Senator Clinton (as the Obama campaign has recently stated almost verbatim) cannot take credit for President Clinton's successes without accepting the liability of his failures. And unlike Bush 41 and Bush 43, Sen. Clinton is at a disadvantaged position to claim that she is a "different candidate" while so engaged. To do so would also be, most tellingly - disingenuous based on the campaign tactics presented thus far, and the reality of the "situation on the ground" with regard to who is running her campaign and how - and what this could mean for every other democrat running for office in the nation.
if Hillary wins the nomination fair and square, i'll support her in the general. i feel really strongly about the "fierce urgency of now" and about Obama being the person to bring about change - i think he is singularly our generation's greatest hope and his candidacy our greatest opportunity. That said, if it doesn't come to pass and Hillary wins (fair and square) i'll even donate and volunteer for her campaign in a general election.
BUT some of the shit she's pulling is really starting to erode the immense respect and admiration i had for her before this primary, and it doesn't smack of that aforementioned "fair and square" prerequisite. In fact, it kinda chaps my hide.
seating the delegates in MI and FL is bullshit. even the idea some have floated about a "do-over" primary in florida is an unsound idea as one candidate (Clinton) goes in with an unfair advantage as Florida's "savior" for her support for seating the delegates after the DNC disqualified them. you can't step into the same river twice, and the jury there has already been tainted.
then her penchant for litigiousness is a little overboard. first she sued to suppress voters from caucusing in their workplaces in NV. now there's talk of the Clinton campaign suing here in Texas over the caucus/convention process. I'll tell you this much, Texas hasn't mattered in a primary in a long time, and I think even her threatening to smeg up Texas's chance to be influential in the nomination process will dampen her support here. I almost wish she had threatened a lawsuit with more time to go in early voting to let it really ferment and grow, she's bound to piss off the entrenched democratic establishment here(which i would think she's counting on) and this has got to hurt her here. I'm sure she thinks that if she pulls it off, the damage will be negligible and compartmentalized (with Texas being an "unimportant red state") - but news coverage of this will be national, and will absolutely bury democratic turnout in the general should it decide the nomination.
and lastly - her bashing kirk watson and trying to create spin from tweety bird's ambush of our good senator and former mayor. i think that was a low blow, and using it in the debate, a forum in which i at least would expect a higher standard of ethics - if nothing else in front of the cameras - was in pretty poor taste.
oh, and i lied, one more thing, the Ann Richards spot pissed me off too.
- but to redirect from the digression on my grievances with the Clinton campaign and to discuss the relevant implications:
if she "takes away" the nomination in this fashion, it will be the end of the democratic party. i don't mean for this election cycle, i mean the END. I mean apocalyptic, utter devastation, beyond thunderdome - "two men enter, one man leave, bust a deal and face the wheel" - if this comes to pass, democratic candidates will be begging to be included on Green and Reform party tickets in the hopes of hiding out somewhere down-ballot where nobody'll notice.
now, mind you, i am not saying these would be the effects of a Clinton nomination, as i have said previously i think electioneering bullshit aside she's a great representative who has done great things for our party and for america. My point is limited to her tactics in obtaining the nomination and the effect of a Clinton general candidacy emerging from a brokered if not broken convention as a result of such tactics.
honestly with the tactics she's employed so far, i'm not so sure she can win "fair and square." If by some miracle she does manage to pull off the nomination without actually implementing any of the tactics she's considered so far, the appearance of impropriety is pretty damn compelling.
Its pretty illustrative of the kind of politics that Mark Penn seems to advocate and that Hillary Clinton is seemingly unopposed to at best. It dovetails perfectly with her "do anything to win" image, and at least as far as the now canonized media narrative is concerned with regard to both Mr. and Mrs. Clinton, its the president over the party at all costs.
I needn't point out how the party faired across the nation and in every state during president Clinton's administration. And to defend my point, it wasn't simply that the Clinton presidency was buried under the Republican Newt Gingrich/Ken Starr witch hunt - it was in the issue trespassing which Clinton engaged in at the behest of Dick Morris (the man who brought Mark Penn into the fold of the Clinton campaign, who now is at the helm of the Hillary Hindenburg) - this sort of strategy left the Democratic party absolutely high and dry and left nearly every policy position left of Newt Gingrich vulnerable and nearly indefensible without the backing of the presidency.
Now I need to make a point here - its unfortunate that Sen. Clinton has been demonized by the media, especially the right wing driven media the way she has. It's sad, and pathetic and very telling of the kind of sexist, backward banjo strumming, moonshine swilling mutants who have swayed the electorate for the past 8, no make it 12 years. (All the more reason we should nominate a candidate that can kick these inbred hillbilly's asses back to fuckville, rather than one who "inspires" them to emerge from their warrens and holes to vote in mass. ACTUAL PROGRESS IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN A SYMBOL OF PROGRESS!!)
I hope that in time Sen. Clinton will be looked upon in the Democratic party in the same way that Ted Kennedy is looked upon, as a "lion" of the party, as an indispensable leader who champions the best and most treasured of our progressive values and policies. I think she's well on her way there.
I also think its unfortunate that she must carry the albatrosses of the previous Clinton administration. In order to benefit from Bill's immense popularity, she has to take some grief for the decimation of the party under his watch. Of course you can make the West Wing "president Bartlett" argument that a president is president of the United States and not the party, and that party affairs should be left to the party chief.
That is a fair argument, but unfortunately, politics is politics - its is strategy within another strategy. if policy positions are to be crafted and staked out "for the good of the nation over the more radical leanings of one's party" then you had best be damn sure that those policy positions (in pres. Clinton's case what were often called policy "trespasses" on traditional GOP owned issues) are not going to undercut your party's ability to win, and alienate your base and those closest to your basic philosophies and beliefs - THUS empowering those whose philosophies, beliefs and policy agendas are most diametrically opposed to your own. If you do so, then you have won the battle but in doing so lost the war.
Senator Clinton (as the Obama campaign has recently stated almost verbatim) cannot take credit for President Clinton's successes without accepting the liability of his failures. And unlike Bush 41 and Bush 43, Sen. Clinton is at a disadvantaged position to claim that she is a "different candidate" while so engaged. To do so would also be, most tellingly - disingenuous based on the campaign tactics presented thus far, and the reality of the "situation on the ground" with regard to who is running her campaign and how - and what this could mean for every other democrat running for office in the nation.