I know it's easy to bash Hillary Clinton on Dialy Kos, as so many of us are supporters of Obama and Edwards. But this diary isn't simply intended to repeat what we already think.
It is intended to predict that what you are going to see in days to come, thanks to Ted Kennedy, is more Democrats finding it easy to refuse Hillary Clinton and move away from Bill's legacy.
Let's say Al Gore had rightfully taken his place behind the Resolute Desk in the Oval Office on January 20, 2008. Would we all still love Bill Clinton?
Probably not.
The reality is that Clinton wasn't much of a Democrat. He governed to the center, sold out the traditional democrat bases, and moved the Democratic Party into a period of pro-Corporations in order to fundraise.
Simply stated, the Clintons worked to make the Democratic Party, more like the Republican Party.
The greater reality is, a lot of people remember that. And a lot of people don't want to see it happen again. But up until lately, people have been terrified to cross the Clintons, especially because Hillary, for a long time, looked all but certain to be the front runner for the nomination.
Ted Kennedy may have opened the flood gates of Anti-Clintonism.
Today, John Harris of Politico put it very plainly:
Washington’s liberal establishment — members of Congress, fundraisers and commentators — has coalesced around the view that Bill Clinton is soiling his legacy and wounding Hillary Rodham Clinton’s prospects as he rambles around the country in a peevish, piece-of-my-mind monologue ostensibly devoted to helping her win the Democratic nomination.
But it's not just a current fad to be upset with the Clintons. It's been one the best kept secrets in Washington.
It is striking how many people around town seem to be loving it. But it should not really be surprising.
And why shouldn't it be surprising? Because not everyone always loved Bill Clinton ... it's just all they had to work with. He's the only Democrat to win a nation election - Sorry Al Gore, make that take office after winning a national election - in more than 30 years and therefore is not someone you can move away from. In fact, he is the only Democrat to win two national elections since FDR (Truman and Johnson won their first terms as VP, then moved up to the big chair).
Clinton spent so long as the dominant personality in the Democratic Party that it is easy to forget: Lots of elite Democrats never liked the guy that much. Or, perhaps more precisely, their feelings of admiration were constantly at war with feelings of disdain.
He was, for so many, the symbol of the party.
Therefore, it would seem likely, that the only person on the planet that can compete with his symbolic power as a leader of the Party would have to be Ted Kennedy - the lion of the Senate - the backbone of the Party - the last remaining force of the Kennedy legacy - and undoubtedly the most timeless symbol of Liberalism.
He had to do something. Bill's Political tourettes of recent days couldn't go unpunished.
One of the party’s most experienced fundraisers, a former Clinton administration appointee who is close to the Democratic leadership in Congress and both leading presidential campaigns, said that several top Democratic contributors have told him they are furious with what they perceive as Bill Clinton’s campaign of complaints, mini-tirades and smart-alecky talking points.
Ted Kennedy couldn't stand by and watch the Party's most powerful symbol - next to the Donkey and a picture of George Bush with an X through it - disgrace the legacy of Kennedy's Party.
Kennedy has been supportive of both Clintons in the past. But, according to advisers who have spoken with him, Kennedy was motivated to publicly bless Obama in part because he was offended by what he regarded as Clinton’s divisive and distorted arguments against his wife’s chief rival.
So Kennedy is not the only one sick and tired of what the Clinton's are running around the country doing and saying.
He's just the only one with a loud enough voice to drown them out.
But don't think for a second that there will be Kennedy backlash. In fact, quite the opposite. This should open the floodgates for the rest of the Anti-Clintonites to come running out of the closet kicking and screaming.
The ferocity of anti-Clinton sentiments heard around Washington in recent days — as even some former Clinton White House aides say they are enjoying the Kennedy endorsement and the implicit rebuke of the Clintons — has reached levels that haven’t been seen for seven years. Clinton’s pardons in the closing hours of his presidency prompted a similar backlash.
But this sentiment is not new, it's just been hushed. Hushed by many for fear of getting on the wrong side of the Clintons - who looked to return to power and don't forget those who crossed them on their path to it.
The toxic relationship between the Clintons and Washington was always one of the main paradoxes of the Clinton administration — and one of its main mysteries.
Here was a couple who devoted their lives to making establishment connections and scaling establishment institutions (the Clintons first met Greg Craig at Yale law school). Clinton’s policies embraced elite assumptions favored by Wall Street and Washington think tanks — against budget deficits, for instance, and for free trade.
But there was never love at the personal level.
Again, let me repeat what I started with:
I know it's easy to bash Hillary Clinton on Dialy Kos, as so many of us are supporters of Obama and Edwards. But this diary isn't simply intended to repeat what we already think.
It is intended to predict that what you are going to see in days to come, thanks to Ted Kennedy, is more Democrats finding it easy to refuse Hillary Clinton and move away from Bill's legacy.