Yesterday the string of defeats continued, and today we learn that supporters of Clinton's campaign are launching a "stealth 527." You remember those -- Swift Boat attacks and all? It isn't likely to work.
Back in my musician days we had a drummer who hardly ever spoke. He just sat on his stool at rehearsals, a cigarette in his lips, and played his instrument. But one day when we were talking about why some groups made it big and others didn't, he looked up and said:
"People don't let you into their lives unless you create a world they want to inhabit, one that's more exciting and attractive than their own."
He was right, and his observation holds for politicians, too -- especially presidential candidates. To paraphrase the Talmud, "whoever creates one campaign creates a world entire." Obama's 10-state sweep is a reflection of the very different worlds he and his opponent have created. She and her advisors clearly resent that fact, but she's a bear-trap situation now. The more she struggles against it, the more it works against her.
Oddly enough, McCain and his advisors seem to have a better sense of this than the Clinton team does. Take this piece, in which GOP operative Sara Taylor describes a potential McCain VP as "a conservative, rock-n-roll Republican." While the phrase "rock and roll Republican" may create snickers in some circles, she's showing that she understands the same simple truth that my old drummer pointed out: If your world doesn't seem like an uplifting or positive place, people won't let you into their lives.
The Clinton team, whose greatest strength was Bill's (aka "Elvis's") rock and roll sensibility, still doesn't get it. This time around their theme seems to be "recess is over." It's not working, and yet they show no inclination to change.
It didn't have to be that way. Hillary could have spoken of her dreams and aspirations throughout this campaign. Bill could have used his rhetorical skills to move people, rather than to take ineffective and counterproductive cheap shots. The campaign as a whole could have embraced and usurped the themes hope and idealism -- or at least tried -- rather than mocking and deriding the idea that a new generation could be stirred and uplifted.
The old crop of Democratic consultants she has used has been a disaster for Sen. Clinton. Their advice -- don't back down on your war vote, stay on the attack -- has only added to the voters' impression that her "world" is a dark and negative place.
And the hits just keep on coming. The vapid and counterproductive suggestions offered by these Democratic "experts" show why conventional Democratic Party wisdom is a dry well. Take Dan Gerstein, late of Joe Lieberman's last notorious campaign:
"She can't win by affirmatively making the case for herself ...The best thing she can do is either discredit Obama or raise doubts about him. I hate to say it, but in certain respects, it's using the Bush strategy against Kerry against Obama and raising doubts about his willingness to use force to keep the country safe."
Following advice like this is a great way to blow a commanding lead and wind up fighting for your political survival. And now Marc Ambinder reports that "allies of Hillary Clinton plan an expensive, stealth campaign to buttress her standing in the must-win states of Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania."
Ambinder adds that "... at least one major Clinton donor with direct ties to the campaign (emphasis mine) said last night that the effort was an open secret among donors," and cites Jake Tapper as sayng that "the group is calling itself the 'American Leadership Project' and is staffed by several veterans of the Clinton White House."
Can she recover from her free fall using negative tactics borrowed from the 2004 Republican playbook? It's possible, but it doesn't seem likely. Once again, it seems reminiscent of a world that Democratic voters and the electorate in general seem eager to escape. And should she somehow prevail this way, it will certainly give John McCain a great way to make the case that he's a more "honest politician" who's more likely to "change Washington." After all, he's opposed 527s since McCain/Feingold.
It's a shame. Sen. Clinton is a brilliant and gifted person. I've always assumed she would be a good president. But the calculations she has made in search of the presidency, starting with that war vote in 2002, undercut her chances and raised questions about her judgment.
Time will tell whether this latest strategem will work -- but so far, people have been less and less inclined to inhabit this campaign's increasingly dark world.
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One last question: It seems almost surrealistic, but did Sen. Clinton actually lie ... about plagiarism? This article suggests that she did. That would be a falsehood about an arguably false accusation of falsehood. If it's true, then this election has gotten so 'meta,' so conceptually recursive, so drenched in cascading layers of embedded meaning, that it could drive a semiotician insane.
Paging Dr. Baudrillard ...
A Night Light
The Sentinel Effect: Healthcare Blog
Future-While-U-Wait
RJ Eskow at the Huffington Post
Follow RJ Eskow on Twitter: www.twitter.com/rjeskow
The landmark civil fraud suit, Paul v Clinton et al pending in Los Angeles Superior Court against the Clintons on and off since 2001 has been hidden from the public by the mainstream media for seven years. While the case was showcased in the documentary trailer for Hillary! Uncensored which made internet history with more than five million downloads in a few weeks in November, 2007, it has remained under the radar of the public consciousness as part of the greatest political scandal cover-up since Watergate.
On Thursday, February 21, 2008, a hearing before Judge Munoz will be held in Paul v Clinton with David Kendall representing the Clintons. A trial date will be set for late in 2008 and a discovery schedule will be created for sworn depositions to be taken of all principal witnesses.
The limited perception and understanding that exists of the case is that it is simply a business fraud suit by Clinton donor and erstwhile Clinton employer Peter Paul against Bill Clinton who was aided and abetted by Hillary in inducing Paul to spend more than $1.2 million to elect Hillary
But the prosecution of the first suit to haul a President and Senator into court for fraud and coercion has the potential of revealing through sworn testimony of the Clinton hierarchy of the Democratic Party the culture of corruption that permeates the party and egregious examples of party leaders including Al Gore, Ed Rendell, Terry McAuliffe as frauds and scofflaws.
The threat to the party as well as the Clintons that is posed by the discovery and trial in the suit is that it not only links the Clintons personally to felony violations of the law and obstructions of justice but it will also destroy the credibility of Clinton surrogates who control the party at a time when Obama will be looking to take over the Party with his people.
She can only win by destroying Obama and misusing superdelegates (and cheating in Florida and Michigan). And what would that do to black voters-- whom the white Democratic establishment has often taken for granted?
It's not just about Obama's support among African Americans, because whites and Latinos can feel the same outrage about these tactics.
Yet there's a pattern throughout our history of black voters being shut out of the political process, and black leaders being called frauds. The "grandfather clause" in the Jim Crow laws, and the felony purge lists in Florida in 2000. The charges of plagiarism against Martin Luther King Jr. The charge of mail fraud against Marcus Garvey.
If Hillary stays in only to treat Obama like a high school graduate cutting and pasting other people's speeches, she will destroy her own reputation, and-- worse-- jeopardize the 90% support Democrats have among black voters. If they see their votes being nullified by old white men in the party with whom a single vote equals ten thousand votes-- if they see this respected statesman and author being dissected in a way no white politician ever has been (they all borrow words from other speeches), why would they vote for Hillary in November? Why would any Democrat?
Hillary is better than this campaign, and far better than this latest tactic of shoving superdelegates down our throats (see http://www.delegatehub.com/) and calling Obama a plagiarist with no solutions. She is giving the GOP more ammo every day, disgracing her own standing among Democrats, and potentially leading the party to alienate for decades the African American community, a community whose story of strife and quest for equality define the image of the Democratic Party.
Hillary was on a role up until her slip about illegal driver licenses in the debates. Since then her campaign has been spinning to recover and losing ground daily.
Instead of focusing on righting her own ship the tactic was to sink Barack's. That's what the public sees. It's about illusion and the suspension of disbelief. But Clinton made it about reality and the suspension of belief. The results are evident.
http://www.taylormarsh.com/archives_view.php?id=27060
Sleazy obama supporter msnbc and fox
http://www.taylormarsh.com/archives_view.php?id=27047
Millions of Americans STILL won't have healthcare because Obama doesn't believe in it ---and is still learning how to lead.
Its ones like YOU with a voice --who don't support the most talented in our country & like the 52% who thought GWB was the best thing to come along since apple pie---he's down to 19% now---that's how much the public knows about picking leaders.
First there was the GREENHORN GWB & now the superhero GREENIE OBAMA to follow.
She have every right to do it and every right to a vigorous campaign.
Unless of course you are saying if the Clintons use it, then its wrong.
RJ is right. Hillary has only tried to appeal to the voters' head not their heart. You need to appeal to both. If her campaign launches a Swift-boat-like attack on Obama it's going to backfire on her. It will only fire up his base and turn off potential voters.
Right now, the media has given Obama a free pass, especially whenever Obama uses code words to make any comment racial. In addition, every time the Clinton campaign makes a contrast the media bash the style of the comment repeatedly without addressing the real issue.
Here is what they should do; I had too much time the other day and discovered where some of the Obama plans came from. Lobbyists and big business! The theme is, Don’t see much change and all the plans are derivative of big business lobbyists.
1. Health Plans: Obama’s is a windfall for the insurance companies. The rhetoric Obama uses is directly from the Health Care lobby talking points, Harry and Louise ad campaign they did and the I will not be forced to pay for insurance, it is my right to be uninsured Rhetoric. Health Cares costs every American 7K somehow and 30 percent goes to administration, united Health Care, WellPoint et al win. Obama does not attack those costs.
2. Obama’s Ethanol plan is directly from the Farm Lobby and all those that understand the issue know that it won’t lower gas prices and will keep accelerating food prices. Archer Daniels Midland wins.
3. Obama’s alternative energy plan and the 10B that goes along with it looks like GE’s strategy for the world. GE wins here.
This is what she should start out with. Don’t see much change and all the plans are derivative of big business lobbyists.
We as a Nation are tired of it, may Obama go all the way, so that "We are what we've been waiting for," can get busy changing things we have been waiting for.
After Texas and Ohio, if she doesn't make a comeback, the she should leave the race gracefully. Maybe just maybe, she isn't as experienced as she claims to be and she would be the "Roll of the Dice." Better to find out now than have another Bushco disaster.
You may not love Hillary, but let her open the door for better female candidates in the future.
Barack is just another man. Girls who vote for him are just trying to impress their stupid boyfriends.
There are many things that are keeping Hillary out of this race, not the least of which is Hillary herself. Most importantly is the division that her candidacy represents. It may be unfair, but republicans absolutely hate Hillary. A divided country cannot make the kind of drastic changes we need to make.
Barack's is presidency could unite the country behind a common purpose. The silent majority is more than ready to move beyond partisanship and toward progressivism. I believe Barack's vice president will be the first woman who is truly able to win the presidency in a landslide and provide the last 8 years of a 16 year American Renaissance.
Why not work for that reality?
Saying that your candidacy is not politics as usual is politics as usual. Why are so many so blind?
She may as likely have come out against NAFTA for a return to tariff based trade treaties.
This is the typical kind of Obama fan attack. They just presume they speak for everyone. The truth is, more actual Dems have voted for Clinton.
This is the Democratic Primary.
The Washington State vote proved that the Caucases have disenfranchised Clinton supporters.
I am glad they are finally going to get tough. I'm sure we will hear the collective whines of racisim again. But there are only 52 cards in a deck.
He deserves to be called on some of his dealings. Where has the media been?
He also has ran a campaign in which the whole theme is negative and attacking but in such a covert way, nobody notices.
He attacks by saying he is the only one who truly cares, who is beyond petty politics, as if all other public servants are just in it for themselves.
Nobody would put up with what Hillary Clinton has if it was just about herself!
It's time to take the gloves off and get really rough and speak the truth about this so called movement. How naieve it is. How doomed to failure it is. How weak it is at it's core. How hyocritical it is. How it is just flip-side of the bushie coin.
You see it with the fanatical posts on here. You see it in how this place has become Obama's Fox news. Nobody is willing to take an objective look at the shortcomings of this this whole movement/campaign. Nobody is willing to say anything fair about the oppenent. It is non-stop demonization, and it's wrong and we're not going gently into that good night!
Have you ever heard the phrase "Ok to disagree without being disagreeable"?
You are missing the point of Obama's message. It's not that he is perfect and Clinton is imperfect. Its not that he is capable while she is incapable. It IS that he wants us (that includes You) to come together to fix OUR problems. Hillary keeps talking about how much she can do; while Barack keeps talking about how much WE can do. The Barack Obama campaign is not about how weak/strong, synical/naive, or good/bad we americans are. We are all those things and more, but when asked to WE have risen to the challenge of greatness and We WILL again.
The author of the Article was correct when he points out the difference in the Visions of the candidates. I personally would rather live in the world Barack Obama envisions, rather than the "dangerous" world Hillary Clinton sees ahead.