Bill Clinton Blasts Media For Not Covering His Wife’s Record
This is not a good sign of a healthy Hillary Clinton for President campaign. In fact, it’s the sign of a campaign that now perceives itself to be in trouble:
Bill Clinton said Tuesday that if reporters covered the candidates’ public records better, his wife’s presidential bid would be far ahead of her rivals.
During a campaign stop on behalf of his wife, New York Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, the former president said he can’t understand why so much of the media coverage of the campaign ignores her experience – and, without naming him, the relative lack of experience of her closest Democratic rival, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama.
“One percent of the press coverage was devoted to their record in public life. No wonder people think experience is irrelevant. A lot of the people covering the race think it is (irrelevant),” Clinton said to students at Keene State College.
A bad, bad move, for several reasons:
(1) It won’t win over any votes and will lose his wife votes. Most people who don’t like Hillary Clinton have other issues. It is not because she is getting a terrible press. In fact, for the first part of her campaign she had an almost adoring press. But candidates beware: the media doesn’t really DECIDE there is a narrative, it happens (sort of like..you know what). And the typical cycle is The Rising Candidate, The Now Top Candidate Stumbles, The Now Top Candidate Falls. And there is The Former Top Candidate Returns.
(2) It’ll lose her votes because it’s keeping the issue out there of the fact that during a Hillary Clinton’s Presidency Bill will be either lurking in the shadows or perhaps fighting some battles for her. Yes, many Americans do love Bill Clinton. But Bill Clinton is as much as piece of old baggage for her as he is a beautiful valise.
(3) Blaming it on the media won’t work. To be sure, pundits, candidates, and most assuredly many bloggers scream IT’S ALL THE PRESS’S FAULT! when there’s a problem. But newspapers don’t just run stories with boilerplate information about a candidate’s record. The record is important but does not drive news coverage ..
(4) Some voters won’t totally buy the experience argument, no matter how true it is. There are some who feel that Mrs. Clinton — who by all accounts published and personal (I have friends in New York) has been an excellent, responsive-to-constituents Senator — is where she is because of who she married. By stepping into the battle — and in political terms stepping into it — Bill Clinton is keeping alive some concerns some have about American politics becoming a kind of rotating dynasty for the Bush and Clinton families.
(5) Bill Clinton hasn’t specified who suggested his wife’s experience was meaningless. Unless he has polled the news media or can run a new Psychic Hotline, it’s a blanket statement that will not win over a single solitary vote and be perceived as coming from a husband who is angry that his wife’s once-seemingly-shoo-in campaign now seems to have some problems.
(6) It perpetuates the image of a campaign that is in trouble and is lashing out. Even if that image is really not true, it’s hard to see how media coverage of him saying Hillary is not getting fair media coverage will help her. Not getting good press as an excuse for poll numbers is historically a thumb sucker excuse.
In 2008, Hillary Clinton’s task was to win over a large number of people who don’t like her and see her as a polarizing figure. She had been making strides until she went to war against Obama. Bill Clinton’s comments don’t help her imagery.
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14 Responses to “Bill Clinton Blasts Media For Not Covering His Wife’s Record”
To me, it gives the impression that she is not able to stand on her own by having Mr. Clinton come out to fight her battles for her. We know her record, we have heard of her ‘accomplishments’, it is not the job of the press to constantly report the same historical information to the masses casting Mrs. Clinton and her past ‘accomplishments’ in a positive light.
Lets face it, Mrs. Clinton is the Bob Wier of politics. Bobby puts on a good show, don’t get me wrong, but he aint gonna sell out the garden. Jerry could, Bill can, Mrs. Clinton should be satisfied that she can draw 75% at the Beacon and stay in the senate.
Bad for the Clintons = good for the USA.
Don’t you believe it’s much too early to start frothing at the mouth about Bill and Hillary Clinton (even if you are irrational about having someone else get the Dem nomination)? Does the Clinton campaign know much more than you about how Bill Clinton should best be used in the next eleven months?
Based on what I read here and around the blogosphere it is clear to me that the Clinton campaign will take it on the chin from bloggers no matter what it does. If she defends herself she has hubris. If Bill says something they are desperate. If she says something about Obama she is turning negative. If Obama says something about her and she says they are piling on, she is a weak woman. If she acts tough, she is a b…h, cold and calculating. If she tries to laugh a little more its phony and she is unlikeable. If she appears warm and personable in a smaller setting, she is phony and contrived. She wants to be President so she is an ego maniac. Cripes.
I get it. This election is about perceptions, and the candidates should do as commenters advise.
Attack
Shut up
Defend yourself
Ignore criticism.
Right, Gotcah.
[...] Clinton threw going on offense. It is, but it will not appear that way to a lot of people, I think Joe Gandelman has a good take on why this was an extraordinarily bad move by the Clinton campaign. (1)It [...]
At this point she has to win the primary. Bill Clinton is quite popular in the Democratic party, so bringing him in will help her in the primary. I don’t know how blaming the media goes over in liberal circles though. The impression I’ve gotten from reading comments on leftist blogs is that the MSM is absolutely hated. I’m not sure, but I think the type of people it would dissuade from voting for her are people like me, and she has no chance of getting my vote anyway. So, I’d say it’s a good move in primary season.
Her “moderate-centrist” posture is fake (we know what she did once she entered the White House in 1993), but so many bloggers are far to the left of the Mainstream and see her not so much as a slow-to-move-rashly Establishment candidate but just can’t stand that she hasn’t been as far left already as they want, including not demanding we stupidly pull all our troops out of Iraq yesterday! [tm] They are childishly impatient and apparently fall more for the “centrist-moderate” posturing than others do. Clinton doesn’t so much deserve credit for being critical of Iran, for which now she is being treated savagely by the far Left here and elsewhere, because all rational people would be, and are, critical of Iran and its aggression and threats to our interests in the Middle East as well as to our troops in Iraq, and criticism of Iran by presidential candidates is expected by the sane.
Times Online had said that the new intelligence estimate report was dangerous insofar as it would wrongly be misued by the Democrats to attack criticism of Iran,
and the Dimmies are right on cue:
Are we going to see more oversized postings as a result, about the problems Hillary Clinton is having even before 2008 has begun? “Hillary Clinton, warmonger” and other such nonsense?
It could be that if the Dimmies continue such nonsense they’ll broadcast their softness against our enemies and the electorate will swing back from 2006 toward a security-oriented 2002 and 2004 election result, especially if Iran attacks our forces openly between now and next November and the Dimmies continue their attacks against those who are critical of Iranian malevolence and misconduct.
DLS, (I’ll get to the Hillary component in a minute) what really gets me is that I thought we all knew that Iran was not pursuing nuclear weapons- for the same reason Iraq didn’t have nuclear weapons. I view the run up to the Iraq war and the run up to an attack on Iran (which thankfully is no longer a strong possibility) as the same: in both cases Bush said that he knew Iran (and Iraq) were developing nuclear weapons (and WMDs). About Iraq (before the invasion) Bush said that he could not share intelligence about Iraq’s WMD programs because it would damage national security. However Bush claimed that once we got into Iraq he would be able to show us proof. About Iran- Bush has offered no evidence of a weapons nuclear program. Bush has only said that Iran was developing nuclear weapons. Ahmedinejad, like Saddam, claimed that he was not developing nuclear weapons. Now we find out that Ahmedinejad, like Saddam, really didn’t have such programs.
So for me the NIE report doesn’t offer anything new, other than Bush admitting publicly that Iran does not have a nuke weapons program.
Now don’t get me wrong- I think Iran is much more of a menace than Saddam was after Bush’s father castrated his country after the first Gulf War. So while I am concerned about Iran and feel that we need to be careful and watchful of them, I think we we need to be smart about it. What I never liked about Bush (other than his lies about WMD programs in Iraq and Iran) was his warmongering attitude and threats, especially his threat of attacking Iran without the need for congressional approval. Oh, and his childish habit of not wanting to talk to them.
Hillary lost any support I would have possibly given her when she voted against Iran, not because of this latest NIE report. She lost my support a few months ago because I felt that when she cast her vote against Iran that she was buying into the Bush administration’s story- just like she did with Iraq. I was willing to accept her justification for her Iraq authorization vote at face value (she claimed she voted for a better negotiating position for the US, not for an actual invasion) even though her critics still slammed her. I also expected her to learn from her Iraq vote folly. Foolish me…. But when she made the same mistake with the Iran vote…. well that did it for me and told me what sort of person she really was (not Presidential material). I thought we needed to take a different approach with Iran than we did with Iraq, believing we had learned our lessons there….
However for her critics to assail her now in light of the NIE report, I think is just, well… politics. It’ll be interesting to see if Bush makes out better politically on the NIE report than she does, even though I feel that her vote against Iran a few months ago is evidence that she supported Bush’s position on Iran. Even though he was talking invasion and she wasn’t I still feel that because of her vote that she implicitly supported it. At the time she made a big deal that she wasn’t supporting an attack on Iran, but her vote made her come across as strong on security. I didn’t think she could have it both ways….
I don’t think this will really hurt Hillary because the American public feels that Iran continues to be a threat. and Hillary did vote against them.
I don’t think we’ll swing back to the security-oriented 2002 and 2004 election climates, but I’m not going to dismiss it, because security is viewed as a Republican strength. If Bush can’t attack the Dems and make them look weak on other issues, he can still make security an issue.
Anyway, I don’t agree with everything you said, but you had some great and interesting comments, DLS. Thanks!
This does not even require rational thought.
The far left hates her. The far right hates her. That is roughly 50-60 percent of the country that despises the woman because she is ambitious and either not far left enough or simply Clinton.
Gee I wonder what politician running for office is not ambitious??
Obama is perhaps the most Ambitious and power hungry of them all. The man has been in congress three freakin years and already he is trying to become president of the USA.
He should go back to voting on which car wash to shut down and who should get a beer license. Thats the extent of his governing experience prior to being elected to the Senate in 2004.
But he is far left and he is NOT Hillary.
Hillary and Bill Richardson are the only two that have a clue among the entire democratic party. The right continues to be villified for playing to their base and yet what is happening on the left?
You got it the Base is running the show. The difference is that the “Animal House” Left seems to have convinced this nation that Sex, Drugs and party till you drop is a far better thing then fighting a war.
Gosh what a message. I believe that one too till you take a close look at all the implications. Yet a nation obsessed with Paris Hilton and her DRAMA surely cant see past its own nose to the implications that something as far away as Iraq/Iran/Afghanistan/Russia might play with their future and the futures of their children.
No gimme drugs/booze……..If were stoned or drunk we dont care what happens anywhere else.
Its a good message. No wonder the left so hates the Rights Patriotic flag waving reality based message.
Hillary’s record? What record? Oh, yeah, she’s been running on her husband’s record – as Obama puts, taking credit for everything that went well while not taking credit for anything that didn’t work out.
I’ve looked carefully at both Obama’s and Clinton’s records, and I frankly don’t see an experience advantage either way. I don’t count being First Lady as meaningful experience towards running the country, btw. Both of them are the least experienced of the Democratic field. I just don’t think that’s a card she really wants to play.
I didn’t neglect you — was out picking up my truck and leaving nearly a thousand bucks behind for the privilege. And then there was that Cuban CD I had in the truck that I had to listen to a few times …
Most of us knew Iran had been working on an atomic bomb for several years (the reason for all its game-playing with the IAEA and everyone else). It’s odd that just now we’re being told that it stopped in 2003 and has suspended its program (at least its bomb-specific activities; it is still enriching uranium, which is the real obstacle to getting a bomb). It may well be that Iran is confident of its design (or it is doing what I long wondered what a rogue state didn’t pursue, which is to ignore going for an implosion weapon and go with the simpler though less efficient gun-type weapon, given enough bomb fuel; we didn’t bother testing the gun-type weapon we dropped on Hiroshima, it is so simple). (NOTE: That answers Rudi’s question concerning things like krytrons and such needed for an implosion device.)
Iraq and Iran are different. With Iraq, the regime in power had WMDs and used them in the past, so that is why nearly everyone believed Iraq had WMDs at the time of this war. At least one liberal critic told me how I felt and most felt (reluctantly accepting the war): “Just show us the WMDs.” The Bush under-the-table WMD joke backfired among us.
Actually, Iran has worked on nuclear weapons for years, but the report says it suspended its program as of 2003. Reputable sources on Iranian nuclear activities can be found here, here, here, and here, for example. We know at some of this is nuclear-weapons-related work because of the deliberate deception by Iran about these activities, as well as the claims it makes that simply do not make sense (wanting to create much more fissile material than it needs for its reactors; wanting a civilian nuclear power program when it doesn’t need one and when the reactors, at least in the past, had no planned or actual ties to the electrical distribution (transmission) system).
Little has been said about the possibility this war may have been due in part to Hussein’s attempt to kill Dubya’s father. (In my belief, it was mainly due to the belief that getting rid of Hussein really would unleash a democratic movement in the Middle East.)
I’ve asked this elsewhere. What does “smart” mean other than not rushing to conduct air strikes?
The Revolutionary Guard (and Pasdaran, too) is a terrorist group, by definition, unless you want to say instead that it is a sponsor of and participant in terrorism.
Wasn’t the resolution non-binding? That makes it silly.
She’s the leader and they’re trying to appeal to the left-side base of the Democratic electorate in attacking her.
We certainly swung away from that in 2006.
To me the biggest thing driving 2006 was burnout with Iraq and I believe we’re going to see a Democrat in the White House in 2009 for that reason as well as because the GOP field is weak.
Ask yourself this: If we conducted air strikes in Iran, not suddenly (because we knew something about the nuke program not declassified) but particularly if Iran shelled or lobbed a missile at one of our bases, or was identified as the party conducting a mass attack against our forces, would we be happy to have struck Iran? Probably more relieved after being offended, but not happy about it. I believe such an event wouldn’t necessarily boost the GOP’s chances in November 2008.
I believe the same is true if we are attacked by terrorists before November 2008.
She acted as unofficial Co-President, often behaving as if she had more authority than her husband.
That’s why almost nobody doubts her competence, and in fact why those politically opposed to her have more “depth” to their opposition than they otherwise would have. They know they should be worried.
I’m worried, too, tempered as are other voters by having experienced her rule before, so we’re at least not worried because she’s unknown, and by knowing we can only wait to see how farther left she goes after election.