"As voters left the polls on Election Day, many were asked how they would have voted if the election match-up were between Hillary Clinton and John McCain rather than Barack Obama and McCain. 52 percent said they would have backed the former Democratic candidate; 41 percent would have voted for McCain, wider than Obama’s 7-point margin over McCain."
Vaughan Ververs
CBS News blog
Nate Silver of www.FiveThirtyEight.com expresses skepticism about the exit poll findings reported by Vaughan Ververs in his CBS News blog entry, which concluded that Hillary Clinton would have beaten John McCain more decisively than Barack Obama did.
Silver concedes that Clinton might have won by a wider margin — she "certainly proved herself to be an exceptionally compelling candidate," he writes, "even if her execution and staffing decisions were sometimes wanting."Silver also suggests that the possibility exists that Clinton would have lost the general election. "I doubt you'll find too many Democrats who would be willing to take that trade," he concludes.
Let me address each of the questions he raises.
- "Would she have handled the financial crisis with as much aplomb as Obama did?"
Silver says yes. I agree. - "Would she have been so capable and reassuring in the debates?"
Silver says, "Almost certainly." Again, I agree — although both parties held numerous debates before the primaries — and continued to hold debates once the primaries had begun. By October, both of the nominees had been through the debate process so many times that it was almost as routine as their stump speeches.
I don't think that was a factor for the presidential nominees — nor would it have been if the Democrats had nominated Clinton. - "Would she have had an easier time resonating with working class voters in places like Missouri and West Virginia?"
Silver says yes, and, again, I see no reason to contradict that conclusion. Clinton won the West Virginia primary handily — 67% to 26% — and, although Obama won the Missouri primary narrowly (49% to 48%), he appears to have lost the state in the general election.
Nearly two weeks after the election, Missouri remains too close to call. If McCain is declared the winner of Missouri, Obama will be the first winning candidate to lose the state since Dwight Eisenhower more than 50 years ago.
It would be the first time in my lifetime that Missouri has been on the losing side.
At this point, Silver brings out his big guns. - "[W]ould she have managed the media as deftly as Obama did?"
Silver is uncertain.
As for myself, I can say that I've been observing Hillary Clinton longer than most Americans.
I grew up in Arkansas, graduated from high school and college in that state and continued to live there until 1988. Hillary was the state's first lady for most of the last 10 years I lived there, including a period when she headed up the effort to improve the state's schools, holding open, public meetings in each of Arkansas' 75 counties.
When Hillary became America's first lady, she had already been on my personal radar for nearly two decades — ever since 1974, when her husband was narrowly beaten in a race for Congress.
When you combine those years in Arkansas with eight years as the nation's first lady and nearly eight years as a U.S. senator, that's roughly three decades of dealing with the media. And I speak from experience when I say that she didn't have a cakewalk when she was in Arkansas.
There were certainly those in the Arkansas media who didn't exactly fawn over her.
She hasn't always exhibited a golden touch — few people in the spotlight have — but I think her success in that regard would have depended upon whether her staff resolved to "let Hillary be Hillary."
If her staff interfered, that probably would only make things worse — so the crucial part of the answer to that question, I think, would be determined by who was on her staff for the general election campaign. - "Would Republican attacks on Bill Clinton and Kazakhstan [have] been as counterproductive to their cause as their effort to link Barack Obama and Bill Ayers?"
Again, Silver is noncommittal. "Maybe," he writes, "or maybe not."
Surely, I think Republicans would have connected those dots as they tried to do with Obama and Ayers. But Clinton is no stranger to the "guilt by association" tactic, and I feel she would have been able to avoid being tarred with that brush. - "Would she have matched Obama's field organization and raised as much money?"
"Doubtful," says Silver — without elaborating.
Why is it doubtful? All the polls I've seen, even the ones cited in this discussion, suggest the exsitence of an overpowering hunger for change in this country after eight years of George W. Bush.
I think there were people who were ready to contribute to whichever Democrat won the nomination, so great was that desire for a different direction.
Now, Obama had a clear edge in fundraising when he was running against Clinton — but once the campaign for the nomination was resolved, I'm sure Hillary's army of dedicated supporters would have pledged money — as well as volunteer efforts — to her campaign.
I don't know if she would have matched Obama's total — but I think the desire for change was strong enough to generate contributions for any Democratic nominee that exceeded what we've seen in the past. After the economic meltdown, I think Clinton would have benefited from both the desire for change and the nostalgia for the sense of economic well-being that existed during the years of her husband's administration.
If Obama had won a narrow victory — in spite of his tremendous advantage in contributions — I would be inclined to give more weight to the argument about fundraising. But Obama won the election by margins of more than 8 million popular votes and a Clintonesque 95 electoral votes. - "Would her campaign have had the same steely confidence as Obama's did after the Republican convention bounce?"
"Unlikely," Silver writes — again, no elaboration.
I don't know why it would have been unlikely, given the many campaigns in which Clinton has participated in her life — as well as the grueling campaign for the nomination that she would have just survived.
It might have depended more upon who was on her staff in the general election campaign — but, as the nominee, I would assume that she could have her pick of the best advisers from the staffs of the vanquished. - "Would she have delivered as strong a speech as Mr. Obama did in Denver?"
"Iffy," writes Silver.
I'm inclined to acknowledge that Obama is more skilled as an orator than Hillary — but, as the nominee, her speech wouldn't have been compared to Obama's (which wouldn't have occurred, if Hillary had been nominated).
The only way her speech would have been a factor in the campaign would have been if she committed a serious gaffe while delivering it. - "Would she have catalyzed near-universal turnout in the black community?"
"No," Silver says.
I'll concede that point — but was it essential for victory over John McCain?
Prior to 2008, neither the Democrats nor the Republicans had ever nominated a non-white — but Democrats still enjoyed high levels of support from black voters. I've seen no indication that blacks would have abandoned the Democrats if Obama had not been nominated.
Certainly, they might have been disappointed. But before Obama emerged as the front-runner, opinion polls suggested that a majority of blacks were supporting Clinton. - "If Hillary Clinton had headed the Democratic ticket, would John McCain have been dumb enough to name Sarah Palin as his running mate?"
"One would hope not," Silver writes.
Ah, now we come to a female factor that really is being credited with influencing the outcome.
My contention all along has been that Palin was selected — in part — as a blatant appeal for the votes of women who were believed to be disgruntled over Hillary's defeat. Women have tended to support Democrats in the past, although minority women have been more inclined to do so than white women (I wrote about this in late August — on the day McCain announced Palin was his choice to be his running mate).
If that was truly the case, that Palin was chosen to mollify women, it was clearly a miscalculation. As it turned out, women supported Obama by 56% to 43%.
With Hillary as his opponent, McCain wouldn't have felt that constituency was in play, although, at that point, he might have been more inclined to follow the advice I gave in May and picked a black man as his running mate.
Granted, that pool isn't as deep in the Republican Party as the pool of women — but there are clearly some options he could have taken.
And, in hindsight, perhaps he should have taken my advice anyway. My sense is that Palin didn't help McCain any more than the selection of Geraldine Ferraro helped Walter Mondale 24 years ago.
Perhaps that was because, in both cases, the voters had already made up their minds — and the gender of the running mate for the other ticket made little, if any, difference. - "Might McCain have been smart enough to hire Mike Murphy rather than Steve Schmidt, campaign on themes of bipartisanship, honor, and good government, and appeal as much as possible to independent voters (as the political climate dictated that he ought to have done in the first place)?"
"Who knows," writes Silver. "He just might have figured it out."
I don't know if that part would have changed if Hillary had been the nominee. I suppose that depends on one's evaluation of McCain — and what his probable response to running against a woman would have been. - "And what would Clinton's numbers have looked like after the Republicans had gotten done accusing her of being a socialist, a puppet for her husband, and an all-around conniving you-know-what?"
Silver gives no answer to this one.
And it can only be given a subjective response, anyway — like most of his other points.
I do know that I heard Obama accused of being a socialist by many of the right-wing radio hosts — so if Hillary had been the nominee and had been accused of being a socialist, I presume the response by the voters would have been about the same.
No one accused Obama of being a "puppet" for his wife, although I frequently heard those radio hosts complain about Michelle Obama's statement that she was proud of her country "for the first time." A candidate's spouse is often a political target, deservedly or not. When the candidate's spouse happens to have been president for eight years, of course, that's a unique situation, one for which we have no precedent.
But the Clintons have been handling that kind of criticism since the "two-for-the-price-of-one" concept was first introduced during the 1992 campaign.
As for that third accusation, well, I heard complaints during the general election campaign that Obama was too glib, too smooth by half. I suppose, when a candidate appears to be headed for a defeat, his/her campaign staff will latch on to anything it thinks will turn the tide.
If it fails to do so, and the candidate loses as expected, those staffers are usually prepared to point the finger of blame at anyone or anything else — as we've seen many of them do with Sarah Palin since the votes were counted and the Republicans came up on the short end of the stick.
In fact, considering the pitiful condition of the economy, I'm inclined to believe that talk suggesting Clinton — or any Democrat — would have lost to McCain is merely that — talk.
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