From Tyler Cowen:
1. People tend to overreact to the news of the moment in predicting
a winner, don’t make this mistake.2. Party disunity predicts an electoral loss; if you are a Democrat you should worry about this.
3. The swing voters in the American citizenry don’t really trust the Democrats with foreign policy and won’t anytime soon, whether this is rational or not.
4. When a woman or an African-American or a former first Lady is
running for President, that is a huge issue in the minds of voters,
whether anyone admits it or not.Based on this list, I am still thinking that most people are
underestimating the chances of a Republican President (the ascendancy
of John McCain is starting to reverse this tendency) …
Uh-oh …
January 15th, 2008 at 8:11 pm
I’ve pretty much lost any respect I had for Time magazine, so I’m not surprised to see them overplaying this story. I see a much higher probability of the Republicans fracturing over evangelicals than of the Democrats fracturing over race.
January 16th, 2008 at 10:13 am
I hardly think McCain is ascending. Whatever lead he had was the result of Democrats and Independents voting for him in open primaries. Last night in Michigan he had to compete with Uncommitteds (Obama) and failed even though he had Leibermann trying to convince Michigan Democrats to vote for him. In the end Republicans will not allow Democrats and Independents to help them choose their candidate. McCain has spent the past 8 years offending the Republican base (the list of offenses is nearly endless) and when he enters closed primaries he will find the going very difficult. Another interesting point from last night is that Romney beat out Huckabee among Michigan’s Evangelicals. The bloom may be fading from that rose as Republicans get a closer look at Huckabee’s foreign policy and economic positions and realize he is nothing more than a Democrat in disguise.