The machinery (political/fundraising/media/other) that put Hillary Clinton into a seemingly unassailable position as recently as six months ago is the same machinery that put John Kerry up against Bush last time, and the same machinery that put up Al Gore the time before that (and let’s not have any nonsense about hanging chads: if Gore had won his “home state” of Tennessee, Florida would have been academic). Each time, idealistic Democrats were told: we need a safe, experience choice, someone who’s worked their way up through the system and paid their dues. Each time, the Republicans tailored their campaign around the well-known shortcomings of the successful candidate. Each time the so-called professionals in the Democratic Party were unable even to anticipate the Republican campaign, let alone counter it.

Those who position Hillary Clinton as this year’s Experienced Safe Choice (ESC) are hoping for third-time lucky. Those who oppose her oppose the very idea of ESC - but to do so doesn’t necessarily mean being reckless.

If FTVs were that big a constituency, the main opposition to Hillary Clinton would be coming from a doomed Corey Delaney-style cult figure, or even a fey Eugene McCarthy/Adlai Stevenson-style character - not someone like Obama. All that rhetoric about change and not-politics-as-usual represents opposition to the machinery that Hillary Clinton has worked to her advantage. Until, of course, it ceased to be an advantage. She can’t dump the machinery, where else would she go?

Hillary Clinton has hoped she can get around the animosity to the Democrat machinery with all that hotdog-eatin’ beer-drinkin’ blue-collar nonsense, proving that patriotism isn’t the last refuge. There’s a fundamental shift on here - and while it’s on, it really is best not to lecture FTVs that they must work to assumptions that are clearly causing experienced, high-ranking and not-unintelligent political operatives to fumble, misstep and ultimately fall on their arses.

Not being American, or a woman, I’m reluctant to wade into US feminist political debates. I definitely have no comment on a woman candidate seeking to differentiate herself from a skinny man with a high-calorie food intake, oh no. I do note, however, that Camille Paglia has said that she’s more than happy to vote for a Democrat woman President, just not Hillary Clinton. Whatever one thinks of Paglia, not only is she entitled to her view but it is entirely possible that it is shared by many - a significant, election-outcome-changing many, including (but not limited to) FTVs. If you think the Democrats are riven now, wait until Hillary Clinton stitches up some backroom deal and goes on to lose this year’s general election - after three close losses, any Democrat vaguely resembling an ESC would be publicly disembowelled.

I’m not sure this could be called breaking the rules, but certainly the former would be re-writing the rules, and the latter rewriting history.

It’s been during this period that I’ve seen most of the articles about young Obamaites being disappointed, and frankly if Clinton did win this way they’d be entitled to feel the party had betrayed them, although of course I still think they should vote.

I’d also note that at least the Obama voters are just threatening to stay home if they don’t get their man. Heaps of the Clinton voters have been saying they’ll vote McCain. Interestingly, the polls generally seem to show them saying this at the time of the primary in their state, but as time goes by their opinions soften. Immediately after Pennsylvania McCain was leading Obama in polling there. Now Obama is 5% up. He’s picked up nationally at the same time, but nowhere near as much. It seems like the Clinton supporters are coming round once the focus moves to another state.

All hysterical teenagers need to learn that screaming and threatening to top yourself with the veggie peeler is counterproductive.

Indeed. I can think of many much more effective (and quiter) way for them to top themselves.

But all that aside, I’m not actually arguing that this is a man/woman thing, except in the sense that if the tables were turned, I can’t picture anyone caring about the disillusionment of the women who desperately wanted Clinton to win.

I suspect the disillusionment angle is more an ageism thing anything else. One is the (perhaps unfair) view that the young of today are more likely to give up if they don’t at first succeed. The other is that in a decade or so a lot of the older voters are going to be dead anyway.

2. hillary isn’t going to win on any metric.

One side note I think is telling (and I apologize for being a little bit caustic, but whaddaya gonna do?). There seems to be a breezy consensus here, as if it were really quite a given (and I think rightly so) that a substantial piece of Obama’s base are petulant, not-so-thoughtful, “hysterical teenagers” (whether figuratively or literally) who have a lot of growing up to do politically, n’importe quoi. It would seem to imply certain rather telling things about the nature of Obama’s candidacy, which a lot of folks appear reluctant to admit to.

It’s a weird (and I think unfortunate) accident of history that such an important election, coming as it does in the wake of the worst presidency in memory, should happen at the same time that various forces have unhelpfully pushed so much identity politics front and center. There’s way too much personality and identity loyalty going on, when what is needed is a competent, low-key, clear-thinking individual with a modest but rational and achievable agenda, to reverse some of the damage that’s been done. Zany revolutionary programs, or electing someone because they share some of your biological traits, is really not gonna be the ticket to good political health. We don’t need a president to hit the fast-forward or rewind button; first and foremost we need someone who knows where the pause button is. In that respect your idealistic FTV types are being counterproductive. The good ship S.S. Gigantic doesn’t exactly turn around on a dime without capsizing.

Since I personally wish the Dems and the GOP would both dissolve and reconstitute into new parties, both having become historically of greatly reduced relevance, I think it’s interesting how much potential there is for intra-party disappointment on both sides. Hillary is representing the old-fashioned blue-collar “all we want is a decent shake and a humane safety net” left, and Obama has marshaled the elitists, the crackpots, and the grievance crowd. It’s a key faultline in the Dems, and I wish they would just part ways so we could have a bit more articulation in our politics. Same with the GOP: lots of Repubs are really unhappy with McCain, lots are unhappy with the Bush legacy, and they all seem handcuffed together in an ungainly fashion like the escaped prison mob in “Take the Money and Run.” Would that someone had a hacksaw.

If there’s enough of a ruckus and cries of “Foul!” in Denver, who knows? Maybe things will get really weird. It’s not like they haven’t been weird for a good long while anyway.

But all that aside, I’m not actually arguing that this is a man/woman thing, except in the sense that if the tables were turned, I can’t picture anyone caring about the disillusionment of the women who desperately wanted Clinton to win. But in case it wasn’t clear, I’m saying that would also be ridiculous in the context of who is entitled to win, as is the idea that Obama should win because of those poor young people who might get all disillusioned. It’s Presidential politics: they probably should get a little disillusioned about their ability to get their way.

On the other hand the fear that the superdelegates’ use of their votes to nominate a candidate unbacked by a majority of elected candidates seems to me like a perfectly valid concern—with consequences for the processes of future nominations within the Party, rather than for the popular vote at the poll.

I think thats exactly what they’re concerned about, its not about a male/female thing. There would be the same concerns if Clinton had clearly won the popular vote but failed to get enough superdelegates to get the nomination.

One aspect of the issue which you’ve touched on, but which could be more fully explored, is the extent to which the primary system itself feeds the phenomenon in question, i.e. FTV’s first time vote being between Obama and Clinton rather than between either of them and McCain.

Another issue of more general relevance - and I say this as someone whose hackles are often raised by patronisation of younger generations - is that one has to have lived a certain amount of time to be able to see and appreciate what eventually comes out of the working-through of a political process in which (unless you’re a Spartacist) there will inevitably be compromises, zig-zags, retreats, and indeed reassessments of “principled stances” in the light of new information and reflection on the lessons of experience.

My favourite example from personal experience is to contrast my role (along with other lefties) in denouncing Bob Hawke’s “betrayal” on uranium mining from the time of his preselection struggle against Gerry Hand in 1979 until the mid-1980s, with my role as an academic in recent years teaching university students - young enough to be my kids if I had any - about the significant environmental policy gains which occurred over the course of Hawke’s Prime Ministership.