In chess, this is called a "fork"

And it may have defeated us. The game may be over.

In chess, sometimes your opponent will make a move that challenges two pieces at once. No matter what, one piece will be lost and you will be weakened, perhaps fatally.

According to exit polls, fewer than 50% of North Carolina Hillary supporters would vote for Obama in the general. According to nothing but a hunch, I suspect similar numbers the other way.

Fork. To use another more violent metaphor, each candidate's supporters is figuratively holding a gun to the Democratic Party's head.

If this is an accurate picture, the game is over. We have lost.

Someone please convince me I'm wrong.

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I think I made that pretty clear in the original post, no?

Obama won twice as many contests, fair and square.

It's a Dem year and there are 6 months of campaigning coming up.

But I doubt it.

"...fewer than 50% of North Carolina Hillary supporters would vote for Obama..."

Believe me, I'm sure that many of those Hillary voters are just cross-over Repukes who were voting McSame in November anyway.

Oh, and welcome to DU!

:hi:

I'm not convinced, though. I see a lot of incredible stubbornness on both sides.

I am a firm Barack supporter, which might surprise people who called me a Klan member earlier today, and I find myself gritting my teeth and telling myself that I WILL hold my nose and vote for Hillary if i am absolutely forced to. I justify this in my mind by promising her no peace for four years if she betrays us all.

But it's not easy. She seems to be TRYING to say things that make me shake my head these days. And I used to be a firm supporter too.

let the chips fall. McCain, more barbaric wars, no health care etc etc will be the consequences of Hillary's hubris.

and I don't believe the other 30%, unless Hillary's base of older white women are going to vote to curtail medicare and social security benefits, and for more wars. It's petulance in responding to the poll, not truth.

The party will be fine as long as everyone lets the process play itself out and nobody tries to do something stupid like riot in Denver.

Then again, this is politics, where the stupidest things are often quite likely to happen.

is extremely troubling.

Polls ALWAYS show this when you are polling a 3 way race... they want to make the other candidate look weaker.

Delegates determine the nominee, period. Supers put the closer nominee over the top. So quit with the paranoia and enjoy the show.

Fretting serves no purpose at all.

First of all, you are incorrect about how superdelegates work, and secondly, that is waaay off the subject. This has nothing to do with who gets the nomination. I'm talking about whether the loser's supporters will then fall in line for the general. I hope so.

between voters and a tactic called a fork which makes no sense whatsoever. Just because two pieces are being attacked at the same time does not mean the "game is over." If black forks whites queen and rook it doesn't even matter if white can deliver checkmate on the next move or if checkmate is inevitable.

For Clinton to usurp the nomination by overturning the popular will of democrats would be a sure victory for John McCain in the fall. Clinton cannot afford to disenfranchise AA voters because of the way the districts are drawn and that is a FACT. And though you may be correct in that I made a gross oversimplification of the Role of the SDs, given that they have the freedom to vote based on criteria other than popular vote, for you to be making sweeping statements like "It's Over" is preposterous and you know it.

In short, Clinton can execute whatever tactics she desires but her strategy is losing. She may have delivered a fork but Obama has mate in 3.

When your opponent attacks two pieces simultaneously, you can either put the king in check or attack another piece of equal or greater value. Heck, a fork can be a gambit, where you lure someone into complacency by making it look as if you've left a piece unprotected, only to have them take it and find that you've checkmated them on the next move.

The biggest difference between chess and the primary process is that in chess, you can agree to a draw or end up in a stalemate. Not so here. Either Hillary or Obama will be the nominee at the end of this contest, and we'll all have to suck it up and get behind the winner then.

And great extension of my shaky analogy. ;)

Makes a proud man humble!

where does that leave us? Forked.

doesn't go nuclear in her attempt to smear him and keep open a run in 2012

If she does that, the Dem party will split, and lose 2008.

Of course there are hard feelings now. There is good reason to hope that six months of fighting McCain and the tactics of the republicans will bring most people around.

Then all her supporters who say they won't vote for Obama will take a deep breath, look at McCain and at Obama, and vote for Obama.

and now they all rallied 'round.

It will happen with us too.

Someone please convince me I'm wrong.

Hard for me to even start without a link.

If she is the best the party has to offer it's time to start over. I believe that - I will write in Obama or vote Nader over her. She is a dem in name only.

If only people would face the fact of another Bush term.....they would come around....let's hope they just have a little time for the "bitterness" to get over and they should rally around Obama....

You say something you know is untrue in order to hope to affect the outcome.

If Zogby, CNN or Quinnapiac polling asked me now, I'd lie and say that I'd never support HRC in the GE...because campaigns follow that data and it might be one more vote adding to a large pool of respondents which might finally motivate her to drop-out. I'm not a big fan of Obama but I've been certain that her candidacy is dead for weeks now and that all she is doing is turning what should have been a cakewalk GE into an impending bloodsport.

I'd vote for HRC if she was the nominee, but I think there is zero chance of that happening. Hence, a noble lie.

people saying something in the heat of the moment, 6 months before the GE, and then realizing that not voting for the Democratic nominee will give us President McCain? After all, this has been a rather heated, contentious primary. I'm just sayin'...

:shrug:

Have you been listening to how badly McCain has been sounding recently despite all media efforts to make him look good?


Have you been paying attention to the rift within the Republican party between the extreme right and the moderates that is tearing it apart?

Have you been paying attention to the surge in Democratic registrations everywhere?

Get real.

We may not have won thing things yet--but we are not only still in it, but we have to be the favorite.


And by the way--I do play chess. Why, I challenge you to a game.

The Economy and the War are on the other side of Bush, the forking piece, pinning him to
McCain, the Rep candidate.. so one of our candidates moves away, and Bush is still pinned to McCain.

I am not sorry for HRC, she chose the more low road and it did not work out for her.
All the fear and racist remarks in the world will not keep Obama from being who he is, one classy candidate.
I am glad he will be the nominee for the Democratic party. At last they have someone worth voting for ... for once I can vote happily and for a really great candidate.

http://www.electoral-vote.com/evp2008/Obama/Maps/May06.html

Ok, so its only by one vote, but the campaign hasn't even started. I'd expect some angst and drama if Obama were 100 down on the projection, but this far out even that amount of gap has been overcome by others. Tied is a good start.