Opinion polls are the vital political weather reports that all politicians rely on, especially during campaigns. Arguably, there has been no political couple in history more vigilantly attentive to their fluctuations than the Clinton's -- and never more so than during the stormy conditions of electoral contests. Senator Clinton's campaign has used polling data as more than a guide on how to adjust her message to the prevailing winds. It has utilized such surveys to point up potential weaknesses of the Obama brand that can be exploited, even if the ultimate beneficiaries of these efforts are the Republicans.
On March 2 an ABC/Washington Post poll showed that 59% of Americans were worried "that someone might attempt to physically harm Barack Obama if he's the Democratic nominee for president." By March 6 Hillary Clinton was reminding her interviewer, Time Managing Editor Richard Stengel, of "the great tragedy of Bobby Kennedy being assassinated in June in L.A." This was a response to a question about whether her decision to stay in a race she couldn't win would hurt her party. It only seemed like a thoughtless non sequitur.
As we have recently learned, two months later, on May 23, while discussing the same issue with the editorial board of the Argus Leader, she called upon her audience to "remember [that] Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California." When two utterances of the same "gaffe" are nearly identical, like Senator Clinton's oft-repeated Bosnian sniper "misstatements," such mistakes are likely to be motivated, either by a conscious strategy or an unconscious wish. Of course, at this distance, we cannot know which. But what do we know?
We know that Senator Clinton's determined efforts to assassinate Barack Obama's character have not killed off his chances for the Democratic nomination. We know, as I observed in my last post, that her primary strategy has been to portray him as an effeminate, elitist, and fragile ectomorph who will be weak in the face of aggression, and who will be readily done in by America's more burly antagonists. She, on the other hand, we were often told, is the only one butch enough to stick it to the baddies of the world.
We know that on March 2 it was widely published that Americans saw Obama as vulnerable to assassination. We know that it took only four days for her to remind us that he could indeed be knocked off, just like that other premature peacenik, Bobby Kennedy. What can we conclude? Perhaps her infelicitous phrasing was driven, in part, by a conscious or unconscious death wish towards Obama. After all, in her remorseless "apology" she never apologized to him, only the Kennedys. The other, perhaps more likely determinant is Clinton's by now reflexive effort to paint her opponent as a vulnerable, sweet-talking pretty boy -- more likely to find himself in the sight of another's gun, than pulling the trigger of his own.
Stephen J. Ducat, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist from the San Francisco Bay Area, an advanced candidate at the Psychoanalytic Institute of Northern California, and has published widely on the psychology of politics. His most recent book is The Wimp Factor: Gender Gaps, Holy Wars, and the Politics of Anxious Masculinity.
Clinton has lied to us continuously on a long list of occasions about a long list of topics.
Clinton denied her connection to that (Obama's Muslim past) email. Among the vociferous deniers was Ryan Callanan The Iowa County Chair For Hillary who sent it. "Obama's Mother..., a RADICAL Muslim" and "Obama ... attended a MUSLIM school" and "... joined the United Church of Christ in an attempt to downplay his Muslim background."
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The Canadian Embassy received a call from the Obama campaign assuring the Canadian leaders that he never intended on acting on his revisionist NAFTA comments. Canadian officials outed the "outraged" Clinton campaign as the "perpetrator of the filthy lie".
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She negotiated peace in Northern Ireland.
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That photo of Obama in African clothes that was meant to imply that he was Muslim? It was Clinton who sent it to the Drudge Report.
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Then we have the Bosnian lie .
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“My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary, somewhere in the middle of June. ” Bill in effect won the nomination April 7 in New York. She needed for it to end in June so she could invoke RFK's murder. This slip of a tongue happened four times with almost identical scripts each time.
My simple (albeit long) point here is this. If she is going to lie this much and this often to us now,what will she do when the truth really counts?
Though, if there is, you can come and enjoy as well - as McCain will be president, and we'll all be screwed.
In fact, I'm fortunate enough to be a well off Obama supporter, so I won't be affected that much anyway. What do you have to lose?
Think about it.
It's the same utter lack of logic that underpinned her remark about Iran. She was proposing a hypothetical response to a reality that's not going to happen.
The Clintons have been given more grace by the press and people in the party than anyone else would... but they still want to claim themselves 'victim's' of the media, sexism, Obama, his campaign, and his supporters.
To me that demonstrates that she is NOT ready to lead a nation on day one... or any other day. She is not stable enough to act as commander and chief of our country.
I am not glad she said those words... I know it touched off the fear and pain of dashed hopes in the past. But I do think it gives Senator Obama every reason NOT to offer Hillary the VP position now.
I am grateful to Keith Olberman. I was relieved when shortly after I heard the news of what she had said... yet again... he was speaking for me in his commentary. Senator Clinton you are not worthy of being our president.
But WHERE IS HER JUDGMENT?!? This woman wants to be the leader of the free world, to hold the most powerful position on the planet, and she shows this kind of recklessness in her campaign? To even say the word "assassination" in the context of a presidential campaign is an abomination. It's such a vulgar lapse of common sense (much like her comment about obliterating Iran) that it's hard for me to believe that anyone can take her seriously as a candidate in the wake of such remarks.
Sure, she's tired. What happens when she's tired and that 3:00 AM phone call arrives? Is this the kind of judgment we'd see from her in a crisis? God help us all.
if your dumb enough to take it that way than im sorry your so dumb.
Im sorry that i raped you, but you fought it, so you made it rape. not me..(its your fault)
i think she was speaking to the crazies out their .the ones that hear voices and in fragments.
I am scared and appalled that these people exist(clintons)
anyway, obama 08-16
She has tipped her hand in the most glaring spotlight. Now she and any possible unhinged Obamama-haters will have to think twice before proceeding in that direction.
It has effectively ruled her out as the running-mate. The reason for her exclusion will be so obvious that there should be no whining now about disrespect for poor Hillary.
It should serve as a wake-up call for the Secret Service to keep utmost vigilance. I've been worried about it lately, what with Hillary sending barely concealed signals to God knows who.
It finally allows us to complete our picture of Hillary's character structure. What a frightening, fascinating spectacle it is. Historians, psychoanalysts and playwrights will have enough material to keep them busy for the rest of the century.
That said, I really don't think she has a leg to stand on with all of her complaints about how the press and bloggers are treating this incident. She herself used Obama's "bitter" remark as the basis of an attack on Obama's character. She tried to transform his verbal gaffe into evidence that he was "elitist" and "patronizing." In other words, she herself did exactly the same thing that she's complaining about now. So if it's okay for her to use a single misstatement by Obama as evidence of his supposedly defective character, why should it be off-limits when people do the same thing to her? Had she taken the high road after Obama's "bitter" comment, I think she'd be far better positioned to claim that people are going overboard about her assassination comment. As it is, it looks to me like she's now on the receiving end of the same kind of crap she was dishing out only weeks ago. And she ought to be thankful that the Obama campaign has been pretty restrained about this.
What they forget to tell her is that in the Internet age their is no avoiding the firestorm that she started. The media had nothing to do but report her own words! Even if some media tried to keep this from blowing up in her face it was too late. The minute the news hit the net she was finish. Hillary Clinton would had have a decent campaign by 1992 standard but this is 2008 by 2008 standard her campaign was a train wreck.
If Obama cannot unite the party, then how in the hell can he expect the American public to believe that he can handle the entire world? If he cannot "handle" the Clintons, how in the hell can we expect him to handle the Iranian leader? Are you telling me that his political skills are good enough to handle the Iranian leader, but not to handle the potential of Hillary being a VP candidate? That he can't handle a race to the finish without pushing Hillary out of the race? That he has to cheat, to win?
As for kool-aid drinking, better check the color of your own tongue before you go accusing other people of being mindless followers.
It is NOT Obama's fault that people cling to their prejudices and allow themselves to be inflamed by a self-serving narcissist. and he perpetual juvenile delinquent of a husband.
If Hillary's supporters vote for McCain against their own best interests because those who make the Democratic Party rules insisted on candidates following the rules, then all it tells us is that country hasn't come very far in tolerance or decency since the 1950s or l960's.
It is almost funny the way those who have swilled Hillary's Kool-Aid sit by while she inflames the racists and then demand that Obama put a stop to it, or it is somehow HIS fault for being not totally white.
Does she honestly think that Obamas supporters (the ones she and Krugman and her peabrained supporters have called "cultists" would willingly hand over Obama's delegates to HER....the person who ran the filthy racist campaign against her? She really ought to be more concerned right now with salvaging her own reputation. I am told that congress wants her out, but will settle for a bit of good behavior. She is costing the party not only the presidency, but many lower-level elected offices as well with her disgusting racist behavior.
How can decent people continue to support her? They claim they aren't racists, but they are disuaded by any of her racist slurs. Is there such a thing these days as somebody to whom racism is IRRELEVANT? I just don't buy it.
There are plenty of other good Democrats that Obama supporters would be more likely to support than Hillary. How about Edwards or Biden or Dodd? If they got all of most of Hillary's delegates, they could easily win. How about GORE?
I have two friends who claim that HIllary is only doing what she must to compete against men. I guess it is part of that "sexism" thing that makes her talk about "hardworking white people"...something she would never do---incite racism---if she didn't have to because she is a mere. pathetic female victim of something or other.
Couple of hours of listening to that kind of crapola, and all thoughts of editing, grammar and spelling are right out the window.
God bless President Obama!