Our next President...

[Ben.]

If Allen gets the GOP nomination and goes on to face Hillary then yes he will almost certainly win IMHO.

With Allen as their nominee the GOP will keep its base solidly behind the ticket both small state conservatives and social conservatives will be able to fully support a candidate like Allen, and probably quite enthusiastically.

Allen will also be quite free when it comes to selecting his running mate, Allen having been a governor will not need to add to the ticket someone with executive experience, as a sitting senator there will be no imperative to selective someone with legislative experience and as a pretty mainstream conservative Allen would have no need to pick a moderate or conservative running mate to soften his ideological edges.

The fact that Allen is comparatively young might mean that he would be well advised to select an older running mate such as Chuck Hagel or Lamar Alexander, but at the same time he could just as well take a risk and select and another promising republican leader such as Mit Romney or Mark Sanford. Either way as his running mate will not be “plugging” any sizable holes in Allen’s ideology or experience it won’t have a huge impact, unless it is a very bad selection.   

Hillary has been working very hard of late to cultivate the image of a foreign policy hawk, and her voting record has born this out but despite this she will still face the problem of being perceived as too-liberal on other issues as well as perhaps lacking experience.

 Hillary will probably also emerge from a bloody primary battle on the right candidates such as Mark Warner and Evan Bayh will have attacked her as unelectable and divisive while on the left she will also have faced pressure from “true believers” such as Russ Feingold and potentially Barbra Boxer.     

So Hillary would seek in her running mate to reassure moderate and independent voters by reinforcing her Hawkish approach to foreign policy, and softening her stances on other issues in a more moderate direction. The best possibility would be a moderate governor or former governor, without the disadvantage of a paper trail of senate or house votes… this would mean that the most likely candidates would be people like DLC chair and (by then) former Iowa Governor Tom Vilsack, North Carolina Governor Mike Easley, Kansas Governor Kathleen Sebelius and then retired or semi retired moderate politicians such as John Breaux, Roy Barnes, Tony Knowles or Bob Kerrey. In the end I think Hillary would be wisest to select a current or recently termed-out moderate governor and so would probably go for Easley or Vilsack and as Vilsack would hail from a key swing state she would probably choose him.

Allen’s campaign would no doubt follow the GOP’s playbook from 2004 and attempt to paint Hillary as weak on defence and liberal on domestic concerns, its likely that Clinton’s campaign (with plenty of the old Carvillite team) will fight back more aggressively than Kerry’s indecision allowed them to in 2004, but this would likely as not, secure the Democrats no permanent advantage. By the early part of the campaign Allen would have the core Bush states locked and the Democrats would likely pull out of much of the south save perhaps AR and WV. The battle would quickly narrow to the Midwest and while Hillary would fight hard the GOP would bring the battle into states such as MI and PA as well as OH and IA forcing the Democrats to fight with little margin for error and in the end Allen would win by secure in a string of these critical Midwest swing states though it would not be a blow-out it would be a sound win for a GOP ticket lead by Allen against a Hillary lead Democratic ticket.

   

Allen/ Sanford (Republican) – 317 EV, 50% Popular Vote.
Clinton/ Vilsack (Democratic) – 221 EV, 48% Popular Vote.


If However Hillary is not the nominee, and I'm still very doubtful that she will be, and Bayh win the nomination then I think the Democrats will beat any GOP nominee short of McCain by a solid enough margin.

[Ben.]

Well said, Ben.

Thank you

I think if Hillary was anyone else she’d not be nearly so polarising, a hawkish, liberal from a blue state would not be a complete liability as a candidate, that not to say Hillary would but…

She has become such a polarising figure and facing any credible GOP candidate, as Allen would be, she would be forced into defending Democrat leaning states like PA and MI and would probably lose votes amongst moderate voters (especially blue collar workers in the Midwest), despite this with Bush gone she might claw back some Hispanic voters… but this would never be enough to save her from a sound defeat at the hands of Allen.  

Paradoxically I think that where Hillary to be nominated and beaten soundly, that would strengthen the hand of the right of the party, then again the left has never taken to her and might claim that her defeat was just another rejection by the electorate of a “Washington Politician” attempting to ape the Republicans at their own game (it sounds bizarre but it might well be how the Liberal Left would see it).      

[Ben.]

Well said, Ben.

might claim that her defeat was just another rejection by the electorate of a “Washington Politician” attempting to ape the Republicans at their own game (it sounds bizarre but it might well be how the Liberal Left would see it).      

right, as always!

Thanks Again

Will there ever be any reasoning with the Liberal Left? Now they tell us Kerry was too conservative? They would probably say the same if Clinton was nominated… why don’t we just nominate Barbra Boxer to show them what would happen if we ran a full blown Liberal Lefty