“Voters are getting tired of it; it is demeaning the political process; and it does not work. It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election.” Disgusted by recent events, such as the Osama ad and the warnings of “obliteration”, the NYT editorial board for all intent and purposes unendorses Sen. Clinton.
Meanwhile, Sen. Obama open the post-PA era with another super endorsement, Gov. Brad Henry of OK. “Senator Obama understands that the serious concerns facing average Americans must transcend partisan games if we are to rise to the challenges of today and tomorrow. He is a strong, committed and inspirational leader, ideally suited to bring together Democrats, independents and Republicans,” Henry said.” Update: Clinton gets one too: Tennessee Congressman John Tanner, while Obama counters with 49 high-profile Edwards supporters in NC.
Well, I’m sure you watched it too. But, anyway, to recap: In tonight’s big contest, the two race horses started out neck-and-neck, and it looked in the early going that an upset might be in order. But, slowly but surely, the plodding, methodical contender pulled away for a small but convincing victory, and that’s all she wrote. I’m referring, of course, to Game 2 of the Suns-Spurs series. Why, was there something else going on?
(By the way, in case you didn’t know, I’m not sure of the Obama analogue yet, but the San Antonio Spurs are definitely the Clintons of the NBA. Tim Duncan’s the Bill of the bunch, the natural talent (with past championships to his name) who whines and works the refs constantly. Bruce Bowen is Hillary, a less-talented workhorse whom people in the media describe with euphemisms like “tenacious”, when he’s clearly and obviously just a dirty player. And, like the rest of the Clinton campaign, Parker and Ginobli are basically slashers…but let’s not belabor it too much.)
Nevertheless, if you’re looking for someone to blame for Obama’s loss tonight, look no further than Philadelphia. The City of Brotherly Love broke from the rest of the state and went 2-1 for Obama. And, as every sports fan knows, Philly always loses despite themselves. You can’t fight the curse.
In any case, I’d been girding myself for a 15-point margin for Sen. Clinton of late, so, in the grand scheme of things, 55-45 was fine with me (particularly given that the contest seems to have cost Clinton what was left of her bankroll.) So, now, on to Indiana and North Carolina in two weeks, where hopefully this primary — finally — comes to an end. Eat, drink, and be merry, Clinton folk, for tomorrow, your candidacy of choice dies.
Update: They’re still tallying the delegates, but it’s looking like Clinton will remain behind by around 150 pledged delegates overall. In the meantime, Al Giordano crunches the exit poll numbers: “Senator Clinton lost ground in every one of those key foundations of her former base vote…Whether or not the commercial media spins it that way – in her campaign’s lexicon – ‘doesn’t matter.’ And ye shall know the dumbest and slowest – and intentionally dishonest – political reporters, pundits, bloggers (and former presidential candidates and spouses) by those that argue otherwise.“
Was that magical night in Iowa really less than four months ago? It seems since then that we Obama-leaning political junkies are being punished by the Clinton campaign for the sin of putting too much faith in the process, and have been consigned to a neverending Purgatory of endless lowballs and trifling media idiocies. In a different world, I might have been flabbergasted by Clinton shoehorning Pearl Harbor and Bin Laden into a political ad against a fellow Democrat. But, at this late date, did anyone really expect anything less? Give it a few more weeks and the Clinton campaign will likely be regaling us with D.W. Griffith and guys in blackface. And it will still be over. Update: By way of Dangerous Meta, Sen. Clinton also attempted to recertify her cajones this morning by threatening to “obliterate” Iran. Dubya much, Senator?
At any rate, if you are of the Pennsylvanian persuasion, please consider voting for Barack Obama today. Let’s get focused on our real opponent, already.
“I think that they played the race card on me. We now know, from memos from the campaign that they planned to do it along.” It’s not a lie if you believe it, right, Mr. President? I’ve grown bored with tryingtokeeptrackofallthemyriadwaysBillClintonhascontinuallyembarrassedhimselfinrecentmonths. But, since I’m blogging today and as per his “mugging”, former President Clinton whines further about the reaction to his unfortunate Jesse Jackson comparison, citing once again a vast Obama conspiracy and now memos that do not exist. (In his own mind, he probably meant the Amaya Smith memo during the MLK/LBJ uproar, which, of course, had nothing to do with Clinton’s idiotic remarks.) The former president also said he couldn’t have said anything racist because he has an office in Harlem. Uh, I live in Harlem…I didn’t realize that constituted a free pass for us white folk to spout ignorant and dismissive bromides whenever it’s politically expedient.
Not realizing the mic was still on, Clinton later scoffed to an aide during the interview, “I don’t think I should take any shit from anybody on that, do you?” Actually, Bill, you really, really should.
Update: Now, in full defiance of the audio, he’s denying he said it. “Outside a Pittsburgh campaign event, a reporter asked Clinton what he had meant ‘when you said the Obama campaign was playing the race card on you?’ Clinton responded: ‘When did I say that and to whom did I say that?‘” (Can you find the Clintonian distortion? I’m guessing it’s “played” versus “was playing,” but who knows how the man’s mind works?)
“‘Moveon.org endorsed [Sen. Barack Obama] — which is like a gusher of money that never seems to slow down,’ Clinton said to a meeting of donors. ‘We have been less successful in caucuses because it brings out the activist base of the Democratic Party. MoveOn didn’t even want us to go into Afghanistan. [sic] I mean, that’s what we’re dealing with. And you know they turn out in great numbers. And they are very driven by their view of our positions, and it’s primarily national security and foreign policy that drives them. I don’t agree with them. They know I don’t agree with them. So they flood into these caucuses and dominate them and really intimidate people who actually show up to support me.‘”
The only news made tonight? ABC is rather terrible at this whole debate thing. Tonight was basically a fiasco. From Stephanopoulos questioning Obama on flag pins to the tut-tutting about affirmative action to George getting questions from Sean Hannity to Gibson trying to wrest a “no new taxes” pledge from the candidates, virtually every minute tonight was occupied with trite Republican nonsense. Oh, and Gibson’s dim remark at the Manchester debate that two-professor families make $200,000 a year was not a fluke. Apparently, the guy knows less about the economy than John McCain. Tonight he informed us that there “are a heck of a lot of people” making between $97,000 and $200,000 these days. If by “heck of a lot” you mean 14% of the US, well, ok. But some might consider 1 in 7 a rather small minority of the total population, and thus argue that our tax policy should keep the other, more-likely-to-be-struggling 6 out of 7 in mind. Sheesh…less than a week and our friends in the pundit world have already abandoned their newfound blue-collar bitterness.
At any rate, no news or game-changers to speak of. Sen. Obama is still our nominee, Sen. Clinton is still grappling with that fact. If you didn’t watch this tonight, you chose wisely. Update: Having run ABC’s gauntlet of idiocy, Obama brushes his shoulders off, puts distractions on notice, and says no to more debates.
“Clinton is viewed as ‘honest and trustworthy’ by just 39 percent of Americans, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, compared with 52 percent in May 2006. Nearly six in 10 said in the new poll that she is not honest and trustworthy.” Who’s bitter now? A new poll finds that a solid majority of voters now believes Sen. Clinton is dishonest. “And now, compared with Obama, Clinton has a deep trust deficit among Democrats, trailing him by 23 points as the more honest, an area on which she once led both Obama and John Edwards.” In other words, all the shenanigans of the past few months seem to have made her unelectable. Oops.
Hey all. As promised, I’ve been working on other things over the past few days, and thus haven’t really been following the election news as closely as in recent months. I’d heard that Sen. Obama had basically restated the thesis of What’s the Matter with Kansas? at a fundraiser in San Francisco, and thought that, lordy, it was a slow news week. So, imagine my surprise when I settled in for the Sunday shows to discover that I was supposed to be outraged — outraged, I tell you! — at the import and tenor of Sen. Obama’s remarks. Across the board, the Washington punditariat had ratcheted up the pique to 11, lambasting Obama for being elitist and out-of-touch because he argued a case for the appeal of cultural conservatism in economic bad times that’s been made all over the place, not the least by the Clintons themselves. (By the way, this televised uprising of the pundit proletariat included several people I dealt with personally during my previous sojourn in DC and, well…let’s just say I wasn’t buying their newly-discovered blue-collar bona fides. Not. One. Bit. (and I’m not talking about Carville & Matalin, although they were in the mix on Sunday too.))
Enter Sen. Clinton, shameless as ever. Apparently seeing “Bitter-gate” as her last, best hope for the nomination, she’s plumbed new depths of self-parody this week, not only calling Obama an elitist but trying to recast herself as some kind of working-class hero. (I guess she assumed we’d all just forget that she made $109 million over the past seven years, has been running around with a Secret Service detail for nearly two decades, and has had people otherwise waiting on her since 1978. Springsteen, she’s not.) Nope, now she’s banging back boilermakers, attacking Obama like he’s the Second Coming of John Kerry (to the point of getting booed for it) and conjuring up this ridiculous ad of small-town folk aghast by Obama’s words.
Well, I guess I’m an out-of-touch elitist too, because, frankly, I’m just not seeing it. Not only does this entire brouhaha seems like a completely media-manufactured (and Clinton-prolonged) event to me, but I’d be highly surprised if the vast majority of people Obama was referring to take any offense whatsoever. In fact, if anything, I’d bet the people who are supposed to feel so put upon here may well end up feeling more condescended to by Clinton and the mass media for trying to tell them they should be ticked off. Just a hunch…I could be very wrong. With fifteen years and counting in BosWash, it’s been awhile since I’ve had my finger on the pulse of the Heartland. Still, I’m willing to bet that the white working-class Americans who are theoretically insulted by Obama’s words are smarter, and made of sterner stuff, than Clinton et al would give them credit for. And this too shall pass.
Update: Speaking of Springsteen, the Boss endorses Obama, in part due to Bitter-gate. “At the moment, critics have tried to diminish Senator Obama through the exaggeration of certain of his comments and relationships. While these matters are worthy of some discussion, they have been ripped out of the context and fabric of the man’s life and vision, so well described in his excellent book, Dreams of My Father, often in order to distract us from discussing the real issues: war and peace, the fight for economic and racial justice, reaffirming our Constitution, and the protection and enhancement of our environment.“
“Judging from Gen. David Petraeus’ Senate testimony today, our military commitment to Iraq is open-ended and unconditional…Their unwavering stance amounted to this: Further pullouts might trigger defeat; the costs of defeat are too horrible to ponder; therefore, we shouldn’t ponder further pullouts.” Slate‘s Fred Kaplan takes the measure of yesterday’s Petraeus hearings, and the performances of Senators Obama [transcript | video], Clinton and McCain respectively. “Near the end of the afternoon, Sen. Barack Obama, the Democrats’ likely presidential nominee but a junior member of the foreign relations committee, finally got his turn to ask questions — and he homed in on one of the administration’s key conceptual failures…’I’m trying to get to an end point,’ he said. ‘That’s what all of us are trying to do.’ This is what many critics and thoughtful supporters of the war have been trying to do for five years now. The Bush administration hasn’t addressed the issue. And, ultimately, neither did Petraeus or Crocker today.”
