A bird in the hand

The GOP have, in John McCain, a bird in the hand.

Surely their bird is the oldest turkey you will ever see, but he is most certainly in hand - while our two birds, either of them far surpassing McCain in every category, are still in the bush.

What does it mean? Should I be worried that Obama hasn't finished off his opponent? Does this mean he can't beat John McCain?

John Judis, co-author of The Emerging Democratic Majority, and a Senior Editor at The New Republic, posted an online article at TNR with the title "The Next McGovern?". Judis says:

Obama's weaknesses as a general election candidate grow more apparent with each successive primary... [snip] ... if you look at Obama's vote in Pennsylvania, you begin to see the outlines of the old George McGovern coalition that haunted the Democrats during the '70s and '80s, led by college students and minorities.

I think Judis is right to be worried. Hillary has done a good job of painting Obama as an elitist (um, yes, he helped) while she herself plays up her newly discovered passions for hunting and beer-drinking (with a shot of Crown Royal to boot, of course). He has some work to do to recover from all of this negative framing.

Elsewhere in TNR, Gabe Sherman reminds us that even the vaunted NY Times has trouble choosing between these two fine candidates.

Last night, I listened to a dozen pundits debating the significance of Obama's failure to close the deal - to put her away - to throw the knockout punch. Lots of emasculating suggestions that Obama was lacking something necessary to a president. Nobody actually mentioned testosterone, but we all got it.

People, the reason we still have two candidates is that Hillary, everyone's favorite in this race in December, didn't finish off Obama in February. And - because she is a great candidate. Almost as good as Obama - but not quite.

That is why our two birds are still in the bush - because they are birds of excellent quality - far surpassing anything the GOP had to offer their voters this year.

This too shall pass, my friends. We're going to clobber John McCain.

Technorati Tags: McGovern, Obama, Testosterone with your waffles, sir?

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