Monday, June 09, 2008

A Whole Lot of Grumbling Going On

Now despite the fact that Hillary Clinton has urged her supporters to now support the campaign of Barack Obama, we still have lots and lots of grumbling going on among Clinton supporters. And now with the Texas GOP convention about to get underway in Houston, we get to be treated to the grumbling going on within the party of the Dark Side.

It seems that the evangelical wing of the GOP is very upset about their party’s presumptive nominee, John McCain. That is, the darkest part of the Dark Side don’t think McCain is conservative enough. They rage at his soft stance on immigration, for one thing. McCain is not their first, second or even third choice.

As a matter of fact, with Ron Paul in a home court advantage at the convention, there will be more visible opposition to McCain at this convention.

But even Tom DeLay, it seems, has come over and is now supporting McCain even despite the harsh words he had to say about him earlier this year:

“‘If McCain gets the nomination, I don’t know what I’ll do,’ DeLay said at the Capitol Hill Club, according to a source in the room. ‘I might have to sit this one out.’”
DeLay’s wife, Christine, has yet to be won over however. DeLay says that he has been unable to convince her to vote for McCain, saying that she will cast her vote for the Libertarian nominee, Bob Barr.

This is a schism in the GOP makes the whole “misobamania” thing among Hillarycrats pale in comparison. Mainly because between these two disaffections, one is not a Democratic Party thing, but the other is very definitely a Republican thing.

Supporters of Clinton who now say they will cross party lines and vote for McCain cannot be Democrats. They’re independents, and possibly Republicans who were entranced with the notion of having a woman in the Oval Office.

Contrary-wise, right wing anti-McCain Republicans would never, ever, cross party lines and vote for Obama. They’ll maintain their intransigent stance and support Ron Paul, or do as Christine DeLay says she is going to do, and vote for the Libertarian. If this holds through November, the traditional 5% that Libertarians get to the detriment of the Republican nominee will likely be higher. And Obama will win, with or without the votes of intransigent Clinton supporters.

But I find it ironic that there will be one issue that may rein in any party defections at all this November. One issue that will bring Clinton supporters to vote for the Democratic nominee, and Barr/Paul supporters to vote for the Republican nominee. And that issue is the Supreme Court.

As I mentioned before in another posting, Justice John Paul Stevens wants to retire from the bench. He is tired and his health is failing. He is 88 years old. John Paul Stevens is the swing vote on The Court that votes to uphold a woman’s right to choose every time the issue comes up to be heard.

It’s as simple as this. John McCain is stridently “pro-life”. Even though he is viewed as “a maverick” in the Republican Party, in this issue McCain maintains a firm right wing stance. Whether or not everyone knows this, because of the “maverick thing” will be moot at election time because both Democrats and Republicans will go out of their way to inform voters of his stance. Evangelicals who have such strong views on abortion will not want to cast a protest vote and give Obama the election. Nor will Hillary’s supporters cast a McCain vote to give McCain the election and four years to appoint pro-life justices to the Supreme Court.

In reality, all of this grumbling on both sides will have been for naught come November. And ironically, all for the exact same reason.

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