The futur of the dem party: Edwards or Hillary?

[dazzleman]

I voted for Edwards, even though I can't stand him.

The Democrats need to be able to crack the south in order to win national elections.  It seems that at this point, given the huge cultural divide between the north and south, and the highly negative perception that southerners have of northern Democrats, only a native southerner can attract sufficient support in the south.  Clinton's performance is proof of that.

Al Gore did poorly in the south because of the perception that he abandoned southern values during his term as Clinton's VP.  I think the fallout from the Lewinsky scandal, and Gore's strong defense of Clinton in that matter, took away Gore's advantage in being from the south.

I can't see somelike Hillary Clinton improving upon Kerry's performance in the south.  If anything, she would do worse.  For those who really hate liberals, a liberal woman is always more noxious than a man, for whatever reason.  She's from New York, which is the kiss of death.  I cannot imagine Hillary doing as well as Kerry or Gore did nationally, unless conditions during the second Bush term are horrible.

It may not be Edwards, per se, who will lead the Democrats to victory, but the Democrats in my opinion need to tone down the liberalism and become more moderate on cultural issues to win national elections, and for that it will probably take a southern, or possibly midwestern, moderate, not a liberal from a hard-core Democratic state.