It's 3 a.m. And Hillary's Dreaming
For two or three days, the Hillary Clinton campaign will spin itself –and the media—silly, breathlessly celebrating her overwhelming victories in Rhode Island and Ohio and her squeaker in Texas. After the confetti is swept and the champagne bottles are tossed a more sober reality will take hold. Not just that her net gain of delegates this week will be, at most, in the single digits. But worse. There is no plausible scenario in which Clinton can win the nomination. At least, not democratically. Read the rest...
March 5th, 2008 at 12:12 am
It’s here.
March 5th, 2008 at 6:48 am
Perceived momentum will be important. Obama’s gotta get some back. That, with a delegate lead, will win it for him. Without momentum, superdelegates will convince themselves that HRC has the best shot in the general. So here’s hoping Barack takes Mississippi and and Wyoming. That should right the ship.
BTW Marc – every time you sing the witch is dead, she rises from the grave You’ve got to stop singing — go play some celebrity poker already, or find an ocean and go fishing.
March 5th, 2008 at 7:21 am
I’m fascinated and repulsed watching Clinton bludgeon Obama to death.
He’s inspired American youth to vote in record numbers and has won the support of independents in swing states depite the republicans nominating a perceived moderate. Yet there she is, with a smile on her face, more than willing to run him down for daring to stand in her way. Hillary may be the only politician in the world Putin would think twice about facing.
March 5th, 2008 at 8:39 am
Hillary’s dreaming and got Marc drinking.
March 5th, 2008 at 8:50 am
Chicago 68 redux to happen this summer…
March 5th, 2008 at 8:51 am
Yes, I’m with evets. Marc, you’re jinxing the primaries! Definitely time for you to lie low and do some fishing….
March 5th, 2008 at 9:19 am
Marc: The more steely-eyed amongst us, then, would do well to psychologically prepare for the nomination going, somehow or another, to Hillary Clinton.
Count me among the “steely-eyed.” Clinton will get the nomination by hook or crook. Maybe Marc can give us the Vegas odds of her nomination.
Clinton is now talking about sharing a ticket with Obama, which is basically telling people that if they nominate her that they won’t lose him. Bull.
And, Marc, don’t compare Clinton’s campaign tactics to those of Republicans. She’s in the major leagues compared to them.
It looks as if the crossover support that Rush Limbaugh drummed up will insure that he has broadcast material for the next four to eight years.
March 5th, 2008 at 9:32 am
HRC is accused on intentionally darkening the skin color of Obama in a campaign commercial of hers. Maybe he can retaliate by having a picture of her dragging a black man behind a pick-up truck in Texas. It’s appropriate and worked before.
March 5th, 2008 at 10:49 am
I should have realized the Democrats would be their own worst enemies. Unless some senior party leaders (or the grassroots, but how?) put a stop to this, we can count on another Republican administration…
March 5th, 2008 at 12:11 pm
“(or the grassroots, but how?)”
In the next primaries ? I have no idea how this will turn out and I don’t know what strategy Obama will seize on, but there seems to be some weird pendulum effect when Hillary seems to be rising back up that could now turn to Obama’s advantage. And if Obama can weather the current Clinton blows – which mostly mimic what McCain, et. al. will definitely throw at him – he might could stronger and better positioned for the general. The “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” theory – which isn’t always true, but this race has been full of enough surprises and twists on all sides, including the GOP’s that I’m not writing anybody off. I will admit to having developed a degree of animus and skepticism about Clinton’s chances in a general – considering that she’s positioning herself not as an alternative to McCain, but as a stand-in for McCain on the areas where she percieves Obama’s weakness. The truth is that she’s weaker on that front running against McCain because if it’s a choice between who you want answering the 911 call at 3am (double entendre intended) in order to protect your children, the guy who’s actually got some skills at killing people is obviously your go-to guy. Framing foreign policy that way weakens Hillary as much as Obama. On that score, yeah, if Hillary’s the nomineee we can probably count on another Republican administration.
Frankly, I’m not sure that Hillary will be less of a wack-job than John McCain on foreign policy. “Gencer perceptions” might drive her to be more opportunistically aggressive than the average liberal Dem. I’m also not a fan of Richard Holbrooke’s – who seems like a garden-variety hubristic interventionist and one of the last people I would like to see occupying the chair at State. (But I’m of the opinion that McCain wouldn’t have launched an invasion of Iraq in 2003 were he President and that his consistent support of the war is the result of his “Vietnam syndrome”, not because he would have made the same choices or had the same team of advisors nudging him to launch wars on two fronts in response to 9/11. It’s hard to imagine the Cheney crowd having inordinate influence in a McCain administration. I could be totally wrong about this – he’s got some crazies like James Woolsey on his FP team (although it’s instructive to remember where Woolsey came from.) I’m not predicting he would do the following – I have no idea – but McCain is the best positioned of the three candidates to make a strategic decision to do to Iran what Nixon did to China. Among other things, that would be the smartest move over the long term in order to manage the facts on the ground in Iraq, which he wants to do without a perception of “premature” withdrawal. One thing we know about McCain is that when he’s not running for office – and he might well decide to screw the noation of re-election and just do whatever the hell he wants for four years – he’s not as loathe as some Beltway types to just piss people off, including his “base.” Of course, if McCain started doing not-totally-predictable stuff as President, his real “base” – the press – would be walking around with hard-ons and hiding under his desk in hopes of becoming the next Monica Lewinsky.
March 5th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
Yes, reg, I can imagine President McCain getting off AF1 in Teheran and the band striking up BaBaBaBarBarbaraAnn….While there is an argument that McCain would not have invaded Iraq, mostly because it was so damned pointless, I do believe he would have exercised American might somewhere in his first term.
And speaking of a McCain presidency, I do think the American people will be (literally) very tired of his voice before November. No one seems to be mentioning this, but I find him almost impossible to listen to for over 2 minutes. Last night he misread or messed up the emphasis of what I’m sure his speechwriter thought of as world-class rhetoric. And when will he feel comfortable to give a big speech without hte Lord & Taylor’s mannequin standing beside him?
I missed on McCain. I recall writing that I didn’t think he had the stomach for a year and a half of prayer breakfasts…but he has made it at least half-way. His nomination is, however, the product of a true fluke situation—the dominant religious right could not settle on a candidate, and his stronger rival on the militarized left, Rudy G, succumbed due to heavy baggage and an irrational strategy.
As for HRC’s resurgence (to perhaps overstate last night’s results), I did get one thing right a few months ago. Democrats love drama…unlike Republicans, we really believe in the democratic process. When the process is operating in a way that generates drama, we cannot get enough of it, even though we know in our heads that success in November is endangered…more every day.
Often this characteristic has manifested in the late challenge of an nsurgent–Tsongas, Jerry Brown,etc. But this time it seems to be giving HRC just enough electoral oxygen to keep her campaign aspirated and alive.
Is this time going to be different? I think it might be, because Marc’s interpretation of the last week or two is pretty accurate. And people like Al Gore and John Edwards and maybe Fritz Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro have too many years invested in the party to allow it to be destroyed by the Clintons’ sense of entitlement and noblesse oblige on the eve of the best year for Democrats in 30 years. And as those people know, it is getting to the time when it could be too late, even though we are almost 6 months out from the convention.
March 5th, 2008 at 1:16 pm
From what I’ve heard from Geraldine Ferraro she share’s the notion that HRC is entitled, and has no problem belittling BHO. Don’t count on her to step in for the party’s sake.
I just read a quote in TPM which shows BHO questioning HRC’s claims of red-phone experience — asking whether she’s signed any treaties, handled any crises — and answering No. It’s about damn time he got around to pointing this out. I guess he figured that as the unsullied outsider he didn’t need to challenge her claims of great experience — that they didn’t matter, since experience wasn’t the pivotal criterion. Bad move on his campaign’s part, since the meme has already caught hold. BTW – James Fallows points out the enormous gap in experience between Bush 1 and Bill Clinton in their race. Clinton of course claimed the gap wasn’t meaningful.
March 5th, 2008 at 1:37 pm
“I do believe he would have exercised American might somewhere in his first term.”
I agree – but I think that it would have been a more concerted effort in Afghanistan. I’m totally engaging in speculation – and McCain has crafted an image on which all kinds of disparate notions can be projected (actually more than Obama, who’s the guy who gets that rap) – but I have a hard time believing he wouldn’t have kept his ear closer to the military brass – who weren’t enthusiastic about the Iraq invasion, and certainly not the “plan” and timing – rather than unhinged ideologues with Grand Ideas. Certainly McCain sounds unhinged on the “bomb Iran” question, but I’m wondering if Nixon sounded any less bombastic on China being one of the threats related to the “dominoes” back in the heyday of the Vietnam war. I remember being totally shocked when Nixon went to China – seemed totally out-of-character with the public figure of the era. My main point was that McCain fits the profile of the guy who could pull a deal with Iran off with less domestic fallout than Hillary or Obam. (Hillary is the least likely, for a number of reasons.) Of course, Nixon spent most of “his war” playing poker, not bombing people and then ending up as a POW, so the underlying impulses and analytic capabilities of McCain and RMN are probably radically different.
March 5th, 2008 at 1:56 pm
>When the process is operating in a
>way that generates drama, we
>cannot get enough of it, even
>though we know in our heads that
>success in November is endangered
Nah, in this case there is no such thing as bad publicity. The horse race just keeps them in the news so the ultimate winner gets max publicity. If they start with really nasty personal stuff, it might change. This is not likely since they are both likely to be on the same ticket.
I argued the opposite a couple of months when there was a Repug race. That’s different-there really were differences between, say, Huckabee and McCain, so that conflict could exacerbate tension among the GOP’s motley crew of country club libertarians, bigots, and serpent handlers.
March 5th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
Michael Crosby,
As someone said McCain reminds me of the old man who lives next door and yells at you to get off his lawn.
March 5th, 2008 at 2:12 pm
What bothers the Coopers, Sullivans, and Hitchens of this world is that every time they settle down for a good Auto-Da-Fe of Hillary she slips out of the trap and lives to fight another day. As a result more Concentrate bullshit per cubic litre is sprayed on the Dems and ‘08 than any other topic.
I see that the dreaded picture of Chicago ‘68 has been raised. Why? Where are the deep ideological fissures to create such a scenario. Unlike that year this war presents a unified voice – everyone hates it and wants out. It is John McCain who stakes all in the sands of Mesopotamia. Have we had other conventions where the outcome was unknown going in? Sure. Just about every contested one before 1976. This will be settled. Polls show the rank and file like both and probably hesitate picking because they do like them.
I’m goping to enjoy this. The Dems will have v\center stage all Spring.
Meanwhile McCain sinks into the black hole of non-storydom begun today when he accepts the fatal embrace of the Decider.
March 5th, 2008 at 3:03 pm
Whether McCain or Clinton expands or curtails American chauvinism depends not on their personality or enigmatic ideology but on how they read the political winds.
If they campaign on chauvinism and win on it, why would anyone expect them to turn their backs on it? On the other hand, if their focus groups and polling show that they need to carefully spin the Iraq issue to avoid being seen as chauvinist, they will heed that as well once elected.
The peace movement, or people who believe in the superiority of diplomacy and “soft power” over military aggression, should know by now that simply electing a new president won’t bring a fundamental change in policy.
Bill Clinton certainly dailed down the chauvinism, but didn’t bring fundamental change because he had correctly calculated that his political survival depended on appeasing the Bubba vote. He knew that half of the American left, i.e. the Marc Coopers of the world, would never be satisfied with anyone short of The Messaiah, and the other half had either gone to sleep or fragmented into quixotic single-issue campaigns headed mostly by feckless identity seekers.
Presidential elections are fun (although this one has seems to have prompted Marc to sensationally sqaunder every shred of journalistic credibility he ever had) and we all hope for the best. But we have to remember that the ideology and personality fo the candidates is only a template through which they interpret voter sentiment. Their decisions are ultimately depend on the variable, then, which is the political wind and which way it’s blowing.
Obama moves us slightly away from this model, it seems, because his claim is that he’s actually engaging in politics, meaning he’s trying to build a new majority by power of broad-minded persuasion, rather than via small-minded marketing tactics. And there is evidence that he’s succeeding. Let’s hope so.
And…some of the wingnut blogs are crowing that their tactic of having Republicans vote for Hillary in open primaries has worked…
March 5th, 2008 at 3:41 pm
“I’m goping to enjoy this. The Dems will have v\center stage all Spring. ”
Yeah – like gladiators in the coliseum.
March 5th, 2008 at 4:02 pm
Are all the people who revile Nader for 2000 prepared to cast Hilary in the same role in 2008 should the dems lose? You should be.
By all accounts, a win by Hilary–in this case that means a delegate lead–is all but impossible. Yet she soldiers on. Why? Does she want to recast the party as Nader hoped? That can’t be, since Bill already did that, this is a fait accompli–nothing left to be done there.
So really, she’s just the Nader of ambition. She soldiers on, becasue she wants to be pres and only for that reason. That’s why they run in the first place of course, but allegiance to party is generally expected to trump personal ambition. Unless you are a Clinton.
What does she hope to achieve beyond her personal wants? Nothing. And what damage will she do along the way? A lot. As people here have pointed out she has to criticize Obama to gain momentum at this point, and she’ll keep on providing fodder for the opposition, making a win over McCain that much harder.
I just hope Obama gives it right back to her. She can’t win the nomination straight up, so put her away.
March 5th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
What Dan O says, and then some.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rick-perlstein/some-apocalyptic-observat_b_90096.html
March 5th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Where are the deep ideological fissures?
Sorry, RLC – I didn’t see your post before posting htat Perlstein blog. But first of all, between those who accept democracy and those who settle for establishment fises, there is a huge fissure. Second, and more importantly, most post-80s social upheavals – the Caracazo, the Nepalese Revolution, the Intifada, start over relatively minor occurences, in comparison with vote rigging. Obama has raised people’s hopes so high that they’ll be angry as hell, and potentially revolutionary in a situation in which Hillary can use racism and cheating to win the nomination.
Hillary Kerensky!
March 5th, 2008 at 6:11 pm
jcummings I’d be more concerned about the CBC’s coverage of Harper’s dirty hands all over the “NAFTAGate” story. What is it about Conservative Commonwealth PMs that makes them want to Dis Obama. Maybe he should recall what happened to Howard!
March 5th, 2008 at 6:28 pm
The more I think about it, Mondale is the guy to convene the come-to-Jesus conclave with Hillary. Of course he would have to be convinced that she has no reasonable chance of winning, but if he were, he would be the guy. First, he has endorsed her. Second, she stole his red-phone piece, and she owes him…
No one really has the right to demand that she drop out, but the party surely has every right to demand that she not conduct her campaign in a way that damages the chances of the other candidate, who because of his lead is odds-on to head the ticket in every state. As some of the talking-heads correctly noted last night, this is what DNC chairs must do. If Howard Dean suspects that HRC and her people won’t listen to him, it is his duty to find someone to whom she will listen. Again, Mondale is the best I can think of. Jimmy Carter would be good because he could talk about the damage some of Ted Kennedy’s arguments did him in 1980, but the Clintons dislike Carter about as much as they do EMK.
March 5th, 2008 at 6:34 pm
I agree about Harper, RLC – and I’ll add that even moreso I blame the corporate owners of CTV, Bell Canada and the thompson family, close friends of Bill
March 5th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
I add do not blame the CBC. Its CTV, a private network, not CBC, that is responsible for the story.
March 5th, 2008 at 6:35 pm
RLC: The Coopers, the Hitchens and the Sullivans? Geez, Richard, you forgot to add the Cheneys, the Addams, and the Mansons! You’re just warming up, as Hillary loves to say.
But in any case, I’m more than happy to remain un-associated with the Clinton family and would rather any of the above as a second cousin before I’d have Chelsea. I’ll leave that stinky crew to y’all.
And as to what Reg said… I can’t believe that any intellectually honest person believes that Clinton somehow has different instincts on foreign policy than John McCain. I see no effective difference between them, other than momentary tactical campaign positioning.
Would you like to paw through those transcripts of a few years ago when Hillary and McCain did their JOINT fact finding trip in Iraq? They were virtual Bobsey twins.
Hillary puts exactly NO more at ease than McCain on that front. You can have her.
As to Dan O: I dont know about Nader. Dont think Im going down that road. But I cant imagine myself casting a vote for Hillary Clinton. And, yes, let Obama roll out ALL the dirt if necessary.
I can’t wait until Clinton is forced to release her tax returns. It will immediately become a class project for my investigative reporting class — and for daily newspapers across the country.
RLC, are you looking forward to the disclosures about which foreign governments have given millions to Bill’s library? I certainly am. So is the RNC. Get ready to lose, amigo. LOL
March 5th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Harper has proven relatively independent of the US lately, strongly critical of Israel in Gaza (but recent canadain standards) and publicly criticizing the world pushing for Kosovo (Bondsteel Airbase) “independence” (I think its understandable why any Canadian government would oppose Kosovo indpeendence, as a Quebec separatist myself)
March 5th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
I have no problems Marc but that’s because I was never in the mood for burning at the stake. Unlike you and the “Witchfinder-General” Sullivan and his assistant Chris Hitchens (see him on “Morning Joe”? Hear about the infamous Resko and all of BHO’s shady Iraqi friends? Hitch don’t like Obama either and will shill for “Bomber” McCain) stuck in an alcoholic haze. I have differences with Hillary and have been commenting here for over a year and half that she was not inevitable. But, to me, it is not personal. I’ll take her friends word that she is a thoughtful and likeable person and the fact that Chelsea turned out so wholesome (unlike Genna and not-Genna) suggests something went right. But then, unlike the other Chris (Matthews, that is) I’m not a member of the “He Men Woman Hater’s Club” either.
I suspect Obama to go negative. He demanded Hil’s tax returns be released. While he’s at it he could ask the same of McCain who has also been reticent. He might also ask St. John why all those lobbyists work for him – Charlie Black?
Here’s an idea for you worrywarts that I heard from AIR AMERICA’s David Bender – their political reporter. Have Howard Dean, Al Gore and Ted Kennedy (as representatives of the superdelegates) encourage the two to compete on who is stronger against McCain and keep the neg attacks to a minumum. Penalty for avoiding this counsel? The supes will vote en mass for the other guy. I like that idea.
March 5th, 2008 at 7:15 pm
Actually jc, I was praising CBC as they were apparently the ones that got to the bottom of all this.
March 5th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
Obama needs to win this thing so that I don’t have to campaign and vote for Ralph Nader.
March 5th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
“Have Howard Dean, Al Gore and Ted Kennedy (as representatives of the superdelegates) encourage the two to compete on who is stronger against McCain and keep the neg attacks to a minumum. Penalty for avoiding this counsel?”
I think the horse is already out of the barn. BHO will have to go low against Hillary, if only to show he can. That seems to be a job requirement at this point. Proves you can be trusted with a red phone.
March 6th, 2008 at 8:23 am
MC “…unlike Republicans, we really believe in the democratic process.”
Oh Please!!!!
March 6th, 2008 at 8:23 am
“Get ready to lose”
Jeez, DP strategy is determined by what policies are acceptable to the donors, not by what wins elections. The same strategy of following the repugs further and further right keeps them losing, but they knowingly keep doing it. Those who are ultimately in charge don’t care which party wins, any more than it matters whether Coke or Pepsi is #1 to someone who owns stock in both.
Here’s a scary thought, though. McCain is worried about losing the serpent handler vote to a third party, names Huckabee as VP and wins the election. McCain has a stroke and dies or is incapacitated in late 2009. Here comes Armageddon.
March 6th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
“Harper has proven relatively independent of the US lately, strongly critical of Israel in Gaza”
What’s up with JC turning into a Harper apologist. He forgets to mention that Harper suppported Israel’s invasion of Lebanon, refusing to call for a cease fire, that he has said anything about a Khadr, a Canadian born teenager facing US military court trial to the loud dismay of of human rights groups, that he has reversed long standing Canadian tadition of seeking clemency for those abroad who face the death penalty. Weird