In the wake of Hillary’s astounding victory (and by that I mean functional tie – 9 delegates for Clinton, 9 for Obama, and 4 for Edwards) in New Hampshire, one issue that seemed to help her was the electability factor. In the days following Iowa, Clinton garnered support by attacking Obama from the right, saying he was “too liberal” to win in the general election. This is an interesting critique in the primary season, though it does make some sense in light of McCain’s resurgence, who, as a high-profile GOP critic (at least when it’s politically convenient) of Bush, is perhaps the only Republican candidate who can still draw significant support from independents. However, even though her attacks were overshadowed by her crying, I think we are nonetheless obliged to examine whether there’s any truth to these assertions.
Barack Obama – Known Pinko Commie
First, the “too liberal” criticism. There are numerous measures of the “liberality” of a legislator’s voting record, but most are computed the same way. I’ve picked one metric from the left (Americans for Democratic Action) and one from the right (the American Conservative Union). In the ADA rating, Senators are given a “liberal quotient” – the higher the percentage, the more “liberal” they are. In 2006 (the most recent data available), both Senators scored an identical 95%. What’s more, they were both dinged on exactly the same vote – they voted for the Oman Free Trade Agreement (someone will have to explain to me why voting against free trade makes you liberal and/or progressive; as I understand the terms, opposing free trade makes you a reactionary – but that’s another issue). This seems to imply that the “too liberal” label is unwarranted – at least in comparison to the one making the charges – but let’s look at the ACU rating.
Here again, both Obama and Clinton scored an identical 8.0 (Senators are ranked from 0 to 100; higher means more conservative) in 2006. For their lifetime voting records the picture is different; it becomes apparent Obama would start nationalizing industries, burning American flags in the Rose Garden, and offering free abortions in the Lincoln Bedroom: she scored a whopping 9.0, compared to commie Obama’s 8.0. In other words, there’s little, if any, veracity to the implication that Hillary is more moderate than Obama, at least with regards to their respective records in the Senate.
Things get more complicated when we consider other issues besides votes cast; for instance Senator Obama has a much better record on earmarks – declining them for private contractors, but accepting them for public infrastructure. Clinton, by contrast, has been shameless on the issue – since taking office in 2001, she’s earmarked over $500 million for private companies, which have benefited 35+ corporations that have donated to her. She delivered nearly $250 million last year alone. I don’t think earmarking is a liberal or conservative issue anymore than theft is (but I repeat myself), but it is indicative of the type of irresponsible leviathan government that many still associate with the left. Attacks aside, Obama is also arguably more moderate in his rhetoric, which is far from irrelevant.
Numbers
Now onto the polls. I’ve included the four Republicans that I think still have a viable path to the nomination. I tried to contact the Thompson and Paul campaigns for comment, but Thompson was back in his coma, and Ron Paul was too busy race baiting to get back to me. I’ve also excluded John Edwards since he – barring a 3-way sex scandal between Hillary, Obama, and Dick Cheney – doesn’t have any real way to win the nomination. In addition, I think the polls reflect most people’s recollection of sunny, optimistic, moderate 2004 John Edwards; not angry, populist 2008 John Edwards. Anyways, here are the most recent RCP Averages (Dem Var means the difference in the margin of victory between Clinton and Obama):
Rudy Giuliani 45.2% vs. Hillary Clinton 47.0%
Spread: Clinton +1.8%
Rudy Giuliani 41.5% vs. Barack Obama 48.8%
Spread: Obama +7.3%
Dem Var: Obama +5.5%
Mitt Romney 44.2% vs. Hillary Clinton 49.0%
Spread: Clinton +4.8%
Mitt Romney 39.2% vs. Barack Obama 51.4%
Spread: Obama +12.2%
Dem Var: Obama +7.4%
Mike Huckabee 43.5% vs. Hillary Clinton 48.3%
Spread: Clinton +4.8%
Mike Huckabee 39.0% vs. Barack Obama 49.4%
Spread: Obama +10.4%
Dem Var: Obama +5.6%
John McCain 48.8% vs. Hillary Clinton 43.8%
Spread: McCain +5.0%
John McCain 45.0% vs. Barack Obama 45.0%
Spread: Tie +0.0%
Dem Var: Obama +5.0%
Average Dem Variance: Obama +5.9%
My personal views aside, the conclusions are fairly obvious – Barack Obama wins by a substantial margin against all Republicans but McCain, with whom he is tied. Hillary is within or barely out of the margin of error in contests with Romney, Giuliani, and Huckabee; she loses to McCain by a statistically significant margin. On average, Obama is 6% ahead of Hillary in general election match-ups. Perhaps more importantly, Obama has room to move up amongst undecideds, while Clinton’s polarizing nature means she can’t expect to move up much, if at all, against the GOP nominee. Only 37% of likely voters would never vote for Obama, compared to 50% for Clinton – the highest unfavorable rating of any candidate of either party.
One advantage Hillary does have is that she might be able to turn out Dem-leaning women in higher numbers than Obama; however, Obama would likely offset this by turning out minorities and young people in higher numbers (especially if he picks my original favorite for the VP slot). The final issue is money; it’s quite well known that Hillary is the favorite of Wall Street – which has dumped the GOP, and now seems willing to put up with a modest tax hike to deal with the fiscal mess and weak dollar – but that has likely been due to her status as the inevitable nominee until recently. Obama is at least as pro-business (contrary to John Edwards’ claims, the interests of business are not opposed to the interests of ordinary Americans, in my opinion) as Clinton, so, like Hillary, he’d have no problem slaughtering the GOP candidate in fundraising.
All of this seems to point to an obvious conclusion: the Republicans are salivating to run against Hillary Clinton. OK, maybe not salivating, but there’s no doubt they feel she’s their best shot at holding the White House.
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