The latest New York Times ‘Bloggingheads’ video features TDS co-editor Ruy Teixeira and The Atlantic.com conservative blogger Ross Douthat discussing Democratic strategy regarding the “blowback on universal health care.”
Also at NYT, Kevin Sack takes an in-depth look at John Edwards’s health care proposal and probes his flexibility on on the issue. The Times also has a convenient gateway link to articles about all the presidential candidates’ health care plans. Yet another way to check out the candidates’ recent statements and positions on health care (and other issues) is through WaPo‘s nifty “issues tracker” tool, which flags relevant articles. Meanwhile, the just-released Pew Research Center report on issue priorities indicates health care reform is increasingly a leading concern of Independents.

In SC this week, John Edwards has continued his campaign’s complaint that he would be winning in that state and nationally if it weren’t for the news media’s obsession with his two rivals.
He’s obviously right that disproportionate media attention has been paid to Clinton and Obama, even prior to Iowa, though the historic nature of their candidacies was clearly a factor as much as any bias. Since Iowa, however, the focus on the two national front-runners has been completely natural, if somewhat self-reinforcing.
Moreover, the idea that Edwards’ only political handicap has been media negligence just doesn’t bear much scrutiny. He’s been running a relatively poor third in polls in his native state for many months, mainly because of his longstanding inability to attract much African-American support. And you can at least partially forgive the punditocracy for treating his loss in Iowa–his obsessive focus for years, building on a big head start in popularity and organization, and benefitting from an environment where national media coverage wasn’t that big a factor–as the crushing blow that Edwards supporters had long conceded it would be. Live by Iowa, die by Iowa.
The dispiriting Clinton-Obama slugfest in SC has given Edwards one last chance to significantly exceed low expectations–which he failed to do in NH and NV. If he succeeds, and the media continue to ignore him, then he probably has some right to complain.
But if Big Media probably shouldn’t be blamed for Edwards’ travails, I personally think they have played a major role in the “racialization” of the Clinton-Obama rivalry. It’s significant that all the race-talk began on the night of the NH primary, when the networks gave exceptional (and IMO, unmerited) credence to the “Bradley-Wilder Effect” of hidden voter racism as an explanation for Clinton’s upset win. I know some people blame the Clinton campaign for “racialization,” but it should be fairly obvious that if her campaign wanted to “go there,” it would have done so prior to the vote in the whiter-shade-of-pale states of IA and NH. Maybe the race-talk was inevitable in any contest including Obama, and maybe identity-based voting is higher than it otherwise would be in a competition where actual policy differences were visible to anyone other than the most serious wonks. But Big Media definitely let the race-genie out of the bottle, and it’s unclear when or whether it can be bottled back up.

One of the more interesting subplots in the Republican presidential contest is the attitude of conservative elites towards long-time intraparty nemesis John McCain. Most don’t like him, for a variety of reasons ranging from his sponsorship of campaign finance reform, to his wavering record on tax cuts, his past feuding with the Christian Right, and his habit of cosponsoring legislation with Democrats (most importantly, on immigration reform and global climate change). Sure, he’s flip-flopped at least partially on some of these issues, and has won some conservative brownie points with his championship of Iraq escalation and his frank support for a permanent U.S. military engagement in that country. But many conservatives opinion-leaders still don’t trust him at all, and their views appear to be shared by a significant number of conservative voters in the early primaries.
But results are results, and between McCain’s wins in NH and SC, and his uniquely strong showing in general election polls, conservatives are having to come to grips with a McCain nomination, particularly if he wins in FL.
In general, conservative elites are talking about McCain much as many of their Democratic counterparts talked about Howard Dean during the brief period in the last presidential cycle when his nomination looked “inevitable.” And just as some of those Democrats longed for reassurance from Dean that all his revolutionary rhetoric hid a conventional politician, conservatives are openly asking McCain for a pander or two to make them feel better about succumbing to his nomination.
Here’s an interesting opening bid by the L’Osservatore Romano of conservative opinion, National Review:

McCain will never win over all conservatives, even if he gets the nomination. But he can reassure conservatives if he pledges to name a conservative running mate and identifies respected conservative legal figures to whom he will turn when nominating judges. He can promise to approach immigration reform piecemeal rather than comprehensively. He should say that strong evidence that the illegal-immigrant population is shrinking will have to arrive before he legalizes any large segment of that population. And he can acknowledge that scientific advances have weakened the case for federal funding of embryonic-stem-cell research.

Note the pointed reference to the veep choice, which should pour some cold water on neocon fantasies of a McCain-Lieberman ticket (no career-long supporters of abortion rights need apply), along with the demand for a flip-flop on stem cell research, and a full surrender on immigration reform.
At present, it’s unclear exactly how much leverage conservative elites have with McCain. He’s done pretty well without their support, and the real-world obstacle to McCain’s nomination is Mitt Romney’s bottomless campaign treasury, not conservative hostility. But expect to see more of this bidding for McCain’s allegiance if his electoral success continues.

Just an amen addendum to the conclusion of Ed’s article below that “Obama’s “ghetto” may be bigger than the pundits realize.” If any presidential candidate can be said to be appealing to the broadest possible demographic cross-section, it has to be Senator Obama. Conversely, I can’t think of any constituency he has pandered to as aggresively as, say Senator Clinton’s outreach to women voters of a certain age, or Edwards’ targeting of unions and blue collar workers.
Obama’s grand strategy seems to be casting the widest possible net, while his opponents are focused on snagging key demographics they see as critical for their respective campaigns. Sure, Obama wants the highest possible percentage of the African American vote. But if memory serves, he has been criticized by Jesse Jackson and other Black leaders for not being focused enough on the Black demographic. And yes, Obama is no doubt grateful for his huge edge with younger voters. But it’s not like he’s out there spending a lot more time on college campuses at the expense of other groups. He doesn’t have to spend a lot of time working young voters. They just like him. The young, white voters in my family talk about him like he is the hope of their generation.
I had to chuckle at the title and subtitle of Mickey Kaus’s Slate article flagged in Ed’s post: “How Obama Can Win: He can escape his electoral ghetto by playing the race-blind card.” Well, that train left the station some time ago, regardless of what happens in SC. Also the thought of any pundit giving Obama advice beyond maybe some really good ads targeting California Hispanics and seniors may be a smidge presumptuous. This guy was a state senator less than four years ago, and he’s got a good shot at becoming the leader of the free world by this time next year. There’s not a lot any journalists can teach him about taking advantage of political opportunity. Like him or not, Obama is running one hell of a smart campaign.

There is a new and (no matter whom you support) disturbing CW dominating analysis of the Democratic nominating contest at the moment. It’s that Obama is becoming the “black candidate,” repelling the white and brown voters who will determine the ultimate outcome. Indeed, this point of view is feeding the Clinton campaign’s efforts to downplay an expected Obama win in South Carolina this Saturday. After all (suggest the pundits, not the Clintons), SC is just about black folks, who won’t matter down the road. Typically, Dick Morris is the bluntest in publicly presenting this point of view, but I can tell you, it’s endemic in the DC chattering classes.
Totally aside from the corrosive effect of such race-based political assumptions–including the planted axiom that white and Latino voters don’t want to be on the same bandwagon as African-Americans–they strike me as a being over-simplistic from even a cold, amoral perspective. Here’s a new flash for the punditocracy: there are African-Americans who live in states other than South Carolina.
A case in point: the most under-discussed story about the Nevada Caucuses was that (according to the entrance polls) the African-American vote was a large as the Latino vote. Among the latter, it was widely reported that Clinton won by a little better than two-to-one. But among the former, Obama won by better than five-to-one. And lest we forget, Clinton was running even with or even ahead of Obama among African-Americans nationally until very recently.
In the February 5 states, African-American voters will almost certainly outnumber Latinos in a majority of states, will be crucial in quite a few (e.g., Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Arkansas, New Jersey, Delaware, plus Obama’s own Illinois) and will be a significant factor in others, including California. If Obama’s margins among black voters match what he won in Nevada–not a bad bet, given the “racialization” of the campaign–then he can lose white and Latino voters substantially and still be competitive.
In other words, it’s not all that clear which candidate would ultimately benefit from a “racialization” of the nominating contest. And to use Mickey Kaus’ infelicitous term, Obama’s “ghetto” may be bigger than the pundits realize.

The “electibility” argument among Democratic presidential candidates is complicated enough from the get-go, as illustrated by a recent exchange between Jonathan Chait and Ezra Klein about the general election strengths and weaknesses of Obama and Clinton, which pretty much covers the waterfront of informed speculation.
But two new factors are pushing the electibility debate in new directions. The first is the re-emergence of John McCain as the Republican front-runner. He’s the only GOPer in shouting distance of the two Democratic front-runners in general election trial heats, and actually runs ahead of Clinton in some. And there’s a reason for that: aside from his famous appeal to independents, and the media adulation he enjoys, he’s the one candidate hardest to typecast (except on the subject of Iraq) as mired in the same ideological delusions that gave us the Bush administration. His one major electoral weakness, the hostility of movement conservatives, won’t be much of a problem in a general election (and they seem to be coming around; elite conservative attitudes towards McCain at the moment strongly resemble those of establishment Democrats towards Howard Dean just prior to Iowa in 2004–resigned).
The second factor, though, cuts in the opposite direction. It’s now virtually certain that the economy will be in recession during the critical period prior to the general election. This will represent a real anchor on the Republican ticket, regardless of its composition. And this is not a subject conducive to any McCain Magic. The Arizonan’s economic message is basically one of fiscal austerity seasoned with a commitment to heavy defense spending. It’s hard to imagine a prescription less well suited to hard times.
This problem may catch up with McCain in the primaries; Mitt Romney would be insane not to exploit the advantage of being both more knowledgable and more conservative than McCain on economic issues. But if McCain does win the nomination, all the talk about service and courage and straight talk won’t matter much to people who are worried about their jobs, their pensions, and their homes.

Well, what can I say? World financial markets are in an uproar; the Fed has discarded all decorum in issuing a major interest rate cut; the Bush administration, after spending most of the autumn posturing against federal budget deficits, is now in a panic-stricken drive for a “stimulus package;” and the two leading Democratic candidates for president are going after each other like crazed weasels.
I think giving this day a few hours to sort itself out would be a prudent idea.

As a white southerner whose childhood was mostly spent in a Jim Crow society, the life and death of Martin Luther King, Jr., is not something I just read about in history books. I remember the searing challenge he posed to the polite white southern “liberals” who were embarassed by his simple demands for justice, and his direct evocation of the ideals of their country and their faith. And I also remember the incredible hatred his gentle, quintessentially Christian movement provoked in so many of my own “people” (e.g., an aunt who before the apprehension of James Earl Ray said she’d love the opportunity to hide and care for King’s murderer).
Even today, I’d guess a majority of white southerners–and white yankees, for that matter–think of MLK Day as an ethnic holiday that has nothing to do with their own “people.” I recently read a new biography of Jesse Helms that showed pretty convincingly that Helms’ opposition to a federal MLK holiday was the single most important factor in his survival of the toughest political challenge of his life, his come-from-behind victory over Jim Hunt in 1984. Clearly, many white North Carolinians thought of MLK as a man who had helped vanquish their heritage, when in fact he helped redeem it.
More than anyone in recent memory, Martin Luther King, Jr., held up a mirror to the people of this country and asked them to live up to the best of what they believed about themselves. And that’s why this is, and should be, a truly national holiday, for all of us.

Democratic candidates are all in South Carolina on MLK Day prepping for the CNN debate. HRC will start the day in the front ranks of the King Day March and Rally in Columbia and will join Edwards and Obama at the CNN debate in Myrtle Beach. Her husband Bill Clinton will address the MLK Commemorative Service at Dr. King’s Ebenezer Baptist Church in Atlanta. (Interestingly, Huckabee will also attend). Edwards will hold a campaign rally in Columbia before the debate and afterwards will take part in a town hall meeting in Conway. Obama apparently doesn’t have major scheduled events, other than tonight’s debate, according to the New York Times candidate schedule tracker.

John McCain’s narrow win in SC over Mike Huckabee probably dooms the Arkansan and creates an entirely new dynamic in the January 29 FL primary. As you will hear over and over in the next few days, SC was a kind of terrain that was as close to ideal for Huckabee as he could have wanted, a southern state with a heavily evangelical Republican voting base.
But in the end, Huck’s luck wasn’t that good. Fred Thompson’s decision to throw everything into SC, and to go negative on Huckabee, and Romney’s decision to all but bail in the state, almost certainly produced the McCain win. Thompson ran well in Huckabee Country, while Romney ran well in McCain Country. Had Thompson pulled out, and had Romney really competed, it’s pretty clear Huckabee would have had a major advantage.
Now we get to find out if Rudy Giuliani’s decision to concede every state prior to Florida was a fatal mistake. Today Rudy won 4% of the vote in NV and 2% in SC; he was running first in some SC polls less than two months ago.
But more and more, it’s looking like a McCain-Romney contest for the nomination. And despite McCain’s reinforced front-runner status after SC, Romney may have the money and the positioning to overcome him.