Tag: Hillary Clinton

Hillary Rove Clinton

My Sunday Times column is on the surreal new alliance between the Rove right and the Clinton campaign:

Obama scrambles politics in ways they do not fully understand yet, and profoundly fear. Endorsing Clinton’s attempt to redefine him as an elitist, leftist snob is win-win for them.

If Clinton prevails, they know how to beat her. If she loses, she will have legitimised a main Republican line of attack against Obama. It’s not that hard to understand. And it’s even more intelligible when you absorb a simple fact. Beneath the headlines about suicidal Democrats, there is a sobering reality for the Republicans in the current polling.

Even now – as the Democrats are tearing themselves apart – the polls are still showing that McCain and Obama are all but tied in the national vote. In a swing state such as Minne-sota, Obama actually has a 14-point lead over McCain, as of last Thursday.

The death match is now. And the Clintons and the Republicans need all the mutual support they can muster.

Accepting Hillary’s $10 Million Haul

Marc makes a fair point:

As an amateur observer of human social behavior, I am quite impressed by the steel wall of aversion that some Obama supporters put up whenever they’re confronted by something that does not fit with their established perception of Hillary Clinton — namely that there is just NO way that Hillary can raise that much money in such a short period of time…because she is, well, Hillary. The fundamental attribution error is at work: it must be a lie because Hillary is a liar; the situation — a 9 point victory in Pennsylvania, or the roughly half of the Democratic electorate who supporters her — well, it matters much less.

In general with the Clintons, however, it is safe to assume that what they say is a lie until proven otherwise.

Hillary Milhous Clinton

The Clinton camp is hammering the Weather Underground connection on the conference call this morning. The merging of the Clinton campaign with the very forces that once tried to destroy the Clintons is a fascinating moment. It does indeed show that for the Clintons, anything is possible in the pursuit of power. There are no permanent enemies, no permanent arguments, no permanent principles. Just the pursuit of power by all non-violent means. This, of course, has been the guiding, polarizing direction of American politics since Vietnam. It is the kind of politics that defined the Clintons and their generation. It is the boomer war fought by proxy: red-blue; patriot-wimp; American-unAmerican; faithful-Godless. And you cannot help but notice a kind of liberation in the Clinton camp, as they finally thrill to the full experience of deploying the cultural warfare and marginalization that they have been so used to Republicans using against them. And they get to use it against a black man in ways no Republican could get away with so easily. Man, that must feel good after all these years. No wonder she’s still smiling.

The Clintons began their career fighting Nixon. They ended up, in terms of political tactics, becoming him. Yes, it’s 1968 again. And the Clintons want to coopt the Silent Majority of their time. Their only problem is that it may no longer actually exist. We’ll see.

Women And Hillary

Michelle Goldberg:

Some have suggested the whole thing was part of a Clinton scheme to ratchet up racial tensions in advance of the Pennsylvania primary. That’s possible, but there’s a simpler explanation. Several otherwise admirable, even heroic women seem to identify with Clinton so profoundly that they interpret rejection of her as a personal rebuke. Stung, they accuse Obama supporters of flighty illogic, but there’s a powerful, extra-rational emotional current in their arguments, a flailing in the face of an imagined betrayal. In their anger, they’re lashing out in all kinds of counterproductive ways, doing far more damage to feminism than a Clinton loss ever could.