One of the possible saving graces of this election cycle seemed to be the fervent hatred of the Clintons on the right. Now that Barack Obama has gained enough momentum to become the front runner, albeit without actually saying anything substantive, this poses an interesting problem for those of us on the right. The particular problem is illustrated by Fred Barnes (via Patterico’s Pontifications):

[T]here’s a growing consensus among both Republican and Democratic strategists that Obama would be the stronger general election candidate. He may be more liberal than Clinton, but by almost every other yardstick he’s a more appealing candidate.

Nevertheless, many Republicans are rooting for him to knock off Clinton. If that makes it more difficult to keep the White House, so be it. Being spared another President Clinton is reward enough. For now.

So be it? Wait, what? This isn’t a matter of principle, because if you look at their records and positions, Obama is the more liberal candidate. So why would any Republican/Conservative/sane person root for someone whose policies reflect less experience and more opposition to our own, and who appears to be a more formidable foe in the general election?

Clinton hate.

We’ve all been gearing up for this fight since she first floated running for Senate in the hours after the Clintons left the White House with a bag full of silverware and keyboard parts in tow. We’ve been watching and seething as she jumped back and forth every which way to carve out a name for herself and a faux-legacy for her husband. We’re still upset that he didn’t get booted out because of his perjury. In retrospect it’s a good thing he stuck around, as it ensured that Al Gore never got to sit in the big boy seat.

Yet this devotion, such as the “Stop Hillary Express” on Sean Hannity’s radio show, has now shown its weakness as with most opposition based strategies. Obama may well defeat Hillary, and so complacency sets in.

If you had never seen Hillary before, you might listen to the first ten minutes of her speech, or catch one of her cryfests, and conclude that she seems like a decent enough woman with reasonable ideas. Perhaps a slight stretch, but I hope you get the idea. If you added a dash (or a few pounds) of charisma to the tired old liberal/socialist ideology that Hillary is peddling, you’ve created Barack Obama.

So to all my fellow conservatives out there chomping at the bit to see Hillary flop and fail, think again. If you really want to see her go down, you’d better keep her in the race. If Obama gets to the general, he’s going to still have that new car smell covering all that liberal baggage, and it will be a much more difficult race. It will be a game defined by “hope” instead of ideas. Don’t think that McCain can simply swat these pleasantries away. And whatever you do, don’t think that an Obama presidency will be any more palatable than a Hillary administration would be.

In fact, Rush Limbaugh just had a supposedly conservative caller phoning in that he might vote for Obama because he “inspires people like Reagan”, even acknowledging that Obama is most likely a socialist. The caller wants to feel good above all else. A plant? Hopefully, scary either way.

Note: Patterico gets it!

UPDATE BY PATTERICO: I wholly disagree, and urge my readers in the remaining primary states to cross over and vote for Hillary. It’s our only hope.

Related Obamagasms:

Next Up On The Liberal Agenda After Surrendering In Iraq: Surrendering In Afghanistan - Right Wing News

http://www.qando.net/ - Obama, Exxon Mobil, economics and populism

Ankle Biting Pundits » Blog Archive » Has Barack Obama Considered The Fact That He Might Actually Be President? Apparently Not.

Confederate Yankee: The Unbearable Lightness of Obama

Cool on O’Bama - The Corner on National Review Online

The Jawa Report: Barrack Obama: Dangerous

Update 2:00PM CST:

Hot Air seems to get it.

Gallup: McCain wins more Democrats than Obama wins Republicans? Heard it last night, but didn’t have time to check it out. I’m skeptical. Remember that there were a lot more voters in the Democrat primaries thus far than there were in the Republican primaries. So any advantage here seems negated to me by large Democrat turnout expectations, but that’s just my two cents.

GINA COBB: Why Democrats Have Turned Against Hillary

JustOneMinute: She Comes To Bury Hillary…

Hillary Will Defeat Obama « THE TYGRRRR EXPRESS

JustOneMinute: Faux-mentum For Barack At The Times

McCain’s Challenge to Obama | Redstate We’re going to need a lot more of this.

Update 3:00PM CST: Michelle Malkin » Hillary’s plea: Save me, white women and Hispanics!

I’m not Hispanic or a white woman, but I’ll do my part to keep the weaker Democrat foe viable in the primary race.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, February 13th, 2008 at 11:53 am and is filed under 2008 Race, Hillary, Obama, Republicans. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.