The GOP is Now Gaming Our Primary for Hillary Clinton

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

The GOP is now gaming our primary for Hillary Clinton

12 Mar 2008 11:29 AM CDT From the Jed Report

Now that John McCain has won the GOP nomination, Republicans are voting in the Democratic primary
in increasing numbers, hoping to pick their opponent for the November election,
or at least cause more turmoil in our already divisive nomination battle.



Their choice? Hillary Clinton.

Yesterday, in the Mississippi primary, 24% of Hillary Clinton's support came from Republicans.
Unlike the Republican support generated by Barack Obama, according to exit polling data,
Clinton's Republican support appears to be part of the explicit plan promoted by
radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh to wreak havoc upon the Democratic Party by voting for Hillary Clinton.

Let's first take a look at the bigger picture.



...

Yesterday, 12% of Democratic primary voters in Mississippi were Republicans --
triple the numbers from January and February.



Hillary Clinton's support from Republicans, on the other hand, is coming from
Republicans who will not support her in the general election.
They are simply wreaking havoc in the Democratic primary, hoping to further
divide an already divided party, and perhaps even help Hillary Clinton win the nomination.

How can I be so sure that this is the case?

more at the link

[babylonsister]

1. I sincerely hope the SDs and Dems are aware of this. If we are,

they should be. :grr:

[grantcart]

25. they are

[99th_Monkey]

Now I'm liking Oregon's "no cross-over" rule better, as this illustrates the wisdom of it ~nt~

[amborin]

31. it is a better rule, screens out fakers

[Qutzupalotl]

2. Wow.

Thanks for making this its own thread.

Pennsylvania is a closed primary, right? It will be interesting to compare polling with the results.

[TwilightGardener]

5. They have until March 24th to switch parties for the PA primary--

Limbaugh reminds his listeners of that date every day now.

[catgirl]

26. This is a huge problem

Dean needs to solve this ASAP. Interestingly, South Dakota is now
planning on changing their rules to include all parties in the democratic
primary! I wonder who influenced this decision.

[rug]

34. There are 4,000,000 registered Democrats in Pennsylvania.

Even if true, the effect will be neglible.

[Pirate Smile]

10. People can register as Democrats through March 24th - Rush and his

minions are aware of that deadline.

[tekisui]

3. Meanwhile, her surrogates go on Fux News and Limpball's.

[grantcart]

17. the don't seem to be able to find this thread

[Dems Will Win]

24. kick

[catgirl]

27. Bill Clinton did an interview with one of Rush's cohorts

and it sounds like it was a pleasant interview. Really scary.

[tekisui]

37. A cohort filling in for Limpballs on Limpball's show!

[Saturday]

4. Don't you just hate a free country where anyone can vote for anyone they like ..

for whatever reason they like?

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

11. 31% of HRC's voters said she was not honest

31% of Hillary Clinton's voters said she was not honest

From that same link

On several questions a shockingly high percentage of the people who voted for Hillary Clinton
indicated they did not like her -- numbers that were not reflected in the views of Obama supporters
of their own candidate.



For example, 31% of Hillary Clinton's voters said she was not honest and trustworthy.
By comparison, just 4% of Barack Obama's supporters said the same.

24% of Hillary Clinton's had a strongly favorable opinion of John McCain --
compared to 6% of Barack Obama's supporters.

[mckara]

6. Obama Terrifies the Grand Old Potty

I wish the Clinton supporters would climb on the Obama bandwagon.

Hillary is qualified to be Secretary of HHS!

[ElsewheresDaughter]

7. Obama won 58% of the "registered" Republican Texas vote

[democrattotheend]

9. How do you know that?

Was the secret ballot tampered with? Otherwise, how could you possibly know how people voted by their registration status?

[Lucinda]

19. It's in the exit polling. You can find Dem, Rep and Indy data.

[democrattotheend]

20. That's party ID, not registration

[Lucinda]

21. They would be registered to be able to vote.

[democrattotheend]

36. The question asks them which party they consider themselves, not what they are registered as

And party registration is often not the same as self-reported party ID.

Plus, I don't like the idea of using the exit polls for anything other than analysis. It's just a tiny subset of the voters, and it has a margin of error. I was not exit-polled, so if you went solely by exit polls, my vote would not count.

[democrattotheend]

8. I can't wait until we get the data for this

I would love to break down the percentage of Hillary's voters who identify as Republican and view her negatively as a percentage of the votes she got. Hopefully we'll get the datasets soon.

[amborin]

32. have to get hold of the data....is there a way to separate out the crossover votes?

[Utopian Leftist]

12. Votes

Hillary's supporters don't care where she gets her votes from. They don't care that she can't beat McCain, either. They are just so ANGRY that she can't win, that they are taking it out on Obama.

[Skidmore]

13. Not just gaming, but running her campaign. Read the following:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x4958510

[jgraz]

14. That's nice, cuz Hillary is gaming the general for the GOP

Quite the little partnership they've got going there.

[PATRICK]

15. This was a major reason

for Romney stepping down. Not THE reason perhaps, but their terrible contest was keeping them from concentrating on the necessary attack on the Dems. This also explains the wisdom of Edwards stepping down
since he would more and more be relegated to a third way to game the divisions in the party. So we are seeing the gaming, checked partly by edwards and the fact it is too late to do anything except marshall everything that is nauseating and crooked against Obama- a lesson he and all of us need to be taught now while it can be withstood.

ALL that is nauseating and crooked. The flood of GOP voters is actually the fairest because the primaries
in various states simply let that happen according to their rules. The defections TO Obama account for real positive votes for our party's nominee. Now, supposedly, they are more joined by hostile crossovers with nothing better to do, but who would have stayed in the GOP primary contest. They are weak enemies and not potential November voters for our side.

All that the negativity has amounted to is the usual sordid example of what we have to face in November. Would that Obama supporters, especially the young, would learn these nauseating lessons and be all the stronger for it in the fall. More educating is how blind ambition INSANELY pushes some forward to their utter doom and incremental advantage. Doom, aka Spitzer and Clinton, comes in the form of utterly mad and destructive judgment. Just because it seems the GOP usually gets away with such- and lately they don't always although they cling to their useless jobs better- doesn't mean we can and should have better people as our national leaders. Ambition coupled with corporatist and/or personal vices is a recipe for total national damnation and ruin along with the puffed up heros who betray the people's blind good will.

The particular crossover issue mentioned here is small, thank God, and trying to game an argument using their unfortunately legal participation is the lesser point. Crossovers, albeit more honest ones, may have helped Obama. The issue here is that Hillary has joined Nemesis in the hope she can squeak past personal doom which is more and more certain in November as she pushes Faust out of line for the spring fire sale of souls. (I like that analogy but apologize for its discriminatory nature).

[grantcart]

16. great post thank you

[grantcart]

18. The assumption has been that some sincere Republicans were voting for

Obama but that a few were voting Clinton even early on because they were not particularly satisfied with their nominee and knew that the key to winning in November was running against Hillary - she was the true uniter of the Republican party.

The only emperical numbers we have (besides the uncertain exit polls) is the recount of the double bubble ballots in LA.

(to remind: if you were crossing over to vote in the democratic election in California you had to fill in a second redundant bubble)

They went back and were able to recoune 43,000 of the double bubble ballots and 23,000 were for Hillary and 19,000 were for Obama.

Source: NPR reporting on LA times - no link sorry

Recounting the double bubble ballots actually helped Hillary.

[NEDem]

22. How many open primaries are there?

This is a great post.

[amborin]

33. doubt this happened in Texas.

[Blarch]

23. Bingo was his Nameo

[catgirl]

28. In Ohio, they were the "for one day only" democrats

Some even gave interviews stating that they switched parties so they
could vote for Hillary. They want to destroy her in the general, so Mc
will win.

We can't let this happen.

[McCamy Taylor]

29. No, they are still doing "general primary smears" on Obama one per day

like always. They are simply doing "Brokered Democratic Convention". The moment Obama's delegates caught up and passed Hillary's they stopped trashing her 100% and started trashing him some. If he slips behind, she will 100% trashed again. They want Denver to be "Chaos at the Convention" a graphic Nora O'Donnell had on the screen behind her at MSNBC.

The general primary smears against Obama are at Fox and on RW radio and at the Washington Times and they continue at their usual rate. Obama is a Muslim. Obama is a terrorist. Obama will send our money to Africa. Obama's wife is radical. Obama supports Farrakhan. Obama is inexperienced with the military (and no the never quote Hillary because they call her a bitch and a witch and a lesbian), Obama is a crooked politician. Obama has money scandals. It never stops. Anybody who watches Fox or listens to RW radio is now convinced that Obama is a commie Black Muslim terrorist unAmerican who will tax us to death and send the funds to Africa.

The RW would not even bother if they did not think that Obama was going to be the nominee.

[amborin]

30. that article/study has methodological errors that undermine its credibility

for starters, you'd have to know that the repubs and independents who similarly voted for a dem in earlier primaries answered the same questions, and responded similarly

did they?

the same poll or same questions would have to have been used

another problem is that poll/survey informants often answer questions untruthfully

otherwise: did it show the percentages of repubs and independents who voted for each dem candidate?

lastly, who paid for the study? and who conducted it?

[grantcart]

35. kick