Democrats quietly fear a backlash from Clinton

[JTFrog]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20237246/

AP
Updated: 2:22 p.m. ET Aug 12, 2007

WASHINGTON - Looking past the presidential nomination fight, Democratic leaders quietly fret that Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton at the top of their 2008 ticket could hurt candidates at the bottom.

They say the former first lady may be too polarizing for much of the country. She could jeopardize the party's standing with independent voters and give Republicans who otherwise might stay home on Election Day a reason to vote, they worry.

In more than 40 interviews, Democratic candidates, consultants and party chairs from every region pointed to internal polls that give Clinton strikingly high unfavorable ratings in places with key congressional and state races.

[JTFrog]

1. Sorry, dupe.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=3445728

[aquart]

2. If she wins the primary, she ain't polarizing to Democrats.

And there are more of us than them.

[TwilightGardener]

Independents and Republicans. That's who we're worried about.

She may be polarizing enough that there may end up being more of "them" crawling out of the woodwork that statistics don't account for right now. Obama, by contrast, comes in third among Iowa Republicans--ahead of McCain and Thompson.

[DemBones DemBones]

5. Disagree. A lot of us would not vote for her.

So you'd better get busy converting Republicans to support her.

[aquart]

8. Really. How Democratic of you.

All the members of your party will make a choice and you will refuse to honor it?

Gosh, that impresses me so much.

[DemBones DemBones]

12. Principle above party. I've voted for Dems for 40 years so I have a right

to be fed up with their continued machinations to force us to vote for a DLC Republi-Demo-crat.

[jaysunb]

14. Go Bones !

I find it reassuring that someone thats voted as long as I have, sees this exactly the same way. As we used to say, " you took the words right out of my mouth! " :thumbsup:

[DemBones DemBones]

28. Thanks! It's like that e.e. cummings poem about the

conscientious objector who's drafted and is a medic but because he's a CO in WWII, the soldiers constantly harass him. He's a real peaceful guy but finally they push him too far and he says "there is some shit i will not eat."

[Peregrine Took]

20. And many more of us would't vote for her. n/t

[mike_c]

6. are you kidding...?

"...she ain't polarizing to Democrats?"

Huh?

[DemBones DemBones]

10. He must have meant

"She ain't polarizing to Democrats who support her."

[JDPriestly]

3. I agree. She will be far too polarizing.

The last thing we need now is a campaign that rehashes the arguments of the '90s. This is a new century, a new era. We need new approaches to problems. Clinton did well for his time, but we are seeing that some of his policies did not pan out as intended. His policies have passed the test of time better than Reagan's or the first Bush's and far, far better than Nixon's (responsible of HMOs, ERISA re pension funds and employee insurance), but give an awful lot of opportunity for looking backward. We need to look forward. Hillary would not be a good candidate in spite of her obvious competency and intelligence.

[DemBones DemBones]

7. I agree. Would point out that Bill Clinton gave us NAFTA,

which Poppy Bush would not.

I'm not sure who got us into the WTO but Bill was all for globalization, which is a curse on the world. Think Hillary's against it?

Bill is even hanging around with the Bushes, being part of their family these days. No, no, no to Mrs. Bill.

[karynnj]

15. Is that a sensible comparison?

You are comparing the outcomes AS EVALUATED BY DEMOCRATS against the policies of Clinton. That's a low bar to jump.

Maybe you should compare them to LBJ - Vietnam was a major screw up that he opted not run to try to fix. But there were also programs like medicare, head start and food stamps. Not to mention the major civil rights legislation.) The great society programs beat Clinton's. JFK, who only had three years had the peace corps.

Carter, who was ridiculed by the media, took some steps on conservation, that Clinton should have re-inforced once he got the Republicans out.

[JDPriestly]

29. Clinton -- better than Bush, but not what we need. Not what we deserve.

[Peregrine Took]

21. How many states would she carry? More than McGovern? I doubt it.

[DemBones DemBones]

4. They'd better "fret" over it because Hillary would have

a very tough time winning. Too many Democrats and Independents dislike her politics, won't vote for her.

She's being pushed on us by the media, the DLC and the GOP. That should tell us not to buy into her candidacy, choose someone more like a Democrat that Truman might recognize as such. As your great sig line from Truman says, given the choice between a Democrat acting like a Republican and a Republican, people will vote for the Republican every time.

[asjr]

9. Are those fretful candidates, consultants

and party chairs going to remain incognito? Frankly I don't care who our nominee is--they are all good. But this nit-picking from some pundits and "consultants" makes me think they are only wanting to muddy the waters. After all it is politics. And we have more than a year to go. The race will be open for election 2012 just after January, 2008. No one but the media will benefit.

[KingFlorez]

11. I highly doubt there would any backlash

We don't know who the Republican nominee will be and if Republicans would be compelled to vote for him. And even if it is someone Republicans are compelled to vote for, the rest of the country probably won't be too thrilled with them. If Clinton gets the nomination, any GOP candidate is going to be 10 times more polarizing because of George W. Bush.

[jobycom]

13. Ah, poor babies. Frankly, I suspect this article is more about the media's fear

that Clinton will win, than any real fear by Democrats. If Obama were in the lead, they'd spin it that Democrats were afraid an inexperienced black candidate would drag the ticket down, and Edwards would drag it down by being too extremist, and Richardson would drag it down for some reason...

Just more crap. Sad to see DUers take the bait.

[MichiganVote]

16. And of course Bill Clinton was never a polarizing figure.....

[Bitwit1234]

17. What do these posters do.

When they get enough people complaining about the constant barrage of Hillary bashing, they change their name and start all over.

I wonder what they would say, if everyone started bashing their candidate over and over and over and over and over and over like they do.

[laugle]

18. Is it a slowwwwww news day, I seen this 3 times! nt

[w4rma]

19. Hillary will hurt Democrats on every ticket in the U.S. She is the worst choice for nominee. (nt)

[Cameron27]

22. Nah, Edwards is

:rofl: Sorry, I couldn't resist.

I disagree with you, I think she'd be a great fighter and would help the Democrats.

[liberalpragmatist]

23. You know what? I don't think she should be.

First off, although I still prefer Edwards and Obama to her for the nomination, I think she will win if nominated. The political climate is poisonous for the Republicans and I don't think even Giuliani - their strongest candidate - will hold up under scrutiny.

There have been several state polls that show Hillary carrying Arkansas and Missouri against the Republican nominee. Same with Ohio. It's early, yet, so there's no guarantee. But I think she'd win.

And frankly, if she IS the nominee, Democrats ought to stand up and NOT be afraid to defend her. We at DU and on lefty blogs are constantly fretting about how Democrats have too often let the RW define us and how we wimpishly embrace their frames and their terms of the debate. If Hillary is the nominee, then Democratic candidates for Congress need to step up and defend her. Just as have made progress in getting red-state Democrats to proudly call themselves Democrats, we'll need them to stop running from our party's nominee, which just reinforces the idea that she's unassailably left wing and un-American. If she's president, she'll need support from a broad swath of Americans and if our Democratic candidates run away from her like she's the plague, that's not going to be forthcoming.

[pingzing58]

25. Totally agree with you! Finally the voice Democratic reason.

[dmr]

26. I don't think Giuliani will be held up to scrutiny -

If the GOP/neo-cons want Rudy, then he'll get even a bigger pass than slacker-GW*. If the media were doing their jobs, Rudy wouldn't be as far as he already is. You don't even hear 'boo' by the other GOP candidates on Giuliani's blantant lies, moral indiscretions, and money-whoring. I'm archiving all I can on Giuliani, because, rest assure, if he gets the GOP nod, much, if not most of his crap will disappear from the net and file cabinets across the nation. Like Bush*, history will be rewritten in his favor if he becomes number 44.

Whatever the polls say today about any GOP candidate will not be what will be said later in the campaign. Once the GOP starts spending their money, the dirty tricks machine will kick in, and it will be a whole new ballgame. I don't trust the GOP at all, presently they are laying low and will pounce once they're ready to pounce. They are nasty, dirty and evil.

[illinoisprogressive]

24. Bill did not have any coattails either and he was at least likable.

[_Wayne_]

27. These same "consultants from every region" lost Dems the last two elections

Hillary Clinton will win. And those who hate her will remove their stinky foot from their big mouth and wonder why nobody listens to them anymore.