Politics 2008:The Caucuses and The Dem/Rep Conventions

[TonyB06]

Originally Posted by SummerChild

TonyB,

I think that I would think about it like this:
I give the voters of Michigan and Florida much credit in terms of being intellectual saavy enough to know that their own state, and not the Democratic party, is the group that prevented their votes from being counted. Now, Florida could actually go Republican if people sat at home. However, Michigan, with the state that Detroit and some of the other areas are in economically - do you think that they would *really* sit at home in November and let Republicans go out and turn Michigan red. Come on now. Detroit is experiencing one of the worst fallouts of this economy and it is likely spreading over Michigan (although i'm not sure).

I doubt the people of Michigan will sit at home in November in large numbers.

And Florida, well, I also worry about a do-over in Florida b/c there is always so much shadiness with the voting down there. A paper vote? How untrackable is that? That might be worse than the Bush v. Gore debacle only for smaller potatoes.

SC

Well, super lawyer that you are, I know you hold it down intellecutally over most of us

Of course, your speculations are as valid as mine are on this, but I still think the safer political play is to take possible voter disaffection (among your base) out of play.

Besides Obama -- especially if dude is not going to more forcefully challenge HRC on her flip-flop on this -- cannot be seen as "not wanting" a solution to this, it'll look like he's afraid of the outcome.

Depending on how this plays out, it'll be interesting to see how voter motivation polls in Michigan/ Fla. i.e. how likely are you to vote --strongly, somewhat, likely, not likely, etc... Obama is bringing a lot of newer, first time voters to the process. are they are more easily soured on the process (likely to sit home) if they feel they've been played?

Of course, as a former Obama law student, I'm sure he could put you on payroll and have you canvas Michigan from Labor Day through Nov. 5 and just put it on lock for him.