1. Hilary had won the primaries? Hard to say what the impact would have been. The economic crisis would still have favoured the Democrats, but Hilary is part of the establishment and the electorate wanted to vote against the establishment. Also McCain probably wouldn't have picked Palin as VP so there would have been the possibility of a positive impact from the VP. Verdict Close, but Hilary maybe just sneaks it
2. McCain picks someone other than Palin? Palin did energize the Republicans but ultimately they would have voted for McCain anyway. She did nothing for the swinging voter, and if the idea was to take Hilary voters, it showed a very poor understanding of them, and deserved to fail. And a focus on policy didn't help her - if it was a culture war election, maybe she helps but the electorate wanted a policy based election. The attempts to present a black guy from a single parent family as somehow part of an elite was pathetic as was the attempt to link him to Castro. This deserved to fail Verdict Its closer, but Obama wins anyway
3. Republicans pick someone other than McCain? Ultimately McCain didn't stand for anything in particular and thus couldn't shake off the somewhat unfair Bush comparisons. Badly run campaign Verdict Its ultimately closer, but Democrats win anyway
No comments:
Post a Comment