Thoughts on why the Dems feel this is the year to put Hillary, Obama..

[LBK]

as the 2 big democratic nominees? The problem for the Dems the last few elections is that they have failed to put the charismatic middle of the orad type candidates out there and have thus, lost the election 2 times in a row. You would think they would learn from this and get someone that is tough, has a spine and can garner the support from those middle roaders that can be influended to vote dem.

This is a critical election for the Dems. This should be the year they can win given they put a popular figure out tehre that is not too polarizing. Yet, they place Hillary and Obama at the top of the list. 2 polarizing controversial nominees.

Why?

Any thoughts on why the Dems can't seem to understand the need to place a less polarizing figure in the running?

And I am a democrat. Frustrated one at that. Seeing no options here.

[Dan.]

The nomination process isn't what it used to be. The Dems don't just "put" people as front runners; polls do. Thus, Hilary and Obama are what the people want.

[iron81]

The Dems have actually done a good job this year of putting forward middle of the road types that have a broad appeal. Hillary is actually a very moderate candidate: she is tough on Foreign Policy and relatively conservative on taxes. The hatred you see for Hillary is largely based on the first impression we got of her 15 years ago.

Obama is more liberal than Hillary, but he has a very broad message. He got 70% of the vote for his Senate run in Illinois and from what I've seen, conservatives at least respect him. The media still fawns over him so much that he isn't very controversial or polarizing.

Also, I'll say that your ideal candidate that is "tough, has a spine and can garner the support from those middle roaders" is basically impossible. The conventional definition of moderate is someone who holds some liberal positions and some conservative postions. Anyone like this is going to be labeled a flip-flopper.

[MoreWineII]

C'mon man you can't put Hilary and "broad appeal" in the same sentence with a straight face, and I'm a liberal.

[iron81]

I'm not saying that she has a broad appeal, I'm saying she should have a broad appeal based on her stance on the issues. I don't get why a lot of people hate her: a few liberals have challenged Hillary haters why they don't like her, and their responses have been vague.

[Misfire]

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The nomination process isn't what it used to be. The Dems don't just "put" people as front runners; polls do. Thus, Hilary and Obama are what the people want.

[/ QUOTE ]

...just like they wanted Dean on 04.

[Misfire]

[ QUOTE ]
The Dems have actually done a good job in past decades of putting forward middle of the road types that have a broad appeal. Hillary is actually the wife of a very moderate candidate: he was tough on Foreign Policy and relatively conservative on taxes. The hatred you see for Hillary is largely based on the the fact she is nothing like her husband.

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FYP

[ConstantineX]

She's a conniving populist in the worst way - not even strong enough to stand up for her supposedly liberal ideals. She's intelligent enough to obfuscate the issues to the least discriminating voters (the poor; the blog The Skeptical Optimist records lots of instances). She'll use the presidency for cronyism; lord knows Mr. Clinton did it before. And most importantly I'm not convinced she's going to keep taxes low, especially the capital gains taxes levied on hedge funds and private equity - the entities that make our capital markets so versatile. I used to be a liberal too, hell, my friends and I campaigned for Kerry after reading "The Working Poor". Then I went to college. [img]/images/graemlins/tongue.gif[/img]

[mark_foley]

Since when is Obama polarizing? Besides the Klan members most everybody likes him even if they don't agree with his sides of the issues.

[theweatherman]

[ QUOTE ]
The nomination process isn't what it used to be. The Dems don't just "put" people as front runners; polls do. Thus, Hilary and Obama are what the people want.

[/ QUOTE ]

A better reason is that they are the two people the media has put forth and told the people to want.