
The collapse of Hillary Clinton's campaign for the presidency has been absolutely breathtaking. The candidate herself seems to be unsatisfied with the pace of the collapse and has been rushing to accelerate it taking her cues straight out of the Republican playbook. Reported by the Boston Globe:
"I don't think it was by accident that Al Qaeda decided to test the new prime minister," she said. "They watch our elections as closely as we do, maybe more closely than some of our fellows citizens do.... Let's not forget you're hiring a president not just to do what a candidate says during the election, you want a president to be there when the chips are down."
I've got a newsflash for Hillary Clinton: if you want to win the Democratic nomination for the presidency you should studiously avoid using the same fear-mongering tactics that the devil himself Karl Rove and the Republicans have been shamelessly using against Democrats since September 11. If, however, you are running for the Republican party nomination then what you are doing would seem like a wise tactic. Republicans enjoy living in a state of fear, in fact, they seem to thrive on it.
Contrast Hillary's scare tactics with words from Senator Barack Obama:
"There is a moment in the life of every generation, if it's to make its mark on history, when that spirit -- spirit -- has to shine through, spirit that says we are casting aside our fears, and our doubts and our cynicism... when we embrace the difficult, daunting task of remaking a nation..."
Senator Clinton, the American people are tired of being afraid. We have, for the last 7 years, lived with an incessant drumbeat of fear and fright pounded into our heads by Republican politicians and the media about when and where the next deadly terrorist attack will occur. To live our lives in a constant state of terror is not the American way. We will not be bowed or frightened by any bloodthirsty terrorist who wants to change how we live our lives. Nor will we succumb to the overtures of opportunistic and unscrupulous politicians who seek to exploit the threat posed to our people by the terrorists to obtain or maintain their political positions.
This election should be about hope, not fear. We are tired of being afraid.
Update I: Now it appears that Hillary's minions are exploring the idea of creating a 527 to conduct a negative campaign against Barack Obama and drive up his unfavorable ratings. This is a bad idea that won't work but it will succeed in driving up Hillary's unfavorable ratings among Democrats.
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Comments (3)
I'm already picking up signs of a negative campaign being organized against Obama. I'll try to drag these out into the daylight over the next few days.
My blogging time is spotty right now, but I'll to get to it this weekend if I can't blog on this topic sooner.
1. Posted by Lee Ward
| January 8, 2008 3:33 PM
Posted on January 8, 2008 15:33
On the other hand we have how Obama campaign which treated its own campaign crisis when it was 30 points behind Clinton But last summer...
The Clinton campaign was justifiably angry, and seized on the episode as proof that Obama had abandoned his vaunted "politics of hope" and had offended Indian-Americans in the process. Obama was furious with his staff. "Some of my roommates in college were Indian and Pakistani," he told NEWSWEEK. "I had to call some of my best friends and explain that my campaign wasn't engaged in xenophobia." Obama held a come-to-Jesus meeting with his senior aides at his Chicago headquarters and vented his anger. "If you're even going close to the line, you better ask me first," he recalled saying. "That was the most angry I've been in this campaign."
Obama's high-minded themes of hope and change--and not getting your hands dirty--can come off as earnest, even naive, in the world of hardball presidential politics.
I have a feeling that some of the Clinton campign aides are going to become defectors of Clinton tactics and then we will read some interesting stories. Idealists are almost exclusively Demcorats and some are still in the Clinton camp.
2. Posted by Steve Crickmore | January 8, 2008 3:48 PM
Posted on January 8, 2008 15:48
The sad thing is that negative campaigning as distasteful as it may be, is effective. We only need look at the 2006 election to see examples of that.
3. Posted by Lee Ward | January 8, 2008 7:21 PM
Posted on January 8, 2008 19:21