Letters to the Editor
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won't get fooled -
by such a timeline -
lets try an easier version:
Barack Obama (BO) wins the Iowa caucus on the basis of lovely speeches about change and unifying America.
The media pronounces Hillary Clinton's (HC) campaign sunk.
Polls tell us she will lose in New Hampshire. Hillary shows Emotions (no value judgement)and wins the New Hampshire primary with a strong support from emotional women.
The Nevada caucuses goes the same with a strong support of very emotional Hispanics, who are not too excited about Obama,
(no value judgement)
The campaign moves on to South Carolina - attempting to counter Barack Obama’s claim that Hope and Change is more important then experience, the Clintons turn out very complicated "facts", which easy can be misunderstood. The "black" voters don't understand them and close to 80% of the emotional African-American vote goes to Barack Obama.
His momentum is restored, and across the nation, people celebrate his message of Hope and Change. And the Clintons finally kind of get it. Hillary goes "positive" - but it is too late - Hillary goes negative - but it's to late and
everything else you listed is background noice.
I would have loved to vote for Hillary but if somebody takes such a long time to get "the picture" and get's lost in all
these pesky facts and details it might prove that the more
experienced person is the one who stays on focus.
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One Thing
I saw Bill Clintons remarks on the South Carolina Obama victory . They were neither innocuous nor subtle. His statement was careful and deliberate, and was meant to minimize the victory and imply a racial factor. I do not fault Mr Clinton for making the statement, I object to you spinning it to be anything but what it was.
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late again
to the thread.
But has it occurred to Clinton supporters that the media, in its ever blundering and bat-like bumping into to things until it gets a "hit," has been the culprit in the oversensitivity to race?
As an Obama supporter, I'm on record as saying the Clintons are not racist. And by that I don't mean merely that they don't think blacks are inferior to whites. I mean that they did not deliberately inject race into this campaign. I think many of Bill's appearances were hounded by press vultures, looking for red meat. I think most of us in the masses don't get how many reams of platitudes, misspoken sentences, flat jokes, inadvertently offensive remarks get said on campaign trails. Nobody's perfect. If someone followed me around in my everyday life, they would find much of the above, and I'm as smart and decent an all-around person as they come. So stuff Bill Clinton said was cherry-picked and spun into race-baiting. Guess what? Much of what any of us say, while factually correct, could be turned into sexual innuendo, anti-Semitic, racial rage. Hitler was actually a really well-organized man who had charisma. See what I mean? Play that on MSNBC two days in a row and tell me I'm not seen as anti-Semitic. But what if it came at the heels of a question by one of my kids asking why people didn't recognize or reject Hitler's evil ways from the get-go--so I needed to show them that he had "good" qualities that fooled people? You get my drift.
My point is that the Clintons have always attracted a nasty press, and there's no doubt that's played into this campaign. Clinton supporters are rightfully frustrated but in my opinion don't see the forest for the trees. The press is not going away any time soon. If Clinton becomes President, this sort of thing will happen 24/7. So, for all you Clinton fans, this knot in your stomach, this bile in your throat, this bitter feeling of being wronged--on the Clintons' as well as your own behalf: Do you like this feeling? Do you want this feeling for 8 more years? That exact feeling made me sick in the last years of Bill Clinton's term. Who the hell wants to live like that?
To reiterate my major point: that there was misinterpretation about race in this campaign doesn't mean that Obama was behind it. Please don't forget about the press, which is not a conspiratorial monolith but much worse--a disorganized, unintelligent, disparate group of idiots looking for salaciousness.
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Please read today's TIMESONLINE to see what Trevor Phillips has to say on this vexed topic'
Trevor Phillips is British and is prominent in public life. I think his parents might have been from the West Indies and were immigrants to Britain. As a black Briton with strong opinions, Mr. Phillips offers a unique perspective on the subject.
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Disingenuous
First off, thank you Salon for killing the anonymous postings. Finally, you did something right.
@Xranadu Hutman
We are not children, and we've seen enough in our lifetimes to know how politics works. All manners of rationalization will not disguise the fact that Obama's campaign and the MSM willingly portrayed the Clintons as racist leading up to, and during the key primaries and caucuses where black democrats made up the majority. It is Politics 101 to make sure the candidate is "above the fray", while the surrogates perform the hit jobs. Stop arguing the point. Just realize that these tactics have turned off a lot of people who supported Hillary and it may just have turned them off enough to make them take a second look at a "Republican Moderate" like McCain. I know that it has done that to me. All he needs to do is to campaign on a platform of Fiscal Conservatism (which he has done all his life) and argue that Obama is a "Tax-and-spend Liberal" (which his record shows he is), and he's got my vote.
You see, what comes around -- goes around.
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Obama and Hillary
To my thinking, the people defending Hillary Clinton/the Clinton campaign in these sites tend to have more valuable and potent information about the dirty dealings of Barack Obama than the campaign they actually say they support.
If anything is legitimate I think as his opponent I would use it against him at every turn. That would make more sense to me than the whining and backbiting I see here.
(Such as the whole removing an incumbent from his first senate run in IL, or him being anti semetic, to black, not black enough, etc.)
Theres just something about provable facts, when revealed theres no way to counter them. Another thing, if you have proof by all means send it to HRC and let her trumpet it and then let Obama, if possible rectify it, but this endless claiming of BO's dirty dealings and Rovian connections is getting tired with no substantial proof.