With astonishing chutzpah, Hillary Clinton has compared the unfortunate but legitimate outcome of the flawed 2008 Florida primary to the chicanery of the stolen 2000 presidential election in that state:
"We believe the popular vote is the truest expression of your will. We believe it today just as we did back in 2000 when right here in Florida, you learned the hard way what happens when your votes aren’t counted and the candidate with the fewer votes is declared the winner," Clinton said.
"The lesson of 2000 here in Florida is crystal clear: if any votes aren’t counted, the will of the people isn’t realized and our democracy is diminished."
"The candidate with the fewer votes is declared the winner"? Only in Hillary Worldtm. Obama leads by every reality-based metric. The increasingly contorted math by which she declares herself ahead in the popular vote (which, even if it were true, wouldn't win her the nomination under party rules), involves not only counting the fatally flawed results of the illegitimate MI and FL primaries, but discounting the fully legitimate caucuses in IA, WA, NV, and ME.
Never mind that she agreed to strip FL of all its delegates last year. Never mind that many FL Democrats didn't bother to go to the polls, having been told that their state's primary was an empty exercise. Never mind that MI Democrats who wanted to vote for Obama or Edwards weren't even able to do so, because their candidates' names weren't on the ballot. Weren't those voters were disenfranchised? Why doesn't Clinton have anything to say on their behalf?
But upon reflection, her specious comparison is not just mathematically nonsensical -- it's a low-down attack on the presumptive Democratic nominee. Let's be very clear: She is comparing herself to Al Gore -- victim of a stolen election -- and comparing Barack Obama to George Bush -- the one who stole it.
Perhaps this Florida gambit is a cynical attempt to muscle her way on to the ticket as Obama's VP nominee. And let's not dismiss the possiblity that this is part of a strategy to sustain her campaign until Denver, where she'll launch an all-out floor fight to grab the lead spot on the ticket herself.
Either way, Clinton's Florida folly is highly destructive. She is manipulating the legitimate dissatisfaction of Florida Dem voters -- who were cheated by their state party leaders out of a full and fair opportunity to participate in the primary process. And she is undercutting our nominee-apparent, Barack Obama, by comparing him to the election-stealing George W. Bush.
How to shut this circus down? First of all, I think it's vital that Obama offers a clear and reasoned response to Clinton's fallacious claims about the FL primary. I'm sure he's capable of doing this, but as with the Wright controversy, he seems to be waiting an inordinately long time to do so.
But calm and balanced words from Obama may not be enough to bring Clinton's riled-up FL supporters back into the fold. And we do need these voters in November. That's why I think senior Democrats with Florida street cred need to speak up. And I can think of no individuals better positioned to do so than Bob Graham and Al Gore.
Graham is the perenially popular ex-governor and ex-senator, who at one point had his own hat in the presidential ring. He played a key role in questioning the Bush administration's missteps before and after 9/11, and their manipulation of intelligence prior to the Iraq war. He is widely respected as a moderate, thoughtful leader.
Gore, of course, was the victim/hero of the stolen 2000 election, and Florida Democrats still feel a connection to him based on this. No one has more authority to dismiss Hillary Clinton's preposterous attempts to compare herself to Gore himself during the 2000 controversy.
I don't expect Gore or Graham to endorse Obama over Clinton -- both have previously said that they will not endorse during the primary process. But they could play a decisive role in putting paid to Hillary's phony Florida rhetoric.
So how about it, Senator Graham and Vice President Gore?