcome, I think it would be impossible to make a claim, scientifically or otherwise, that either group had ANY real impact on the outcome. My point is, that outcome likely would have been EXACTLY the same without the uproar.

Meaning? It would have been close, not as close perhaps, but close, and McCain would have still won. Being able to argue “Huckabee LOST by LESS because of us!” is just about meaningless. (Keep in mind here, I support Huck, and don’t care much for McCain.)

Even without the uproar of the Coulter’s and the Limbaugh’s of the world, the outcome would have been the same, just perhaps not as close. To suggest otherwise would be to suggest that either Conservatives are stupid on their own, or that in fact they DO just follow the talking points of the media heads in the party.

I think otherwise, and I will argue they can figure it out themselves.

I think the effect of talk radio and far right wingers on actual primary elections is much more minimal than general elections. The problem with THIS election is that the far right let McCain survive too long. They (the far right) should have stated from the get go that they would not support him, period. Had they done so early on, months ago, when he was getting on planes alone, and out of cash, he would have been done. The media was even saying “stick a fork in him???”

The far right missed their chance there, perhaps out of kindness, perhaps out of common negligence (lack of foresight) and perhaps out of smugness that there was NO way McCain would win. But there is no doubt in my mind that the far right could have squashed McCain early on, had they had the unity and foresight to do so.

Do I blame them that we are where we are? No. That would be ludicrous. I will only blame them if we lose the White House (Veto power in a Democrat controlled congress), the war in Iraq, or the chance to nominate 1-2 SCOTUS judges for LIFE, due to their insistence that they cannot vote for McCain.

So- let’s just assume McCain can win if we put the collective votes of the GOP behind him- he CAN. If that is the case, what do we DO as Conservatives to make this work for us?

The key word is, we will have to work. Daily. For four years.

We cannot vote, then sit by and go back to our lives as they were, so to speak, and just expect that on autopilot our Conservative Warrior is going to take care of business for us. Even BUSH has failed us in some regards, on issues that might have never have expected, and honestly, it is OUR fault.

I mean, seriously, you far-righters… how different is BUSH than McCain on immigration? Hasn’t Bush let us down on spending? Even McCain would likely be stronger than he on pork. Granted McCain and Bush differ in other ways, but we have to understand how to WIN… how we MAKE lemonade out of, well, lemons.

McCain will most likely need to be ridden hard and put away wet. The likes of Dobson and AFA and Grassfire and the Minutemen will have to put his feet to the fire over and over. The Log Cabin Republicans and the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute will have to pound him from time to time. The Federalist Society and the NRA will have to bounce him around. I could go on and on, but the point is, we are going to have to WORK.

We are going to have to work at the grassroots level to make this “President” work if we want to “win” with him.

If you want to vote and go back on autopilot, he is not the man for that. We don’t have a better alternative, than to put him IN, and then WORK, ourselves, to make HIM work.

This last summer, McCain stuck his finger in our eye again with immigration legislation that he supported that amounted to amnesty. Big mistake, and honestly, we as a party made him feel our pain.

He will respond, as President… I actually have faith that he will. But, it won’t come without some kicking and screaming, on both sides (his and ours). But WE have the power- he is one man; we are the PARTY.

McCain will bend. If he is good at anything, it is that. He has proven that, much to our dismay. We just have to be the bigger wind on his reed.

I am willing to support the man, but I am also willing to work to make HIM work. Are you?

If you are not ready or willing to work, then be willing to lose. Big.

Well, Kreskin I ain’t, but after today I have to say that my prediction last week of McCain taking the Republican nomination is looking more and more accurate. And again, I have to reiterate that this is not what I am cheering for, but rather this is simply how I see it playing out.

With a sound victory today in Florida, Senator “I get it… Border security FIRST!” looks to be headed in the direction of a Super Tuesday victory,