Letters to the Editor
-
PART II: I'm of the belief that Ms. Walsh was neither mistaken nor misunderstanding of Ms. Brazile's comment...
Damsel of Distress-CONTINUED
by Peggy Noonan, May 9, 2008
Who can save the situation? The superdelegates.
You know them. They're the ones hiding under the rock, behind the boulder, and at the bar.
They are terrified, most of them. They want the problem to go away. They want it handled, but they don't want to do it. They don't want to tell Hillary to stop, because they would likely pay a price for it, and not just with her.
They are afraid of looking as if they're jumping on a train that's speeding down the tracks and is about to roll over the damsel in distress.
Which is how Hillary -- and her supporters -- will paint it. Even though she's no damsel, and she causes distress.
Some insight from a superdelegate I spoke to Thursday:
It's not math anymore, it's psychodrama. If she can't have it, no one can have it. If she has to tear the party apart, she will.
Nancy Pelosi can't make her drop out. The Clintons think the speaker is for Obama anyway, her San Francisco district went for him 70% to 30%; they'll dismiss her. Chuck Schumer can't do it, he'd offend women in New York. Harry Reid can't do it, he'll offend women, period. If black political figures go to the Clintons and make a plea, they'll be dismissed as Obama partisans.
So who, I asked, can do it?
White women have been Mrs. Clinton's most reliable base of support and readiest crutch, the superdelegate said. And maybe they're the only ones who can break through, both to Mrs. Clinton and to the country, and tell her to stop. "If it's a man, she goes back to gender: Men are always picking on me, you just don't want women in power. If it's a black, it's You betrayed us, how can you call on me to get out after what I've done for you?"
Sen. Dianne Feinstein made a feint in the direction of stopping Hillary this week. Mrs. Clinton should offer a rationale for her continuing the campaign at this point, Ms. Feinstein said.
The superdelegate mentioned Maryland's Barbara Mikulski. "I can assure you that Sen. Mikulski is 100% behind Clinton," her office told me. The superdelegate mentioned Kathleen Kennedy Townsend and Ellen Malcolm of Emily's List, the No. 1 political action committee in the country. "They can say, 'We've stood with you, you've got true grit, but now you have to go.'"
The question "Who will tell her, who can make her go?" is really the question "Who will save the Democratic Party in 2008?" It cannot be doubted at this point that real damage is being done to its standard-bearer and to all those who will be on the ticket with him.
Maybe the superdelegate is right, and maybe saving the party this year will be women's work. Maybe the Democratic Party establishment, such as it is, men and women, black and white and all other colors, will rise up together. Maybe that would be a perfect rebuke to race-baiting and gender-gaming.
It will be amazing if someone doesn't start up that train, someone doesn't get in the cab, someone doesn't shout, "All aboard!" But then it's been an amazing year.
-
Joan-Obama gave a major speech on race and you spent it texting your witticisms to
Joe Scarborough. Get fucking real: Obama made major inroads in redneck Pennsylvania and red neck Indiana. He's converting former racists in Appalachia. Not alot, but he's moving them out of their column into ours. Sure he doesn't out polls these people against Hillary, but when he's running against a republican during a recession, he'll convert a lot more. Think how much anti-catholicism Kennedy overcame. Get on board.
-
From Joan Walsh
Ballsee, I wrote some of what I think about that here:
http://www.salon.com/opinion/walsh/election_2008/2008/04/24/looking_past_pennsylvania/
-
I hope so
First, Donna Brazile said that Paul Begala's vision was limited and that the Democratic Party is capable of expanding the base. Begala pretended that she was talking about marginalizing constituencies.
What is really laughable about this is how the Clinton campaign targeted women in the Iowa campaign and nearly completely ignored men. It was a terrible campaign for that reason. At the same time, her assumption that women would automatically jump on board was an affront to many women I know. They told me she should have appealed to their brains, not shared body parts.
Now Hillary is a gun totin', whiskey drinkin', Old South channelin' true representative of those who have been abandoned by "elites" and "eggheads" and, you know, those people who are getting everything they don't deserve.
As a caucasian male who has worked hard to complete an education and paid for much of it through military service, I resent her marginalizing me in Iowa and how her campaign now denigrates people with intelligence and education as "eggheads"
-
true. but You wouldn't believe that from joan's and clinton supproters words and actions
"Is this a problem for the candidates?
Or is it a problem for the Democratic party in general?
There has been so much discussion this election cycle about how similar Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are in terms of their policy positions. If you believe that, it would be the height of pettiness for anyone who voted for Clinton or Obama to vote for McCain just because their candidate didn't win the primary. And that's a charitable assessment.
"
they sure are "worried" about this. As they are driving wedges in and sticking knives in our backs. Then blame us for it. Unbelievable.
-
Obama not Clinton
If I were asked in an exit poll who I would vote for, Clinton v. McCain and Obama v. McCain. I would be tempted to tell the pollster that I would favor McCain over Clinton and Obama over McCain. Not because I would actually vote that way, but because if the polls broke that way it would help my candidate. Yes, I might LIE to a pollster. It is my feeling that this is happening in a number of cases by voters who are sophisticated enough to realize just how easy it is to manipulate polls, all you have to do is give the answers that move the results in your favor. Otherwise how could William Hung have lasted on American Idol as long as he did. I have seen a number of articles claiming that polls over report the support for African American candidates because no one wants to be labeled a racist in public, well this could be just another example of this phenomenom.