Hillary? Obama? Oh my...
Tue Dec 05, 2006 at 06:30:25 PM PDT
So, Hillary -- and maybe Barack -- are running.
Kos is already calling it for Obama. I think he's in denial about Hillary, who kossacks seem to detest. I seem to recall he pronounced Kerry dead, and said Edwards would not be the Veep candidate, no way. We are all fallible at this stage.
I may as well say it. I think a Hillary / Obama ticket is a distinct possibility.
OK, flame away, kossacks. But follow me over the fold for the reasons...
Just because she isn't our first (or second, or fifth) choice doesn't change the fact that she has the Democratic party in her pocket, modulo Howard Dean who is still an independent mind running the DNC (and a very healthy thing that is).
I suspect the Clintons have been grooming Barack for the Veep role since the '04 convention. Where did he come from all of a sudden, anyway? I'd like to know who exactly chose him to give that keynote speech, and why the press fell all over themselves to annoint him the "future first Black president". I suspect it was part of Bill's plan to make Hillary electable. Remember, Bill already was "the first Black president". Trust him to think long and hard about how to win big with that constituency. He is still the smartest political mind on the planet. And he wants it as redress for his disgrace the way Pappy Bush wanted redress for not getting a second term; nobody wants it more.
EDIT: I see I wasn't the first to speculate that Hillary and Barack have a pact already. See Jeffrey Feldman's earlier diary.
I don't think Kerry slotted Obama for fame. Edwards sure didn't do it. Howard Dean wasn't DNC chair yet. Come on, why would the beltway crowd give him a leg up? Just as they were shoving Dean under for the third time? Somebody powerful had to make it happen. It was like JFK's keynote in '56, when Stevenson was nominated. Didn't just happen by accident.
Having Obama as Hllary's Veep choice would make it impossible for Karl Rove to make the election entirely about doubts re: a woman president, wouldn't it? And that's the big danger -- that it all gets hung up on a stupid irrelevant prejudice. Like JFK and the Catholic thing (which sank Al Smith in '28), it needs to be defused adroitly at the outset. So, misdirection. Which pundits can even focus on the woman issue for long, with the prospect of a Black president 8 years down the road? The talking points just got so much more diverse. And the endless, mindless repetition engine got derailed. Moreover, prejudice gets its true name -- it's actually harder to get away with being a racist in politics today than it is to be sexist. Bottom line: it's attacking on two fronts at once.
Also, imagine the South in play, if Blacks voted in their greatest numbers ever. Don't you think they would? Maybe enough to offset all the vote fraud. (Sheer massive turnout worked good against it in the midterms.)
My guess is, Obama knows it's too early to go for it on his own, but is going to show some strength, get people excited / worried, then take the second slot he's already been offered. Eight years of on-the-job training and he'd be unstoppable. Why wouldn't he take that deal? So much safer. You only get one try! Just my guess. Notice how moderate he's been lately, even on the war? He sounds more and more like Hillary.
Wesley Clark is another Clinton creation and possible Hillary ticket-mate, but I suspect he'll be her SecDef and point man on the Iraq mess -- she'll need a team in place before the election to have a convincing story there. He makes a much less charismatic Veep, and besides we're tired of having the Veep run wars, that was Cheney's thing and Hillary knows how discredited that whole twisted arrangement is now. But the guy who got in and out of Kosovo as SecDef, to get us out of Iraq? Perfect. Announce it at the convention, or as soon as she seals the nomination.
Come on, folks, let's make some history. Time for an inflection point. First woman, first Black. In that order. Oh, and with 25 Rethug Senate seats up for grabs in '08, and only 10 Democratic Senate seats, we could be looking at a veto-proof legislative majority for the first time since LBJ. Remember the Voting Rights act? Medicare? Remember the last time Democrats actually did anything, except send jobs overseas and balance budgets? (Well, Jimmy Carter did get SALT II and the Egypt/Israeli treaty signed.) But I mean big stuff, FDR-scale stuff that lasts forever -- like national health insurance -- lobbyist reform -- campaign finance reform.
Even CLIMATE CHANGE action. Make Al Gore secretary of the environment (new cabinet level position). Well, maybe not, he and Hillary aren't friends. I know someone who thinks Harvard might pick him as their next president. That'd be a great bully pulpit for him and his cause right now. Maybe he's best as a single-issue man. He sure owns that one.
2008 will be the closest thing to a 1932 FDR opportunity for Democrats since, well, 1932. Eyes on the prize, candaidates. (1) Get elected president, with a congressional majority. (2) Be idealistic and progressive, like JFK/RFK again. Put (2) before (1) and you lose. The time for a great soaring speech for the history books is your inauguration. Save it for then. (Go back and look at what JFK ran on. "Nixon will continue the policies that will surely lose Indochina to the communists!')
I was, and am, a Dean man from Vermont, but if it tips the way I'm suggesting, I say we get over our Hillary disappointment as soon as we can. FDR was a coward too, before 1932. It's too much to expect to have a great president who tells you in advance just what he's going to do.
Permalink | 35 comments