by Pablo Fanque
National Affairs Editor, All This Is That
Washington, D.C. Saturday 6/7/08
OK. We supported her. And then we didn't support her. She and her husband have perhaps too often aggressively pursued their dream, and along the way made some dumb comments about race, Obama's religion, Bobby Kennedy and other tasteless faux pas. . But today, when she finally conceded defeat, it was Hillary Clinton who made the big classy speech, as she bowed out.
"As we gather here today," she told her fans and staff at the National Building Museum yesterday, "the 50th woman to leave this Earth is orbiting overhead. If we can blast 50 women into space, we will someday launch a woman into the White House."
"Although we weren't able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time, thanks to you, it's got about 18 million cracks in it," the Senator said, "and the light is shining through like never before, filling us all with the hope and the sure knowledge that the path will be a little easier next time."
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I didn't see the speech over the weekend but I chased it down yesterday on youtube. I wonder if you think she rehabbed herself sufficiently? Some good stuff, for sure, but I am afraid that I remain deeply cynical about all things Clinton.
ReplyDeleteYou know that I have been harping about her campaign debt for a couple of months now and if recent reports are true it is every bit as deep as I had feared. Some say it's forty million.
What is really troubling is that she ran these enormous deficits on the backs of unpaid vendors while she gambled on a long shot win that would balance her ledger or if she were to lose, as she was almost guaranteed to do, then Obama would bail her out. To go after a fellow Democrat on credit is flat out disgusting to me and I am shocked that the press has been mute on this ploy.
I guess they weren't as hard on her as Hill & Bill wanted us to believe. She basically funded the last two months of her campaign with a Ponzi scheme. Yes, two months when her donors were becoming chastened by the facts and the delegate math that had just become insurmountable
The party's current divisions would almost certainly been less fevered had she allowed the cash and count reality to inform her decisions she certainly would have slogged through the mud for eight solid weeks exacerbating the race and gender tensions.
that last sentence should read "would NOT have slogged through the mud exacerbating the race and gender tensions."
ReplyDeleteI do not think she re-habbed herself, nor do I think Bill is off the griddle either. She is tending in the right direction. I, too, have become sceptical about anything thatemanates from the Clinton camp.
ReplyDeleteAs for your feelings about her campaign debt--don't get me wrong, I've read the stories about the delis, and bars, etc., who have fronted them food and drink on good faith. But mostly this debt you speak of is for media buys, and at least twenty million, or more, of this is debt she owes herself. Believe me, the ad agencies, commercial brokers and the like went into this with their eyes open.
This method of financing a campaign on the cuff is not something your beloved NY Senator invented. It's how it works. Ask John Glenn...an honorable democrat. Guess what? It took him 20 years to pay off his dents. Amd even then, the FEC (Federal elections commission) let him off the hook for part of it).
Granted, Hillary left more businesses on the hook than anyone...ever.
Although I wish she had dropped out earlier, there always was a glimmer of hope. If she had employed a truly scorched earth tactic, who knows what would have happened.
All in all, I still think Obama has some things to prove. And he's a very lucky man to have been lobbed McCain as an opponent.
I very much want Barack to become President. But this is not going to be the cakewalk Obamanites are leading us to believe. Like it or not, this is going to be a dog fight.
I didn't know that about Glenn but I imagine that the amount he owed was relatively modest and the term over which he paid it down was due more to his lower wattage than the actual size of the debt.
ReplyDeleteI don't think it's wrong to ring up debt while running but forty mill is a boat load and though she didn't resort to outright scorched earth tactics she did demonize Obama and preyed upon the race and gender issues while throwing scurrilous attacks that didn't enhance his chances in the fall.
Discrediting Obama while affirming McCain's tested status for the office was beyond the pale. After FEB she only had a glimmer of hope and tweren't $40million worth of glimmer. She essentially went double or nothing for eight solid weeks. She might need to look into GA.
If she had faced up to the math and the cash reality then it's hard to imagine anyone but her most blinded supporters would think now that Johnny Mc is preferable to Barack. Whatever happened in the DEM primary, nobody stole this from her. She lost to a better organized and more forward thinking candidate. He won this before she knew what hit her. And what has to gall her is that even in the face of this rarely gifted candidate she would have prevailed had she not been seduced by the arrogance of her top advisors. I am happy that McAuliffe, Wolfson, Penn, Ickes et al got owned by a more savvy and drama free team.
Still, I think you're right that Obama has much to prove and he is lucky to have run this cycle but his overall operation is proving it has a long game and if he doesn't stumble he is likely to find himself presiding over an expanded DEM congress. And therein lies the decline of Bill's legacy who may well be remembered as more of a Houdini than a great DEM.