See I don't think Hillary really meant to be offensive.(I say "think" because I can't claim to have any insight as to what goes through her mind a lot of the time.) If she was searching for her memory bank for recollections of campaigns that went into June or beyond, she could have easily mentioned the McGovern campaign of 1972 but somehow she was able to see how referencing that campaign was a mistake and yet think it was a good idea to recall 1968 to make her argument.
I'm willing to think she didn't intend the words to come out the way they did or certainly generate the kind of reaction they have gotten.
But here's the thing. She's not the only candidate who's ever said something that could be interpreted as offensive.
Remember this from 2006?
A Kerry spokeswoman, Amy Brundage, said Kerry’s prepared text had called for him to say: "Do you know where you end up if you don’t study, if you aren’t smart, if you’re intellectually lazy? You end up getting us stuck in a war in Iraq. Just ask President Bush."
This is how the remark came out:
He then said: "You know, education, if you make the most of it, you study hard, you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq."
Does anyone much less any Democrat think that John Kerry intentionally insulted US soldiers? Did anyone cut him any slack?
Here is Hillary Clinton's statement:
"I think we have to look forward here we don't need to be refighting the 2004 election as much as President Bush would like that to happen," Clinton told reporters at an event for military families in New York. "What Senator Kerry said was inappropriate and I believe we can't let it divert us from looking at the issues that are at stake in our country."
Notice what she does with her statement? Tells John Kerry to "move on" from 2004 when she's not willing to do the same thing herself in 2008. And she's piling on because at the time he was thinking of running for president again in 2008 and would have been serious competition for her.
For a more recent example, there's Bittergate. Obama's remarks were made at a private fundraiser-not for the press and yet she jumped on him insulting working class voters. She labeled him an "elitist" and herself the champion of the working poor.
"It’s being reported that my opponent said that the people of Pennsylvania who faced hard times are bitter; well, that’s not my experience," Mrs. Clinton told an audience at Drexel University. "Pennsylvanians don’t need a president who looks down on them; they need a president who stands up for them, who fights for them, who works hard for your futures, your jobs, your families."
That Obama is willing not to exploit her statements say a lot about his character. That she is unwilling to do the same for anyone she thinks might be in the way of what she wants speaks volumes of hers.