Iowa is too close to call and Hillary Clinton could pull it out. But things don’t look good for her. Kucinich is throwing his support to Obama, as is Richardson, and, perhaps, Biden. That’s enough to make me revise my prediction from yesterday. I now believe Obama will win tonight. Edwards will come in second. If I’m right, the explanation will be, as Robert Novak notes, premature triangulation. And the main culprit? Mark Penn.
Sen. Hillary Clinton faces tonight’s Iowa caucuses not as the inevitable Democratic presidential nominee but seriously challenged by Sen. Barack Obama, thanks in no small part to committing a strategic error: premature triangulation. The problem is reflected in what happened to a proposal for a simplified, though far-reaching, health-care plan.
One longtime Democratic consultant, not involved in any campaign this time, suggested that Clinton propose a genuine universal health-care scheme. Everybody would be covered by Medicare, except people who chose to retain their private health insurance plans. The consultant gave the idea to somebody close to the senator, but the intermediary refused to pass it on to the candidate. He said it would never get beyond Mark Penn and his strategy of triangulation.
Penn, a professional pollster who was political adviser to President Bill Clinton, is chief strategist for Hillary Clinton’s campaign. He has embraced the triangulation — coming across as a third force somewhere between the liberal and conservative poles — that characterized Bill Clinton’s politics after 1994, based on advice from Dick Morris. To many Democratic operatives, Penn’s triangulation prematurely introduced a general election strategy when in fact the party nomination was still in doubt.
We could also call this a ‘premature sell-out to corporate interests’ or a ‘premature Republicanism’ or ‘imprudent honesty in marketing’. But whatever we call it, it ain’t very popular among progressive Democrats. I await a crushing Team Clinton defeat with almost the same eagerness I anticipated the drubbing of Joe Lieberman in the Connecticut primaries. C’mon Iowans…drive a silver stake into the beast.
Why would you listen to Bob Novak?
duh. Only one?
And the candidate, who believes she knows more about health care reform than anybody else running, had absolutely no idea that universal healthcare was an option.
You may get to the same result without Bob Novak’s “facts”- but why on earth would you give him and his “facts” any credence?
Obama may very well win tonight and you may get your crushing Clinton defeat. But take whatever Novak says with a grain of salt. Somebody wanted this senseless story out there to make Penn the fall guy.
Tough call on believing Novak, you can want to believe his story so much you give it undue credence, or you hate the guy and discount anything he says.
Seems like there’s a proliferation of Hillary stories like Novak’s out today.
Wow! Call me shocked that a “conservative law professor” would somehow find his way onto CNN to throw out something like this on caucus day.
Gotta love that ol’ liberal media. I’m sure they had to dig deep to come up with this one.
Shocking. Not.
btw – When Jeffery Toobin was on Charlie Rose hawking his book The Nine he predicted that if Clinton won she would appoint Obama to the court.
Penn is the fall guy.
Yes, I think that’s what I said. If I wasn’t clear — Penn is the fall guy. Novak is in on the plan to make sure Penn is the fall guy. Doesn’t make Novak’s story true.
No. Penn is responsible and will probably get fired if she loses in Iowa and New Hampshire. He’s not really the fall guy. But he will become the fall guy. They’ll blame him, but they won’t change anything because Penn represents their values.
This is a DLC machine from beginning to end. If Hillary keeled over tomorrow they could plug in Carper or Bayh of Ford Jr. and nothing would change.
I think Penn deserves to be the fall guy. I saw some clips of him, especially that “Barack used drugs” thing with Trippi, and I was disgusted.
In a way, I’m grateful to the fat bag of sleaze for mucking up Hillary’s chances, and like you I hope Iowa drives a stake through the Clintoon Restoration.
Ahem. From all critiques I’ve read and heard “It’s the top-down approach and that smug attitudeup – ” I’m entitled, it’s my turn” is a contributing factor responsible for her implosion (exactly what I’ve been waiting for since she announced.
The 3rd place as OK spin last evening aside I hope this is the end for Clintonism and the DLC. Won’t happen- she has the bucks to go all the way, and she will to the detriment of the party.
But one can hope.
Somebody wrote something good in the last 24 hours:
You should read it.
Touche.
Let me be clear then.
Novak is pulling some source out of his ass. But his point is valid. Clinton did something at the Philadelphia debate that made my ears perk up. She said ‘I’m the frontrunner.’ I was live blogging it and you can go back and see my instant reaction. Her campaign has been sagging ever since. She did prematurely triangulate and Mark Penn is largely responsible for the decision. And, if she loses, that will be the largest factor in why she lost.
So, while Novak may be using his typically cynical style of making his point, I agree with his point. His point is true.
There you go. That was a good comment.
I agree with you that the point is true. And I agree with your reasoning in this comment.
But I don’t think Novak is simply using “cynical style”.
Whenever there’s a fall guy there’s the public story and there’s the real story. The public story has shards of truth and much that is misleading. The real story is always the interesting one. Novak is part of the public story. He is being misleading. I don’t see any reason to cover the public story when you could talk about the real story.
First of all, I liked ‘premature triangulation’ for both its cleverness and its accuracy, and I wanted to use it.
Secondly, the real story is exactly what Novak is saying. Clinton voted for Kyl-Lieberman, she went with a pharma-friendly health plan, she refused to lead from the left on the war, torture, detainees, etc, because it would soften her on national security. All of this was a general election strategy, and most of it was driven by Mark Penn. Obviously, she went along with it. But Penn screwed up.
Booman, I have already started to celebrate Clintons loss. The Cosmos are being mixed!
Some of those tire tracks that remain on my body from being thrown under the bus in the 90’s(DOMA, DONT ASK DONT TELL,NAFTA) will finally start to heal.
But look out for the bloodbath and the DLC vicious trolls that will be released by McCauliff, Carville and Begala. It gonna git’ ugly out there very soon!
I think you’re right about Hillary seeing an embarrassing defeat tonight. HOWEVER, I don’t think it will be by Obama. His supporters are concentrated in certain precincts and much of his support just isn’t going to show up because they are young and flaky. Much of his support at rallies has been by people out-of-state just there to see him speak. Those people didn’t look like Iowans to me. Dana Milbank illustrates this well in his column this morning.
I hate making predictions about things that are so up in the air, but from my readings of late and my watching of all the campaign rallies, looking for who’s there, what towns they’re in and whatnot, I think Edwards has much stronger support where it matters than Obama does. The old folks and overweight albino rural women are angry and they’re going to show up for Edwards. And the trading of supporters’ loyalty (endorsements) between the candidates will have little if any real effect.
I predict Edwards will come out on top by a pretty good margin, followed by Obama. Then Clinton.
But then again, my predictions are no better than anyone else’s. So we’ll just have to wait – until tomorrow – and see. Because I think the media’s predictions based on Entrance Polls will be wrong as well. Entrance polls to a Democratic Caucus are not accurate like Exit Polls of a secret-ballot election because what goes on inside that caucus is so fluid and the peer pressure that goes on inside is powerful.
For the Republicans, Huckabee will win in a landslide. His supporters are determined and he’s the only one “genuine” enough to bother showing up for. Hell, Ron Paul could come in second for the same reason. Fans of the phonies will stay home and watch football.
From what my brother tells me who is in Iowa, Obama supporters are NOT concentrated in certain precincts. But Edwards are for sure. And as for Milbank he is a clown, and I also know for a fact many many young people are working as we speak for Obama. I agree we will see very soon.
I’m keep having the same nightmare, in which Obama is dressed as a stalking horse .
…clever title. Heh. One can only hope.
Now I’ll just go back to reading the thoughtful analysis presented on this post.