Question: What Do We Do If Hillary Wins?

I feel bad for Howard Dean. Really, I do. The man just has a politician's version of Tourette's syndrome. I'm sure when he said that he wanted to bring "the candidates together and make some kind of an arrangement" in order to create unity at the DNC, he didn't mean for it to sound like some kind of crazy conspiratorial Bilderberg Group meeting between hooded members of the Skulls and Bones society, consisting of Kennedys, Bushes, and the remaining decedents of Vlad the Impaler.

Oh, but Howie, it did sound a little strange.

I get his anxiety, though. With all these statewide 50/50 splits between Hillary and Barack, the Democrats are already acting like it's a presidential election! Never before in the history of the country have we acted so indecisive, so early. All Howie meant by his cryptic remarks is that we need a front-runner because what happens if -yikes- Hillary Clinton gets the nomination?

Will Progressives sacrifice the pureness of their consciences for the sake of backing the only Democratic candidate left standing? Or let's say Barack takes the nomination: will Hillary's people rush to support him? Michael Moore says he is morally prohibited from voting for Hillary Clinton, and I agree with him.

I can't in good conscience vote for a woman who labeled the Iranian Guard a terrorist organization.
I can't vote for a woman who voted to give President Bush authorization to invade Iraq, regardless of what she claims about not thinking he would use the power she helped give him.
I can't vote for a woman who sat on the board of Wa-Mart, yet now pretends like she's not in the pocket of big business.
I can't vote for a woman who thinks working "35 years for change" means working 15 of those 35 years for a law firm that represented big businesses.
I won't vote for her even if Ralph Nader decides not to run.
I wouldn't vote for her if she was the last Democrat on Earth.

I'm sick of compromising my principles just so the Republicans won't win, as if Hillary Clinton is anything but a triangulating conservative in liberal's clothing.

There is a deep divide in the Democratic party between Progressives and the traditionalists, like Hillary Clinton, that helped sell the rest of us down the river. I've heard from many people that they would loathe seeing another Clinton in the White House, and so I wonder what will happen come election time if Hillary is indeed our presidential candidate. Perhaps this is all talk, and once the cold feet set in, liberals will sprint to the voting booth, and vote Hillary in, nonetheless.

The anxiety is palpable in the Democratic party, which is why Howard Dean, as usual, gave the game away with his complete ineptitude of maintaining a serious poker face. What was once considered an easy Democratic victory now seems up for grabs, so he's eager to work something out quickly. Maybe he plans to cajole one of the front-runners into taking a V.P. nomination, though I can't see Barack or Hillary taking second place at this point.

Mitt Romney's resignation from the campaign trail is indicative of the Republican strategy for victory: unite at any cost, even if you hate the bastard representing your party. Though everyone from Coulter to Limbaugh are busily chastising professional old bastard, McCain, they'll surely vote for him at election time. However, Democrats have a hard time voting against the consciences like that. If voters hate Hillary, they may simply stay home come November.

Comments

[urbanrevolt]

My suggestion to your question would be an Urban Party.

http://www.urbanarchipelago.com/

[Tankan]

Hillary Clinton is an establishment warmonger in the Bush mould!

If she wins.......

Get ready for more blood, death and tears!

[KaAp]

I believe Hillary Clinton's supporters are usually strong democrats with a large "D" who are party loyalists. Obama supporters who are having problems with Senator Clinton may be democrats with a small "d" or independents or former republicans or progressives etc etc etc ...
I am not going to fall lockstep into line to support a party or anyone whose policies do not represent my beliefs or convictions ...
I may not vote which is a statement, I may vote for McCain who at least has an aura of authenticity and does not play Orwellian language games ... heck I am struggling with the idea of leaving the US since the American dream seems to have become a nightmare lately

[corbetdean]

Dear Democrats:

This Independent, and millions like me, are only willing to stand with you if you are strong enough to stop the lies, the distortions, and the slander.

Ever wondereed why so many Independents and disgruntled Republicans view Obama favorably? After all, he votes LEFT of Hillary on most issues. Namely, he doesn't resort to the hate speech that has cluttered most of the idiotic "comments" to this article.

There is no more a "Right Wing Conspiracy" than there is a "Liberal Media Bias." There IS, however, incredible ineptitude driving the Democratic leadership if they are actually harboring a shred of hope that Hillary can really win a general election.

If Senator Obama is your selection, you will expand your base and take back the White House. Your only alternative is a resounding defeat in November.

Good luck with that.

~ corbet dean

[tbone99]

In other words you won't vote against torture& renditions, you won't vote against another right wing nominee to the Supreme Court, you won't vote against Rice or Bolton for VP, not to mention MCCain.You won't vote against permanent tax cuts for the top 1%, school vouchers and even more deregulation for increased corporate explotation of the economy.You won't vote for recognition of climate change and against drilling in the Arctic, etc.You won't vote for alternative energy resources.

I have yet to have the chance to vote for a candidate I truly wanted in all my voting years, but I did what I could to hold back the tide on facism.Suck it up girl, its not just about you.

[LarBear]

Allison Kilkenny: Question: What Do We Do If Hillary Wins?
WE? Meaning non- Democrats??? Grab your toys and run home to Daddy??? Continue to try and divide the Democratic Party, so the Obama's can gratify their ego??? Obama supporters/ followers project their hate and anger onto Hillary and say she, not the Hate and anger, is dividing the Party... How about owning your hate and divisiveness and stop blaming it on Hillary and Bill...
You Hope one Person, Barack Obama is going to make our National boo boo's all better... Think on this... How is one person going to clean up the corruption in our two branches of our entrenched political system??? Do you think the individual and collective controllers are going to give up money and control???
Congress's sworn oath of office is to protect and defend the Constitution... There is NO serious contemplation of doing so, especially as to impeachment... An Oath and Duty, not a convenient choice... The Oath and Duty is the same for both branches, Republican and Democrat...
Pogo said, "We have met the enemy and it is us!"... We the People allowed the Bush Dictatorship to Invade and Occupy Iraq... 911 didn't make us do so ... Al Qaeda didn't make us do so... We, the Enemy caused that to happen... Did WE shut the Country down? Did WE massive protest? WE, our Enemy, allowed our Office Holders to violate the Constitution... Our Office Holders spoke words of fear and WE allowed them to run wild... They stirred up a Hornets Nest that is still buzzing, stinging and killing... WE allowed our Fears to give our Office Holders Control over us...
How about WE look into the mirror and see our actual Enemy... No office Holder called President is going to save us...
This part of the WE is ready to join she who wants to roll up her sleeves and make a difference, not talk about a difference...

[Palito]

yep, This has become personal platform for Mr Obama and his personal quest for power (like any politician) The party will end fragmented and weaker after this and Mr OBama knows it and doesn't care.

[trailrunner9]

I reject the premise of your article and the disservice it does to this party.

Hillary Clinton did in fact make a dissasterous mistake with her war authorization vote and I'm sure she regrets it in ways we cannot count at this time.

However, to pretend that Barack Obama has always been consistent with his original anti-war rhetoric since coming to the senate is disingenous. He and Hillary Clinton have almost mirrored voting records in every way on foreign policy matters, as with all other voting as well, including the re-authorization of the Patriot Act, and Obama, unlike Clinton, actually campaigned for the war candidate Joe Lieberman while rejecting the anti-war candidate, supported John Kerry over Howard Dean, and even tried to qualify his position at that time as not very far apart from George Bush's at that time. Obama was also supportive of an original bill similar to Kyle Lieberman and we don't know how he would have voted on Kyle Lieberman as he did not show up for the vote, so it's really not as clear cut as you are making it.

Hillary Clinton is not the demon to this party that you are making her out to be and in fact has a very liberal voting record, which like said is almost a mirror to Obama's. I am not trying to tear down Obama, but rather point out some balance to the story.

How could you even put the idea out there to not support the party nominee and possibly subject this country to a continuation of the Bush doctrine.

There is no doubt in my mind that Hillary Clinton would restore good will and diplomacy to this country as existed during her husbands's regime. They certainly were not warmongers in any way. She may not be your first choice, but for God's sakes, she is a polar opposite to John McCain and I have no doubt will end the war. This rhetoric has to stop for the good of the party.

[trailrunner9]

It is the rhetoric that you are putting forth that is dividing this party and you are doing so with an unfair and unbalanced assessment of the two candidates positions and records. I have never been for this war and was devastated by her vote as well, especially as a New Yorker, but there was a tremendous atmosphere in New York of anger and most supported Bush's rhetoric at the time. It would have taken a very principled stand to have voted "no" in that climate, but Obama is not Dennis Kucinich either by any means, so let's give some balance here and in the end support the party. I really think you and others should check yourselves about what your rhetoric is doing to this party.

[Mollye]

Great commentary, trailrunner9.

[JasonEverettMiller]

Again, to call a candidate out on their actual record and rhetoric is not "dividing" the party - it is having a conversation in the party that is long overdue.

Do incumbents represent our wishes? The last 28 years, including Bill's presidency, shows that they most certainly do not. Otherwise, impeachment proceedings would have already commenced.

Hillary, like her husband, are DLC democrats and are for whatever is good for corporate America even if it bad for the rest of us. She has a long history of toeing the DLC line that she can't run away from.

Half of the democratic senators, and ALL of the ones who actually read the NIE as Bush offered, voted against the war. Period. It wasn't taking some principled stand to vote against the war.

It was examining ALL of the available evidence, especially the 92-page report that was the casus belli for the Bush Administration, and then makign an intelligent choice. I could have read a 92-page document in an afternoon to tell me what I and many others already knew. She didn't and failed the nation as a result. Who knows what might of happened had Hillary spent her time being against the war rather than ushering it in.

I really thin you should check yourself. It sounds like your head is in the right place, but your heart keeps getting in the way. Take off the Clinton Rose Colored Glasses and look at the historical record as it truly exists. There is really very little abiguity in who Hillary and the DLC truly represent - and it isn't us.

Obama '08!

[KaAp]

I really am forced to think of the conundrum of what happens if she is the candidate of the Democratic party. I am tired of cynical divisive politics and machine driven corporate hegemonic games ... I cannot morally ethically or politically support another Clinton candidacy ... I think at least McCain is authentic: but, I am a progressive ... my family (my husband, son, daughters and myself) have discussed this: do we stay home? Do we take to the streets? Do we vote for McCain? I keep trying to sort through this ... what would happen given the problems we face as a nation right now they seem insurmountable and I do not know if anybody can rectify the proto-fascist state in which we live (you know fascist being the merger of corporate and state power) ... Maybe it is better if she gets it or McCain gets it ... it is a mess that may well be un-fixable ... the Democratic party may no longer be the space for progressives ... someone said here that the Democratic party is for working people I am not sure what the euphemism signifies but ... oh well
Sometimes I think my husband and I should retire early and move somewhere in the tropics and chill ... or move to Europe (where the living standard is better than here) ... I am tired of fighting what may seem (especially if Clinton is the candidate even more so than McCain) a further goose step towards the right disguised as populism ... and so my sadness and conundrum continues: what to do? The only thing I know is that I cannot ever vote for Senator Clinton ...
Ah democracy it seemed that at one moment in time we were moving closer to that process ... but it was illusory ... we may be witnessing the ends of democratic dreams when people say be pragmatic and do not reach for hope or the stars ... by accepting what is ... no, I cannot consider that ... and I still do not know what to do ... but I still cannot vote for Senator Clinton ...

[Boadicea]

YOu call the Clintonites "traditionalists." I'd call them Regressives, and I think FDR would agree with me. Clinton took the party of the working people BACKWARDS. Ordinary working people in this country have lost ground, and Bill Clinton helped make that happen. Clinton-nostalgia Democrats are willfully ignorant on this point. From NAFTA to the decimation of the social safety net, the Clinton administration was no friend of working people in this country.

Enough. Democrats on the ground need to take their party back from these corporatists in union-made clothing. We need to spend our own tax dollars on our own needs.

And Hillary's foreign policy team couldn't be more "more of the same" if they were all Republicans. Firing her campaign manager can't change that.

[tbone99]

Well, there's back , which isn't good . and then there's under the bus with the Repugs which is catastrophic.

[milo9]

Killkenney, if it's close and the choice is between Clinton and McCain, then I'll have to hold my nose and vote for Clinton. I firmly believe that another term of Republican rule will be the end of us.

I'll vote for Clinton and then hunker down for four more years of cyber-subversion and guerrilla warfare in the blogosphere. Just the same as now. I don't expect she'll be significantly more respectful of the rule of law and the Constitution. The battle will continue.

[Ides]

Three things drive the Obama voters:

1) Principle - we're tired of corrupt politicians.

2) Policy - we're tired of voting for people racing toward the center (i.e., toward MONEY AND POWER) to secure more votes by selling out their principles.

3) Electability - Hillary WILL lose. Bill Clinton would have lost in 1992 if Ross Perot didn't steal 10% from George H.W. Bush. He would have lost in 1996 if Ross Perot didn't steal 10% of votes from Bob Dole. Bill Clinton has never gotten 50% of the vote.

Hillary Clinton won and held her Senate seat in NEW YORK STATE, among the bluest of the blue, after having the last name of the previous Democratic President.

Hillary's supporters would push Hillary Clinton on us...why? Do they like her centrism? Fair enough. Do they think she's more electable? There's no evidence of that and plenty of evidence against that. In addition, they are wallowing in the muck by pulling her along behind them just to make a point.

[tbone99]

Obama voters are tired of people racing to the center?Then why pick a candidate who lauds Reagan?

[JasonEverettMiller]

Who lauded Reagan's ability to craft a governing majority and take the country in a brand new direction. Finish the analogy if you are going to make it.

[jdm58]

When Obama surfaced over a year ago as a possible candidate, I was hopeful that perhaps he had some substantive plans behind his hope for change. He has still not given me any sign of "change we can believe in", other than party and race. Triangulation? The pot calling the kettle black. He was first to state his cabinet would have members from both parties.
I was skeptical of Bill Clinton in '92, and voted for Perot. But Clinton won me over, and I believe this country owes a great deal to him, and Hillary. This is recognized around the world, even if it is less so at home. He is an Ambassador of Good Will and Humanitarian causes along with Bush Sr. Even Shrub figured out his mass appeal, and if Obama wins, I hope he doesn't overlook it.
It took me a long time to decide my candidate this time. I ended up supporting Edwards as the truely viable candidate of progressives, yet he was outspent by the frontrunners, and progressives vanished from the polls, caving in to a "historic election". It seems no matter how much we SAY as a people that change is necessary, we tend to fear it in the end, and stick to something that is easier to identify with, this time it is change of race or gender. If that is truly the case, then McCain should chose Condi Rice as VP, and thus assure him of the Presidency.
I support Hillary Clinton, out of the two remaining candidates on the Party ticket, because of her documented support of Human Rights, Womens Rights, Children's Rights, Healthcare reform, and the Environment. However, should Obama win the nomination, I will support him, as should everyone who wants ANY semblance of change. To stay home in November, pouting over the outcome of the primaries, is a passive way of insuring the failure of our country, in a time when our country needs us most.

[FogBelter]

I plan to write-in my Candidate in November if they don't get the Nomination ... the Democratic Nomination process has revealed itself to be Opaque, Questionable and unworthy of my blind support.

[Ides]

I wonder if we can motivate half of the electorate to go for a third party liberal candidate to make a protest statement about how corrupt and pandering the Democratic Party has become? If the conservatives can do it....

[wilhelmR]

I will not vote in the general elections.
"First time voter."

[Ides]

First they sold out the working class and we said, "Trade is a form of diplomacy."

Then they sold out the environment and we said, "Prosperity comes at a cost."

Then they sold out the blacks and we said, "At least there's affirmative action."

Then they sold out the peace movement and we said, "Well, sometimes war is necessary."

Then they sold out the gays and we said, "Patience. Write them another check."

Then they became Republicans. And no one had the votes to complain.