Republicans for Obama--AND Clinton?

By Si Dunn

If Hillary Clinton loses the crucial and tightly contested primary races in Texas and Ohio March 4, one important key to her defeat will be the sudden surge of Republicans crossing party lines to vote for Barack Obama.

Despite Obama's strongly liberal track record, many disenchanted GOP voters have begun to view the Illinois Senator as someone who truly can bring much-needed fresh air to Washington and work constructively with political leaders on both sides of the aisle.

In Texas and Ohio, registered Republicans can choose to vote in their state's Democratic primary, rather than casting their ballot for the likely GOP contender, John McCain. And many will do just that--mostly for Obama. The irony here, of course, is that Republican leaders such as Karl Rove really wanted Hillary Clinton to be the nominee to go up against John McCain in the general election.

Indeed, many months ago, some key GOP leaders began urging Republicans to vote in open primaries for Hillary, so flyboy McCain could score an easy "mission accomplished" victory this November. They considered Senator Clinton both a very easy and strongly polarizing target.

What the Rove-ites and other Bush Administration nabobs didn't count on is that many everyday Republicans meanwhile have grown sick and tired of their own party's fiercely partisan politics and ultraconservative attitudes toward social and environmental issues. The U.S. economy now is swirling around and around in the toilet, and McCain's stated willingness to stay a hundred years or longer in Iraq has further dispirited many moderate, liberal and even conservative Republicans. The Democrats' strong message of change, whether voiced by Sen. Obama or Sen. Clinton, is resonating with them, too.

One other ironic note: some conservative Republicans recently have been urging their fellow conservatives in Texas and Ohio to vote for Hillary Clinton, because she is now seen as being politically more conservative than Barack Obama! These GOP conservatives fear a nationwide groundswell is growing stronger by the minute for Obama-style liberalism. At the same time, they also see their not-so-true-conservative John McCain's chances of getting elected now plunging out of the sky like a 500-pound bomb. Their one remaining hope to keep some faint semblance of conservatism in the White House is to help Hillary Clinton beat...Barack Obama.

Republicans for Obama--and Clinton. Truly, it's gonna be a long fall for the Grand Old Party!

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