Hillary or George

Because Hillary is a woman, she is more polarizing than Bush. People don't want to admit it, but a lot of the animosity towards her is based on her forward nature.

Look at the approval ratings of Laura Bush compared to those of Hillary's when her husband was president. Everyone seems to like Laura despite the fact that she has put forward absolutely nothing for the country. Hillary tried to get involved and was lambasted for it.

Then you have to throw in the whole "standing by the cheating husband" thing. This put off a few women.

If she were ever obtain the presidency, she would be the most hated president ever.

 

George W. Bush is president of the United States. What more proof do you need?

It's a generalization, obviously, but you will see more Republicans win in "Democratic" districts than you will see Democrats win in Republican area.

 

Again, do you have any kind of empirical evidence to back that up?

 

This link will show a map that illustrates counties that votes solidly Republican are much more numerous than ones that vote mostly Democrat, even though there are more registered Democrats in the country.

http://www.pensee.com/bowditch/maps/elections/voting.html

 

That doesn't mean much. The counties that vote blue tend to be more populous.

 

It's a map of all counties and how they vote, not how many vote.

 

Plus, there are a lot of people who are registered Democrats who haven't voted that way in a presidential election since 1964. Remember, the Democrats were the majority party for a long while. (They may even still have an edge on the national registration numbers) Hell, there are rural counties in the South where every elected officeholder is a Democrat, but Bush got 80% of the vote. These folks are registered Democrats, but when they get in the voting booth, they're conservative Republicans.

 

That's true. Plenty of conservative Democrats. (Not too many liberal Republicans, though).

 

Results so far...

Hillary Clinton 14 (35.9%)
George W. Bush 12 (30.8%)
Both the same 13 (33.3%)

Looks like those of us voting "Both the same" nailed this one.

 

It's hard to imagine anybody being more polarizing that George W. Bush. His politics is based on that... I refer to Bob Woodward's book where Bush people talk about the base. Bush gives few press conferences and they arrange appearances to demand loyalty - in the 2004 campagin, they didn't want undecided people at their rally. Think about that - part of giving speeches used to be to try to convince people, and the Bush/Rove political machine does pretty much the opposite. Bush got 600,000 fewer votes in 2000 than Gore, and got 51 percent of the vote during a war. That is Bush's political way during the past six years.

Compare that with Hillary Clinton. Six years ago she was looked at as a carpetbagger (with justification) in running for Senate in New York. In 2006, the Republicans are pretty much conceding her a Senate seat. Yeah, it's New York, but you would think they could do better upstate which isn't so solidly Democratic. And while the Republican/right-wing noise machine might "hate" her, she does have ability to work with Republicans in the Senate. She is successful as a politican, although that is probably because her husband is the master.

Hillary loses to McCain if that's the matchup in 2008 - it's like a team which doesn't match up against another team in a playoff series but could win it all if it doesn't have to play the difficult matchup. Yeah, a lot of people don't like Hillary but if she gets the nomination, the Republicans have to say hello to the gender gap.

 

A few quick points:

--All but the most blind Hillary haters will give her credit for working well with others in the Senate and not letting ego run amok. But that doesn't translate into picking up swing votes.

--The Republicans' failure to find a good candidate can be traced to Pataki's utter failure to develop "a bench" of good Republican candidates throughout the state. The NY GOP (and Conservative party, et al) is in for an ass-kicking of epic proportions this year. Spitzer and Hillary could each win 70% of the vote because Pataki wasted away his governorship without using his political capital to win downballot races. Rick Lazio was a Republican up-and-comer who gave Hillary a helluva race in 2000. In 2006, the NY GOP has no Lazios.

 

I've always felt Hillary's appeal will be directly tied to how people feel about Bush and the direction of the country in '08. If they disapprove as much as now, people will be a lot more open to going hard in the other direction - Hillary may not be uber-liberal, but people have a good idea of what they'd be getting.

But if Bush's approval has leveled out a bit, the Dems would be much better off nominating Warner, Edwards or Bayh. Or even Gore if he jumps in.

Still, I don't think McCain vs. Hillary would be a walk for the GOP. Don't discount the importance of McCain's age, and the fact - as I would regard it, but it's arguable - that Hillary's political instincts are probably better. She has, after all, gone from a close Senate race as of early 2000, to winning by a comfortable margin to having practically no opposition in '06. Yes, McCain went from losing in 2000 to front-runner in 08. But I would argue that he may only be front-runner because of name recognition; the Tennessee straw poll was discouraging.

Do I want Hillary to win? Not really. Give me Warner/Edwards/Bayh/Gore vs. McCain or Romney, and I'll live with the result. Give me George Allen, Bill Frist or Sam Brownback, and I'll vote for whatever semi-breathing creature the Dems nominate.