Overall, Hillary Clinton’s big night was another Pyrrhic victory. Much like Super Duper Tuesday, when Clinton had big wins in California, New Jersey, and Massachusetts but lost the overall delegate count, Clinton utterly failed last night in her main task…closing the delegate gap. Super Duper Tuesday was played in the press as a great night for Team Clinton, but the reality was that it was a complete disaster that cost her any chance to win a clean victory in the nominating process.
The press coverage last night was remarkably bad, in that it completely ignored THE MATH. But Clinton did succeed in one respect. She raised the specter that Obama cannot take a punch. Democrats do not want another nominee like Michael Dukakis or John Kerry that doesn’t fight back adequately. Clinton will get farther making that argument than she will questioning Obama’s foreign policy judgment or personal ethics. So, that is the test that Obama must pass in the next few weeks.
First things first…Obama must win the Wyoming caucuses on Saturday and the Mississippi primary on Monday. Doing so will both add to his insurmountable delegate lead and stem Clinton’s considerable momentum. If he can accomplish that, he needs to make an effort to get the superdelegates to come forward and throw their weight behind him. It really isn’t up to Clinton whether this race goes on. Seven weeks of campaigning for the Pennsylvania prize will be a total disaster for the party. If Clinton succeeds in destroying Obama’s electability in those seven weeks, she’ll also destroy her relationship with the black community, thus dooming her chances in the general election. The superdelegates exist to prevent things like that from happening. It’s their responsibility to take a hard look at THE MATH and make sure that THE MATH precludes any possibility of Clinton winning the nomination.
If the superdelegates do not do this and they let the Clintons shred the party coalition, then we deserve to lose…and we will lose. It’s up to Obama to fight back and win the next two contests. If he does that, it’s up to the adults to put this nominating process to bed.
Slightly OT, but last night watching a snippet of MsNBC I heard Chris Matthews claim that Hilary winning in Ohio meant John McCain sits in the catbird seat, and is now the most likely candidate to be elected President.
The man crush on McCain just never ends for the media.
If I had a nickel for every time that Jeffrey Toobin or someone else said that the nomination is now ‘wide open’ I’d be able to buy a latte.
It’s not wide open. The door is, and has been, shut tight.
As I’ve said time and time again, the Village wants Clinton vs McCain. They will do anything to get it, including this “nomination is wide open” crap.
Soon we’ll be seeing the articles saying how “If Hillary had Michigan and Florida’s delegates, she’d have the lead.”
They need McCain to appear viable. They’ll lose viewers if they admit that the results in November are in any way a foregone conclusion, so they’ll keep beating the dead horse to make it look like it’s still racing.
Even before 3/4 Hillary had pretty slim chances for an honest win and her camp seems pretty happy with a result that knocked her chance for an honest win down to none. She was praying for some kind of miracle scandal to knock out Obama. She didn’t need good chances to stay in.
She can’t be forced from the race because she has enough grassroots support to fund the rest of her campaign. Remember, the campaign is 3/4 over – not much left. Superdelegate endorsements don’t force her out because they can always change (just watch the Hillary camp drop references to totals with supers if they ever get bleak for her.)
So she’ll keep praying and criticizing and party-splitting, probably all the way to the convention. She needed a miracle. She’s not going to change her strategy, because the cost-benefit hasn’t changed much for her.
A few thoughts. This is worth a read:
Comedians and Voters: Don’t Let The Press Bias Toward Hillary Throw You
Link
I think it’s time for the media to stop doing “penance” for what Saturday Night Live apparently told them was an “anti-Clinton bias”, and just try reporting the freaking facts, without bias.
Also, “balance” does not mean being sure to have one negative Obama story every time there’s a negative Clinton story. From the article I just linked:
Has it ever occurred to the Comedy Bloc that, to paraphrase Stephen Colbert, the facts have a pro-Obama bias?
And finally, as a mother and someone with a graduate degree in psychology, I’m concerned about the fact that Hillary Clinton’s recent rash of negative attacks seem to have worked, according to exit polling. Nothing like good old fashioned positive reinforcement to help insure that we’ll be seeing more of the same. And I don’t think it’s good for any of us if this race gets more negative. It’s the sort of thing that makes a lot of people disgusted with politics. So I do hope that the “grownups” will step in, in some way.
If Obama wants to retain my respect, he needs to hit her HARD right now. I need to see that he’s capable of fighting and winning a war, and she has openly declared war on him. He MUST dump the dirt that he has on the Clintons and really fight tough. I know… I know… He wants to take the high road. That is no longer an option. He’s looking like a pussy and he needs to fix that situation right now. I can not support a candidate who will do the Lee Atwater techniques up-front (Clinton) but I also can not support a candidate who is either unwilling or afraid to defend himself against those tactics.
Demand the tax returns be released now that she thinks she’s the “front-runner.” That’s a first step. And feed some of the dirt on Bill and Hill to friendly press right now. They need to disappear from the picture right away. If he can’t kick her off the stage quickly, I’m not sure if I can continue to support his candidacy.
Wonder when the hell John Edwards will come out with an endorsement.
Somewhere last night I read that he was supposed to endorse today. Can’t find that now…maybe I imagined it.
But I’d love to see Obama get a new endorsement every time Hillary pulls some negative crap.
I studied psychology at Ohio State. That was years ago, but maybe I really am a behaviorist at heart. š
Hillary Clinton has gone through the looking-glass, entered the bubble and is planning to sit there pertly smiling at everyone on the outside, singing her own virtues, until the sticky bubble bursts in all our faces.
Let’s agree that she won’t win the nomination, but the lesson her camp learned after last night, that fear and smear work, has me worried again that we will lose in November. I used to believe that because I thought she would be the nominee, now I think it’s possible due to the impending scorched earth. Say what you want about Tweety, he’s right about McCain being in the catbird seat right now.
For anyone who’s interested, Jerid at Buckeye State Blog has posted a breakdown of the delegates in Ohio, by district. Just so you all know, we don’t all suck here in Ohio.
Another post here at Plunderbund analyzes the trends, and wonders about racism as a factor in some areas.
with this:
imo it should have been clear to him after Super Tuesday that that was going to be part of the test with March 4. She made it her firewall. Part of the reason this race is dragging on is because he failed on that test. So he’s not coming out of this nominating process with an “A” no matter what.
If Clinton succeeds in destroying Obama’s electability in those seven weeks, she’ll also destroy her relationship with the black community, thus dooming her chances in the general election…. If the superdelegates do not do this and they let the Clintons shred the party coalition, then we deserve to lose…and we will lose.
Brendy-boy is predicting that Clinton will shred the coalition and go on to lose to McCain.
You can see it coming a mile away booman. there is only one thing the Democratic Party really does well: lose.
just watch.
I have BBC news playing on the radio. Some Hillary idiot just said we live in a dangerous world and Hillary has the experience that Obama doesn’t. And he’d be happy with Clinton or McCain.
For me, that pretty much sums it up re Hillary lovers.
My answer?
It grew.
read it here if you so desire:
Booman: “What now?” AG: “Ain’t Democracy Grand?”
Yup.
AG
Don’t worry. David Axelrod ran Harold Washington’s mayorial campaign in Chicago. The Democratic oppositions was just as sleazy and racist as the Clintons and he came through.
Here’s what you do.
Hey Hillary. You claim Obama has done something illegal with Rezco. So you obviously have evidence that the prosecutors in Illinois doesn’t have. So save them the time in money. Let us see your evidence.
Or are you just lying?
Hillary. There are a million people in this Country sick, dying, or going broke trying to get health care.
You claim you are an experienced leader with all these years of experience. You claim you spent all your years in the White House fighting for us.
So tell us, where is the health care.
Or are you lying again.
As far as I am concerned, giving the voters in the later primary states the choice of more than one candidate is not bad for democracy. Giving the voters more opportunities to see both Clinton and Obama respond in debates is not bad for our democracy. Even giving the Clinton campaign the opportunity to run ads that raise legitimate questions about Obama is not bad for our democracy because it gives the electorate the opportunity to see how he handles these (his response to the “3AM” ad was excellent).
What is bad for the Democratic Party is team Clinton’s willingness to engage in scorched earth tactics to claim the nomination by any means. If the Clintons continue to run this campaign with the attitude that their legacy and ambition are more important than the health and success of the Democratic Party, then not only the convention, but the general election will be disastrous.