Mending Fences

With the primary season over, presumptive Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama has his eyes on defeating the Republican candidate Sen. John McCain. But some political watchers say McCain may stand to benefit if Obama and his former rival Sen. Hillary Clinton don’t take steps to mend fences with each other and with their prospective supporters–a move that may be easier said than done.

“It doesn’t matter what the Republicans do if Obama can’t get all of the Democrats behind him,” says Marvin King, an assistant professor of political science at the University of Mississippi. “You’ve got to take care of home first.”

That notion was underscored this week when a CNN/Opinion Research Corp. poll found that if Obama does not choose Clinton to be his running mate, 22% of Clinton supporters said they would not vote in November and another 17% said they would vote for McCain. Likewise, a Website called Ex-Hillary Clinton Supporters for John McCain (http://hcsfjm.com), bills itself as an anti-Obama site and is calling for Democrats to raise money and support McCain.

On the

other side of the equation are the Obama supporters, many of whom are just as vehemently opposed to the thought of Obama selecting Clinton to be his vice presidential candidate. Many African American voters were particularly turned off by what some perceived to be personal attacks on Obama by Clinton. “I don’t think black Americans are going to take it easy on Barack Obama if he chooses Hillary,” says L.N. Rock, a political blogger in Silver Spring, Maryland, who created the African American Political Pundit Website (www.aapoliticalpundit.blogspot.comd). In fact, Rock says, some African American voters may even think twice about voting for Obama should he select Clinton. “Black voters would probably take a second look at Barack Obama and say, ‘Are you really the person of change? Can you take the heat at this moment in time?’ Because there will be heat on him if he were to select Hillary.”

A better move for Obama might be to appeal directly to Clinton’s supporters, King says. “Barack Obama will have to spend the better part of the summer detailing

some policy prescriptions aimed at Hillary supporters,” King adds. “He’s going to have to think long and hard about where the country is now, where the economy is and figure out what we need to do to reach these people and make the next four years of their lives better than the last four years of their lives.”

If he can pinpoint the issues that matter the most to blue-collar, white Americans and white women–Clinton’s core following–they may lose their resentment toward Obama, even if he isn’t their first choice for president. “The goal is to get them to stop being anti-Barack and to become pro-Democratic Party again,” King says.

Another step Obama might take is to reach out to some of Clinton’s former campaign workers, fundraisers, and volunteers, and make room for them on his campaign, King adds. “That would be a great way of mending fences and saying, ‘Hey, nothing personal, this is all about making a better America.’”

For Clinton, the stakes aren’t as high since the 2008 presidential election is now out of her grasp,

but if she decides to run at some later time or aspires to a more powerful role within the Democratic Party, she must attempt to win back the trust of Obama supporters. “For all the 18 million votes she received, it still was not as many as Barack Obama,” King says.

One way she can make inroads with Obama supporters is to campaign vigorously for him against McCain, says Desiree S. Pedescleaux, a political science professor and dean of undergraduate studies at Spelman College. “I think Hillary will work with Barack for the overall good, and the goal is to unseat the Republicans in November,” she says. However, African Americans may not be as forgiving of her husband, former President Bill Clinton, who also took some heat during the primary season for what some believed to be personal attacks against Obama.

“I think he has turned off so many voters that they will remember,” Pedescleaux says. “So he should really take a seat and let this play out on its own.”

Indeed, in her concession speech on Saturday in

Washington D.C., Clinton said, “When I started this race, I intended to win back the White House, and make sure we have a president who puts our country back on the path to peace, prosperity, and progress. And that’s exactly what we’re going to do by ensuring that Barack Obama walks through the doors of the Oval Office on January 20, 2009.”

The attention the media is giving to Obama’s vice presidential selection process is also fueling the fire, experts say, since the question of whether he will select Clinton keeps the divide between the two on the front burner. And while many experts don’t see an Obama-Clinton ticket–he is said to be looking at a retired military officer–historically it’s not unusual for former rivals to link up after a contentious primary season.

“I think back to 1980 with the Republicans,” King says. “You had George Herbert Walker Bush vs. Ronald Reagan and those two really did not like each other. Yet a month after the campaign ended, they made nice and George Bush became Reagan’s vice president.”