The result is Joe Liebermann as V.P in response to media's call for Gore to distance himself from the "damaged" Clinton.

I see it a little different. Unfortunately, 9/11 did change someone, it was Lieberman. Until then, he was a pretty darn decent liberal Senator, even if he was a bit prissy...but it could be argued Gore was, too.

From all I've read, Gore and Bill Clinton respected each other, but didn't particularly like each other. I remember reading that Clinton's temper was pretty fierce but the one guy that could talk him down and make him see reason and be logical was Gore. I wish I could quote (remember) the source, but it stuck with me because it was one I trusted.

Seeing Bill's (who I liked very well in 1999) defensive and inconsistent performance in the primaries on Hillary's behalf, makes me think that Gore might have been right to not have Clinton be out there actively campaigning for him. I actually don't blame Clinton, picture in 1999, a Gore event, the MSM would have been focused on asking Clinton if he and Hillary would get divorced after he leaves office, who is he going to pardon, how could Gore return diginity to the office, etc. All things designed to get "interesting" answers and to provoke Clinton, none of them helpful to Gore.

Gore (like Dole before him) somehow did come off as wooden. Neither one of them are/were. The cool club kids that make up some of the most widely read and watched pundits didn't like them. Made fun of them. It sucked for Gore, wasn't "fair", but he still did manage to get the popular vote anyway. The rest is history.

On another note, the same thing happened in the debates. It used to make my head explode. When we still had a large group in contention, the debates were always about Clinton and her plans. "Senator Dodd, what do you think about what Senator Clinton's plan for topic de jour?" If they agreed it was boring, if not, it was painted as an attack. They were left in the background regardless, never able to articulate their own plans. This happened with Edwards, if he wanted to present his own views in the debate, it was usually to answer why he disagreed with Hillary's.

Why can't you let Hillary go? She was never going to be the nominee. For one thing, she is a type A personality. They don't take the back seat well. Second of all, just as many Hillary supporters took the sexism of the media (as in NOT Obama) personally, many Obama supporters took, and still take, Hillary's sense of entitlement personally. We honestly don't beleive that she would work for the best interests of the party or the country. Bill Clinton had little or nothing to do with it.

Third of all, it is important that a president and his running mate get along. Quite frankly, I don't think that's possible with these two, there's too much bad blood. Not the least of which being the fact that many Hillary supporters think that Obama "owes" her the nomination. For what? What makes her more important then anyone else running for the job? Becuase she was his opponent? Based on that logic, he also owes Edwards, Kucinich, Biden, Gravel and whoever else was in that media circus in January. This is exactly the sense of entitlement issue we are talking about.

Hillary's campaign is over, it is time to move on. If you can't do that, then the rest of us aren't going to wait for you to catch up. This is how politics works. Your candidate runs, they lose, you move on and support the nominee. You don't keep dragging it out to try and prove that your more important then every other voter, like Hillary supporters appear to be doing now. Obama doesn't "owe" Hillary voters anything. They can either get behind him and support the smae causes their candidate did, or they can spend the next four years with a chip on their shoulders hoping that the next presidnet fails and it vindicates their bitterness. Needless to say, the first option sounds more appealing.

Maybe the reason racial undertones were heard were because Penn wanted Obama to be seen as "foreign". Many of us saw that as racist, there's nothing "foreign" about him. Obama's American, comes off that way.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0808/12420_Page2.html

The article shows that it was worst of both worlds, the undertones were there and so there was backlash, and at the same time the ads weren't negative enough to be effective. Hmmm.

My bet is McCain and his supporters will pull out all the stops and soon we won't be arguing about "implied" racism. If Hillary had been nominated we would see what real sexism is, too.

Voters all over the country voted for her. Her delegates will be there. We should insist that those who believe they are now in control of this “staged” Denver convention or “coronation”, that is the Obama people including Howard Dean and Speaker Nancy Pelosi should realize it's good politics to let them (the Clinton Delegates) "speak" for us by casting the vote WE the voters gave them.

If not, I consider that a problem.

If that were to happen (no Clinton floor vote), let me suggest that all Clinton duly elected delegates meet downtown Denver at some large public square, pass around an attendance roster, and record their votes. Local and national press will cover that and get the word out.

We would like to have that recorded. Thank you.

"Gore (like Dole before him) somehow did come off as wooden. Neither one of them are/were. The cool club kids that make up some of the most widely read and watched pundits didn't like them. Made fun of them. It sucked for Gore, wasn't "fair", but he still did manage to get the popular vote anyway. The rest is history"

You make fair points in response to mine, but you just reiterated the media's take. Notice that Republicans do not listen much to the media either in their choice of V.P or policies. Al Gore comes off as wooden is media's take that forced him then to change and become more of a caricature of himself.

Think about it, the Clintons were the most scrutinized, and villified politicians in a generation yet they are winners--an unknown governor from a small state of Arkansas and a humiliated and villified first lady who became two term senators. You can agree with the media's interpretation of Bill Clinton's performance in the primaries as the basis for the reason Gore was right but that is the media's. I can bet my bottom dollar that if Democrats follow the same scipt it is going to be a long November.