Why Obama Will Lose Today- a contrarian view

RK

While I think he is too optimistic, what I share same feelings on is his take on how Obama has not solidified the 4 groups in Democrtic party, especially women and Jewish.

Tuesday, November 4, 2008 By: Richard Grenell

The mainstream media did everything they could to knock off Hillary Clinton in the primary season and John McCain in the during the general election campaign to help elect Barack Obama the 44th president. Fortunately, their attempt to persuade the American people that the inexperienced and untested junior senator from Illinois is qualified to be president has backfired. While the media try to weave a story of a unified Democratic Party and a Republican Party in turmoil, the facts point to a different outcome. Although I may be one of the few pundits in America who think McCain will win today, I hold firm to the lessons learned in the Democratic primary and politics 101. To win the presidency, a candidate must unify his base, split the Independent votes, and steal one more vote from the other side. Although the media's polls have concluded almost unanimously that Obama will sweep to victory, fundamental problems remain for the Obama campaign with the base of Democratic voters. Since Obama's problems from the primaries have not been resolved, nor reported in the national media, the Electoral College map signals trouble for the media's main man. Throughout the primaries, Obama never garnered significant support from four of the major groups within the Democratic base. Union members, women, older voters, and Jewish voters all were Hillary Clinton supporters in significant numbers. Although the national media did focus on the disgruntled female supporters of Clinton in the lead-up to the Democratic National Convention in Denver, they dropped the issue after Obama won the nomination. However, the media's short attention span has not solved the problem for the man whose pastor of 20 years still gives many Americans pause. Additionally, very little has been written or aired about the lack of support for Obama with older voters, Jewish voters, and union members. The assumption that the 25 million people who voted for Clinton and the rest of the Democratic candidates now have Obama yard signs will prove to be a fatal mistake for the media and Howard Dean. Now, I admit that the majority of the members of these groups ultimately will end up voting for the Democratic nominee, but the slightest amount of slippage in the percentage of these voters means Obama will not have the support the media and the polls assume he has. And this is no small problem. Since Obama has not united the Democratic Party the way Sarah Palin helped McCain unite the Republican Party, the 44th president of the United States will be John S. McCain. If this doesn't make sense to you, then your emotions have carried you away from reality. McCain doesn't need the majority of supporters from these traditional Democratic groups to win. McCain needs to get only a small amount because these voters are not Independents or swing voters, these people are traditional and frequent Democratic voters. None of the main media outlets has looked in to whether these groups, who did not support Obama in the primary, have come back to the Democratic base. But they have not. How else does one explain the fact that Pennsylvania gave Clinton a huge win in the primary and is still giving Obama trouble today? Pennsylvania traditionally is a Democratic state, but Obama has failed to close the deal in this anti-Republican year. A closer look at Ohio, West Virginia, Missouri, and even Michigan suggests that union members and older Americans are not comfortable with Barack Obama. The media, however, have overplayed their hand in all but calling the race for Obama. While CNN reports, as it did last week, that Obama is up in Missouri and NPR and The New York Times are trying to convince us that North Carolina and Virginia are really tossup states, the American electorate quietly waited for the polls to open. Richard Grenell was the U.S. spokesman at the United Nations until he resigned on Sept. 29. He had been one of the longest-serving press spokesmen at the United Nations.