Wednesday morning quarterbacking the Clinton campaign
Posted on August 27th, 2008 at 2:25 pm by Contributor ArchiveCall it political Wednesday morning quarterbacking. Hillary Clinton gave the speech of her life at the Democratic National Convention Tuesday night. But the media pundits gushed too much about what might have been for Clinton and even questioned Barack Obama – the actual Democratic nominee, which seems to have been lost by some in the media – and his wisdom in passing over his rival while selecting Joe Biden as his running mate.
Forget the politicians, it’s the talking heads this election who are the real flip-floppers. Did they forget all Clinton did to get dissed by Obama? To paraphrase something my grandmother would say when I would act up in public right before she put the switch to my behind, Hillary Clinton showed her – er, um – arse during the primaries.
It was Team Clinton who ran an overtly old school, negative campaign that was the antithesis of Obama’s change message. It was Team Clinton that overplayed the race card with racially-tinged rhetoric during the South Carolina primary. And it was Hillary herself who made the infamously uncouth gaffe when she said “Anything can happen in June,” a reference to Bobby Kennedy’s assassination during his historic, yet tragic bid for the White House in 1968.
And of course there was Bill Clinton. Obama knew that even if Hillary toed the line and accepted her role as his Number Two (not evidenced by her actions as a verbal knife-wielding backstabber of Shakespearean proportions, by the way), that he couldn’t comfortably govern with Bill Clinton within the vicinity of the Oval Office. Just as the former president’s actions proved during this election, Bill Clinton’s words and actions would cast an insurmountable shadow over an Obama presidency. So Hillary for Veep? Obama coolly said, “Hill, no.”
All of this seems forgotten during the coverage of this election. That‘s painfully obvious as the major networks and cable news “journalists” are too busy talking to each other, analyzing ad nauseam strategy and tossing around toothless, baseless innuendo, instead of letting viewers actually hear the blasted speeches and make judgments for themselves.
Instead, we have to suffer through the filter of Pat Buchanan’s shenanigans, Wolf Blitzer’s absentmindedness and Brit Hume’s Droopy Dog drollness. But if any of those fellows and their ilk used their long-term memory then they wouldn’t second-guess why Obama snubbed Hillary. Sure, Clinton could have been Obama’s vice president. Hell, if she delivered a Tuesday’ night’s speech earlier in the primary season, she could have been the Democratic nominee.
But here’s the irony: Clinton always mocked Obama’s gift of oratory, saying that words and speeches don’t mean anything in politics. She learned Tuesday night, that good speechifying inspires people to action. Inspiration is the engine of change. Ronald Reagan knew that. So did John Kennedy and Abraham Lincoln. Too bad Hillary learned that lesson too late.
Had she learned it sooner, perhaps she would have given a speech on Thursday night to accept the Democratic nomination.
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All this may be true but you don’t snub the candidate that pulled 18 million votes to select the candidate that brought in less then 5 thousand.
You do if she’s a backstabbing, second-guessing so and so…
Biden said he didn’t think Obama was ready to lead… sounds like second guessing to me.
You do when the one that “supposidly” got 18 mil votes doesn’t want you to win and the one that got 5 thou does.
The fact is that Biden has the experience, which Hillary does not—unless looking over your husbands shoulder counts as experience, and any of you job seekers out there should keep that in mind—and he is a team player. I think Biden was a great pick. I am formerly a Clinton supporter, both of them. I am sorry to say that through this campaign they have lost me. Even though I firmly believe that Hillary would be amongst the most effective Majority Leaders or Senate Whips ever, I hope the voters of New York put her out to pasture. The name sickens me now.
My wife looks over my shoulder all the time at home. I would love to hand off those tasks and allow her to be “experienced”. But she only wants to supervise me…
That might have been the back-room arrangement. Get rid of Harry Reid and let Hillary become SML.
I wonder, and this is just me, wondering to myself, if Hillary just flat out told him, “No, thanks, not interested, please don’t consider me at all?” Have any of the news outlets covered that angle?
But, I somehow think, the choice of Biden was more about keeping the Clintons away — or like you said, Bill away. Barak is smart on that one…I don’t think I would want them around either.
If the political partys did business like they did up until about the end of the 1960’s when the party chairman was a powerful position, such a party chairman would probably have gotten Obama and his top advisors into a room and said: Hillary garnered 18 million votes, she has abilities you don’t and appeals to voting block you can’t–she’s going to be your running mate. Of course, it’s your choice as the presumptive nominee. LBJ as JFK’s VP is a good example.
Of course, it’s easy to say that would have been the right decision in hindsite. But I’m far from sure of that. With Hillary on the ticket so much of the Clinton era would be dragged out over the next 3 months that it would end up being a negative for who really matters–the American voter.
So, regardless of Biden was the best choice or not, Team Obama probably made the right strategic decision to not go with Hillary. Of course if he loses, much of the analysis will be had he chosen Hillary….
And of course, if he does lose, Hillary and BIll will be even more pleased she wasn’t chosen. That is the plan after all…Obama loses to McCain, Hillary begins the four year campaign against a likely one-term President, John McCain.
I still think Obama put a nail into his electoral coffin by not picking Hill. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy he didn’t pick her. It might be the single biggest reason Obama loses the election.
I always felt like the media had a lot to do with the ‘92 election. The media liked Bush up unil mid-summer, then they switched to Clinton. As they began to drift to Clinton, so did the polls.
Now it looks like it’s happening with Obama. The media’s love affair with him is fizzling and so are his poll numbers.