Letters to the Editor
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Hillary is the problem, not the campaign
Given that she is in charge of the campaign, and as a free woman can do what the fetch she wants....and she has....all of it belongs to her, and it ocntinues, and will until...who knows...
Many of us have been stating this for innuerable months, to no avail.
I mean, she is the one who decided to say that Obama cannot attract white, working class voters. In this regard, we also said she'd play the race card, euphemistically referred to as "the southern strategy," and even in her twillight she is pulling out all of the stops.
What about this did we not predict? Nothing.
I am not bitter, just clear.
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Hillary Misunderestimated
I admire Hillary, and have since the Clinton adminstration. I wanted to support her and was prepared to volunteer for her and vote for her in November if she won the nomination, but she's run a terrible campaign. Fighting against long odds shows tenacity, but her odds got worse the longer she campaigned. Failing to acknowledge a loss shows a weak grasp on reality. I'm not gloating over her, truly I wanted her to do better, and do less pandering to the Right Wing. The longer she goes on, the less credibility and dignity she'll have left.
Why Obama won my support instead is in part because of the Iraq war. Of the three candidates left, he was the only one who voted against it, and the only one who seems committed to ending it. There are many important issues in this election, but that one is most important to me. It doesn't hurt though that he's a brilliant speaker who can talk about difficult issues rather than issuing panicky sound bites and hoping the problem disappears in a news cycle or two.
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Hillary's mistake
Was in not factoring in the MSM's unprecedented, and nauseating, love fest with Obama. Her other mistake was in not factoring in the viciousness showered on her at the same time by the MSM. We now have a completely useless Fourth Estate which has abandoned all pretense of objectivity. It is deciding this primary. It will decide the general election. Does no one else find this more than a little scary?
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The campaign didn't realize people were sick of the Clintons
She was bland as toast in the beginning and staked no ground. She didn't address the baggage and also ran as an incumbant (something few people bought). The "capable" message was not the message that resonated at the time. She didn't get feisty until pushed to do so, then came off as petty and never seemed to rise above. Her campaign didn't figure on a MUCH more charismatic candidate.
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The big state argument holds some water
OK, Mark Penn showed his ass, but he may have been intending what was in fact expressed during the later primaries: that if Hillary shows greater strength in the big states, especially swing states like Ohio and Florida, than Obama, then she stands a better chance of winning in the fall. It makes sense.
But it only goes so far. This is a year in which America is trying to reclaim its soul. The antipathy toward Bush is so strong that it can only mean that large numbers of people feel they were led down the primrose path, that they were lied to about the war and so many other things. And the race of Obama, while it offers a reason for bigots to have a blood feast, is a moral challenge to others who know they hold some manner of racial bias but want to get beyond it in this special year. And John McCain, decent man thought he is, is giving off signs of not having a mental grasp of things, and of being obsessively committed to an earlier war and not the one he is facing now.
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Enough
No more dynasties! Bill was fine for 8 years, but enough is enough!
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Destiny's Child
While it is arguably true that the Clinton Campaign made many mis-steps during the entire primary process, it is also glaringly true that Obama's candidacy was successfully shoved down our throats by the original architects Kennedy, Daschle and Axelrod; all of it duly certified by media giants who foresaw big dollars from a big story. The re-invention of a neophyte and sparsely credentialed Senator with preacher like oratory skills into a viable presidential prospect, was correctly assessed. It was smartly conceived and successfully made dependent upon the transformation of Obama from "bi-racial" to African American, the messianic support of left leaning liberal democrats seeking a means to cleanse their latent guilt about matters racial, the call to exuberant (if not naive) youth to attach on to an attractive standard bearer as if supporting an "American Idol" contestant and of course, the most easily constructed campaign tactic there is: portraying the Clinton's as a demonic force, representing all that is wrong or ever was wrong with the political landscape.
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@blaktop
Hear Hear! Well Said
I vote for a red star for you!
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History or Her story?
Discussing why Clinton is still in the race, Tumulty reports, "Clinton's calculation is as much about history as it is about politics. As the first woman to have come this far, Clinton has told those close to her, she wants people who invested their hopes in her to see that she has given it her best."
Having listened to the chameleon-like changes in Hillary's rhetoric across the past three months, one has to wonder whether Clinton's decision making process is guided more by her campaign's historic legacy or from its impact on the public's long-term view of the saga of HRC?
Had I been asked this question in February 2008, I would like to think my cynicism could remain contained.
Today I - along with much of an America hoping for a better tomorrow - am saddened to see another corrupt bid for personal glory and power reign over the finer aspects of leadership and decency. Robert Kennedy would be ashamed of his old friends.
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NO NOTHINGS!
"Time magazine's Karen Tumulty has a good analysis of what went wrong. She lists five big mistakes: "She misjudged the mood," "she didn't master the rules," "she underestimated the caucus states," "she relied on old money" and "she never counted on a long haul.
"She...she...she..." Hillary Clinton had the high-priced-spread consultants who got it wrong for her. And, here is the reason she is not the presumptive nominee at this point:
1. The campaign relied upon polls that pretty much measured name recognition.
2. The campaign got ahead of itself and failed to organize, implement, and operate a Primary campaign, and instead, went straight for a General Election mentality.
3. When shocked back on it's heels, first with Iowa and then by the Obama campaign initiated charges of racism (invalid, by the way), the campaign pros still failed to organize a grass-roots field strategy.
4. The Obama campaign was structured to play in all the Caucus states, where they could overwhelm the frequently, voting base of the Democratic Party (mostly HRC supporters) with newly registered voters and left-leaning younger party activists.
5. By the time, the HRC campaign started getting it's footing, the Obama campaign had the perception of eventual victory. And in politics, perception of often more important than reality.
6. Even today, the HRC website has no page dedicated to grass-roots organization; i.e., supporters in West Virginia being able to contact each other through the website and help build the grassroots.
Clinton needed a guerrilla warfare plan and a strategist who understood how to run such a campaign. She wasn't going to find that person among her hand-picked "ladies in waiting" from the Clinton White House days or the D.C. Clown Jesters of ole.