Hillary Says the Unspeakable, Creating New Uproar

[Dr Ron]

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3301


Hillary Says the Unspeakable, Creating New Uproar

May 24th, 2008 by Ron Chusid

Looking back at the year to date there are two headlines which could be repeated over and over. George Bush hits a new low in the polls and Hillary Clinton crosses the line (again). The year has seen a steady stream of Democrats dropping their support for Clinton. For some, such as myself, she became intolerable when she first started attacking Obama using Rove-style arguments distorting Obama’s positions and statements early in the year. Others looked the other way at first, but became repulsed by other claims from Clinton, such as her attempts to change the rules for winning the nomination, her belief that only her supporters count, her hypocrisy on Michigan and Florida, and her ridiculous claims of leading in the popular vote. For some the last straw came yesterday when she brought up the assassination of Robert Kennedy (video above). Even her apology made matters worse as she apologized to the Kennedy family but not to Obama or to all the Democrats who are so shocked by her behavior.

This statement is a problem for Clinton on so many levels. Primarily it is found offensive on a visceral level. Many interpretations have been made. At best she shows again that she is in her own world where all that matters is giving her the presidency which she thinks she deserves. At worst she is trying to create further fears about the consequences of nominating Obama, with some even suggesting she is trying to give a hint to her more deranged supporters.

There is no way to know for sure what was going on in Hillary’s mind. The problem is that she said this regardless of her motivations. If she wasn’t so lost in her own world she would have realized the reaction that talk of assassination would create, especially in a the case of the person who very likely will become our first black president after so many years of racial hatred and violence have disgraced this country.

I’ve received a number of comments here regarding the potential assassination of Obama ever since he became a credible candidate but I have not put these through. Discussion of the assassination of Obama, along with continued claims that he is a Muslim, paranoid conspiracy theories from supporters of Ron Paul (along with a number of racist and anti-semitic comments), and even a number of off the wall comments attacking Hillary Clinton intentionally never made it out of moderation for reasons which most rational people will understand.

If Clinton wouldn’t otherwise understand how a comment on assassination of Obama would be received, she should have considered the response to Mike Huckabee’s poor joke on the matter last week. Her claims that she brought this up now as she was thinking of the Kennedys in light of Ted Kennedy’s medical problems does not hold up as she made a similar reference in the past. Besides, if one is really thinking of the tragedy the Kennedy family is facing with the diagnosis of cancer in Ted Kennedy, is this really the time to bring up the assassination of his brother? Maybe she will next try to cheer them up by reciting the entire list of tragedies faced by the Kennedy family.

Clinton’s comment doesn’t even make any sense historically or politically. She claims people have been trying to push her out of the race since Iowa, but there is no truth to this. Sure many of us have predicted that Obama would win, but that is hardly the same as pushing someone out of the race. Obama certainly has not been trying to push her from the race. She ignores the fact that the nature of conventions have changed from the days in which they were expected to be a battle for the nomination. In recent years the primaries, not conventions, have determined the nominee. Instead the conventions are being used as a means to promote the candidate who has already won, and the party which does not do this is at a disadvantage, especially now that the conventions are being held even closer to election day than in the past. Sure, some contenders have not left the race until long after they should have, but the consequence has typically been a loss for their party in November.

If Clinton wanted to remain in the race until the final primaries were completed few would blame her. The outrage against Clinton is not that she remains in the race through all the primaries, but it is a response to the dishonest manner in which she is campaigning, along with her threats to remain in the race until the convention despite an insurmountable lead by Obama. Her attempts to change the rules, whether by falsely claiming a majority in the popular vote or by using invalid primaries in Michigan and Florida only increases the desire by most Democrats to see her put an end to this nonsense.

Clinton’s ultimate argument here makes no sense even looking at the possibility of Obama having to leave the race, regardless of the reason. If for some reason Barack Obama could not be the nominee it would not matter if Clinton had dropped out of the race. Her delegation would be the largest, and undoubtedly some Obama supporters would wind up backing her. The convention would most likely give her the nomination as the only remaining candidate who has an organization in place and has been actively campaigning. The only way that would not occur would be if Clinton repulsed so many delegates that they would rather take a risk on someone else. While unlikely, this could possibly happen if Clinton continues campaigning as she has been doing recently. If she really thinks there is a possibility that Obama will not receive the nomination, her best course would still be to suspend her campaign, at least after the last primary, so that she stops losing even more support.

[Dr Ron]

1. Keith Olbermann's Response

Video and full transcript here:

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3302

[sandnsea]

2. There were only 15 primaries in 1968

She never should have been using 1968 as a comparison to 2008. The only reason she did it was to inject the fear of assassination, "something might happen", into the nomination. Anybody who would lie about winning elections when there were no campaigns would most certainly do this. I don't know why people are having such a hard time believing it.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=132&topic_id=6103773&mesg_id=6103773

[Dr Ron]

3. Another reason she likes 1968

Hubert Humphrey won the nomination in 1968 without going through the primary process. Hillary would sure love to just pretend the primaries never occurred and take the nomination as the inevitable leader she was seen as last year.

[sandnsea]

4. He won through the convention process

Because that's the way it was done then. The only way to overthrow the entrenched party machine system was to get some momentum through the primary process. It was Humphrey's strategy to use the non-primary states, the party machine, to win the nomination. There's NO comparison to today, none, zero, zip. Read that article I posted.

[Dr Ron]

5. I was being sarcastic re Hillary

Of course there is no real comparison. Hillary would like there to be a comparison. She would like to be able to win thru the convention process because she lost thru the primary process. This makes no sense, but that wouldn't stop Hillary.