Would Clinton really have done that much better than Obama in Appalachia?

[Beet]

Who says she would have?

I actually do think she would have, but I haven't heard anyone actually make the case. Here's what I think:
[1] As BRTD pointed out, Bush was a good candidate for the region compared to both McCain and Romney. Romney was actually a terrible candidate for the region, but not as bad as Obama.
[2] Kerry was a terrible candidate for the region. Massachusetts, rich, liberal, and then there was his wife. Although he did help himself with John Edwards, it's the top of the ticket that counts.
[3] Gore wasn't really a southerner anymore by 2000. He was a DC'er. When you're away from your home state for 8 years, join an economically (classically) liberal administration that emphasizes the "New Economy", shift to the left, and take up causes like environmentalism, you're no longer Tennessee's or Appalachia's home boy. I remember when Gore had to move his HQ from D.C. to Tennessee in the middle of the campaign and it became another emblem of his supposed insincerity. Bush was a great candidate for the south and Appalachia, and that's what did it. But Gore did have enough vestiges of southern in him to make Florida as close as it was. He still did light years better than Barack Obama in Appalachia.

But my main case is based on the polls in 2008. For instance, our polling average shows Clinton was lagging McCain by just 5 points in Kentucky at the time she lost her nomination battle. At the same time, Obama was losing the state by over 30 points. Three polls taken in West Virginia showed Clinton leading by 3 points in May while Obama was losing by 10 points. In Arkansas Clinton had a 2 point lead in Arkansas, when Obama was losing by 25 points. Missouri is closer, but shows the same pattern. In early May, Clinton and McCain were tied, whereas Obama was slightly behind, although he closed the gap after the nomination. But for instance, if you look at the Survey USA poll taken May 18, Clinton was up 2 and Obama was down 3 in the same poll. In the May 6 Rasmussen poll, McCain was up 6 on Obama and only up 2 on Clinton. In the April 13 Survey USA, McCain was up 8 on Obama but down 1 to Clinton, and so on. Finally, there is Tennessee. The early April 2008 polls show McCain opening a 10 point lead on Clinton, (partially based on an extremely suspect polling firm, Ayres McHenry) but he was leading Obama by at least 15 points. For instance, on the April 3 Rasmussen (the last GE poll to include both candidates), McCain led Clinton by 14 points, but he led Obama by an astonishing 27 points. The February 28 SurveyUSA poll (the second to last poll excluding Ayres McHenry), Clinton was tied with McCain. Obama was down 16 points in the same poll. Further, a quick glance at the chart shows Tennessee voters considered Clinton much more consistently than Obama- she actually led the polls in late 2007. Obama never came close.

Finally, there is the fact that the virtually singular, herculean Republican swing in Appalachia the heavily Democratic wave year of 2008 was too much to be explained as the product of long-running, secular factors. These are states (with the exception of Missouri) that were Clinton's biggest sources of margins in the primary by far. And in 2006 many of these areas sent blue dog conservadems to Congress and state capitols by huge margins. All indications point to 'personal' (i.e. personal to the Dem candidate) factors for the Republican Presidential ticket doing so well in Appalachia.

Given the fact that the May polls were taken before Lehman Bros. & the national popular vote was roughly tied at the time, I believe Clinton could have easily carried Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia, and Missouri as her husband did in 1996.

[Beet]

Yes, but because she was more centrist than Obama.  Obama far and away is just not a good fit for the region politically--he's WAY too liberal.  Not that Hillary Clinton's not pretty far-left herself, but just not as much as Obama.  So, although she probably wouldn't have done a whole lot better, she would have performed better than he did.

Obama and Clinton had the same positions on cap and trade, healthcare and taxes.  On what issues was Obama far more liberal?  I can't think of any.

Not exactly -she favored the individual mandate, and until he became President, Obama did not. 

That's relatively minor as a political matter.  Especially in the context of proposing the broad outline of a healthcare reform, which translates into a negotiating position with congress and the industry, not a piece of legislation.

The individual mandate is the centerpiece of Obamacare and at the maelstrom of that law's controversiality. There's a very good argument that it matters more than, say, whether Clinton was willing to apologize for her AUMF-Iraq vote, which was a purely symbolic matter. Clinton's health care plan was also larger in absolute size than Obama's. Clinton also called out the housing collapse and called for mortgage relief well before Obama. The housing collapse was the biggest economic factor that's been hanging over the country for the past 5 years, and the economy has been the biggest political issue this whole time. Also, Obama's advisors were also caught reassuring Canada that his promises to renegotiate NAFTA were bunk.

That Clinton was to the left of Obama on economics is one of the underappreciated aspects of the primary. No one remembers it because Obama was winning the more liberal voting blocs and most progressives focused on defeating Clinton at all costs. Even Obama's campaigning for Joe Lieberman was forgotten.

In fact, most progressives had no clue that the economy was going to become the biggest issue and were still living 2003-07 when the Iraq war was the biggest issue.

John Edwards was further to the left than either of them. He had the most conservative support in the primaries (just looking at the results in Iowa, South Carolina, and Oklahoma) and probably would have done even better than Clinton in Appalachia and among white voters (I'm just speculating here). It would have been a coup d'etat... get conservative white voters to vote for a far left populist.

The BIG irony of the 2008 Dem primary is that the candidate farthest to the economic left (Edwards) got the most conservative voters, whereas the candidate farthest to the economic right (Obama) got the most liberal voters.

If it had not been for Rielle Hunter most progressives would be saying "If only we had nominated John Edwards, we could have really transformed America." Instead of a joke and a disgrace he would be the Big What-If and Missed Opportunity (o/c, had he actually won it'd doubtful he would have followed through on his promises since he was always a phony, see his private equity connections, but still). Of course progressives hated Obama over the bank bailouts, but by then it was too late.