Democrats: Still on the Fence?

Via email from TC, some points to consider:

It's Time to Give Hillary Clinton a Break.

by RenaRF

Wed Mar 26, 2008 at 07:45:55 AM PDT

I think we need to give Hillary Clinton a break.  After all - she's only trying to win here, right?  I guess I can understand.  She didn't get into this race to lose the nomination.  She didn't serve as First Lady for eight years or stand by her man or run for the US Senate only to lose the biggest, most historic race of her life.

So I can see how she feels motivated to find a way to win and it casts some of her activities in a different light.

She really does believe that she would be the best President, that she is what the country needs at this time.  It's unfortunate that actual voters haven't fallen into line.  But there's still hope - it's still, theoretically, close enough.  So she does what she has to do to win.

Despite what was then an air of inevitability, I'm sure she was protecting her presumptive "win" when she planted questions in the crowd. (h/t retriever)

It was also probably in the spirit of safeguarding the win that she dug into Barack Obama's secret Kindergarten files.  (h/t lams712)

She had to distort Barack Obama's abortion record to try to confuse and mislead voters.

She needed to cry to stay alive in New Hampshire.

She needed to try to suppress the vote in the Nevada caucuses (despite the fact that caucuses are, according to her campaign, "undemocratic").

She and former President Bill Clinton had to make racially divisive comments that, among other things, attempted to downplay the importance of Martin Luther King, Jr. in the civil rights movement.

Clinton campaign surrogates had to speak in a tacit and derogatory fashion about Obama's admitted younger-life drug use and insinuate that this negated all of the wonderful things he accomplished as a community organizer.

It's why Hillary Clinton constantly talks about the "fairness" and yes, necessity, of seating the Michigan Democratic delegation despite the fact that Michigan had anemic Democratic turnout and only one major Democratic candidate.

It also is definitely the reason why she and her campaign keep incorrectly referencing the "historic" voter turnout in Florida as she tries to seat their Democratic delegation and ignore the rules.

It's the reason Hillary Clinton seems to find it acceptable to use Republican scare tactics to advance her so-called "day one" credentials.

It makes sense that Hillary Clinton feels the need to emphasize that every single hour of her life since graduating college adds to her insurmountable 35 years of experience.

I guess, then, that it's totally understandable for a former President and spouse of one running for President thought it was perfectly fine to misquote and mischaracterize Barack Obama's comments on Republicans and the Reagan years.

It also has to be the logic behind increasingly inflaming fears of disenfranchisement in Florida nd Michigan, despite the fact the Clinton campaign had agreed to those same rules and consequences in August of 2007, when her campaign was still "inevitable".

It is the only thing that explains why, after a stunning rout of Clinton by Obama, Bill Clinton felt the need to simultaneously throw Jesse Jackson, South Carolina, and African Americans under the bus to explain Hillary Clinton's loss.

It does make sense, in a twisted kind of way, that the Clinton campaign would even suggest that the popular vote doesn't really matter when it comes to choosing the Democratic nominee.

It certainly sheds light on the charges of plagiarism that were hurled at Barack Obama.

I figure there must have been a lot of debate in Clinton campaign headquarters in trying to decide which states mattered and which ones didn't to make her appear to be winning.

After decrying dirty tactics on the part of the Obama campaign when challenged on her healthcare plan, the Clinton campaign thought that launching the 3am ad, another in a string of Clinton scare tactics, might help navigate her to victory.

She figured hyping her experience would be a boost to her chances so she - uh - exaggerated the heavy sniper fire she experienced in Bosnia.

Staying on the experience subject to secure her win, she also - uh - overinflated her role in negotiating peace in Northern Ireland.

And hitting much closer to home, to secure a win she tells voters that she was privately against NAFTA but had to keep mum on the subject because of her role as First Lady.  It turns out not so much.

And now, on March 26 2008, with the delegate math looking impossible and an extremely narrow chance of overcoming Barack Obama in popular votes, after declining to comment for a week, Hillary Clinton decided it was time to put her $.02 in about the Wright flap.  After all - how is she to win when the lens of scrutiny shifted back to her and away from Obama?

She IS trying to win a race here, folks.  That's something we should really keep in mind when we're so critical of the things she says and does.

Because after all - as long as she wins, by any means necessary, isn't that all that matters?

(source)

To which I might add another item: the letter her cronies sent to Nancy Pelosi two days ago, threatening to withhold support from the DCCC in response to Pelosi's statement that the superdelegates should not overturn the will of the voters. The implication of the message, of course, is that Hillary (or at least her supporters) would be perfectly content for Hillary to win the White House and the Dems to lose seats in Congress.

And of course, there's the utter lack of principles demonstrated, once again, by her cozying up to Scaife.

I have been resisting the temptation to pledge withholding my vote for Clinton, should she somehow manage to steal the nomination. But I have to say, each day that goes by, it gets harder.