11 Observations On Clinton’s Crash & Burn
First and foremost, Hillary Clinton never seemed comfortable with herself in stark contrast to Barack Obama, who as one speech analyst put it, can sound rousing while being conciliatory. Clinton’s discomfort sometimes translated into a sense of phoniness and was exacerbated by her mood swings – from crying on cue early in the primary season to angrily pounding the podium as she became increasingly beleaguered.
Clinton’s early and enthusiastic approval of the Iraq war dogged her throughout the campaign. Hypersensitive to being viewed as a flip-flopper and apology averse to begin with, she never made a clean break with the war and might not have wanted to. What she did do is dodge the issue by saying that she would not vote for the war if she had it to do over again.
When Clinton’s initial strategy of campaigning as an incumbent flopped in the face of Obama’s seductive hope-and-change mantra, there followed a series of ill-conceived course corrections. The first was her as Ms. Policy Wonk, then as Ms. Race Baiter and finally as Ms. Voters Are Idiots in which she pandered by backing a gas-tax holiday scheme that no economist will touch, emptily threatened to destroy OPEC, and prattled that elitists are what ails America.
Clinton relied on insiders who were out of touch with the mood of the electorate. This was especially egregious in the case of strategist Mark Penn, a pollster who used his own data as ends to justify predetermined means much like Bush used ponied up intelligence to justify the Iraq war. Penn eventually embarrassed her campaign almost as much as the other big insider — her husband.
Clinton painted herself into a corner by stressing her Washington experience in a campaign in which many change-hungry voters viewed that has a handicap and a some already suffered from Clinton Fatigue. Compounding this problem was that some of her experience, notably the Tuzla Incident, were figments of her imagination.
Clinton got creamed at the grassroots level. While Obama had substantially more money to spend, his staff went to extraordinary lengths to understand the lay of the electoral land all the way down to detailed profiles of each of the 435 congressional districts, and had a substantial volunteer presence in all 50 states. Clinton concentrated her ground operations in a few large states, didn’t bother to organize in caucus states and had to continually play catch up.
Although Clinton and Obama took substantially similar positions on most issues, she failed to make the case that she would be an agent for change because she often blurred her message, Bill Clinton stepped on her lines and, as the primary season dragged on, Obama became adept at quickly responding to her increasingly bellicose pronouncements, including using nuclear weapons against Iran.
Clinton never was comfortable with her role as the first serious woman presidential candidate, which may have had something to do with the fact that her feminist credentials are suspect. In any event, she used her gender more as a cudgel than a talking point, and the feminist notion of liberation — which was one of Obama’s memes, was AWOL from a campaign that was run like a patriarchy.
Clinton was not a natural campaigner but grew into that role. But compared to Obama, she simply did not inspire. This would not have mattered against a less charismatic candidate and less capable speaker as a primary foe.
Becoming a vice presidential running mate is not something that is negotiated like a labor contract, but from appearances Clinton is determined to do just that. Problem is, Obama would be foolish to ask her to come on board because a belated endorsement would seem insincere after all of the bile that she has spilled and adding her negatives to his own would not be a winning combination. Giving her another go at heading up a health-care reform initiative is a much better idea.
Beyond her own negatives, Clinton’s biggest handicap was her inability to come to terms with Bill Clinton both as husband and campaigner, and he with his own role. It almost seemed as if he was out to sabotage her campaign with his angry outbursts, and it probably will only be a matter of time before he becomes enmeshed in another sex scandal. We can be thankful that it did not happen during the primary season. Or, God help us, if Hillary Clinton became president. Or becomes vice president.
32 Responses to “11 Observations On Clinton’s Crash & Burn”
[...] get things rolling, Shaun Mullen at The Moderate Voice comes up with a list of reasons why Hillary’s campaign fell apart: First and foremost, Hillary Clinton never seemed comfortable with herself in stark contrast to [...]
I hardly think Hillary Crashed and Burned.
She was battled to an essential tie by a very good Orator and a party that wants desperately to swing farther left.
Barak Obama did NOT win. He was crowned. He secured MORE delegates then did Hillary but he did not win enough to by the rules win the nomination. The party therefore gave it to him even though in the end it appears that Hillary won more popular votes then did Barak.
Which of course we all know that when Obama was leading the popular vote it was one of their major talking points, now that he has been slightly passed in the popular vote its a bogus contention now.
So I reject your entire thesis. Hillary was supposed to win and did not.
One thing I will grant you. The party has made it very obvious that they have grown tired of the Clintons and their more moderate stance and want the party to move farther to the left while pretending to be moderates.
The center has moved so far to the right these last 20 years, partly because of the Clintons. The results haven't been pretty.
Uh yes he did win.
The election is decided by delegates not popular vote. There is no use in being purposefully dense.
It was one of his major talking points? When? You still counting the non-elections in Michigan and Florida? How about the caucus voters?
You can reject his thesis, but you didn't even begin to refute it.
If you think Obama is much further to the left of Clinton, I don't think you've done your homework. And I don't think the Clintons ruled as moderates, they ruled as centrists. And centrism is dangerous while the Republicans insist on being so radically to the right.
I think many of your statements are inaccurate and/or delusional. Perhaps you drank the kool-aid?
- “it appears that Hillary won more popular votes then did Barak.” NOT TRUE. Not only does it not appear that way, it isn't the case at all after Tuesday;
- regardless of the popular vote, candidates are elected by delegates. I suppose this whole “popular vote” issue started with Gore, but the fact remains, as any high school student knows, the delegates/electoral college decide elections, not the popular vote;
- “Hillary was supposed to win” – what does this even mean? I, like many Americans, apparently did not get the memo indicating that Hillary was the presumptive nominee before any vote was cast. Do you REALLY believe she was entitled to the nomination?
- I think there are million reasons the party is tired of the Clintons, but I don't think “their more moderate stance” has a single thing to do with it.
Chris
Perhaps I am being dense but no less so then the Obama supporters who are taking from this primary season a victory when this primary season has been a defeat for democrats in general.
Delegates that each candidate WON via the primary process.
1766.5 Obama.
1639.5 Clinton.
Delegates NEEDED to SECURE the nomination. 2118.
Popular vote. Obama pulls out a win on the popular vote if you include the caucus states as well as the uncommitted votes from Michigan BUT This number would be about 50,000 less if the Washington primary results from February 19th were used instead of the Washington Caucus results.)
If you use the primary numbers which are official and not the caucus numbers which are guesses and not official then Hillary wins the popular vote.
We can go round and round about this all day long. The point is that who ultimately decided who was going to represent the Democrats was not the voters. It was the Democratic big wigs lead by a DNC leadership that wanted to punish voters for not following their rules.
The punish mentality is running the democratic party. They have railed about the war so long that they have actually poisoned their own party as well by splitting it right down the middle.
I think many of your statements are inaccurate and/or delusional. Perhaps you drank the kool-aid?
This speaks for itself. If you do not agree with Obama and his supporters you are a “fill in the blank”
You can reject his thesis, but you didn't even begin to refute it.
Chris perhaps you could point out his thesis.
Definition of a thesis. A proposition that is maintained by argument.
I believe his thesis is the title since his post was simply 11 points.
Therefore 11 reasons why Hillary Crashed and burned was his thesis and my rejection of his thesis was not a rejection of his points. I simply rejected the assertion that she crashed and burned.
Look, there was no election in either Florida or Michigan, so give up trying to use those numbers.
I could come out and say “Hey, I'm Davebo and I'm holding an election for the democratic nominee, come vote” but no one would consider it a valid election.
Judging by the turnout, voters in Florida and Michigan didn't consider it a valid election either. What about all the voters who chose not to vote because they had been told it wouldn't count?
Spin it anyway you want, but Obama won the primaries. It was indeed an incredibly tight race, but he won.
It's like saying, 'Well, the Giants ended the game with a higher score, but the Patriots had more total yardage so the NFL just gave the win to the Giants”.
On this we can agree. Throughout the Primary process Hillary's support remained steady according to aggregate polling data. See below.
http://www.slate.com/id/2192952
What happened is not that Hillary lost, but Obama won. The numbers bear this out. His support increased steadily throughout the primaries with the exception of a small drop in May.
Watch out for one of the Republican talking points – that Obama is “the most liberal senator”. To put it quite simply, this is factually untrue, and easily disproven by checking his actual votes.
Based on his 2007-2008 voting record, Obama is the 40th-most-liberal senator (compared to 29th for Clinton and 82nd for McCain, by the way). Over his entire lifetime senate record, he ranks 24th (compared to 18th for Clinton, and 60th for McCain). And when you just look at party-line substantive votes, Obama ranks 43rd (compared to 30th for Clinton and 69th for McCain).
For all the details, check out here: http://downwithtyranny.blogspot.com/2008/05/oba…
Bookmark the site, and bring it up the next time you run across a Republican shill who is trying to push the “most liberal” meme — because I'm sure we'll be hearing it trotted out dozens of times in the upcoming months.
An excellent analysis, and I'm sure we will be seeing plenty of Clinton post-mortems in the weeks to come. As they say, “Hindsight is 20/20″, it's easier to see all the glaring errors in the Clinton campaign now that all the shouting is all-but-over.
There were plenty of mistakes that lead to Clinton's downfall, but if I had to boil it all down to one, single thing, I would pin it squarely on her inexplicable inability to admit that she made a mistake when she voted for the invasion and occupation of Iraq. I truly believe that if she had admitted her fault early in the campaign, this whole nomination process would have been over by Super Tuesday…just as she predicted. That one massive mistake opened the door just enough for Obama to walk through, and the rest, as they say, is history.
It took a bevy of mistakes to bring the Clinton machine to its knees, but it was her failure to admit fault with the Iraq vote that made that all possible.
Exactly.
Clinton did not crash and burn. Clinton lost in a close race to Obama, who was favored by more people than those who favored Clinton, largely due to emotional and other subjective bases of appeal, including ridiculous extremism and misstatement of reality about the Iraq War. Or as it was also said,
“She was battled to an essential tie by a very good Orator and a party that wants desperately to swing farther left.”
Farther left than the 1990s, obviously; farther left than 1980, may the USA truly fear such a prospect. I do not believe things would get that bad, that there would be another well-earned 1994 if that movement even farther to the left were attempted.
Obama is a good orator and a pretty boy and he's young and has the starry-eyed even more in love with him than they were for Bill Clinton and Gary Hart combined, but that is worrisome if it continues to be all that Obama offers the US public or at least it is worrisome to those of us who have other, more substantial criteria by which we will assess Obama as a future President. Is he going to bring naive or worse, aggressive activists to Washington, or just do what's most likely and talk grandly while the Democratic Party machine and Washington insiders seize more power and influence and control over Americans' lives than they've had before?
I believe the smitten will overwhelm the concerned this year and Obama will defeat McCain this year, but you never know — it will depend on concern about what not only Obama but other Dems in Washington threaten to do if they have full control of DC, and if it's a large enough push factor to overcome the lack of pull factor for at-times-Dem-Lite McCain. Heh, heh. “Safe and sane — John McCain.”
As if concerned voters that have actually paid attention to the last eight years would vote for McCain.
A vote for McCain is a vote against your own economic interests (unless you're a millionaire). A vote for McCain is a vote for unfettered executive power. A vote for McCain is a vote for more war.
Delegates NEEDED to SECURE the nomination. 2118.
http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2008/primaries/resu…
Barack Obama = 2,158
Hillary Clinton = 1,926
He won the elections and he's more popular among the party elite. You have NO argument.
neocon, I don't even see your point about:
1766.5 Obama.
1639.5 Clinton.
And Delegates NEEDED to SECURE the nomination. 2118.
Are you saying the superdelegates should have overturned the will of the delegates directly elected to support Obama in the primaries/caucuses and chosen Hillary (even though Obama had nearly 8% more delegates than Hillary)?
Or are you merely pointing out that the superdelegates validated what the elected delegates decided?
No I wished people would actually read what I write instead of what they think Im saying.
Every vote does not count for the democratic party.
Thru the normal process of the primary season the democrats found a way to trump the will of the people by having a process designed to create gridlock.
What I am saying is that the will of the people spoke and now the democratic party is finding a way to alienate HALF of its voters in a process that should be scrapped and reworked.
Thus no matter how you slice it. Obama did not win. He was crowned king by the democratic party when quite possibly more people voted for Hillary then did Obama based upon the numbers.
Examples of what Im referring to which failed to get any press coverage at all.
In the Iowa Democratic caucuses Democrats had no right to cast a secret ballot.
In the Democratic Nevada caucuses, rural votes counted more than urban ones, and while Hillary Clinton got more popular votes in the state than Barack Obama, it appears Obama will capture 13 of Nevada's Democratic delegates compared to Clinton's 12.
Orthodox Jews complained that they couldn't vote in the Saturday morning Nevada caucuses.
In California if neither Clinton nor Obama gets more than 62 percent of the vote in a congressional district the delegates are split down the middle.
The point I make is that the democratic primary process is a farce and it needs to be dealt with.
And now we have two states that have voted to run the general election along the same lines as the democrats run their primaries. Winner does not take all in two states this coming election but in fact the delegates are split according to popular vote with the delegates not bound to cast an electoral vote the way it appears.
Thus its conceivable that in Washington you could win the state but the electoral delegates could vote for the other fella. The democrat have just proven the folly of this concept and yet the drive unabated to anarchy continues.
There is no point in pointing out Neocon/s many errors of stating fact.
Like Hillary, he/she will renvent, redefine and reconstruct the real world in the hopes that if a falsehood is stated often enough, it will magically become true.
I think people like Neocon should actively seek to rewrite the rules for the next Dem primaries, instead of engaging in endless and useless 'what could have been'
In fact, I like that idea. Then, if neocon's candidate lost by the new rules, we could all discuss once more what could have been or should have been.
Regarding the post, I find it a sad post mortem to the Dem primaries.
It started with attacking Hillary, the person, and it's ending the same way.
She cried, and people like Shaun just KNOW whay she cried. What hate driven hubris.
I'm glad Hillary lost, and Obama won.
But Hillary is still a human being. I don't lose sight of how hard it is to come out of the intensity of being focused on a goal for so many long months. I don't spit on losers any more than I spit on graves.
Yes. There was a time when Hillary and her closest advisors accepted that Michigan and Florida would not count. There was a time when they actively pursued superdelegates. There was a time when they thought caucuses were legitimate.
Of course, all of that was thrown out the window at precisely the moment it was no longer politically advantageous to hold those positions.
Sorry Hillary. Sorry Neocon. You can't change the rules after the game has begun or after it has ended.
“As if concerned voters that have actually paid attention to the last eight years would vote for McCain. “
If you believe the laughable lies that McCain is a Bush clone and he offers nothing but a continuation of Bush-Cheney, you have not been paying attention. Note.
“What hate driven hubris.”
Not hubris, but a lot of derangement from the hate. This has been so for months.
“What I am saying is that the will of the people spoke and now the democratic party is finding a way to alienate HALF of its voters in a process that should be scrapped and reworked.”
Not true, no more than pro sports competition should be reworked if there is parity among the teams and the teams are good, not bad (leading to close contests that are interesting, even to those who aren't fans of the contestants).*
What's this pathological opposition to that which is interesting, robust, vital, and superior to what we have experienced
Or did you just want the result decided at the start (to make it more than 100% serious, say with a single one-day nation-wide primary election or election day) and end the unnecessary competition (elections) cancelled, which is where your opposition leads ultimately? After all, the best thing would be just to have a non-contest with only the contestant you want. No need for a game; it's already over.
* The San Francisco Forty-Niners (pro football) became, while I was still living in the Bay Area where I grew up, the greatest sports team and organization in history. During several years they played against the one team acknowledged as their peer (at times, a better team on the field on a single day), the Dallas Cowboys. The NFC championship games between the 49ers and the Cowboys were correctly known as “the real Super Bowl.”
This Dem primary season was the Real Election this year. This was the best thing to have happened in electoral politics for the past several years, decades.
“Thru the normal process of the primary season the democrats found a way to trump the will of the people by having a process designed to create gridlock.”
If Clinton had clinched the nomination by Super Tuesday (as she was expected to do, to confirm her strength, as opposed to the weakness of everyone in the GOP), there would have been no gridlock. The close contest this year among the Dems was not “deadlock.” It simply was close and exposed differences of Dem voter preference. The starry-eyed crowd has adored Obama from the start but many like Clinton; others have chosen Obama or Clinton for other reasons (including preference of Obama because of Clinton's historically-and-behaviorally-based negatives), while others have chosen Clinton because they want someone who already had been proven (as co-President, unofficial President, already, in fact!) while they distrusted Obama (and some dislike the uglier-left baggage he has had exposed, or dislike the more strident anti-war types among the Obama set).
There is no gridlock, just a situation that puts the meaning to a word so often badly and wrongfully (and dishonestly) misused by the Dems: “Split.” The word connotes roughly equal division into two parts (when a wedge is used correctly), and normally the word is used to cloud or conceal how little support the Left has for a position on an issue. (For example, scientists knowledgeable on the subject might favor nuclear power 98 to 2 per cent; the lib media and activists will say that opinion is “split.”) There is no misuse of the word this time and nothing wrong with a near 50-50 voter choice among the Dems this year. The contest is the best thing that has happened to the Dems and to electoral politics in ages. The race has been of real interest, meaning, and substance, for once in many, many years.
Guess what. Dem voters are (honestly) split between Clinton and Obama this year.
There is no gridlock. Dem voters are not obliged or compelled to all choose the PC candidate of the elite-minions' choice at the start of the “election.”
Clinton should not “un-suspend” (and end) her campaign until the convention. Not merely until she gets what she wants (a future position; money to service her campaign debt), but until the convention. There is nothing wrong with a convention that could feature controversy and activity and which would constitute an event worth observing, again for once in generations. (If the superdelegates had any brains, they'd now shut up and not say what decisions they would make and not make any until the convention. Think of the advertising revenue effect!)
Clinton should not “un-suspend”
Yesterday I would have disagreed but today I think she should not go to the convention but rather start her own third party run for the presidency.
This nation has been begging for a third party for decades. What better time then now??
Lol yea, probably the only way McCain can pull off a win. Maybe Lieberman will join her.
Neocon, is it fair to say that you given your concerns about the Democratic primaries/caucuses (which we all know are unfair), that you also have concerns about the general election and the selection of the president? If I understand further, you have that concern about the general election because some states can award the electoral vote to a candidate other than the one who received the most popular vote. Do I understand you correctly? My apologies in advance if I totally missed your point.
[...] The City Gal wrote an interesting post today onHere’s a quick excerptFirst and foremost, Hillary Clinton never seemed comfortable with herself in stark contrast to Barack Obama, who as one speech analyst put it, can sound rousing while being conciliatory. Clinton’s discomfort sometimes translated into a … [...]
Yes I am not trying to unelect Barak Obama. He apparently has won according to the rules. My point is that the Democrats have a nominating process that is broken because it is designed to keep power within the party instead of giving it to the people.
Their greatest assest has always been every vote counts……cept in their primaries. They then have rules everywhere in the primary process to prevent the will of the people in each state from being influenced by whatever they perceived as non democratic when they made up these rules to begin with.
A process that does not declare a winner by the rules THAT REFLECT THE WILL OF THE PEOPLE when its over is flawed. This process did not declare a winner. Neither Candidate won enough delegates to win. Therefore it then became a popularity contest within the democratic party big shots for the nomination.
The process itself left the party bitter. Any process that leaves the party bitter is just wrong. I compared it to the 2000 Election in which the democrats felt bitter and felt as if the will of the people was negated. Gore won the popular vote. Bush won the delegates………..sound familiar?
Yet here we are 8 years later in our own party with the same dilemna. The Obama side says…….its the delegates…………The Clinton side says its the popular vote. Obama is technically right. So was Bush but that did not stop the anger did it?
This needs fixing. It was originally designed to fix the 1968 fiasco and in its attempt the laws in each state are inheritantly unfair. For Example in one state the caucusus were held at midnight. Lots of old folks that support Hillary just didnt make it……….ahhh too bad.
Im not complaining about Hillary's lost Im complaining about the process and if we do not begin looking at it now. It will never be fixed and we might very well have the same thing in 4 or 8 years and once again divide up the party down idealogical lines which is bad for not only the party but its bad for the country as well.
The very fact that I point out that Obama did not win 2118 delegates. The very fact that I pointed out that Hillary by some sources won the popular vote. The fact that I can point to these things and then get read the riot act supports my contention that this is a flawed process and needs to be fixed.
Will it? No. Unless people stand up and start talking about it and putting pressure on the party to make positive changes to make sure this does not happen again.
Washington State.
State senators have approved a bill that would deliver the state's electoral votes to the U.S. presidential candidate who wins the national popular vote.
So fundamentally Barak Obama could win Washington, lose the popular vote, win the electoral college by a smidge and then along come Washington and throws its votes to McCain and voilla we have McCain as president and not Obama.
This is the kind of stuff Im pointing to that needs to be stopped and people need to stand up and start making their feelings known.
While I understand the popular vote sentiment it in effect cancels the founding fathers understanding that some states will not be as populated as others and therefore they need to have their integrity maintained and have a sense of being involved in a nation that values their influence as much as a state with a much greater proportion of population.
Under the national popular vote drive coalition which is working to institute this policy what we are going to find is that states like Wyoming, Alaska, North Dakota, Montana, Idaho, Utah etc…..etc….are going to find their roles minimized in government and could very well lead to a states right issue no less daunting then was the case prior to the civil war in which a contenious policy was deemed states rights issues and not the national governments issue.
I call this the road to perdition if left unchecked.
Neocon, thanks for the thoughts. I agree the system is flawed, but I'm more concerned about the general election than the primary rules- the political parties have their own discretion in making rules to choose which candidate to forward to the general election. No one is actually elected to an office in the primaries. If a presidential candidate doesnt' like the rules, then they are free to go to a party more in line with their thinking, or they are even free to start their own party.
Your concerns about the general election are very real. I see your anger and frustration, and I too wish that the process to choose a leader does not leave room for hanky panky. I'm all for dropping the electoral college and choosing the president/vp by most popular votes received.
Thanks again.