Reply #27: Again, I disagree with your assertion.

[leftofthedial]

It was pretty clear he'd win the election from about midway through the primaries. Sure, he could have screwed it up. But he was clearly the front-runner from Iowa on for all but about three weeks after the repuke convention.

He has worked hard to find the lowest possible degree of deck chair rearranging that he thinks his base will let him call "reform." I think enough of us see through this that the kind of momentum he had in February or March will never come back. He has alienated much of his own base.

(This is the inevitable outcome for a right-center corporatist who relies on left-wing support; in order to be who and what he is, he MUST sever his connections with the left. After 30 years of disastrous neocon rule, the left is in no mood for more cynical "lesser-of-evils" triangulation by yet another neocon in Dem clothing. Unfortunately for Obama, the left is nearly half of his base. Strike one was escalation in Afghanistan and failure to exit Iraq. Strike two was devoting 90%+ of the "stimulus" to giveaways to banks, with zero reform attached. Strike three is health care.)

If, by some miracle, real health care reform is passed, I will be ecstatic, not disappointed. You see, I care about America and Americans, not about which politician "wins."