A Clinton backer turns to McCain
[cnn-photo-caption image=http://i.cdn.turner.com/cnn/2008/images/06/08/art.clinton.gi.jpg caption="Sen. Hillary Clinton suspended her presidential campaign last week."]
(CNN) – After eight years of a Bush White House, Will Bower was looking for a Democrat to move into 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in January 2009. But not just any Democrat. Bower wanted Hillary Clinton to win the Democratic nomination and move back into the home she left in January 1993.
After a bitter primary battle Clinton conceded the race to Barack Obama last week urging her supporters to back her rival. Bower heard the message, but he is not going to follow it. Instead, he said in an interview he plans to vote for Republican John McCain and has formed “Party Unity My A–,” otherwise known as PUMA to express his frustration at the Democratic Party.
WATCH: Hillary Clinton throw her support behind Obama
The initiative he said is “to unite voters who don't want Barack Obama as president.”
The 36 year-old Washington resident said his anger is not just directed at Obama, but the party as a whole.
“[The] Democratic Party has thrown away democratic principles through this primary season," charged Bower, who pointed to the delegate sanctions levied by the DNC against Michigan and Florida. "If parties won't uphold democratic principles; who will?"
The group is predominantly comprised of female Clinton supporters, said Bower. The Clinton-turned-McCain supporter said he has also helped launch the “Just Say No Deal,” a nationwide coalition he estimated has two million voters who are also vowing to ‘say no’ to the Illinois senator come November.
Bower acknowledged Obama will be crowned the Democratic nominee at the party’s August convention, but said he holds out hope that the GOP will uncover potentially harmful information between now and then. At that time, “the party might be desperate for another candidate," he said.
Why is CNN giving this one guy such prominence? When I saw this headline, I thought, my god a DNC member, senator, congressman, etc who is not supporting Obama? That's bad....
No, it's one guy with stationary and a letterhead, wow....
Where is my story, I will be voting for Obama, bringing others to vote for him as well, donating and campaigning for him because it is the only way to stop the slide of our great nation....and guess what, enough people will join me in November that PUMA's efforts will be for naught...
For all of you who say that we're all about "identity politics" and not focused on the issues:
I would have dearly loved to have a candidate who I could embrace come November. Instead, you were all swept along on Obama's wave of emotional rhetoric and have lost all ability to reason. Stop and LISTEN to him! He doesn't SAY anything! WHO IS HE???
As horrible as four more years with a Republican will be, Obama is terrifying by comparison. No thanks.
Hillary Supporter for McCain
PUMA ??
Very interesting, although I think the Democratic Party has gotten too big and needs to split into two parties...one for the left wingers, and one for the more moderate Democrats.
A lot of Dems feel left wingers Howard Dean and Nancy Pelosi treated Hillary unfairly by working on the inside to promote Obama. In past national conventions the superdelegates have voted in secrecy, but in this primary election, the superdelegates were pressured into deciding early and making endorsements. This influenced the voters by the media rants. Also, more states were given caucuses while they had held primary elections in the past. Hillary did not do as well in the caucuses as she did in the primary voting states. I don't know why the DNC even has caucuses because the Democratic way is one vote for every person. That is how the general election will be held (with all the electoral votes going to the winner), so why would you want different rules when selecting your party's nominee? It's no wonder the Dem's have lost so many past elections when they go by their wacky precinct delegate apportionment rules rather than selecting the candidate with the most votes.
A lot of Democrats will vote for McCain because they feel he is more of a moderate and, although they do not share all of his views, they feel comfortable that he will have a more centrist view on several of the issues they care about. Age will not be an issue because McCain is younger than Reagan was when he ran for his second term and won. Experience will be an issue because Obama does not have a voting record to match the views and rhetoric of his speeches.
I have been a lifelong Democratic, but sometimes I feel the party has gotten too far to the left from the party I used to know. In catering to the environmentalists, the left wingers have not found common ground that will appeal to all. If countries like Canada and Norway can drill for their own oil and still have areas of pristene beauty, why can't we? We should be oil independent even as we continue our search for green energy sources. Also, in the left wingers agenda to save everyone from themselves, they seem to tax us to death to find funding for all their social programs. They seem to forget that America is not about government intervention and welfare, but about retaining the freedoms of our constitution so everyone has the right and empowerment to succeed. A lot of the people that the left wingers want to tax, are people who worked hard and pulled themselves out of a poverty existence. There must be some common ground not to penalize these people for the sake of those who have yet to find their potential.
I'm not sure who I will vote for, but I find some of the Democrat's platform hard to swallow. During the recent interogation of the oil company execs, I found it rather scarey when the California Rep. Maxine Waters told them... "guess what this liberal will be all about...about socialize...about basically taking over and the government running all the oil companies".
WHAT ???!!!
This left winger thing is beginning to smell like a Hugo Chavez socialist party. Isn't that what Chavez did with Venezuela's oil companies?
SCAREY !!! ...and people wonder why some Democrats say they will vote for McCain.......at least people knew the Clintons are not extreme left wingers that want to socialize everything!
Bower heard the message, but he is not going to follow it. Instead, he said in an interview he plans to vote for Republican John McCain and has formed “Party.............. Just coming out the CLOSET,I respect his
DECISION ................. jt.................. It is the EXPERIENCE!!! WONDER IF EXPERIENCE is RESPONCIBLE FOR THE out of control GAS and FOOD PRICES.........IF the truth be TOLD some DEMS are not ready for an AFRICAN AMERICAN PREZ ............NO ANGER just FACTS !!!!