How do these two quotes jibe with each other?
“I have no intention of stopping until we finish what we started and until we see what happens in the next 10 contests and until we resolve Florida and Michigan. And if we don’t resolve it, we’ll resolve it at the convention—that’s what the credentials committees are for.”- Hillary Clinton, Interview with the Washington Post, published March 30, 2008.
Top Clinton campaign aide Harold Ickes doesn’t deny [Rahm] Emanuel’s political skills, but he says there won’t be any blood feud to referee. “There’s all this apocalyptic talk about a bloody convention,” Ickes tells NEWSWEEK, “a raging fight over credentials—some reports have gone so far as to analogize the possibility of Chicago in 1968. This is just overwrought hype … I think this issue will be settled well before the convention.”
Maybe it will all be settled before the convention, but how is it ‘overwrought hype’ to talk about a credentials fight when Hillary Clinton is not only threatening just that, but her entire strategy is completely dependent upon it?
Clinton advocate Governor Ed Rendell (D-PA) argued on Meet the Press this morning that young voters, Obama supporters, and the African-American community will mostly come home to Clinton as a nominee even if she is selected over Obama without winning the most states, having the most pledged delegates, or claiming the popular vote. Rendell asserted that Democratic voters would be persuaded by an argument that Clinton polls better against McCain in a few key battleground states. That’s not a persuasive argument. It’s magical thinking.
Newsweek asks, “Who will tell Hillary Clinton that the time has come to fold her tent?” But Clinton insists “I have no intention of stopping until we finish what we started.” The key error in Rendell’s reasoning is that he fails to acknowledge that current polls that show Clinton doing better against McCain, in e.g. Ohio, take no account of the disastrous alienation a Clinton nomination would inevitably engender in young voters, Obama supporters, and the African-American community. There is no realistic way for Clinton to win the nomination in a way that is seen as legitimate by the majority of Democrats. Anyone that ponders the future must wrap their mind around that basic unavoidable reality.
Rendell is under sniper fire and his thinking is pressured….
he’s delusional.
“that young voters, Obama supporters, and the African-American community will mostly come home to Clinton as a nominee even if she is selected over Obama without winning the most states, having the most pledged delegates, or claiming the popular vote.”
Before all this started poll after poll showed Hillary with high negatives – those who stated they’d never vote for her, moi included, have not changed.
Clinton camp needs to keep big donors assured there’s an option. Pig’s ear can be made into silk.
How do you run a mobilize the base Gore/Kerry type campaign which concedes all the Great Plains-Inter-Basin West and Southern states and then win in Ohio and Florida without the Black vote? You can’t and that’s HillZilla’s campaign. After Bill’s dog-whistle coded racist stuff in So. Carolina, she lost her electability. If I could hear it (and I’m a 56 year-old White Okie) I can damn well guarantee you the Blacks got it and if you don’t believe me, visit Jack and Jill Politics.
http://www.jackandjillpolitics.com/
She can’t win the General and has lost my vote because I don’t vote for racists. Especially when they’re Dems.
they don’t even use a dog whistle anymore. They are overtly arguing that he can’t win because he attended a black church.
It’s not even that. The devil’s whispers are out there basically telling white folks “Look, you know what’s going to happen if he’s the nominee…you won’t be allowed to disagree with Obama without being called a racist. Nobody’s going to 100% agree with Obama on everything, therefore you’ll be called a racist even if you have legitimate concerns about Obama. And that itself is proof Obama’s the real racist here.”
You see? Obama can’t win because America won’t elect a racist as President.
“young voters…will mostly come home to Clinton”
No we won’t. Most of us hate her and won’t vote if she’s the nominee. And that’s a fact.
Yep. Eddie’s not kidding anybody. Seriously, when did Pennsylvanians find this guy?
Whatever ends up happening, I hope that black voters will focus on the revelation of their political power and not on a (possible) palace coup by Hillary Clinton. The most outstanding and underreported feature of this election cycle is the sheer volume of voters a motivated black community can send to the polls.
Yes, the Establishment might well steal this election, but that’s almost beside the point. We talk about fighting for the soul of the party in primary contests. If black voters came out in the numbers they are this year at primary contests they could effectively pick and choose candidates for the party in any district with a significant black population. Congressional primaries have extremely low turnouts that would be completely swamped by high black turnout.
While this battle is up in the air, Barack Obama has shown the way to much bigger victories in the future. Keep it positive, refuse to be drawn into a mudslinging contest, and always, always go to the polls no matter how insignificant the contest. I can’t speak for white liberals any more than any given black person can speak for the black community, but I’ll guarantee you this: I’ll see you at the polls. We stand at the verge of a great political awakening if we hold fast no matter what happens this year.
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"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
I’m neither young, nor African American and I will not vote for Clinton. Her husband made the Democratic Party a corporate party, something which Obama will undo, not through words but through actions like raising $40 million from 442,000 donors in the month of March.
I have been an Obama supporter from the first time I heard him speak about solving problems through an inclusive politics that requires citizens to be active.
Until the South Carolina primary and Clinton’s fear mongering, I would have voted for her had she been the nominee. No longer. People show us who they are if we pay attention, and Clinton is blaring out who she is every passing day. It’s not very appealing in a Presidential candidate nor in a Senator. Not voting for Clinton doesn’t mean I’ll vote for McCain or Nader. What I will do is find a dog that looks like the one dataguy is threat’nin’ to martyr, and hold it hostage.
If this doesn’t get answered here, I’ll drop it in later in an open thread.
Boo-you’re a Pennsylvanian, what do you think of this analysis on dKos? I think the diarist also posts here.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/6/165230/3645/427/490794
It’s currently in the diaries here, and I commented there about what I’ve seen in the 19th.
thanks. I’ll take a look. Unfortunately, I often miss the diaries here, even thought they are excellent and often cross posts from other blogs.