Rush Limbaugh Subverts the Democratic Process: Urges Republican Crossover Voting to Keep Hillary in the Race
Mack the Knife
Seek to prolong bitter battle
By Scott Helman
Globe Staff / March 17, 2008
For a party that loves to hate the Clintons, Republican voters have
cast an awful lot of ballots lately for Senator Hillary Clinton: About
100,000 GOP loyalists voted for her in Ohio, 119,000 in Texas, and
about 38,000 in Mississippi, exit polls show.
A sudden change of heart? Hardly.
Since Senator John McCain effectively sewed up the GOP nomination last
month, Republicans have begun participating in Democratic primaries
specifically to vote for Clinton, a tactic that some voters and local
Republican activists think will help their party in November. With
every delegate important in the tight Democratic race, this trend
could help shape the outcome if it continues in the remaining
Democratic primaries open to all voters.
Spurred by conservative talk radio, GOP voters who say they would
never back Clinton in a general election are voting for her now for
strategic reasons: Some want to prolong her bitter nomination battle
with Barack Obama, others believe she would be easier to beat than
Obama in the fall, or they simply want to register objections to
Obama.
"It's as simple as, I don't think McCain can beat Obama if Obama is
the Democratic choice," said Kyle Britt, 49, a Republican-leaning
independent from Huntsville, Texas, who voted for Clinton in the March
4 primary. "I do believe Hillary can mobilize enough [anti-Clinton]
people to keep her out of office."
Britt, who works in financial services, said he is certain he will
vote for McCain in November.
About 1,100 miles north, in Granville, Ohio, Ben Rader, a 66-year-old
retired entrepreneur, said he voted for Clinton in Ohio's primary to
further confuse the Democratic race. "I'm pretty much tired of the
Clintons, and to see her squirm for three or four months with Obama
beating her up, it's great, it's wonderful," he said. "It broke my
heart, but I had to."
Local Republican activists say stories like these abound in Texas,
Ohio, and Mississippi, the three states where the recent surge in
Republicans voting for Clinton was evident.
Until Texas and Ohio voted on March 4, Obama was receiving far more
support than Clinton from GOP voters, many of whom have said in
interviews that they were willing to buck their party because they
like the Illinois senator. In eight Democratic contests in January and
February where detailed exit polling data were available on
Republicans, Obama received, on average, about 57 percent of voters
who identified themselves as Republicans. Clinton received, on
average, a quarter of the Republican votes cast in those races.
But as February gave way to March, the dynamics shifted in both
parties' contests: McCain ran away with the Republican race, and
Obama, after posting 10 straight victories following Super Tuesday,
was poised to run away with the Democratic race. That is when
Republicans swung into action.
Conservative radio giant Rush Limbaugh said on Fox News on Feb. 29
that he was urging conservatives to cross over and vote for Clinton,
their bête noire nonpareil, "if they can stomach it."
"I want our party to win. I want the Democrats to lose," Limbaugh
said. "They're in the midst of tearing themselves apart right now. It
is fascinating to watch. And it's all going to stop if Hillary loses."
He added, "I know it's a difficult thing to do to vote for a Clinton,
but it will sustain this soap opera, and it's something I think we
need."
Limbaugh's exhortations seemed to work. In Ohio and Texas on March 4,
Republicans comprised 9 percent of the Democratic primary electorate,
more than twice the average GOP share of the turnout in the earlier
contests where exit polling was conducted. Clinton ran about even with
Obama among Republicans in both states, a far more favorable showing
among GOP voters than in the early races.
Walter Wilkerson, who has chaired the Republican Party in Montgomery
County, Texas, since 1964, said many local conservatives chose to vote
for Clinton for strategic reasons.
"These people felt that Clinton would be maybe the easier opponent in
the fall," he said. "That remains to be seen."
Wilkerson added, "We have not experienced any crossover of this
magnitude since I can remember."
In the Mississippi primary last Tuesday, Republicans made up 12
percent of voters who took a Democratic ballot - their biggest
proportion in any state yet - and they went for Clinton over Obama by
a 3-to-1 margin.
John Taylor, the GOP chairman in Madison County, said he toured
various precincts and witnessed Republican voters taking Democratic
ballots to vote for Clinton.
"Some people there that I recognized voting said, 'Hey, I'm going to
vote in this primary this year, right now. But don't worry, in
November I'll be back,' " Taylor said. "They were going to do some
damage if they could."
Another popular conservative radio host, Laura Ingraham, who had also
encouraged voters to cast ballots for Clinton, crowed about her
apparent success the day after Ohio and Texas voted.
"Without a doubt, Rush, and to a lesser extent me, had some effect on
the Republican turnout," Ingraham told Fox News. "When you look at
those exit polls, it is really quite striking."
Some political blogs have suggested that the influx of Clinton-voting
Republicans prevented Obama from winning delegates he otherwise would
have, by inflating Clinton's totals both statewide and in certain
congressional districts. A writer for the liberal blog Daily Kos
estimated that Obama could have netted an additional five delegates
from Mississippi.
It is also possible, though perhaps unlikely, that enough
strategically minded Republicans voted for Clinton in Texas to give
her a crucial primary victory there: Clinton received roughly 119,000
GOP votes in Texas, according to exit polls, and she beat Obama by
about 101,000 votes.
Not everyone casting ballots for Clinton did so primarily to sink her,
however. Brent Henslee, 33, a Republican who works at a radio station
in Waco, Texas, wanted to keep Clinton in the race to expose more
about Obama, whom he sees as more "fluff than substance."
"I'm not buying into all the Obama-mania, is the main reason I did
it," he said. "A lot of these people don't know a thing about this guy
and they're crazy about him. And I thought that maybe keeping Hillary
alive will just shed some more light on the guy."
Of the nine remaining major contests, four - Pennsylvania, Kentucky,
Oregon, and South Dakota - have "closed" primaries, which means only
Democrats can participate.
If Republicans and conservative independents continue their tactical
voting, it may be more likely in Indiana, Montana, and Puerto Rico,
which allow anyone to vote, and possibly in North Carolina and West
Virginia, which open their primaries to Democrats and independent
voters.
"If you are a Republican you could pull a Democrat ballot and vote for
the Democrat presidential candidate you think will stand the least
chance of beating McCain in the fall general election," the assistant
editor of the Greene County Daily World, in southwestern Indiana,
wrote in a blog post earlier this month.
Meanwhile, Clinton, despite trailing Obama in delegates, is projecting
confidence about her chances as the nomination race careens toward the
April 22 Pennsylvania primary. The morning after her big wins in Ohio
and Texas, she was asked on Fox News whether she had a message for
Limbaugh.
"Be careful what you wish for, Rush," she said with a grin.
janet_...@yahoo.com
> Rush Limbaugh Subverts the Democratic Process: Urges Republican Crossover Voting to Keep Hillary in the Race Options
Nobody listens to him. If his "loyal followers" voted as he said,
Bill Clinton would have never been elected. So much for Rush
subverting.
But - when Georgia's democratically controlled state legislature
gerrymandered to create a majority black congressional district so
Cynthia McKinney could get elected, that wasn't a subversion of the
democratic process?
Tom Gardner
<janet_...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:3ca381af-ff99-42fc...@a1g2000hsb.googlegroups.com...
That doesn't count, Democrats involved!
Eddie Haskell
> Rush Limbaugh Subverts the Democratic Process: Urges Republican Crossover
> Voting to Keep Hillary in the Race Options
> Nobody listens to him. If his "loyal followers" voted as he said,
> Bill Clinton would have never been elected. So much for Rush
> subverting.
Uhmm.. The people who voted for Clinton weren't Rush listeners, Einstein.
-Eddie Haskell
Governor Swill
babble
I'm not a fan of gerrymandering and both parties have been doing it
for practically forever.
Swill
--
"Once again an election may involve a lawsuit in Florida.
"How . . . precedented.
"How . . . heard of." -- Jon Stewart
Governor Swill
>gerrymandered to create a majority black congressional district so
>Cynthia McKinney could get elected, that wasn't a subversion of the
>democratic process?
Oh, btw, McKinney got trounced in her primary.
janet_...@yahoo.com
>
> Oh, btw, McKinney got trounced in her primary.
>
After she had served a while in congress.
mm
crossover is good it helps dems to pick the right nomimee
mm
"Mack the Knife" <bulldo...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1bfc0b9d-8f25-408e...@e23g2000prf.googlegroups.com...