Personal Aside: The McCain Nomination and the Clinton Victories Make it a Sweet Election.

McCain.

Divine providence has a special interest in looking out for straying puppies, drunks and the Republican party.

It seemed to do so tonight with the nomination of John McCain. While not my first or second choice…and not the prime choice of many conservatives…it turns out that the Vietnam war hero is indeed the logical man if there can be found anyone who can lead the Republican party to presidential victory. And it will not be easy. I am not optimistic. Already the innate flexibility that has been woven into the political fabric and which has saved the nation from ideological wars and multi-parties has taken hold once again…and McCain is coming home after pique and past resentments to the conservatism he once embraced. He is indeed the Republican Man of the Hour.

What he must do is to (a) get some rest, (b) take over command of the Republican National Committee and name an outstanding organizer as chairman and so funnel the resources in that committee prudently to his campaign so that there is a smooth transition and (c) conclude wisely on a vice presidential nominee who is a good deal younger and more sophisticated on the economy than is the nominee by his own admission.

Clinton.

I am delighted to see Hillary Clinton win Ohio and, at this late night writing, possibly take Texas. For three reasons. First if we must make a choice between the two Democratic candidates for president, there is no doubt in my mind that she is (a) a patriot and (b) has the political skill to organize and run a government effectively. Second, having been deeply involved in the White House she has a more instinctive and combative view of this nation’s priorities than the ethereal Barack Obama. Third and this is of utmost candor, she is less popular than Obama and more likely to lose to McCain.

For these reasons I was delighted to see my old neighbor from two blocks down the street make her victory speech last night. She deserves it. Obama and his cult following has subliminally used the old black guilt that so subverts liberal whites—but it is of more than passing interest to me…and forgotten by many…that black males received the voting franchise after the Civil War but it remained until 1920 until women received their suffrage. It is something that most of my black friends are loath to mention but is nonetheless amazing. So-called liberals following the Civil War were imbued with adding black males but under no circumstances would entertain or tolerate women to be added. I did not live at that time, of course, but I cannot imagine how the cause of women suffrage came to be as underrated as it was. Yes I understand certain states like Wyoming adopted the franchise before passage of the Constitutional amendment but I will have to study up sometime on the peculiar sexist hatred that denied women rights while at the same time allowing them to nurture their families, bear their children etc. It boggles my mind. Perhaps some of my readers will enlighten me.

While this night is Clinton’s, I do not yield in my belief that the nomination will ultimately go to Obama because of the tyranny of the math. Don Rose our esteemed colleague in The Chicago Daily Observer has had a go at the math some time ago and says that there is a barely minimal chance she can be nominated. Jonathan Alter in “Newsweek”…interestingly enough another old Chicago hand, the son of Joann Alter a one-time reformer on the Metropolitan Water Reclamation Board when it was known as the Sanitary District…called “the queen of sludge”...makes a similar claim in “Newsweek.”

My congratulations to John McCain and Hillary. I hope against hope that they are paired against each other in the national election.