The McGovern Parallels Continue . . .

Karl, having relentlessly researched Black Liberation Theology at Protein Wisdom remarks:

About ten weeks ago, it was becoming clear that Obama was running a campaign of winning caucuses in normally Republican states to overcome the “inevitable” establishment candidacy of Hillary Clinton, much as McGovern did to Muskie in 1972. Thus, it did not come as a shock when Obama’s campaign began to look more and more McGovernite in which voters it wins and loses.

And Robert Stacy McCain has a detailed analysis up at The American Spectator that's well worth reading. Money quote:

OBAMA'S PREDICAMENT now resembles nothing so much as that faced by George McGovern in July 1972, after the Democratic presidential nominee belatedly discovered that his vice-presidential choice, Missouri Sen. Thomas Eagleton, had previously been hospitalized for mental illness.

As with Obama's mishandling of the Wright controversy, the Eagleton disaster was an unforced error on McGovern's part. McGovern and his campaign team had dawdled over choosing a running mate, evidently in the mistaken belief that Ted Kennedy could be talked into taking the No. 2 spot.

When Kennedy finally gave a definitive "no," and other top possibilities also declined, the McGovern campaign scrambled and came up with Eagleton. There was no time for a background check and when Eagleton was asked if he had any skeletons in his closet, he said he didn't—even though he'd been hospitalized three times for severe depression and had twice undergone electroshock therapy.

It was only after he'd been nominated as vice president that journalists began reporting about Eagleton's history of mental illness. Rather than to take responsibilty for his deception and resign from the ticket, however, Eagleton tried to hang on. The Democratic campaign endured more than a week of agonizing limbo—at one point, McGovern famously declared he was behind Eagleton "1,000 percent"—before Eagleton was finally forced out.

Some say Richard Nixon would have been re-elected in 1972 no matter what, but McGovern's mishandling of the Eagleton affair destroyed whatever hope the Democrats had.

OBAMA'S MISHANDLING of the Wright controversy resembles the Eagleton affair in that it reveals a lack of foresight and preparation. Wright's sermons were available for sale on DVD, and Ronald Kessler of NewsMax.com had reported about Wright's controversial views as early as January. Yet when the ABC News story broke in March, the Obama campaign appeared to be caught flat-footed.

Much like McGovern's initial "1,000 percent" support of Eagleton—which only encouraged Eagleton's attempts to stay on the ticket—Obama's Philadelphia speech defending Wright has prolonged the crisis, with Wright now refusing to leave the spotlight.

Those are only a few of the similarities, however. The main one—the one that is keeping the superdelegates awake at night these days—is the fact that Obama is clearly unelectable due to his fringey associations in the popular mind. Simply put, he's been outed for the stupidest beside-the-point reasons as being too far to the left. There's irony to spare, here, because from a libertarian perspective Obama's association with black supremacist Marxism (aka Black Liberation Theology) doesn't yield much policy fruit from the racism side, but produces plenty on the Marxism side. So if it weren't for the fact that Obama's Marxism is (1) associated with violence (see Ayers, Bill), and (2) linked with black racism (Wright, Jeremiah), he'd be getting a pass on precisely the most destructive—albeit an unspoken—part of his platform.

Obama's candidacy is dead. The only question left is whether he'll take the Democratic Party with him. If the Supers go with Clinton, they still have a shot at the White House, but they can kiss the blind loyalty of some segments of the black population goodbye. If they Supers pick Obama, they are taking a four- to-eight-year break from seeking executive power—which the healthcare socialists and anti-War lobby may well find inexcusable.

Me? I'm going to go smoke a cigar.