Historians see little chance for McCain



By DAVID PAUL KUHN | 6/15/08 7:05 AM EST

One week into the general election, the polls show a dead heat. But many presidential scholars doubt that John McCain stands much of a chance, if any.

Historians belonging to both parties offered a litany of historical comparisons that give little hope to the Republican. Several saw Barack Obama’s prospects as the most promising for a Democrat since Roosevelt trounced Hoover in 1932.

“This should be an overwhelming Democratic victory,” said Allan Lichtman, an American University presidential historian who ran in a Maryland Democratic senatorial primary in 2006. Lichtman, whose forecasting model has correctly predicted the last six presidential popular vote winners, predicts that this year, “Republicans face what have always been insurmountable historical odds.” His system gives McCain a score on par with Jimmy Carter’s in 1980.

“McCain shouldn’t win it,” said presidential historian Joan Hoff, a professor at Montana State University and former president of the Center for the Study of the Presidency. She compared McCain’s prospects to those of Hubert Humphrey, whose 1968 loss to Richard Nixon resulted in large part from the unpopularity of sitting Democratic president Lyndon Johnson.

“It is one of the worst political environments for the party in power since World War II,” added Alan Abramowitz, a professor of public opinion and the presidency at Emory University. His forecasting model — which factors in gross domestic product, whether a party has completed two terms in the White House and net presidential approval rating — gives McCain about the same odds as Adlai Stevenson in 1952 and Carter in 1980 — both of whom were handily defeated in elections that returned the presidency to the previously out-of-power party. “It would be a pretty stunning upset if McCain won,” Abramowitz said.

What’s more, Republicans have held the presidency for all but 12 years since the South became solidly Republican in the realignment of 1968 — which is among the longest runs with one party dominating in American history. “These things go in cycles,” said presidential historian Robert Dallek, a professor at the University of California at Los Angeles. “The public gets tired of one approach to politics. There is always a measure of optimism in this country, so they turn to the other party.”

More?

Historians see little chance for McCain - David Paul Kuhn - Politico.com

And so now we must wait to see if they are correct.

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There is something the scholars are missing from their analysis...

McCain is running against a Democrat...

As shown in 2004, the Democrats constantly preach that the country would vote for an idiot before voting for a Republican...and then proceed to nominate someone 10 times worse than an idiot...

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"You get the respect that you give" - cnredd

Are you suggesting that Barack Obama, who is the presumptive Democratic nominee, is 10 times worse than an idiot?
Is that what happened in 2000, and 2004?
Barack Obama, contrary to your opinion, marginal as it is, is the best thing to happen to this country since RFK, if not JFK....it's just that your sensibilities, or the lack thereof, won't admit it.

Could you please explain what Sen. Obama's qualifications for the office of President of the United States are?

What qualifies him to be the Commander in Chief of the most powerful military on the planet?

What qualifies him to make foreign policy decisions?

What qualifies him to make economic decisions regarding this country?

What common vision has he shown for all Americans?

Democrats have managed to do the amazing the last two elections, pulling defeat from the jaws of certain victory, and this time around they've nominated not only one of the biggest empty suits in modern politics, surpassing even Dan Quayle in lack of any discernable principles, but one of the most polarizing, racist, and banal candidates possible, even worse than when they proudly shared the stage with Al Sharpton.

I'm almost dead certain McCain will beat him like a drum; the best Obama can hope for is a draw, and the vote going to the Congress. I'm not an ideologue, or a member of either party, I usually vote for third parties if they're on the ballot, or write in my selections for Prez, so this is not a pep rally for McCain; I don't like him nor his Party. I just see Obama as what he is: a lame unprincipled hack whose only major appeal is to black racists and phoney 'progressive' fashion victims indulging in 'Group Think' trendiness, mainly semi-educated, gullible, and utterly clueless middle class college students who rely on personality cult worship for 'guidance'. The Democrats' version of class warfare is no better than the Republicans and their corporate socialist mentality toward American citizens, and it has the added element of enthusiastic advocacy of provoking a major racial polarization and the disenfranchising and ruin of most of the white working and independent, self-employed business class, the premiere focus of their hatred.

I can't help but read this and think how empty your assessment truly is.
Obama gave an INCREDIBLE speech on mature race relations.
Obama Race Speech: Read The Full Text - Politics on The Huffington Post

But to you, he's a "racist"?

I don't think he's an outright racist, but A) He was complicitly silent when racism was spewed...and B) he does show certain Black Liberation Theology beliefs...

Example - From the speech you linked...

"Original sin" is a biblical reference meaning that man is BORN GUILTY due to the "fall of man"...

What Obama is saying is the same thing in terms of slavery...Americans (in this case, white people) are also born with this same pox on their soul due to ancestory behavior...A white person can be born into the perfect non-racial household, worked for everything they own, give back to the community everyday, espouses cleaning up the racial divide from the highest tower...and they will STILL BE GUILTY simply because of their skin tone...

Of course, this covers ALL white people...including the vast majority who didn't show up until Ellis Island (which opened after slavery) and well afterward, and also includes white people that were around during slavery but had nothing to do with it...They are equally guilty because they wore a sweater in Maine that was made with cotton picked from slaves in Georgia...

The idea of slavery as an "original sin" is nothing more than forcing a white guilt trip on the current generation that did nothing except been born in a country that once had it...

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"You get the respect that you give" - cnredd

My assessment is based entirely on Obama himself.

Speeches mean jack, especially canned hyperbolic, buzz word, and meme ridden pieces of fluff like that one.



Gee, you're right; he only hung around and ultimately got the unqualified endorsements of many of the most racist and thuggish people and organizations in the country ... How silly of us to think 2 or 3 decades of enthusiastically hanging out with notorious antisemites and race baiting cretins means nothing; he made a nifty speech once, after all ...

If you're really impressed with great speechmakers, as well as intelligent debaters, you won't do better than Peter Camejo. If debates and speeches won elections, Camejo would be President, not Gore, Kerry, or Bush, and Obama and McCain couldn't get near the guy in presence, skill, and unrehearsed discourse; he ran circles around every platform put out by the entire retinue of Republicrat Establishment entrants, and still would, except of course the MSM sees to it that these other parties almost never get on national broadcasts, preferring to suck up to the Big Two beauty pageant contestants.

Speech-making is not what qualifies a person for POTUS. Could you please tell us what exactly it is that qualifies Sen. Obama for this position??

Not to interrupt you guys,but Regan was a good 'speechifyer' and I believe that is what got him elected.

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