It took nearly a year, but now we’re starting to make some progress in the presidential race. The three remaining viable Democrats met in South Carolina to debate once again before a national CNN audience and the Congressional Black Caucus, and it was almost as if the guns of Fort Sumter were ablaze once again – we finally got some real fireworks.

 
We also received another dose of Hillary the man-hating government activist who will stop at nothing to ensure that she and Bill get back to the White House. We saw a few flashes of temper from Barack Obama, who clearly has had enough of the Clinton machine and isn’t going to take it anymore. And finally, we got more of blinking doe-eyed John Edwards pandering to every liberal constituency that would potentially listen – and trying out every wedge issue that he could use to set himself apart from the two who are dominating the Democratic contest.

 
The 2008 presidential race has become so crazy that even the Democrats are arguing over how much their fellow competitors have praised conservative icon Ronald Reagan.

 
The most intriguing exchange of this debate concerned a lengthy altercation between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama over the ‘ideas’ of Republicans and Ronald Reagan. In the several minutes of back-and-forth, Obama said that he was on the streets looking after the needs of the community while Clinton “was serving as a corporate lawyer on the board of Walmart.”

 
Hillary wouldn’t let that one stand – she shot back that she was fighting for several constituencies in the nineties while Obama ‘was serving as a lawyer for a slumlord.’

 
No one could’ve ever anticipated a few months ago that it would get this nasty, but the testiness is testimony to the closeness of the Democratic race – and I think, the desperate nature of the Clintons – to turn up the heat in order to win at all costs.

 
Up to this point, I don’t think there have been tangible, real differences between the parties. That still might be true, but there’s no doubt that there are real differences between the candidates of the two parties. To the extent that the American presidency is a matter of personality and temperament, then even the lukewarm Republicans have a huge advantage in desirability.

 
Well, at least over Hillary Clinton and John Edwards. Throughout this campaign, Barack Obama has maintained a sense of cool calm, and while no true conservative could contemplate backing him – at least he’s someone who could fill the role of loyal opposition.

 
You get the impression that Obama would give you an audience and an ear before giving in to his liberal leanings and dishing out the government goodies at the taxpayers’ expense – but at least you could say he listened.

 
This debate was just the latest example of why Hillary Clinton’s negatives remain in the high forties, and why a Clinton II presidency would be an absolute disaster for the United States. She’s mean, nasty, shrill, callus, unpleasant and shameless (we don’t want to pile on, so we’ll stop there). She’s in the shadow of Bill, but everyone who’s ever commented on her ‘dark side’ has been vindicated by her (and Bill’s) behavior of late.

 
Fire up the broom, the woman is headed this way.

 
Meanwhile, John Edwards is a socialist buffoon, and it’s very difficult to pinpoint exactly where his political views belong – somewhere between Soviet communism and contemporary Sweden.

 
Differences in personality if not in philosophy

 
It was Hillary’s answer to the debate’s final question that highlights the difference in philosophy between the liberals and conservatives – not necessarily between Democrats and Republicans, but from those who favor total government control and those who prefer individual freedom and responsibility.

 
Hillary said “the American people should not have to work so hard to get leaders who will help them.” It’s essentially a sweet sounding populist pander to those who actually want ‘help’ from the government, as opposed to those who adhere to the Reagan/conservative philosophy, who believe that we want ‘help’ from our elected representatives to protect us from government’s oppressive reach.

 
It also brings to mind a question: has the American citizenry truly devolved to the point where only the federal government can protect us from the economic selfish whims of our neighbors and the unseen/unnamed ‘interests’ that the Democrats swear supposedly run our lives?

 
It’s true, we probably can’t count on the mainstream press to sniff out these stealthy wrongdoers, but there’s also the conservative new media – and if these demons are hiding in the closet somewhere, common sense says they’d be exposed at some point by the blogosphere. It’s hard to keep a secret these days – just ask Jack Abramoff, Mark Foley, Randy ‘Duke’ Cunningham and Bob Ney.

 
At the same time, when we feel wronged as individuals, do we receive an impulse to call a clerk from some federal agency to bail us out? If we can’t pay the mortgage, would a vote for Hillary save us from the authorities knocking at the door?

 
It’s practically nuts to listen to the Democrats talk about ‘solutions’ to problems that only involve surrendering more freedom to someone else. Listening to Hillary, Barack and John, the lenders who made the loans are ‘predators’ and the people who signed their names on the mortgages are ‘victims,’ to the extent that the federal government (not the states or localities) must step in to protect us from our own decisions.

 
Not to get too personal in all this – but I’ve visited a good many model home communities in the past several years (including those clearly out of my price range), and there’ve always been eager sales people offering me sub-prime loans in order to entice me to buy something I could neither afford, nor need to live comfortably. For all those who took that chance that they’d figure a future way to pay off the loan -- did they figure Hillary Clinton would be waiting at the loan officer’s cubicle to co-sign the note?

 
These Democrats are dangerous – they’re the nanny state at its absolute worst. The Republicans don’t provide a comfortable alternative, but when choosing half a loaf, cut off the moldy side and pray that the ‘clean’ half won’t make you even sicker.

 
Winners and Loser

 
Perhaps it was because of CNN’s debate format, which didn’t set any time limits to responses – only kindly Wolf Blitzer stood between them and endless pontification – but Hillary and Barack Obama turned this into a two person ‘show.’ They’re the co-winners of this debate.  

 
Their attempts to smooth things over and mend fences at the end of the evening weren’t really effective, as everyone who watched was still in shock from their spiteful earlier exchange.

 
John Edwards was the same ‘loser’ he’s always been. He talked endlessly about the influence of Martin Luther King on his life, trying desperately to portray himself as a leader in the fight for racial equality, even arguing “If we really believe every human being is of equal value, when are we going to start living together?”

 
It sounds like John’s going to be inviting some of the local minority poor to share his 28,000 square foot mansion sometime soon.

 
Not likely. What a blabbering hypocrite.

 
2% in New Hampshire has tipped this race

 
A few weeks ago after Obama won convincingly in Iowa and was leading in all the New Hampshire polls, the media and most neutral political observers were writing the obituary of the Clinton dynasty.

 
Then came Bill’s famous ‘fairy tale’ remark about Obama’s views on Iraq, Hillary’s teary-eyed moment about ‘caring’ about the future of the country -- and then the roar of women voters in the Granite State. Hillary ‘only’ won in New Hampshire by a couple percentage points, yet the credibility of her ‘comeback’ has brought her all the way back to the prominent spot in the race.

 
Politics doesn’t make a lot of sense when a 2% plurality of New Hampshire voters essentially decides for us who’s the best candidate.

 
In this South Carolina debate, the entire dynamic of the race has switched back to Hillary’s to lose – which is odd, because she’s almost certainly going to lose in South Carolina. But her national lead has risen once again to double digits, and she’s looking great going into the February 5th ‘Super Tuesday’ primaries.

 
Hillary’s not only attacking Barack Obama, she’s throwing his spent carcass to the side in order to cut into George W. Bush and the Republicans at nearly every opportunity. She’s gone back to running a general election campaign, and you wonder where this strategy originated from – because she’s lapsing into some of the same habits that snagged her a few months ago.

 
Is she dangerously overconfident once again?

 
John McCain and the Republicans

 
I don’t know why, but I found it very surprising when John Edwards claimed near the end of the debate that ‘it looks like we’re going to be running against John McCain.’ The Republicans have struggles of their own, but the GOP race is not any closer (at this moment at least) to resolution then that of the Democrats. 

 
If the Democrats are starting to mention McCain as ‘inevitable,’ are they merely trying to consolidate conservatives behind him in hopes of facing him?

 
Many Republicans would admit that they secretly root for Hillary in the primaries because she’s so cantankerous and divisive that she’d be vulnerable in the general election. But the same could easily be said for McCain, and McCain’s past willingness to pander to Democrats and adamantly oppose his own party only indicates that the distinctions between the two parties would be blurred at best.

 
Edwards isn’t a credible candidate, so it’s not really worth much further comment – but if there’s one Republican that Edwards could beat, it’s probably McCain. Edwards would appeal to independents and the government-loving disgruntled liberals of the country, the same people who would be inclined to follow McCain.

 
Edwards even said that he wants to ‘confront global poverty’ if he’s elected president. As if it’s not bad enough that he wants to dig us deeper into Lyndon Johnson’s failed ‘Great Society’ in the US, now Edwards wants to send more money overseas to create a dependent world class.

 
The logical extensions of this fantasy cannot adequately be grasped. The Edwards-type of politician belongs somewhere else – a different time period, and definitely, a different geographical location. Edwards should be sent on a diplomatic mission to some hopelessly poor country and let him brush the flies off his face for a couple weeks – and then he might have less ‘fight’ in him against America and our ideals.

 
On to Super Tuesday

 
Seeing Howard Dean’s sarcastic smiling mug (talking to Chelsea Clinton) at the end of the program reminded me that the Democrats’ road to the nomination isn’t nearly as straight as the Republicans’. Because they moved up their primaries on the schedule, the Democrats didn’t compete in Michigan and aren’t participating in Florida’s vote either.

 
So the South Carolina primary is coming up on Saturday, and then all eyes look towards Super Tuesday to try and settle on a Democrat front-runner.

 
In essence, the Democrats will have only Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina to ‘weed out’ the candidates prior to the February 5th. That’s a huge advantage for Hillary Clinton, the national celebrity that everybody knows, even if half the people can’t stand her.

 
That half of the people won’t be voting in the Democratic primaries, either, so it’s hard to see where even Oprah can help Obama now.

 
But maybe there’s another surprise or two around the corner.