Letters to the Editor
Mike LeP
Published Letters: 376 Editor's Choice: 6
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Why Clinton was "forced" out
[Read the article: The other 18 million]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Your column is based on two pesumptions I can't agree with:
1. Calls for Hillary to withdraw were sexist
2. Obama is responsible for the sexism in this campaign
The calls for Clinton to leave the race had less to do with gender than with her mathematical chances of winning the nomination and the way she ran her campaign.
This race really hasn't been close since Obama won 11 post-Super Tuesday contests by overwhelming margins. That allowed him to ring up a 150+ delegate lead that he hasn't ceded ever since. In other words, the outcome hasn't been in doubt for months -- we knew who'd lead in delegates and very likely lead in the popular vote as early as March.
Even so, I think what really turned off Obama supporters and made high ranking Dems nervous was the ugly tenor of the campaign, and I hold Clinton primarily responsible: for suggesting McCain is more qualified and patriotic than Obama, throwing gas on the fire so far as Wright/Ayers, repeatedly moving the goalposts for victory, etc. Obama's supporters (self-included) haven't always shown the same class as their candidate, but Clinton herself was quite happy to get down in the mud. And if you think a lack of fresh skeletons in the Clinton closet is what kept Obama from going there, I've got a bridge to sell you.
Clinton was ushered out of the race because her campaign was doomed in March, she was relentlessly negative since about that time, and her advisors have repeatedly signalled a willingness to subvert the rules and spark an ugly convention battle if necessary. Are you really shocked that the Democratic party wanted to get Clinton off the stage? She's made Dems look awful in a year when everything is aligned for victory in the fall.
Joan, sometimes candidates just flat out lose because of their own bad decisions. I can't deny the sexist overtones to some coverage of the campaign, but racism has been equally prevelant and none of this is Obama's fault or the fault of his supporters. Why should Obama need to do anything to woo feminists, other than offering a better platform than John McCain and acting gracious in victory? Today's polls show up him 5 points (outside the margin of error) on John McCain.
Very few Clinton supporters are going to take their grudge with the media out on Barrack Obama five months from now.
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@ KStone
[Read the article: The other 18 million]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Watching Obamabots posting long-winded and predictably ridiculous and reptitive diatribes about Joan's article. They've created quite a little echo chamber for themselves in several places on the internet.
They are so caught up in their own intellectual masturbations and preening that they don't even realize they are merely talking amongst themselves in their own little circles.
What do you expect Kstone? Joan's articles have become ridiculous and repetitive - are we supposed to re-invent the wheel every time a Hillary supporter demands respect and makes the same disingenuous claims to the nomination?
I could direct you to several sites that are echo chambers for Hillary Clinton supporters. If there are more online echo chambers, I'd say that's a function of his superior claim to the nomination and the fact that more Democrats support his candidacy -- he's led Clinton by about 10% in national polls.
Anyway, of course Obama has to win over some Clinton supporters. He's the nominee. It's his job to ask for the support of voters it's not their job to come to him.
Obama also leads John McCain by about 5% in recent polls, without having a sit-down with Ferraro, giving a historic speech on gender, offering Hillary Clinton the VP ticket, or whatever other flaming rings some Clinton supporters think he needs to jump through to "woo" you over.
Either you folks aren't nearly as important as you seem to think you are, or the highly aggrieved Clinton supporters who keep threatening to defect as payback for real or imagined outrages are in a very, very small minority.
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@ jebldmm
[Read the article: The other 18 million]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Alright jebldmm, I'll tell you why those comments are racist, or at the very least racially tone deaf:
Obama's race has nothing to do with his readiness to be President. Call him an "incompetent black male" seems to conflate his race with incompetence, as if he's not qualified to be President because he is black.
The most charitable view of Mrs. Christian's screed is that she believes Obama was somehow favored because he's black. Aside from this view just being assinine and wrong on its face - if being black were such a benefit, why have we never had a black nominee before? - it is also racist.
In effect, she was calling him the affirmative action candidate by saying he wouldn't have been in a position to run if it weren't for the color of his skin. This was Mrs. Christian's way of dismissing Obama's talents purely on the basis of race, which is racist.
There you go.