Do you think if the party splits .....it will bring a third Republican Administration

[surfermaw]

From reading this board, I think arrogance is going to split the party, then remember we will be into the third republican administration. The last time we had republicans, three in a rowe( RESULTS... GREAT DEPRESSION)

[LadyVT]

1. Of course it will. It's already happening.

[libertee]

2. Absolutely see that everywhere! It better be an Obama/Clinton ticket

[Exilednight]

22. Neither candidate can deliver something the other needs.

Obama needs someone who can deliver states. There is no state that Hillary can get that will benefit Obama and vice versa.

[surfermaw]

8. I am in my eighties ,and see things that shouldn't be happening

I know how we feel when one of our candidates drops out, bashing by ones that are still in puts salt in wounds, and some of it may not wash out.. For the new on the board, you should be trying to pick up votes by showing you care for other people feeling, instead of acting cocky. The primary is almost over, get over your win or defeat and keep the party together.

[DemGa]

25. I'm afraid the split might be irreparable

This occurred when Barack Obama overtly rode on Hillary's "negatives" -- negatives that were created from years of vicious right-wing attacks. Many see this as a betrayal.

[soundguy]

3. No doubt about it!

[angie_love]

4. Gosh I hope not, I made this point on another thread

But I'm afraid the vitriol spewed on both sides will split the party. I'm afraid that some ppl are not going to get over one candidate losing over another. This has been a really long election cycle and emotional attachments have been made. It will take a long time to get over. It frankly irritates me to no end that some democrats say they will vote repug for the first time just b/c thier candidate didn't win. Emotions will get the better of us sometimes, even if it means losing sight of who we essentially are first and foremost: democrats. We have 2 very qualified candidates this year to our benefit and also detriment. But the silver lining is the average dem voter I think just wants a dem in teh whitehouse next year, I think that will trump any bitter feelings this process has left us. Please I hope ppl remember that what unites us first and foremost are that we are democrats and we need a democrat in the white house for so many reasons: judges/stem cell research/bringing our troops back/no bombs in iran/economy/healthcare etc. I hope we can unite again.

[scheming daemons]

5. DU doesn't represent the party....

The party won't split.


Some hardcore Hillary fanatics on DU won't give up the ghost, but in a few weeks, even they will fade away.

[surfermaw]

14. But will the smart mouthes of Obama supporters stop? don't put it at the feet of Hillary supporters

[readmoreoften]

23. Yes, it is by no means the Hillary Supporters. And I don't like Hillary.

I'm not voting for her or Obama in the primary--I'm voting for Edwards still--Obama's hardcore followers are largely intolerable. I have over 30 BO supporters on ignore and no Hillary supporters on ignore. The sexism from the anti-Hillary crew is absolutely astounding.

[ficus1]

28. You didn't even ignore P2BA?

I'm impressed.

[cali]

6. No. I think you and others on this thread

need to understand that DU is NOT a reflection of the real world. I find it sad that you can't distinguish between the two. Honestly, in the real world, people are not as divided as this board suggests. Not even close.

[dflprincess]

17. Sadly, there are a lot of people in the real world that,

like a lot of us here, don't like either of the Democratic candidates. Unlike many of us here who will suck it up and vote for whichever one is the nominee no matter how distasteful that is, many of the "average voters" may not even bother to vote. I have several friends like this and rather than try and sell them on a candidate I don't believe in (whichever one it is), I'm going to concentrate on convincing them that they at least have to show up and vote in the House and Senate races. No matter who wins the presidential race, we're going to have a Republican (lite or otherwise) in the White House but we might have a chance to get some actual Democrats added to Congress.


I really wasn't worried about McCain having much of a chance until my mother began to get bad feelings that he will be president whenever she sees him on TV. This is one of her pyschic flashes, that are often accurate and make me very nervous.

[cali]

18. Actually you're wrong.

I suggest you read the recent Pew Report and poll. It's long, but worthwhile and indicates that dems are uncommonly united and pleased with their candidates. Don't mistake projection for reality. And sorry, your mom's "psychic" flashes are less than persuasive.

[dflprincess]

19. I'm talking about people who don't consider themselves to be party members

though they usually vote Democratic. I seem to be running into quite a lot of them between the office and the neighborhood.

I wouldn't worry about Mother's flashes either if I hadn't had over 50 years of experience with them. She's not happy with it either, and says she just hopes she's feeling pessimistic. On the bright side, up until she started getting that feeling she was one of those who was thinking about not voting this year - and she's made it to every election since 1948.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

7. Nope...not going to happen!

We will have our primary wars and all that...

And once those are over, and we have our candidate...

We will come back together!

Everyone remembers the last seven years, and nobody wants a repeat of those...

You can take this to the bank, mark my words...

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

9. LOL

The party isn't going to split. It's rallying behind our nominee.

[Johnny__Motown]

10. Possible, the convention is in August , If Hillary drags this out there is little time to recover

[bpeale]

11. yep. it's headed there as we speak.

[John Q. Citizen]

12. The only thing that will split the party is if Hill gets the nomination without the

voters approval; ie a combination of super delegates, seating the delegates from states where no campaign occured, etc.

If Obama continues to win the majority of elected delegates and gets the nomination as a result, the party will pull together and we will win back the White House and do very well in picking up a lot of seats in congress.

The exit polls everywhere and continuosly show that the voters like both candidates, and will vote in the GE for whoever wins the primary fair and square.

There may be a tiny percentage of voters who love Hill and hate Obama who don't vote, but it won't amount to anything significant. If it did, Hill would be winning the primaries.

[surfermaw]

16. It not the nominee I speak of...It is the candidate in the GE

Probably you are right on the candidate, but I am suspicious of Ind.& Republican votes in the primary, it is a trick that has been used in both parties over the years. In fact one lady yesterday on a talk show called in and said she was voting dem. in the primary,but would vote for MCCain in the GE., now in cases like that we have to depend on our democrats in the party, please, I can take any one of them however I am in my eighties and please don't make me look at another republican president for 8 more years. However never never count any one out until the cows come home.

[Frances]

13. Obama is probably going to be our nominee

I think that Hillary's base (women and blue-collar workers) will vote for Obama over McCain--if they don't get scared by another major attack on our country. After 9/11, I heard several Dems say they were glad Bush was our President. I couldn't believe my ears, but, in their fear, these people, IMO, lost their reasoning abilities.

On the bright side, I have a feeling that most of the people who supported Nader will support Obama. I don't think there will be a Nader or a Nader-like-candidate siphoning off votes in 2008.

[surfermaw]

15. I think you are right on the terrorist thing, another reason to keep voters close to the heart,

We will know I think in the next three states who will be the nominee, unless arrogance kill us...You don't talk down to people and expect them to vote for your candidate, didn't your mothers ever tell you, (You can catch more flies with honey than you can catch with vinegar)

[Iceburg]

20. Both parties are leaning so far to the right that there is room for one

left of centre. America is already heading into a recession. If you think Americans are angry now ... Look for a 3rd party to emerge 2012.

[angie_love]

21. curious are you american? n/t

[NeedleCast]

24. Stop worrying about a party split

based on what you see on message boards. Sweet Baby J. You think DU is really an accurate cross section of the country? Most will support the Democratic nominiee be it Hillary or Obama (like me).

[Moh96]

26. the GE is in Nov, people will be over it and think straight trust me on that

[Sybbis]

27. Reagan, Reagan, Bush-I, was the last threeper for them...

This wasn't quite as disastrous as the Great Depression, although we are still paying for Reagan's deeply stupid economic and taxation policies, not to mention his poisonous effect on the psyche of the electorate.

The issue of splitting the Party is real and serious. To newer, younger voters this doesn't seem particularly significant. To those of us who have been around for a while, it's quite sobering. Voting or not voting is only one part of it and perhaps the least of it.

The real problem is in losing the support of older, seasoned campaigners. The turn-out for a general election is two to three times that of the primaries. It's a completely different ballgame. While it's nice that the kids are volunteering for Obama right now, they are not the backbone of the Democratic ground game in a general election. It isn't possible for them to acquire the needed skills while a campaign is in progress. It's just another one of those pesky "experience" issues that Obama supporters find so irritating and like to sweep under the rug.

The people the Democrats need to win are Clinton, Gore and Kerry activists who are old-school (even *gasp* DLC!) Democrats. We need people who have been working presidential elections for lo, these many years. Hope won't get the work done. Speeches won't get the work done. Small donors won't pay for the work to get done. To win, the entire structure of the Democratic Party - including all the people and institutions the Obama supporters have been trashing - will have to be brought to bear on the Republicans. In their zeal to destroy Hillary Clinton, Obama supporters have been short-sighted to say the least. Sure, people may go ahead and vote for the guy, or maybe not. He's pissed off several core Democratic constituencies so it's difficult to say if he'll still get their votes.

The question is, after all these months of destroying Clinton and acting as if they don't need the Democratic Party - will the Democratic machine get out there and work for the man? Will they talk him up positively at the office? Will they make phone calls, roust neighbors, hold fundraisers, put signs on their lawns, write another check? These are just a few of the tedious, trivial, necessary things that the Party structure and seasoned Democrats take care of every time. Obama may have pulled some old-school Democratic endorsements but his complete lack of respect for the Party and its core has been made abundantly clear.

How Obama and Obama supporters make amends and try to repair the damage they have done thus far will be interesting to watch. I think they're banking on the idea that the "adult wing" of the Democratic Party has nowhere else to turn and won't hang them out to dry. I don't know if they're right about that. I suspect they will not have the cakewalk they're expecting with serious Democrats.