Jack & Jill Politics

Let’s see…No plan B after Feb. 5th? Running on the family name??? Loyalty over competence??? Paranoia of the media??? Secrecy (where are those tax returns?)???

Seems like Hillary should be the last person to compare a fellow Democrat to George Bush.

I thought Frank Rich threw down in this column.

I’ve told you before:

Obama’s campaign will be studied, in Political Science classes, for many years to come.

They had no plan post Feb. 5th. Tim Russert on MTP busted her bold last Sunday by bringin up the quote that admitted as such.

They were going to dispatch this Uppity Negro on February 5th, and that was going to be that.

When it didn’t happen, they had NO PLAN B.

baldwin,

Obama needs to pound the argument that focuses on the mathematics of proportional delegate allocation.

The media is, once again, allowing Hillary to determine the terms of engagement. Hillary needs to win both states by 20% or more. Anything short of that and she turns into Mike Huckabee – just in it for the sake of pride and ego.

Truth is, Obama just has to keep both states close. Hillary could win by 5% in Texas and still come up short in delegates due to the state’s allocation process.

If Obama wins just one of those two states, this thing is over, and Obama will have every right to call on Hillary Clinton to drop out of the race (although, I actually think 11 straight losses by an average of 33% is enough cause for her to drop out now).

Winning TX and OH by small margins only helps Hillary in the perceptions game. But it does little (if nothing at all) to address her deficit in the delegate race.

The Obama camp needs to pound some variation of this message: “It’s the MATH, stupid!” (perhaps in kinder language, with less of an edge).

I’ve told you before:

Obama’s campaign will be studied, in Political Science classes, for many years to come.

I absolutely agree with this – I was thinking the same thing, especially after the “no Plan B after Feb. 5″ strategy failed so miserably for the Clintons.

I think this is a lesson that can be applied beyond politics as well, ie. big businesses ignoring competition from smaller competitors, etc.

Another important point that has been brought up occasionally is the role of technology. The Obama campaign’s superior use of technology has been crucial to his success – from blogs like J&JP, to Obama’s presence on social networks (I have even noticed him on a new social network for writers called The Red Room (http://www.redroom.com/author/barack-obama)

Writers including Amy Tan and Alice Walker have a presence there.

Sen. Obama is also strong on the Net Neutrality issue – another crucial issue that keeps the internet a level playing ground for those of us outside MSM and the Beltway.

Can you imagine this election without blogs, YouTube, thomas.loc.gov and various search engines to research past articles and issues?

Yikes!

Sen. Obama on Net Neutrality via his U.S. Senate website:

http://obama.senate.gov/podcast/060608-network_neutral/

Why do you think Obama is acting like the nominee already?

Good strategy.

And he’s getting critiqued in many (Hillary) corners from being too arrogant, too overconfident.

Any competent Black man who isn’t bowing and scraping will be called arrogant and overconfident.

@ ndn5898: I’m sure the Clinton campaign well understands the TX system. She’s trying to downplay expectations (again). Of course, so does the Obama campaign, though even they may be internally underestimating their wins (an internal memo that was accidentally cc’ed to the press indicated that they expected to win WI by 7%, and I’m pretty sure they underestimated SC as well).

The Frank Rich article hits where it hurts: Hillary’s military(ish) credentials. Nice PR spin, Frank.

To be fair, a lot of campaign skills don’t necessarily correlate actual leadership. But IMHO high-level stuff like planning and strategic thinking does, so I do think this article is a fair critique.