21 July 2011

Hillary for President?


With unemployment numbers continuing to rise (understatement of the year) and debt up to our proverbial ears - President Obama is in serious trouble. Polls show him losing to a generic Republican candidate in 2012.
With the presidential election still 18 months away and the GOP field wide open, 44 percent of voters say they are more likely to vote for a generic Republican candidate than President Obama, according to the latest Gallup poll. Just 39 percent would back the incumbent president.

The level of uncertainty heading into the 2012 election is also evident in the 18 percent of voters who, at this point, do not have a preference for Obama versus the Republican.

It seems that 2012 will be an "anyone but Obama" election.

The question that crosses my mind (and a few others watching the ad above) is that this is the perfect time for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to step into the power void that Obama has left with his base and independents.

We know that Hillary has said that she's no longer interested in being president and is happy being Secretary of State - but then again she was supposedly happy being a senator from the great State of New York and wasn't interested in being president. We know how that turned out.

It would actually be in the best interest of the Democratic Party to run Hillary instead of Obama. Democrats like her - she won all the big states when she ran back in 2008 - and I think she'd bring in the independent vote as well. She's seen as a moderate, and perhaps a fiscal conservative. Most importantly we know that everyone *loves* Bill.

To mollify the liberals - they'd finally have a chance to vote for a black guy and a woman two elections in a row. For those who are guided by identity politics, I think that would be a pretty big deal.

Of course those who do vote based on gender and race also have other options - Herman Cain and Michele Bachmann... but I won't hold my breath.

No comments: