Yeah, you mocked me a couple weeks ago when I likened the current primary to a hostage crisis. Who is laughing now:
In a move that could foreshadow a public push from the Hillary forces to get Barack Obama to invite her on the ticket, Hillary’s top campaign fundraising official said in an interview that there’s a “risk” that Hillary’s political and financial supporters won’t get behind Obama in time for him to win in November if she’s passed over for the veep slot.
The fundraiser, businessman Hassan Nemazee, is Hillary’s leading finance chair and one of the most influential money men in the party. He’s the first prominent Hillary campaign official to raise the possiblity of an Obama loss should she not be invited on the ticket, and his comments suggests that this argument could emerge as central to any Clinton camp push to make her veep.
“There’s a desire on the part of the party to come together under any circumstances, and Hillary and her supporters will do everything in their power to help Obama win, should he become the nominee, whether or not she’s on the ticket,” Nemazee said to me this morning.
It is pretty clear what is going on- after the suffrage/Zimbabwe/civil rights/Florida 2000 nonsense of the other day, we see published reports that Bill Clinton is pushing behind the scenes for the VP slot for Hillary, Clinton surrogates are filing lawsuits (which will be laughed out of court), threats from prominent supporters that just any other woman on the ticket won’t do, and yet another push from the big money Clinton backers (remember the threats launched at Pelosi earlier this spring) as noted above shows what the clear game plan is- show the DNC and Obama what nuclear means, and now CNN is reporting there are formal talks under way to negotiate a spot for her on the ticket (both campaigns deny this report).
To unify the party, of course.
Take it away, Hilzoy:
I have been thinking about Clinton’s conduct ever since she compared her efforts to get the Florida and Michigan votes counted to abolitionists, suffragists, and the current crisis in Zimbabwe. I agree with Josh Marshall that her attempts to gin up resentment and a sense that the nomination was stolen from her are toxic. Even Ezra Klein, who has been a lot more open to Clinton than many people, has concluded that she is trying to ensure that Obama loses. Since then, there have been a lot of stories wondering what on earth she is up to. And while I haven’t heard what the NYPost describes as a “Groundswell Of Calls For O-Hill Union”, there has definitely been a groundswell of stories about that alleged groundswell, much of which seems to be coming from the Clinton campaign itself. There have also been a lot of stories asking: what does Obama need to do to keep her on board?
Note what’s missing here: any sense that Clinton herself is a responsible moral agent. People are writing about her as though she were a bomb that needed to be expertly defused, as opposed to a person who can govern her own life, and is responsible for her own choices.
***Instead, she’s throwing tantrums, making demands that she has no right to make, and threatening civil war.
I can’t imagine a better demonstration of why she should not be President or Vice President. Nor can I imagine a better demonstration of why some of us who are committed feminists are not happy with her as our standard-bearer. She lost. It happens. If she were an adult or a professional, she would deal with it. Apparently, she is neither.
I don’t know if there are actual negotiations going on, but the rest of this post is completely verifiable. She has shown that she will blow the party up if it suits her needs, and people should stop trying to analyze the Clinton campaign and listen to Rachel Maddow:
After the primary calendar has ended, Clinton’s campaign can only justify or explain her staying in the race if she makes the case that the Democratic Party still has not chosen a nominee conclusively. Clinton needs an argument that the game should go into extra innings. Overtime. Bonus round. Detention. Whatever. Clinton has now found that argument — she says she will not stop campaigning until the issue of the Florida and Michigan delegates is settled to her satisfaction.
The Florida/Michigan issue get settled, of course, by the Democrats’ Rules and Bylaws Committee… unless of course that committee’s decision gets appealed to the Credentials Committee… unless of course that decision, too, gets appealed… to the floor of the convention.
Do you see where this is going? If there is an open, unresolved procedural issue involving the Florida and Michigan delegations, Senator Clinton will be able to cite that as her justification for staying in the race until the convention even though she is not ahead in the nomination contest at the end of the primary calendar.
This is not about party, or country, or overcoming sexism and glass ceilings, or fairness, or following the rules, or even about counting every vote or whatever other bullshit the Clinton campaign chums the water with the next few weeks. This is not about principles, this is about Hillary.
Quite the victory for feminism.
Mary
Psst — the SWAT team is on its way. Or maybe it’s just CHiPs.
Rick Taylor
I didn’t mock you, but I had no idea how spot on you actually were. This is old, but I remember being struck at the time. It’s the video where she first questioned whether Obama would be legitimate if he won the nomination, and where she first talked about a convention fight.
dr. bloor
Has Has noticed that Obama has done pretty nicely on the fundraising front without his “influential” money. You can get on the train or stay at home, Mr. Nemazee. Doesn’t make a difference to us either way.
P.S. to John–Lose Word Press.
PeterJ
Take a good look at her laughing? at 2:20.
johninpt
She-berman.
nightjar
This is where the remaining SD’s need to step up en mass and decide for Obama. Otherwise, if they delay or give in to fear of the Clinton Political Terror Campaign and split their votes this will not end. Obama would be a fool to choose this meglamaniacal fashionably gender neutral creature as his VP. I personally wouldn’t trust her for the correct time of day.
merrinc
Our local paper has a section in the opinion pages called “The Buzz” which features “short and snappy comments by anonymous Observer readers on the issues of the day.” Key words – short and anonymous – means it’s quite popular with the wingnut contingent.
Number three this morning:
Will Obama’s little girls someday see Daddy as the man who elbowed aside the first qualified woman who could be president?
What pisses me off the most about this is that Hillary is a horrible role model for little girls. And she frightens my 9 year old. When she sees her on tv, she cringes. During one of the debates she turned to me and said, “Why is she so mean? Why does she keep yelling at everybody?”
I guess that means I’m raising a sexist, though.
gratefulcub
I’m a reader, not a poster. But, for some strange reason, I was so enamored with the Confluence (I thought maybe it was a parody), that I couldn’t help myself. So, after I saw a lengthy post by someone that ‘had lived for a while’ in KY, and me being someone that has lived his entire life in KY, I engaged them. I had the audacity to say that Obama has an appalachian problem due partially to race. I love my state, but it is what it is, and there are Eastern pockets of backwardness.
Long story short: I was banned. I just needed to tell someone, because I have never been banned, kicked out, expelled, etc of anything in my life. They even went as far to ridicule me by name in a follow up post.
The only regret I have, is that it isn’t like baseball. I got tossed for saying very little, and not being offensive at all. (I never even mentioned Hillary in a negative way) If I were a major league manager, I would have been able to get tossed, and make one more trip onto the field to get my money’s worth. I could have thrown a few bases and kicked some dirt. But alas, all I can do is gloat at my favorite place to read.
gratefulcub
Where are the crazy Obamamania websites like Taylor Marsh and the Confluence?
Dennis - SGMM
This is identity politics carried to a nauseating extreme. If Clinton was advocating some crucial issue (Other than obliterating Iran) that Obama was not there might be some reason for her continuing to poison the waters for him. But there isn’t. There is instead her monomaniacal insistence that she must win. If she can’t win then she implies that she and her followers will make sure that Obama loses. At this point, she is our George W. Bush; delusional, toxic, stubborn, isolated, certain that she’s the only one who sees the actual reality beneath the seeming reality, and most definitely unsuited for elective or appointive office as a Democrat.
As TBogg so aptly put it, she’s crossed the Lieberman Line.
rob!
holy crap, why isn’t this bigger news??? why isn’t this on MSNBC, TPM, etc??
ksmiami
In a wierd sort of sick way though, her arguments end up defeating her. She is starting to sound so unhinged and psycho that it makes it impossible to imagine her as barack’s dog catcher, let alone his VP. PLus she is reinforcing every “bitter” feminist stereotype and her own negative image as just a shameless politician. I mean, thank god the democrats had another option this year and if only the delegates would grow a spine and endorse him, this thing will be over.
Rick Taylor
Eugene Robinson in the Washington Post:
Helmut
Hostage crisis, now with blackmail….
Dreggas
In her ever shifting justifications for staying in the race she now is suggesting Obama may be shot like RFK
Apsaras
And what pisses me off is the idea that Barack Obama has elbowed her out of anything. I know the inevitability/itzherturn is practically the raison d’etre for this campaign, but comments like that (in addition to Joy Behar’s grumblings about this being “taken away” from Hillary) really chap my ass.
Barack Obama, you bastard! How dare you receive more votes and therefore more delegates than Hillary Clinton! How dare you! Don’t you know she’s the self-appointed Susan B. Anthony of the 21st century? How very selfish of you, Barack, for winning thanks to being right about the Iraq war I MEAN SEXISM. Yes, sexism. That’s the ticket.
theturtlemoves
Identity politics coupled, as it so unfortunately often is, with a total sense of victimhood and complete abdication of responsibility. Poor little Hillary isn’t losing because she’s run a crappy campaign, she’s losing because The Evil Patriarchy(TM) is trying to keep a sister down.
The thing that always strikes me about the professional victims in America is how they all seemed to become millionaires by bitching about how oppressed they are. (See Steinem, Gloria, et al.) Frankly, if anyone wants to pay me a couple million dollars to call me fat cracker every week for a year, I’d be willing to read their proposals and get back to them.
Dennis - SGMM
LOL! I would do the same for being called an annoying old fart.
Wayne
The tipping point of losing the election to the GOP is at hand.
Clinton wants to lose.
Clinton wants to make it look like her being shut out of the VP spot is so egregious that many in her camp will not vote for Obama.
She also wants to cause Obama supporters to not vote for Obama if she IS selected as VP.
She knows she won’t be president this year and any way she can get a GOP win in November will let her have another go at it in 2012.
CFisher
Maybe this is a case of my old right-wing roots showing, but if I were Obama and I had Hillary forced on me as a Veep by the party, I would definitely take to wearing body armor and hire a cupbearer/food taster.
theturtlemoves
I take some comfort in the realization that both sides of the political spectrum have their cultures of victimhood. While half the people who ever took a Women’s Studies class in college are convinced that every use of language is pregnant with hidden misogyny, all the folks who look askance at us college-educated elitists can join the fun by being convinced that they were passed over for a 25 cent raise because of affirmative action. The whackjobs all end up being the same people. RedState is TalkLeft is LGF is Taylor Marsh. Only the haircuts are different.
Are you asking yourself, did he catch that blatant gender-loaded language in his sentence decrying folks seeing sexism under every rock? Nope, I totally missed that. Because I’m a sexist pig. Or something.
DougL
From the link that Mary posted above:
Well, whatdya know? Hillary did acknowledge this months ago, though I don’t think that this was what she had in mind…
mere mortal
I would be happy to continue to mock you.
Never a peep when Obama broke the seal on the “my supporters won’t vote for the other candidate” crap, no talk about a “hostage crisis” when it was Obama making the threats.
Clinton Rules. Plain and simple, garden variety hypocrisy.
Carol
You know, I don’t often agree with Peggy Noonan of the Wall Street Journal, but today I’m proud to stand with her in the full glory of outraged sisterhood ;).
Her editorial, ‘Sex and the Sissy’ does a perfect job of summarizing my disgust (and the disgust of a lot of other women) with Hillary’s whiny victim meme. I apologize in advance if anyone has already linked this here, but it is SO worth the read. This line alone made me cheer:
“Mrs. Clinton’s supporters are now complaining about the Hillary nutcrackers sold at every airport shop. Boo hoo. If Golda Meir, a woman of not only proclaimed but actual toughness, heard about Golda nutcrackers, she would have bought them by the case and given them away as party favors.”
Here’s the whole delicious link:
Delia
Yes, I admit Tweety has been piggy to Hillary during the primary season. But Tweety is congenitally piggy to all women and to most men in fact. And that’s not why Hillary lost. She lost because she herself is her own kind of piggy.
Hillary’s only remaining open path to the VP slot is to take a litter of Golden Retriever puppies hostage and threaten to drown them in front of the Obama girls. I’m expecting this to come up sometime tomorrow.
Steve V
It’s like the “crazy man” school of foreign policy, being applied to the nomination process.
grumpy realist
Good god, woman, stop WHINING!
Also have noticed that quite a lot of feminists can’t stand Hillary. I know I can’t.
ptw
It’s not just Clinton who is willing to destroy the democratic party. It’s her ‘backers’ as well (Haim Saban and all the other Israel’s hawks). Up till now, they controlled the Democratic Party (with the Clintons and the DLC). Check this and this! For once, I wish people would put two and two together and make five. This is more than just Clinton. It’s AIPAC’s hawks vs AIPAC’s moderates. A Democratic Party with a new alignment of forces that lie beyond their control is of no use to the hawks.
Patrick
If Clinton does end up wrangling a Veep slot out of Obama, he’d better make on the condition that Chelsea becomes his official food taster.
Chuck Butcher
Here’s my bet on how this goes, 5/31 50% & a workable apportionment then after 6/3 a complete roll to Obama by enough SDs to get him past Hillary’s magical 2210 – that’s all folks, it is done. That takes the bomb out of her hand, takes the sting of stolen out of her hand, lets the votes be counted and done. Bet me. (only imaginary krugerands accepted)
Chuck Butcher
I forgot, also no VP for Hillary