Ground Game

Beltway Republicans have apparently found their consensus nominee: Barack Obama. Consider some admittedly anecdotal, but growing, evidence:

CNN’s political ticker sits down with an unnamed GOP strategist (whom I’m guessing is Mark McKinnon) who says that Obama could be a new Reagan for the political left:

A former top Republican official tells CNN Obama could win a significant portion of the Republican vote in a general election, if he becomes the Democratic nominee. The leading Republican strategist, who requested anonymity because this person advises a number of Republican presidential candidates, told CNN "I think Barack Obama is a potential Robert Kennedy or Reagan figure." And "in terms of raw political horsepower, he is the most electable of any of the Democrats and potentially more electable than Bill Clinton. If he ran the right campaign he could appeal to a substantial number of Republicans and Independents."

Meanwhile, Andrew Sullivan has been posting emails from readers who say they will vote for Obama if their alternatives are Romney, Huckabee or Giuliani.

Even George Will hops on the Obama bandwagon to declare:

Barack Obama, who might be mercifully closing the Clinton parenthesis in presidential history, is refreshingly cerebral amid this recrudescence of the paranoid style in American politics. He is the un-Edwards and un-Huckabee — an adult aiming to reform the real world rather than an adolescent fantasizing mock-heroic "fights" against fictitious villains in a left-wing cartoon version of this country.

As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, this sentiment mixes well with the responses I’ve been hearing from most of my conservative friends. I have a background in conservative journalism, so it’s not like I’m hearing trial balloons floated from RINO’s or one-issue conservative voters. While most of their ire is directed at Huckabee, several have used the “I’ll vote for Obama instead,” line in reference to Romney and Giuliani as well. Interestingly enough, without exception, all of these conservative friends and colleagues have said they’d vote for John McCain if he were the nominee. I say that’s interesting, because earlier in the campaign season most of these individuals were vehemently opposed to McCain and seemed very open to Romney, Giuliani or Fred Thompson.