Yet another annoying, but almost certainly true, prediction for the primary season is that, over the next six weeks, we are going to here a lot of electability arguments. When hearing these arguments, keep in mind that any general election electability argument based on results of Democratic nomination events is nonsensical. No matter how high turnout has been, and no matter what states or demographics either candidate has won, the simple fact is that neither of them have won the voters necessary to win the general election. It will take at least 62,000,000 votes (Bush's 2004 total) to win the general election, and so far neither candidate has managed even 25.0% of that total. Further, the voters in primaries are in no way representative of the voters in general elections. For example, winning Iowa or New Hampshire in a caucus or primary does not mean someone can win Iowa or New Hampshire in a general election, because you are dealing with entirely different electorates in general elections than in primaries and caucuses. The same holds true for demographic groups. Winning white Catholics, or Independents, or Latinos, or high-income voters in a primary or caucus is not reflective of an ability to win those groups in a general election, because you will be dealing with entirely different sets of those voters in a general than in a primary or caucus.
The real electability we should be worried about are not asinine arguments over how nomination event performance reflects on general election performance, but rather how we make sure that no matter how long the nomination campaign goes on, that Democrats win the general election. Here are six simple steps we can take in order to make this happen.
Three Steps Toward Nomination Campaign Transparency The first step is making sure that even if the nomination campaign goes all the way to the convention, that there is transparency in the process along the way. This will help to provide clarity on how the nominee will be, and allow the public a better understanding of the process. Here is what needs to be done:
Superdelegates should endorse by July 1st: As Howard Dean, Harry Reid and others have argued, superdelegates should indeed make their preferences known by July 1st. With the final superdelegate selection events taking place on June 21st, this is hardly an egregious demand. If we know where every superdelegate stands, then we will have a clearer picture of who the nominee will be.
Edwards and uncommitted delegates should endorse by July 1st. Another source of obscurity in the nomination campaign are uncommitted delegates from Michigan, and also the thirty-one Edwards delegates. In order to arrive at a nominee with a reasonable amount of time to take on McCain, all of these delegates should make their preferences known by July 1st. And that includes John Edwards himself, too.
Campaign delegate transparency: Both the Clinton and Obama campaigns should provide detailed projections of where they believe the delegate count stands. This means listing which superdelegates they believe support them, how many delegates they believe they have won from every state and territory, and also which delegates they plan to challenge at the credentials committee. Doing so will narrow down the list of disputed delegates to a concrete, comprehensible number that will provide great transparency in the process.
Taking these three steps will either produce a presumptive nominee by July 1st, or at least give the public a clear understanding of how the convention and credentials challenge process will unfold. By removing obscurity and uncertainty from the process, the public will be able to understand the nomination campaign, and begin to focus on the general election with plenty of time to defeat McCain.
Three Steps to Combine The Campaigns Now, even if the process becomes transparent, we might not have a nominee until July 1st, or even August 26th. So, other steps need to be taken to ensure that our resources and attacks can maximize their effectiveness to win the general election without pre-emptively ending the nomination campaign. Here is what needs to be done:
Stop all public, intra-party attacks on June 4th: Once the voting is over, the nomination campaign will be entirely in the hands of delegates. As such, there will no longer be any need for either Clinton or Obama to make public attacks against each other. All remaining aspects of the nomination campaign can be handled in private discussions with the 4,415 or however many delegates themselves. Once there is no need to reach out to Democratic voters in the nomination campaign, both Obama and Clinton should cease attacking each other altogether, at least in public.
Combine Field Campaigns after June 4th: Once the nomination voting is over, there will be no need to have multiple Democratic field campaigns. It would simply be a waste of resources to have two separate field campaigns running, since they would both be performing exactly the same tasks. To remove this redundancy and maximize resource effectiveness, Obama and Clinton should combine field campaigns on June 4th.
Combine anti-McCain paid media campaigns: For exactly the same reasons given in the first two bullet points, Obama and Clinton should combine their anti-McCain paid media efforts after June 4th. If we are running two separate anti-McCain paid media campaigns, we will waste money on overhead, and end up with a muddled message. Creating a joint paid media operation for anti-McCain media would be a necessary step for the two campaigns to take if the nomination campaign extends past June 4th.
A seventh and final step that the two campaigns could take would be to pledged to transfer all of their available cash on hand to the DNC in the event they do not become the nominee. The guaranteed joint ticket should also be considered. While that might seem unworkable now, if the campaign is dragging into August, if the public attacks stop, and if the other coordination is already taking place, a joint ticket might seems like a no-brainer.
I think this is all doable. If we can pull it off, then I will be quite confident in our ability to unite the party and defeat John McCain in November, even if the nomination campaign goes all the way until the convention. Hell, if we can pull this all off, then I might even be in favor of it going all the way until the convention.
