Hillary Clinton vs Mitt Romney

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

Romney is a washed-up has-been at this point. And if he's going to try to re-invent himself for like the 100th time now for a new campaign, he would do even worse than this:

388-150

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

Romney is a washed-up has-been at this point. And if he's going to try to re-invent himself for like the 100th time now for a new campaign, he would do even worse than this:

388-150

Hillary is not winning any states Obama lost in 2012 beyond NC, especially against Romney because he'll lose fewer of his voters than any other GOPer would.

Um Hillary will do much better than Obama among white voters and also perform better among Hispanics. Black voters will remain a solid 90+% Dem voting bloc.

Meanwhile I can't think of any group that would swing to vote for Mitt Romney over Hillary in 2016 after having voted for Obama over Romney in 2012. After 2 failed campaigns, Americans are pretty much tired of Mitt Romney.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

What would turnout be in this election? 25%? Democrats and Republicans alike utterly unenthused with two candidates lukewarmly popular with their parties (at best) would presumably mean Romney would have a better chance than you'd think.

You must have quite a strange definition of lukewarm. Among Democrats, CNN puts Hillary's favorability rating at 93-6. Quinnipiac puts her at 92-4. The Democrats who dislike Hillary are as small as they are vocal. It's not 2007 anymore, no matter how badly some people wish it was.

That's just name recognition combined with the sense that she's "inevitable" and thus practically already the nominee. Again, Hillary was similarly "inevitable" six years ago. We saw how that turned out. If or when an alternative emerges those numbers will collapse just as much as they already have among non-Democrats. Benghazi alone will sink her numbers into the red after the Republicans (and hopefully her challengers in the primary) spend months talking about it.

You should have put Benghazi as the first word in your post so posters know to stop reading right there rather than waste time reading 4 sentences before getting to the cue to stop reading and dismiss your post as trolling.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

IceSpear, that's political analysis that's on the level of a 5th grader throwing poo at his playground rival. You're not trying "spin" Hillary Clinton's candidacy at CNN. This is a forum devoted to psephology, not political boosterism.

Democrats/left-leaning Independents who participate in the primary process in Idaho, Utah, Wyoming and Kansas are very progressive. All of these voters supported Obama in 2008 and the vast majority of them did in 2012. Many Clinton supporters in the South, a substantial portion of her support in 2008, haven't voted for a Democratic candidate since 2010. I'd like to think that this statement goes without saying on this forum but apparently the level of discourse has been degraded to the point of drooling idiocy.

Yes that is true but what is the argument/conclusion you are trying to make? That Hillary will win the primaries with the support of "Demosaurs" who will then vote Republican against Hillary in the general election rendering her a weaker GE candidate than the primary results would suggest?

Hillary may secure the nomination with the help of such "Demosaurs", but she doesn't really need their votes in the general election to win. I think the Clintons are smart enough to realize they are working with a post-Obama electoral map, not Bill Clinton's 90s electoral map, and are not going to waste much resources trying to chase Arkansas or West Virginia unless Hillary is up by double-digits in the polls and has all the Obama states locked up already.

[Obnoxiously Slutty Girly Girl]

I'm saying that the polling overstates her levels of support and that many people, perhaps the majority of the Democratic base, are not enthusiastic about her potential candidacy.

The first part is a fair point to make. I don't think anybody thinks Hillary will actually win by 50 points in the end, and name recognition certainly makes an impact in the current polls. But there's no evidence whatsoever to support the bold, besides your own personal feelings or anecdotal evidence. If a large portion of the Democratic base was merely tolerating her, she wouldn't be polling at 93-6 (November 2014 CNN) or 92-4 (November 2014 Quinnipiac) favorability scores among Democrats.

Most people who tolerate a prominent political figure, would say that they have a favorable opinion of that prominent political figure. By no means is this an exaggerated claim. To be fair, I think you have the right to be skeptical. There's not that much quantitative evidence for my argument at this point. I think there will be in 6 months or so.

The Democratic base (by which I assume you mean the liberal or progressive base, since the Dems have become such a giant tent party as it's taken in refugees from the sunken ship that was the Rockefeller wing of the GOP) might not be excited about Hillary. I'm not excited about Hillary and I won't vote for her. I am hoping Warren runs a serious campaign against her, or at least Sanders runs a protest campaign against her. I would vote Green in the general election since if Hillary is not automatically winning New York by 30 points, there would have had to have been some major scandal to cause her to implode and a Republican landslide would be imminent.

But she would still be the first woman president. Democratic women, and even female voters in general, will probably be quite enthusiastic for her. And there are a lot of Democrats like IceSpear who are shameless Hillary hacks and very enthusiastic for Hillary even if they don't represent the Democratic base.