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FROM CNN's Jack Cafferty:
In politics, the base is everything… and Hillary Clinton is losing hers.
Suddenly, in the Potomac Primaries this week, Clinton started to lose advantages she'd held up until this point among groups like women, whites, older and working-class voters. It's an ominous sign, and if it continues her dreams of being the next president could be doomed.
Exit polls show that Clinton is losing ground with groups that have been strongholds of her support. In Virginia and Maryland, she got the backing of only about four in ten women and three in ten men. She got the votes of 45% of people 65 and over and just more than one-third of people earning less than $50,000 a year or with high school degrees or less.
Obama won huge margins among African-Americans, young voters, higher income and better educated voters, and that didn't leave Senator Clinton anywhere to turn for support. Thus the lopsided victories for Obama. If this trend continues in the upcoming primaries in Texas and Ohio, it's pretty much over.
Meanwhile, a Time Magazine piece asks the question: "Is it too late for Hillary?" It explains how the Clinton campaign was built on inevitability, calling it "a haughty operation so confident it would have the nomination wrapped up by now that it didn't even put a field organization in place for the states that were to come after the megaprimary on February 5."
The article says while Clinton was busy running as a "pseudo incumbent", Obama seized on the theme of change and built a fundraising and ground operation that has topped Clinton's in almost every way.
Here’s my question to you: Why has Hillary Clinton suddenly started to lose her advantages among women, whites, older and working-class voters?
Interested to know which ones made it on air?
Fred from New York writes:
Just look at South Carolina and you could see the worst Clinton elements surface. The public has responded in kind, with rejection. The large states she won, N.Y., California, etc., are attributed to great organization and hard-core, loyal devotees, a throwback to machine old-time politics. The Clintons’ mythology has now been exposed and destroyed. Everyone, including the committed superdelegates, will bail out.
Chris from Greensburg, Pennsylvania writes:
The reason Hillary is losing her base, if she is, is because the media keep pushing and pushing hard for their candidate, Barack Obama. Every time I turn on the news, all I hear is what a loser Hillary is and what an inspiration Obama is. Can I ask: what does he inspire everyone to do, specifically? Since Obama doesn't answer in specifics, don't count Hillary out.
David writes:
I think there are two answers here. The first is that as Obama has become better known, voters who'd identified as Clinton supporters have been convinced by Obama's rhetoric. It seems clear that the longer he's out there on the trail, the better he is known, the better are his fortunes. I also believe that voters in those 'contested' blocs–minorities, lower-income voters, etc.–have been turned off by the campaign tactics of the Clinton machine–marginalizing Obama as the 'race candidate,' Hillary's self-donation of $5 million dollars to the campaign, etc. None of this has been consistent with her message, and I think people are taking notice of that.
Andy writes:
I feel people are seeing Hillary for what she is. A power-hungry monger who is staying with her philandering husband to promote her future plans. I don't trust her and I feel Obama is seen as a more trust-worthy alternative with a good family who would make a good president.
Adam from Canada writes:
Didn’t you Americans have a revolution 200+ years ago because you were sick of dynasties?