The Comeback

After the primaries in Texas and Ohio, John McCain will clearly be the Republican candidate for President of the United States. His candidacy is a remarkable comeback from last summer when his campaign appeared headed for oblivion. Among the unexpected trends of this election the maverick, the inspirational, now add the comeback. Include Hillary Clinton who should have been writing her withdrawal speech prior to the Texas and Ohio primaries.

Senator Obama was and still is my candidate of choice. Early on I would have been ok with a Clinton-Obama ticket and 16 years of Democratic Presidents to see me into senility, if not the grave, with a big grin on my face. At this point, Obama leads in delegates won to the Democratic Convention, and by some counts there is no mathematical possibility that Senator Clinton can overcome this with the number of delegates remaining to be chosen by votes yet to be cast. Still, her double victories in Texas and Ohio have rejuvenated her campaign, and she has vowed to fight on, declaring that she will prevail and win the nomination.

Somebody needs to explain to me how this will happen in any way that will make it possible for a Clinton-Obama ticket or any Democratic victory in the general election. Certainly not more Clinton ads about 3:00 a.m. White House red-phone calls. Nor counter-ads Obama could run saying in effect that the only late-night telephone calls Hillary Clinton ever received in the White House were to suggest she might get a needle and thread and sew shut her husband’s fly. Sen. Clinton seems to think she will claim legitimacy of renegade votes in Florida and Michigan. Will she bring on the cutthroat lawyers and sue her way to the nomination, as George Bush did for the Presidency in 2000 to roll the Florida recount towards an underwhelming question of hanging chad examined cross-eyed under a magnifying glass? Hillary is of the precise correct age to remember all-too-well the mayhem of the 1968 Democratic convention in her hometown of Chicago, the bitter election that followed, and the suicidal Democratic boycott that was just enough to prevent President Hubert Humphrey. And how much smoke-free backroom bargaining and arm-twisting can be exerted on super-delegates, those elected officials and political pros, weathervanes all? In the end, will there be a deadlocked convention for Democrats in Denver?

Enter the comeback of comebacks. Twice Vice-President of the United States. Once almost-President. Nobel Peace Prize winner. Already knows where the red phone is located in the White House, no matter what the time of day or night. Somebody wake me when this is over. I am not a member or follower of any organized political party--I am a Democrat.

Copyright 2008 by William C. Cotter