Friends Don't Let Friends...

I am writing to some of my friends who are friends of Bill and Hillary Clinton. The blessed and beleaguered FOBs, who are hanging in there whether you want to or not. Many of you have confided to me that you want out. Many of you have admitted that you are heartsick about some of Hillary's tactics and tired of the bitterness and infighting of her supporters. So I am just going to say this: you can leave...you can hit the road, you can get while the getting is good (or at least not heinous). I have heard the whispers of a widely held fear of reprisals, of careers scuttled, of the revenge that may be extracted by the likes of McAuliffe and Ickes. I ask in the words of our very own Dick Cheney ...."So?" Honestly what can they do? Set all the superdelegates on fire? Are they really all powerful? These guys seem so yesterday with their bad suits and pasted-on smiles ... are they really to be feared? Seems to me like the man behind the curtain is just a tired, red-faced ex-president looking for a return to his glory days. I promise you, when this is over we will buy the good old bad boys a new set of golf clubs and a membership to the Emperors Club. They will be happy ... Viagra sales will soar, and life in Washington will go on. The cherry trees will continue to bloom in the spring.

I am going to say this because it needs to be said:

If you are standing by them out of loyalty, you are unwittingly standing by their self-destruction. You are at their side as they careen into the history books as self-servin, egomaniacs out of touch with the times and sometimes with reality itself. This is not doing them any favors, or anyone any good. Hillary has a brilliant career ahead of her in the Senate and Bill can still salvage his reputation and accomplish great things in civilian life. They will survive defeat ...really they will. The Clintons' time has passed. This is made more obvious with each passing day. Bill's comments are ever more inappropriate, if not downright strange. Hillary looks exhausted ... way past sleep-deprived. Her rhetoric is confused and confusing. Get her a bed soon and some hot tea or she may end up ducking sniper fire on the train to Cukoo-ville.

If you love them ...set them free.

Bill Clinton spent the weekend here in California telling folks to "chill out." So what if this thing drags on to August? Happened to him and it was no biggie, what's the fuss about? This is further evidence that he is stuck in a time warp. Bush Sr. may have been less than competent and the economy in dire need of a new direction when Bill walked into the convention in 1992, but 2008 is a whole new ball game. The stakes are so high that even we cool cat Californians are not laying back. There is a WAR on and the potential for another battle in Iran ... for more people dead and wounded, more hearts and lives broken. The economy is a wreck, America is demoralized and the myth of our primacy has been debunked by all but the most lunatic of the Fox fringe. No one is chilling out. We are losing sleep and losing hair. We are losing our pensions and our patience. The times have changed and the Clintons have not changed with them. The bright yellow pantsuit has not been made that can make me cheer at the sight of Hillary standing at yet one more podium. We are not asking them to be quitters, we are asking them to realize that this is not about them. It is about you and me and our fellow citizens and the fate of a great nation.

Loyalty is a lovely thing and God knows a lot of you have it in spades. It is not so pretty, however, to see folks threatening Nancy Pelosi, or to hear James Carville calling Bill Richardson Judas. That Carville guy is downright embarrassing and Bill C. needs to just let it go. Is he saying that loyalty to one's pals is preferable to loyalty to one's conscience? We have seen seven-plus years of cronyism and it turns out that kind of thing does not serve us -- just ask the good people pf New Orleans. Hillary is hoping to find a way to destroy Obama in order to climb atop the wreckage of the Democrat Party and declare victory. How sad. This is the sign of a bankrupt campaign and speaking of bankrupt...she is not even paying her bills! They are stiffing cater waiters and printing companies and small businesses all over the country...the very folks they claim to want to help. How is this helpful?

I know this is not what you had in mind. I know you began this effort with real conviction and that you had every reason to believe that you were on the wining team, but it is time to ask yourselves how much of this is about winning and how much about not being willing to admit defeat? The Clintons have held sway for a long time. These folks have driven us to the right of Richard Nixon and let us not forget they managed to lose the House and Senate during their tenure in the White House. It has been the brave and relentless call for change from progressives that has powered our resurgence. Barack Obama has earned his place at the helm by promising a new direction and bringing new ideas and people into the fold.

If you feel you must continue to fight on out of loyalty to your pals, then I ask you to also be loyal to your conscience and demand that they clean up their act. Fighting the good fight requires that there actually be a good fight.

I know the agony of defeat. We all do, but this is not about woman versus man or black versus white or poetry versus pugilism. This is about old versus new. This is a battle for the soul of the Democratic Party At some point the Clintons will have to stand down, so that we can all stand up to the real challenges ahead. The real fight has not yet begun.

Comments

[silverknight]

WHAT WORLD ARE YOU LIVING IN ?

[CalicoJackRackham]

Spot on analysis. If anyone can reach the Clintons on whatever planet they inhabit, maybe it's some of their longtime friends. Please, somebody, put their campaign out of our misery.

[JakeEasy]

I am writing this to my friends who have been supporters of Barack Obama and are starting to get worried. I know how hard it it to admit to yourself that you have been foolish. I know he seemed like the answer to all prayers. And the worst part is that you can't blame him. He didn't say he was the hot new thing. He didn't say that he would bring about a new way of behaving and doing things. (Whoops. Maybe he did to that.) It's just that he was a little to willing to ride free on your dreams.

But now the shiny newness is wearing off. His humanity, in all the good and bad that represents, is starting to come out. No, he didn't really mean that he was going to bring the troops home. Yes, maybe he does take corporate and lobby money through back doors the same way that all the other politicians do. And, yes it is becoming apparent that he used the race card to trump anyone else's use of it.

But all is not lost. He is still a good man. He can win by actually winning not letting his surrogates call for a cessation of the process. Wouldn't you like to find out if he really can win even a majority of the Democratic voters before you send him out to the McCain eat-em-up maching?

[Desdemondo]

Bravo! Ausgetzichnet!!

The facts are well thought out and written.

[johnnygoodwud]

i'm floored, the best article i've read yet, during the entire campagin. great job, my hat is off to you.

[rikoriki]

Great, thoughtful post. Having just read Carl Bernstein's book on Hillary, A Woman in Charge, surely the most perceptive and untendentious available, I am convinced that the Clinton duo (as in folies a deux) are absolutely locked into their path, which like a Greek tragedy, can only lead to their destruction. I hope your piece helps pave the way for well-meaning Hillary supporters to separate themselves from the fates of the two narcissists and find their own paths, based on reality, not delusions.

[RIBassist]

I think what Clinton needs to do is think really hard about what she WANTS to be that she CAN be... and about how those possibilities could be limited or eliminated completely if she continues to drag this melodrama out. I mean, seriously, which cabinet post would she like? Or would she prefer Senate Majority Leader (that would be a good fit, I think)? How about Supreme Court Justice?

IHillary needs to get comfortable with the idea that she's not going to be president, and start focusing on what might be her "second choice." If she doesn't win by a huge margin in PA, she needs to end her campaign... NOT for the good of Obama, NOT for the good of the Democratic party, and NOT for the good of the American people (although dropping out would have all of these effects). Hillary Clinton is a very smart person, extremely self-aware, and good at self-promotion (like most politicians, I imagine). She needs to make this decision based on her own self-interest. If she goes gracefully, she will be a hero of the party and will have her pick of career paths. If she goes down in flames and takes the Democratic party with her, I'll be surprised if she is even able to hold on to her Senate seat.

[wwoodsm]

Absolutely, I agree with every word. Thank you for expressing it so well.

[peggio]

The very best piece I've seen written on this campaign!

In my world FOB means fans of Barbaro.....which makes alot more sense to me.

I noticed last night that she looked as tired as I felt after my regular 8 hour day at work. Why not, I thought, we're the same age and I know how I look at the end of a day. Then I thought it's more than that. I think it's all catching up with her....the lying, the mean spiritedness, the fuzzy, fuzzy math , the greed and power lust. Someone who really loves her (not obviously Bill) will stop playing hit man and tell her it's time to go on vacation and resume her senatorial career.

[booshman]

As you all well know, we have lost the majority in both the houses subsequent to the Clinton scandals and allowed W to tarnish our global image and whittle away our middle class lifestyle. Now the Clintons are destroying the party all-over again.
Hillary unable to face the harsh reality that it"s time for her fade away, continues to linger and lambaste Obama and is still trying to divide us so that she could hold on to her murky dreams. Bill continues to throw temper tantrums and cast doubts about obama"s chance of winning. Why are you still allowing these people to dash and trash our dreams? Isn"t it time for all of you show some spine and quit following the cunning Clintons¦you are not mere lemmings¦ please show some spine and let the Clintons go to the sea alone.

[VicksieDo]

Great post!

[Purple Girl]

This old bill & Hill supporter & Defender began to see the cracks in theri Facade when Hillary began Voting in the Senate, reamined Silent when she should have been leading witha Battle cry against this admins Corrupt Agenda, wehn I look at the condition of our Armed Services (that 'Voluntary' system that holds our kids for extra time and additonal rotations, and gives them NOTHING for their Service- Voluntary - Hostage Takers!). the ONLY VOLUNTEERS are Thsoe HIRED BY BLACWATER etc.They can leave when ever they want- or when theri Contrat ahs eneded- that's voluntary!!!
It has become Pianfully obvious that th eClintons have always been Corporationists disguised as Dems.

[Selam]

A good friend is like a mirror " it is a brilliant article!

It is true that "The Clintons' time has passed. This is made more obvious with each passing day." Also, it is an absolute meth that the Clintons" have the magic to bring the 90th economy back. In addition, the current economic disarray that we are facing started during the Clinton"s administration. Now, Clintons" are the beneficiaries of it. They are rolling a lot of money while single moms could not find a job to feed their children. The whole Personal Responsibility Act imposed to mother, a five year term limit, is a tragic. Think, either Bill Clinton is an opportunist or he lacks a vision or both " this is not the kind of leaders that we need and Hillary and Bill are inseparable, I hope the voters of Pennsylvanian, Indiana, North Carolina, and the rest understand the genesis of the economic hardship that most of the working class are facing, say NO Hillary for president.

Like Beth, I urge my progressive friends not to remain neutral when communities" livelihood worsening day by day. I do believe that Obama is someone we can work with " let"s get engaged!

[JWC]

This is the first time someone has said the obvious, Hillary looks exhausted. I was amazed when I saw the pictures of her in the red suit, either the makeup person is taking a break or makeup cannot cover the effects of the continued campaigning.

Obama was smart to take a few days off. The causal person catching the news or cable news shows, would notice (subconsciously) that she looks tired. And McCain looks old. While Obama looks like someone who could be alert if that 3 a.m. phone call came in.

[Merin]

Well said.