May 9, 2008

Should Hillary Go On?

No, but I say that because she never should have run in the first place rather than anything that happened in Indiana or North Carolina last night. So, no, it's a ridiculous waste of time having Hillary Clinton out there running around wanting to be president, but no more so than it always was.

Learned commentators of most every stripe are falling all over each other commanding their collective grasp of the obvious: Hillary's not going to make it. She's not going to have enough delegates. She hasn't won enough states. She doesn't have enough money (more on that below). She didn't get enough people to vote for her. She can't win, she can only hurt the Democratic Party by going on.

As usual, there's a good bit of truth in the collective wisdom of the corporate media, and as usual they've missed some of the best bits.

First off, Barack Obama doesn't yet have all of the delegates that he needs to secure the nomination. It's been a close race, and one full of surprises, so there's no reason that Hillary should throw herself to the ground just because he's way closer to the finish line. Second, it's a free country and people can run for president whenever they like. If John Edwards wanted to jump back in the race, let him!

If Hillary wants to switch parties and start running against John McCain for the Republican nomination, let her! Actually, that would probably be more appropriate…

I've always believed that Hillary had a better chance of winning the Democratic nomination than she did in winning the presidency if she had it. The main reason isn't that Republicans are less immune to her particular strain of nonsense (rank and file voters in both parties are about equally adept at picking up on the lunacy of candidates in the other one), but because the most important poll that's been taken in the past decade or so is the one showing that a huge and overwhelming majority of Americans believe that America is drifting in the wrong direction.

No one in American politics is more status quo than Hillary Clinton. Her husband adopted the approaches that have ruined so much for so many, and when it suits her she brags that she helped implement them. She has worked feverishly for corporate America since being elected to the Senate, and isn't there a wonderful irony in the way that they've repaid her?

They backed her big early on, but backed off when she fell behind. All of a sudden she went from being Ms. Deeppockets to having to do a Little Orphan Annie routine! Why? Because she was obviously going down, and the corporate bigwigs (most of them, I'm suggesting consensus rather than unanimity) are more afraid of McCain than they are of Obama.

It's worth questioning the truth of that last statement, but the fact is that McCain made his name nationally on campaign finance reform. Obama's rhetoric is masterful and impassioned, but its keynote is inclusion and certainly not class war. McCain has been caught cutting dubious deals with corporate honchos, but they're the ones that have been his personal friends. It's an old Republican tradition, cutting deals for your friends, and George W. Bush's loyalty to friends under fire may be his only even partially redeeming characteristic. If nothing else, Obama is less experienced, which may be mis-read as more malleable.

Of course the floodgates of corporate largesse opened wide when Hillary won Pennsylvania because they're coming to the conclusion that Obama isn't as light as they'd hoped at first, but I've got wonder if there's a trickle left in there.

It doesn't matter.

Fact is, Hillary stands to help Obama more by staying in the race, at least through Oregon . I've lived in Oregon, I've worked a presidential campaign in Oregon and I'm here to tell you that there's no way in hell that Hillary is going to pull three votes more than 40% in Oregon. It's likely that she'll lose every single demographic, including blue collar workers who can't spell "cat" and little old grey-haired ladies who think that Bill Clinton is "kind of cute."

The reality is that Hillary Clinton's campaign has hurt the Democratic party, but not for the reasons usually noted. She's reminded so many Democrats that the only thing they can think of to celebrate over the last 20 years is that they elected Bill, twice. In turn he's reminded them that his only extreme talent is the ability to manipulate the truth to such extraordinary angles that it no longer resembles itself.

It is she-and not Obama-who has reminded everyone that it's possible to run for president without ever having accomplished anything, or had an original thought. She has reminded thinking Democrats that they're on the same team as a lot of people who can't.

Stay in the race Hillary. You're not mortally wounded, you were never really alive. Become a lightning rod for the disdain of the people you've confused and ripped off. It's too late to rehabilitate yourself, but leave them a shot at it, ok?