Reply #29: If she wasn't fighting for her political life In TX and OH, I would agree [View All]

[Tom Rinaldo]

But Hillary already has the lead in Ohio and she needs to be up there campaigning to hold onto it, and in Texas her best chance there is to really turn out the latino vote.

I take Obama at his word that he is not attending because his political priority right now must be winnning the upcoming critical primaries. Hillary has that priority also, only much more so.

For Hillary Clinton her campaign now all boils down to two weeks and every hour counts. I doubt there is anything she can say at this conference that will turn many Black voters, who are overwhelmingly supporting Obama at this point, away from voting for him in Texas and Ohio that she could not better say in Texas and Ohio, and no matter what - Hillary Clinton can't realistically be looking for the Black vote in two weeks to turn her campaign around in those states.

Hillary Clinton's short term need is to spend every minute possible campaigning for the votes she is most likely to win. This doesn't meet her short term needs, it meets her committment to restore good ties with the Black community that have been frayed by this nominating contest - but that is a long term need, and not even a critical one from a self serving perspective if she does not become our Presidential candidate. Hillary Clinton takes her black support in New York seriously, but she doesn't NEED to cultivate it now to defeat a Republican in New York in 2012.

Hillary Clinton is there because as a leader of the Democratic Party who was invited she feels she should be. And because she knows that the Black community matters and that bad blood between Democrats and the black community will hurt the Democratic Party and probably the black community as a result. It is the right thing for her to do but it isn't the right thing to do for her campaign right now - just the right thing to do.