Last night, while I was making the rounds of campaign HQs in Columbia, it suddenly hit me that I needed to come in and revamp the editorial page for today, which at that point had gone to the pressroom hours earlier.
The first thing that hit me was that a couple of passages in my column for today were wrong — more about that in a minute. But the thing that would have really hit you in the eye and make you wonder what we’d been smoking was Robert Ariail’s cartoon. What you see above is what would have landed on your doorstep today if I hadn’t gone back in to the office a little before 10 p.m.
When Robert had left for the day, the cartoon was as fine as prognostication could make it. The polls almost uniformly had said, right up until the day of the New Hampshire primary, that Obama and McCain were going to win up there, and that Obama would win by a bigger margin than McCain. All of the talk about Democratic Party insiders was about how Mrs. Clinton would probably have to skip South Carolina, conceding it to Obama, and concentrate on the big states coming up in February.
By 8:30 or so, it was becoming obvious that even if Obama won New Hampshire, it would be close. An hour later, it was looking increasingly like Hillary had achieved an upset win. And this morning, I have yet to find anyone who offers a plausible explanation as to why that happened. People mention the tears, but to me, that remains implausible. I guess I just don’t want to admit voters can be so swayed by something that that. Perhaps I should know better.
Here’s the cartoon I put in place of the Hillary one (it’s also reproduced below) — fortunately, Robert had finished it earlier in the day, only deciding to do the Clinton one late. All I had to do was scan it in and put it on the page.
Due to a glitch in software that automatically searches for each day’s cartoon and puts it on thestate.com, some of you may have already seen the Hillary cartoon. But we’ve fixed that, and at least I was able to keep it out of the paper.
Oh, yes, here are the changes I had to make in my column. Originally, the relevant passage in my column went like this:
Let’s do Republicans first, since y’all face S.C. voters first (on the 19th) and come back to the Democrats (assuming, of course, that Barack Obama hasn’t sewn up the nomination before this column lands on your doorstep).
We’d like some specifics beyond the vehement claims that pretty much each and every one of you is “the real conservative” in the race.
We’ll start with John McCain, the likely winner (as I type this) in New Hampshire Tuesday.
Once again, that was based on the best info available at the time our page needed to go to meet our normal production schedule. Here’s what it changed to:
Let’s do Republicans first, since y’all face S.C. voters first (on the 19th) and come back to the Democrats (after the cliffhanger night Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton just went through, they could probably do with a rest today).
We’d like some specifics beyond the vehement claims that pretty much each and every one of you is “the real conservative” in the race.
We’ll start with John McCain, the big winner in New Hampshire Tuesday.
As the world keeps changing several times a day over the next couple of weeks, this sort of thing is likely to keep happening. I just hope I can always catch it before an error is published.
Related Posts
The sentiment appears to be (not like it ever changed) that all Black people must support Barack Obama, regardless if his political positions differ with that Black voter. Any who deviate are fair game from the traditional attacks.But it would appear, not all Blacks are toeing the line. It’ll be interesting to see if the effort is made to denigrate the “blackness” of those not so accessible?Among blacks, Obama’s favorables are high (60 percent), but Clinton’s are higher (85 percent). Plus, Clinton and her husband, former President Bill Clinton, have deep roots in the black community always supporting black community, they have allot of excellent history for helping minorities. Black leaders are not interested as much in Obama as one might think either, how does that necessarily affect what the general Black American population thinks of him? We learned in NH not to trust media coverage any longer. Truth is and some of you may have noticed Barack is not getting the automatic support from African Americans that many assumed he would get since throwing his hat into the ring for the Democratic nomination for the presidency and (Louis Chude-Sokei, L.A Times article) makes an effort to inform us as to why this might be true. Unfortunately, while it has a few good points it misses the mark in too many ways. The main point, Obama isn’t “black enough” to get the support of the standing Black American leadership because of his White/Hawaiian/African (meaning NOT African American, but real African) heritage. all this goes to explain why Black leaders don’t seem to be warming to Obama as far as this University professor is concerned. Obamas public line of thinking, all things black in the US threatens the lock on the dem nominamtion, turning away non-black and educated black voters who won the iowa caucus for him. The tides have changed Obama will need to use more than ½ of his race to get educated black voters to support him. He now needs to begin showing substance and back away from the preaching. NH is a perfect example of whats to come.
Hillary Clinton Makes History
First Woman to Win New Hampshire Primary
Tonight Senator Hillary Clinton defied the media pundit machine and made history as the first woman to win the New Hampshire Democratic primary for U.S. president.
The women of New Hampshire turned out in large numbers, and their votes helped Senator Clinton break another glass ceiling. NOW PAC is proud to be a part of this history-making campaign. We were one of the first organizations to endorse Clinton because we believe she is the best candidate to move our country forward, and New Hampshire Democrats agreed.
The United States needs strong, experienced and principled leadership to restore faith in our government and repair its credibility at home and abroad, and to end the destructive policies that have eroded women’s rights and civil liberties and increased injustice and inequality in our society.
Senator Clinton is just such a leader. She has a long history of support for women’s empowerment, and her public record is a testimony to her leadership on issues important to women in the U.S. and around the globe. She has eloquently articulated the need for full economic, political and social equality for women in every institution of society, taking action throughout her career – as a lawyer, community leader, First Lady, Senator and candidate for the presidency – to advance the civil and human rights of women and girls.
NOW leaders and activists volunteered in both Iowa and New Hampshire, giving their time and energy to turn out the women’s vote for Hillary Clinton. In her victory speech tonight, Senator Clinton said “We are in it for the long run.” Yes we are.
Has anyone seen the video of Bill O’Reilly shoving the Barack Obama staffer at a campaign rally? That guy actually had the nerve to show it on his show. O’Reilly is a complete nut posing as a journalist. Yet the neo-cons love the guy. This incident shows how dangerous the right-wing spin machine has become.
http://www.crooksandliars.com/2008/01/07/bill-oreilly-shoves-obamas-staffer-unhinged-the-full-video/
Exceptional use of the cut-and-paste funtion Josh62, both here, the other post and on the Greenville Times Online (http://greenvilleonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080109/NEWS01/80109020/-1/rss) I suppose you adopted the nom de plume of “Lakiesha Jones” in an attempt to lend yourself “black credibility?” Wow.
Regardless, the assessment is incorrect. It’s the Clintons (more to the point, Bill) that are firmly entrenched in the old guard of southern black leadership, true, but those who deviate from *their* support risk being subject to attacks. And the Clintons have enough clout to make those attacks vicious and significant.
Gosh, Bud, seems to me the people posing as journalists anchor the nightly news shows on NBC, CBS and ABC.
How thinly veiled their rampant glee that Hillary cried her way to victory in a miniscule state where 95 percent of the populace is lily white and the rest are stuck in the snow.