Today is primary day in my former homeland of Pennsylvania. While Hillary Clinton is expected to come away as the victor in this particular contest, going forward she carries on her back the hopes and dreams of a group within the Democratic Party who with each passing day become more and more an irrelevant anachronism.
The Democratic Leadership Council was brought forth in the age of Ronald Reagan as a response to Democratic candidates whose views were seen as too far to the left of the country as a whole. Bill Clinton, Joe Lieberman and others felt it was their collective duty to lead the Democrats to the White House by staking a claim to what they believed was the middle ground that all Americans sought. In 1993, the world was their oyster. Having just taken the White House and holding a majority in both the Senate and the House, it seemed like the DLC way was destined to be the new way forward.
In actuality, the DLC way was doomed from the start. When the differences with Republicans across the aisle appeared to be semantic more than substantive, parts became interchangeable in the eyes of the independent voter. The base of the Democratic Party becomes disinterested in voting for candidates that didn’t share their views. It also didn’t help that the early 90’s saw the ascendancy of right wing talk radio and Newt Gingrich, two entities that were more interested in verbal bomb throwing than responsible governance. In eight short years, Clinton found himself impeached for something far short of a high crime, and George W. Bush, the perfect symbol of all that is wrong with the United States, became the president.
The DLC’s last stand now presents itself in the guise of Hillary Clinton. She stands seemingly as the last great believer in the right-leaning triangulation that propelled her husband to the White House 16 years ago. Facts such as Ross Perot taking 19% of the vote in 1992 and propelling Bill Clinton to the White House with far less than a 50% majority of the vote are conveniently left out of her narrative. For Clinton, she is fighting not just for the presidency, but for future relevance for herself and her brethren.
The DLC is having enough of a hard time without a Clinton loss further kicking sand in their face. The DLC’s current chairman, Harold Ford, endorsed Christopher Shays, a Republican, in his current reelection bid to the House of Representatives. When he’s not endorsing Republicans, he’s sponsoring conventions on the DLC’s behalf that feature a lot of empty chairs. Joe Lieberman, fighting his own ongoing battle with irrelevance, turned in his DLC card years ago.
For Hillary Clinton, she only needs to look across the aisle at her Senate colleague from Massachusetts, Ted Kennedy, for a glimpse into her future as a losing presidential candidate. Ted Kennedy says all the right things nowadays and is a reliable Democrat on a host of issues, but his speeches only serve to recall a time when his personal possibilities, based on his name and his position, seemed less limited. His relevance on a national scale is minimal at best, despite his surname and the power that once summoned.
All of this should be taken into account when you listen to Hillary Clinton trash MoveOn.org, or talk about using nuclear weapons on a sovereign nation, or having her subordinates argue that any states with fewer than 15 electoral votes that she happens to have lost are full of latte-drinking elitists. Hillary Clinton currently gazes into an abyss of future irrelevance, buffeted only by millionaire donors making veiled threats and the hope of getting enough Democratic superdelegates to ignore the popular vote. Maybe she and Ted will get together in the Senate commissary someday and discuss their twin fates, even if by Hillary Clinton’s latest words and deeds they have nothing else in common politically.
Showing posts with label Hillary Clinton. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hillary Clinton. Show all posts
Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Thursday, March 27, 2008
A Clinton Victory By #6 Combo
It has been a week since I first put forth a proposition to the campaign of Hillary Clinton for President.
By any reasonable mathematical equation, Hillary Clinton cannot win the presidency without cajoling or making wild and unwieldy promises to the sizable swath of uncommitted superdelegates in the Democratic Party. She has currently won fewer states, has fewer pledged delegates and yes, she also trails in the popular vote, unless you apply what I call the Lieberman Theorem. This theorem posits than when you finish anywhere but where you expect to finish, it’s best to call it a tie, such as a three-way tie for third when you finish fifth in New Hampshire. There’s no such thing as a statistical dead heat when all the votes are counted. Either you finished first, or you lost. Hillary Clinton is currently in second place. The only entity that reverses the absolutes of voting mathematics is 5 extremists in black robes on the Supreme Court.
Being an Obama voter from the state of Wisconsin, I have made my voice heard in this election. I voted for Obama and hope he is the eventual nominee. In the face of the current mathematics, if he isn’t the nominee, I will immediately declare myself to be a supervoter, with carries with it all the expectations of cajoling, wild promises or perhaps bribery that the superdelegates currently hold.
As a supervoter, if Hillary Clinton wants my vote, I want a number 6 combo from Wendy’s, plain, biggie sized with a Hi-C. In addition, Bill Clinton has to sit with me as I eat it, and Eddie Vedder has to join him, as my wife is a Pearl Jam fan and she missed their last concert in Milwaukee because she was giving birth to our son.
There is no doubt in my mind that if Hillary Clinton wins the nomination, she’ll spend about 2 ½ months of time between the Democratic Convention and the general election showing up on campaign stops next to superdelegates running for re-election as a thank you for giving her the Democratic nomination. Absent that, her big money donors, (the ones currently blackmailing Nancy Pelosi Don Corleone-style by tersely worded letter), will more than likely start throwing their money around into the campaign coffers of superdelegates who back Clinton at the convention.
If a superdelegate’s vote for Clinton carries enough weight for a series of quid pro quos, so too does the vote of a supervoter. We all want something. She wants a vote. I want lunch. My wife wants to meet Eddie Vedder. Everybody’s happy, and it’s a hell of a lot cheaper than a campaign stop and much friendlier than a reading from the Book of Threats.
I’m hoping that there are many more like me. I want to start a supervoter movement. Picture if you will the last scene of the movie "Billy Jack". Instead of an upraised fist, imagine that all the students of the Freedom School held a spicy chicken sandwich in their hands? Billy is driven off in the back of a police car (substitute Bill Clinton in the back of a limousine) on a road lined for miles by people holding sandwiches aloft. The slightly clouded Southwestern skies dotted not by the red painted mountains of the desert, but by God’s most perfect creation, the Wendy’s spicy chicken sandwich in the united hands of humankind. It is this kind of rampant idealism that shapes me as an American. My dream of a spicy chicken sandwich has now replaced thoughts on policy as we approach the general election.
I’ll make a promise to all of you. If Obama wins the nomination, come to Milwaukee, introduce yourself by your Daily Kos ID, and we’ll celebrate with a stop at my favorite Wendy’s at the corner of Chase and Oklahoma in Milwaukee. If Clinton wins the nomination, I hereby promise that I shall not eat a beloved spicy chicken sandwich until Bill Clinton and Eddie Vedder come to Milwaukee to eat one with me. Bill’s buying, so it’s not like I need to scrape up the money.
As a supervoter, what I ask for is much less than what is being offered to superdelegates currently. This isn’t a $100 a plate dinner we’re talking about here. Throw in a chocolate frosty and we’re talking about maybe $10, plus the cost of tranportation to Milwaukee. Transportation is negligible though. If Hillary Clinton wins the nomination, someone who represents her is coming to Wisconsin, also known as "a much-needed swing state". My Wendy’s is about a ten-minute drive from the airport. Bill and Eddie could swing by, eat with the jpspencers after local drive-thru maven Ron gives us all our food perfectly matched to our order, and be done in about 45 minutes tops. Then it’s on to Marquette, or UWM or some other high value destination within the city limits where ralliers await (possibly with chicken sandwiches in hand; you never know). You can even bring a camera crew along. I’ll endorse Hillary and take a bite of my chicken sandwich, instantly creating an image for the ages (don’t worry; I weigh 196). And, what the hell, Eddie can have my fries!
A chicken sandwich is such a small price to pay for knee-capping the preferred candidate. A political hit requires a karmic price. As a supervoter, I demand my tribute. E Pluribus Pulli, Unum! GIVE ME SPICY CHICKEN OR GIVE ME DEATH!
By any reasonable mathematical equation, Hillary Clinton cannot win the presidency without cajoling or making wild and unwieldy promises to the sizable swath of uncommitted superdelegates in the Democratic Party. She has currently won fewer states, has fewer pledged delegates and yes, she also trails in the popular vote, unless you apply what I call the Lieberman Theorem. This theorem posits than when you finish anywhere but where you expect to finish, it’s best to call it a tie, such as a three-way tie for third when you finish fifth in New Hampshire. There’s no such thing as a statistical dead heat when all the votes are counted. Either you finished first, or you lost. Hillary Clinton is currently in second place. The only entity that reverses the absolutes of voting mathematics is 5 extremists in black robes on the Supreme Court.
Being an Obama voter from the state of Wisconsin, I have made my voice heard in this election. I voted for Obama and hope he is the eventual nominee. In the face of the current mathematics, if he isn’t the nominee, I will immediately declare myself to be a supervoter, with carries with it all the expectations of cajoling, wild promises or perhaps bribery that the superdelegates currently hold.
As a supervoter, if Hillary Clinton wants my vote, I want a number 6 combo from Wendy’s, plain, biggie sized with a Hi-C. In addition, Bill Clinton has to sit with me as I eat it, and Eddie Vedder has to join him, as my wife is a Pearl Jam fan and she missed their last concert in Milwaukee because she was giving birth to our son.
There is no doubt in my mind that if Hillary Clinton wins the nomination, she’ll spend about 2 ½ months of time between the Democratic Convention and the general election showing up on campaign stops next to superdelegates running for re-election as a thank you for giving her the Democratic nomination. Absent that, her big money donors, (the ones currently blackmailing Nancy Pelosi Don Corleone-style by tersely worded letter), will more than likely start throwing their money around into the campaign coffers of superdelegates who back Clinton at the convention.
If a superdelegate’s vote for Clinton carries enough weight for a series of quid pro quos, so too does the vote of a supervoter. We all want something. She wants a vote. I want lunch. My wife wants to meet Eddie Vedder. Everybody’s happy, and it’s a hell of a lot cheaper than a campaign stop and much friendlier than a reading from the Book of Threats.
I’m hoping that there are many more like me. I want to start a supervoter movement. Picture if you will the last scene of the movie "Billy Jack". Instead of an upraised fist, imagine that all the students of the Freedom School held a spicy chicken sandwich in their hands? Billy is driven off in the back of a police car (substitute Bill Clinton in the back of a limousine) on a road lined for miles by people holding sandwiches aloft. The slightly clouded Southwestern skies dotted not by the red painted mountains of the desert, but by God’s most perfect creation, the Wendy’s spicy chicken sandwich in the united hands of humankind. It is this kind of rampant idealism that shapes me as an American. My dream of a spicy chicken sandwich has now replaced thoughts on policy as we approach the general election.
I’ll make a promise to all of you. If Obama wins the nomination, come to Milwaukee, introduce yourself by your Daily Kos ID, and we’ll celebrate with a stop at my favorite Wendy’s at the corner of Chase and Oklahoma in Milwaukee. If Clinton wins the nomination, I hereby promise that I shall not eat a beloved spicy chicken sandwich until Bill Clinton and Eddie Vedder come to Milwaukee to eat one with me. Bill’s buying, so it’s not like I need to scrape up the money.
As a supervoter, what I ask for is much less than what is being offered to superdelegates currently. This isn’t a $100 a plate dinner we’re talking about here. Throw in a chocolate frosty and we’re talking about maybe $10, plus the cost of tranportation to Milwaukee. Transportation is negligible though. If Hillary Clinton wins the nomination, someone who represents her is coming to Wisconsin, also known as "a much-needed swing state". My Wendy’s is about a ten-minute drive from the airport. Bill and Eddie could swing by, eat with the jpspencers after local drive-thru maven Ron gives us all our food perfectly matched to our order, and be done in about 45 minutes tops. Then it’s on to Marquette, or UWM or some other high value destination within the city limits where ralliers await (possibly with chicken sandwiches in hand; you never know). You can even bring a camera crew along. I’ll endorse Hillary and take a bite of my chicken sandwich, instantly creating an image for the ages (don’t worry; I weigh 196). And, what the hell, Eddie can have my fries!
A chicken sandwich is such a small price to pay for knee-capping the preferred candidate. A political hit requires a karmic price. As a supervoter, I demand my tribute. E Pluribus Pulli, Unum! GIVE ME SPICY CHICKEN OR GIVE ME DEATH!
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