The morning after her win in the Pennsylvania primary over Barack Obama, The New York Times, Hillary Clinton’s hometown newspaper, slammed her campaign for it’s negative and divisive tactics.
The Pennsylvania campaign, which produced yet another inconclusive result on Tuesday, was even meaner, more vacuous, more desperate, and more filled with pandering than the mean, vacuous, desperate, pander-filled contests that preceded it.
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.
If nothing else, self interest should push her in that direction. Mrs. Clinton did not get the big win in Pennsylvania that she needed to challenge the calculus of the Democratic race. It is true that Senator Barack Obama outspent her 2-to-1. But Mrs. Clinton and her advisers should mainly blame themselves, because, as the political operatives say, they went heavily negative and ended up squandering a good part of what was once a 20-point lead.
On the eve of this crucial primary, Mrs. Clinton became the first Democratic candidate to wave the bloody shirt of 9/11. A Clinton television ad — torn right from Karl Rove’s playbook — evoked the 1929 stock market crash, Pearl Harbor, the Cuban missile crisis, the cold war and the 9/11 attacks, complete with video of Osama bin Laden. “If you can’t stand the heat, get out of the kitchen,” the narrator intoned.
If that was supposed to bolster Mrs. Clinton’s argument that she is the better prepared to be president in a dangerous world, she sent the opposite message on Tuesday morning by declaring in an interview on ABC News that if Iran attacked Israel while she were president: “We would be able to totally obliterate them.”
By staying on the attack and not engaging Mr. Obama on the substance of issues like terrorism, the economy and how to organize an orderly exit from Iraq, Mrs. Clinton does more than just turn off voters who don’t like negative campaigning. She undercuts the rationale for her candidacy that led this page and others to support her: that she is more qualified, right now, to be president than Mr. Obama.
Mr. Obama is not blameless when it comes to the negative and vapid nature of this campaign. He is increasingly rising to Mrs. Clinton’s bait, undercutting his own claims that he is offering a higher more inclusive form of politics. When she criticized his comments about “bitter” voters, Mr. Obama mocked her as an Annie Oakley wannabe. All that does is remind Americans who are on the fence about his relative youth and inexperience.
No matter what the high-priced political operatives (from both camps) may think, it is not a disadvantage that Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton share many of the same essential values and sensible policy prescriptions. It is their strength, and they are doing their best to make voters forget it. And if they think that only Democrats are paying attention to this spectacle, they’re wrong.
After seven years of George W. Bush’s failed with-us-or-against-us presidency, all American voters deserve to hear a nuanced debate — right now and through the general campaign — about how each candidate will combat terrorism, protect civil liberties, address the housing crisis and end the war in Iraq.
It is getting to be time for the superdelegates to do what the Democrats had in mind when they created superdelegates: settle a bloody race that cannot be won at the ballot box. Mrs. Clinton once had a big lead among the party elders, but has been steadily losing it, in large part because of her negative campaign. If she is ever to have a hope of persuading these most loyal of Democrats to come back to her side, let alone win over the larger body of voters, she has to call off the dogs.
April 23rd, 2008 at 8:33 am
In order to win in delegates, she would need 70% of the votes in the remaining primaries. She’s done and should drop out all together.
April 23rd, 2008 at 8:39 am
Have you forgotten Florida and Michigan?
April 23rd, 2008 at 9:17 am
You mean the Michigan election which had only one candidate’s name on the ballot? And the Florida election in which candidates were barred from campaigning in?
If some back room deal denies the man with more votes and more wins the nomination, expect violence at the convention.
April 23rd, 2008 at 12:11 pm
Fine, he’ll get the nomination. I’ll still write Hillary’s name in for the general election. If he hadn’t entered this race, which all knew Hillary was preparing for, the party wouldn’t be so splintered. You say she should get out now, he should have gotten out then and prepared himself to be her successor. She is prepared, she is knowledgeable, and she has my vote whether she has the nomination or not. Her substance over Obama’s rhetoric any day.
April 23rd, 2008 at 1:32 pm
counter,
How could any one forget Florida and Michigan?
Most people have recognized that those states Republican lead legislatures volated the democratic partys rules.
Neather state will pay for a re-do.
The votes in the primary will not count.
Blame the Republican fuck-up-governemnt crowd in Michigan and Florida.
April 23rd, 2008 at 2:51 pm
Florida and Michigan broke the rules. They shouldn’t count. Obama is going to win.
April 23rd, 2008 at 10:05 pm
Obama deserves to win if he keeps his cool (honor) which is why I support him in the first place. (My generation’s “JFK”)
Please don’t give in to her bullshit…her bullshit politics are just what I am voting against.
Send a message to the world…vote for Obama (if he keeps his honor…Clinton has none).
April 24th, 2008 at 9:43 am
Well Jim, I completely disagree. If you talk to any of Obama’s “inner ring” supporters you’ll find even they admit he is just part of the machine (note today’s Post article which shows that while he states he doesn’t take money from oil companies themselves, he has taken more money from oil company employees than any other Democratic candidate). If you want to vote for a virtually unknown, untested figure, fine. I prefer someone with experience who has outlined her plans in detail and is aware of what she’s getting into in the world arena. He’s got good rhetoric but that’s not enough to win my vote. I’m not giving in to anything, I have a perfectly good brain, I research the issues and my vote is for Hillary.
April 24th, 2008 at 12:02 pm
If you research the issues, you have probably noticed that obama scores higher with college educated people than Hillary.
Perhaps she needs to raise the issue of just how badly our colleges are educating people these days.
Four years of college and they remain too stupid to recognize her right to the presidency. Some even question her honesty. Why is that?
April 24th, 2008 at 12:32 pm
Obama attracts the educated because they are busy proving they are not racist and they will vote for a black man. They may like his platform too, but as has been noted repeatedly, the policy differences between Hillary and Obama are minimal.
Why do they question her? I have my ideas on the matter, but they can answer for themselves.
April 26th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Anonymous,
I mis-spoke a little when I said “HER bullshit politics”. I meant bullshit politics in general. Hillary Clinton certainly didn’t invent modern politics…but she is not going to try to get rid of them either!
I am looking for our best chance for someone to get us out of all of these deadly vicious circles we (the U.S.) has gotten ourselves into. Since Richardson was a no starter, I vote for Obama.