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| Edited By: |Source: DNA |Updated: Jun 10, 2016, 08:10 AM IST
Hillary Clinton is on track to clinch the Democratic Party ticket for the US presidential elections, having notched enough popular votes, pledged delegates and super delegates to give her an unassailable lead over challenger Bernie Sanders. That she becomes the first woman in the country’s history to reach this mark is a tribute to her perseverance and her abilities. After helping her husband, Bill, to the presidency in 1992 and 1996, America was reconciled to the possibility of another Clinton presidency. The loss to Barack Obama in 2008 almost finished her political career, but it is to Obama, himself, that she must credit her comeback. The stint as Obama’s secretary of state allowed her to return to public office and regain the much-needed confidence for another shot at the top job. Her convictions are often questioned, she may not have Bill’s folksiness, Obama’s soaring oratory or Sanders’ fiery rhetoric, but she has survived three decades in American public life and that is no mean achievement.
The challenge for the Democrats is to prevail over Bernie Sanders before the Democratic National Convention (DNC) and unite the party. Sanders has been sore about the Democratic primary process that gave Hillary a head-start over him even before the primaries began. He has been critical about the voting rights for super-delegates — the distinguished party leaders, and elected officials, including all Democratic members of the House and Senate and sitting Democratic governors — who overwhelmingly backed Clinton from the start, putting Sanders at a disadvantage. Entering the race with this handicap, Sanders ran Clinton close in the primaries and caucuses, winning 1,816 pledged delegates against Clinton’s 2,197 pledged delegate count. However, Clinton has the support of 537 superdelegates against a mere 47 for Sanders. Having forced a close fight, Sanders will be tempted to fight all the way to the DNC, slated for late July.
Such an eventuality will reflect heavily on the Democratic party’s chances. A raucous convention where delegates clash with each other will cause deep-seated divisions. The last time that a convention opened without a nominee having been declared in the primaries was in 1984. The history of such contested conventions indicate that the nominee who was ultimately chosen failed to win the US presidential election. In 1984, Walter Mondale was the Democratic front-runner but was short of 40 delegates coming into the DNC. He ultimately lost to Ronald Reagan. Similarly, Jimmy Carter faced a tough challenge from Ted Kennedy in 1980 until the DNC, and lost the presidency to Reagan. In 1976 Reagan bowed out to incumbent president Gerald Ford at the Republican convention, but Ford paid heavily for the fractious convention, and was defeated by Carter in the presidential polls. A bigger danger for the Democratic party is the possibility of the maverick Sanders choosing to contest as an independent candidate. Having joined the Democratic party only in the run-up to the primaries, and with no love lost for the party’s leaders, Sanders is giving the Democrats the jitters.
Not surprisingly, President Barack Obama has taken the initiative to unify the party and request Sanders to call off his campaign. Having polled heavily among liberals and young White voters, the Sanders campaign revealed the weaknesses that plagued Clinton in 2008 too. But unlike Obama, Sanders failed to convince party apparatchik, minorities and older voters that he offers the party a better chance to retain the presidency. Sanders can take comfort in pushing Clinton to admit that his socialistic agenda — universal healthcare, minimum wages, and rising economic inequality — are dear to her too. The ideological duels with Sanders has hurt Hillary so far, but could help her overcome the populist and majoritarian challenge mounted by Trump.
