Andrew Sullivan has a good column in the Times of London (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/andrew_sullivan/article3215287.ece) that focuses on the aspect of the Clinton campaign that I find disgusting and - if a decent GOP candidate is the nominee - which might cause me to vote for the GOP candidate rather than Hillary if she is the Democrat nominee. I am not alone in these feelings. I was at a party over the weekend and there were a number of people - the majority gay - who said they would be inclined to vote against Hillary because of her and Bill's sleazy tactics. I increasingly believe Hillary cares more about her own ambition than the good of the Democrat party or the country. We have had seven years of that mentality and we do NOT need four years more. Here are highlights from Andrew's column:
But Clinton deftly purloined it for her own purposes, pivoting a classic Karl Rove tactic against one of her opponents. Rove, you might remember, was chief political adviser to President George W Bush and the strategist in charge of his reelection campaign. Ever since the Clintons’ near-death experience in the Iowa vote, their campaign has been playing a very Rovian game. The use of the politics of fear is just the start. In fact classic Rovian tactics are now at the heart of the Clinton campaign.
First, play to your base. Obama continues to appeal beyond core Democrats to independents and even a surprising number of disenchanted Republicans. Clinton decided, in response, to craft her appeal directly to core Democrats: public sector employees, the elderly, working women, the urban middle class. She constantly reminds people that she remains a lightning rod for Republicans. She also retooled her message to focus on the economic concerns that are becoming paramount in the race.
Second, attack your opponent on his strong point. Obama’s biggest strength among Democrats is his early and clear opposition to the Iraq war. And so, following Rove’s golden rule, Bill Clinton dismissed Obama’s long opposition to the war as a “fairy tale”. Because in 2004 Obama had refrained from criticising Kerry’s pro-war vote, Clinton argued that Obama implicitly agreed with it. Because he had voted – like so many others – to continue funding the troops, Obama was no different than Hillary. It didn’t work. But it was a classic Rove try.
Third, wedge issues. She lost women to Obama in surprising numbers in Iowa. So how to heighten gender tensions to her advantage? Earlier in the campaign, she had put out a positive message of breaking the glass ceiling. But she also included blatant appeals to gender. When Obama and her other Democratic rival John Edwards both criticised her in her first bad debate performance, her surrogates put out word that they were “boys” “piling on” a female candidate. As she looked like losing in New Hampshire, she adopted the persona of the badgered woman, unfairly attacked, yet struggling through like so many others. The now-famous emotional incident worked. The Democratic gender gap – previously small – widened dramatically in her favour.
Then there was simple sleaze. The Clinton campaign kept reminding people that Obama had not been “vet-ted”. Her pollster brought up Obama’s cocaine use on national tele-vision. Her New Hampshire campaign chairman also raised the drug issue. Two staffers were caught sending out e-mails accusing Obama of being a closet Muslim. Last week a blizzard of e-mails appeared on Jewish lists accusing Obama of being fond of the notorious black antisemite Louis Farrakhan.
Finally, the real toxin: race. Their calculation was that simply by forcing Obama to become the “black candidate” they would neutralise his postracial appeal. They would polarise the base electorate into blacks and whites, make Obama look more like Jesse Jackson, and so pick up enough white and especially Hispanic votes to win.
The hardball tactics of Rove have defined American political life for a long time. The Clintons have now shown they have learnt from the master. The question for the Democrats is whether they want a candidate who can play the Rove game as cynically and as brutally as the Republicans. Or whether they want a new start and a new politics. That’s what is at stake now in the Democratic race. And one side has shown its true colours.
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