Demos' division may pay off in November

Get ready for weeks — if not months — of a tightly fought Democratic presidential race, while Tuesday night's big winner on the GOP side, John McCain, could soon be sitting on the sidelines, secure in victory, trying hard to raise money and pull together a fractious Republican coalition.

So far, the Democrats have dramatically outdrawn the Republicans at the polls and generated greater enthusiasm among their core constituencies, especially among women, minorities and younger voters. A fierce, protracted contest between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama could sour the good feelings — or energize the party even more, depending on how the candidates conduct themselves.

"The pressure to stay nice and positive will be great, but the pressure to go negative will be even greater," said Linda Fowler, a political science professor at Dartmouth College, reflecting the belief that negative campaigning can be effective in a two-person race. "With the Republican nomination settled, reporters will focus on all the Democrats' tit-for-tats and negative attacks, and that could turn off voters."

But Fowler noted there still could be a hidden benefit for the Democrats: "The reciprocal effect is all the energy put into the get-out-the-vote efforts — the phone banks and volunteers — and that's got to be helpful. For McCain, there are very few places where he has people to knock on doors for him and to give up their Saturdays for him."

Super Tuesday returns gave McCain an enormous lead in GOP delegates and victories over his main rivals, Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee, in many of the largest states, but he did not necessarily win the hearts of conservatives. Exit polls suggested he still has a lot of work to do in winning over core Republican voters who are disaffected by his past votes on taxes, immigration, and campaign finance reform.

Thus, McCain will wake up this morning a winner — but one with little money in the bank and a lot of skeptics among would-be allies.

Right-wing pundits Rush Limbaugh and Ann Coulter are already grumbling about Clinton being more conservative than McCain. But their followers are unlikely to agree, and McCain will almost certainly end up carrying conservative voters in the general election. They could force him to harden his positions on core Republican issues, perhaps jeopardizing his longstanding appeal to moderates and independents.

Meanwhile, various Democratic constituencies will be squaring off against one another at the ballot box, divided equally between Clinton and Obama.