Bill Clinton and the candidates ‘who love this country’

March 22, 2008

As much as I like and admire Bill Clinton, I’ll be the first to admit that on a couple of occasions during this campaign, he’s said some things he shouldn’t have.

The reaction to this, however, seems excessive and off-base.

Former President has made yet another comment ripe for interpretation as a swipe at Senator Barack Obama. NBC reports on his musing about a general election fight between Senators John McCain and Hillary Rodham Clinton:

“I think it would be a great thing if we had an election year where you had two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country,” he said in Charlotte, N.C. “And people could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics.”

The remark comes amid criticism that Mr. Obama did not adequately disassociate himself from comments by his pastor that some see as unpatriotic.

Because delivery can sometimes matter as much as text, the Huffington Post has the video.

I’ve seen some suggestions that this was an instance in which the former president was attacking Obama’s patriotism. As critics see it, Bill Clinton was calling his wife and McCain the candidates “who love this country,” and by omitting Obama, he was implying that Clinton’s rival doesn’t love this country.

I realize that everyone’s on hair-trigger alert here, but the former president’s quote was pretty innocuous, and hardly worth getting excited about.

There’s just nothing striking about the comments. He said Clinton and McCain are patriotic Americans who can face off in a campaign about issues. It wasn’t a shot at Obama; it wasn’t about Obama at all. I suppose one, if they were really anxious to parse the words and raise a fuss, could make a variety of inferences, but there’s really no rational need to do so. At face value, his comments were harmless.

It makes reactions like these excessive.

A retired Air Force general on Friday compared former President Bill Clinton to Joseph McCarthy, the 1950s Communist-hunting senator, after Mr. Clinton seemed to question Senator Barack Obama’s patriotism.

The general, Merrill A. McPeak, a former chief of staff of the Air Force and currently a co-chairman of Mr. Obama’s presidential campaign, said he was disappointed by comments Mr. Clinton made while campaigning Friday in Charlotte, N.C., for his wife, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York. […]

General McPeak said of Mr. Clinton’s statement: “It sounds more like McCarthy. I grew up, I was going to college when Joe McCarthy was accusing good Americans of being traitors, so I’ve had enough of it.”

For goodness sakes, let’s take a deep breath, shall we? Clinton’s remarks were reminiscent of McCarthy? Please.

When Bill Clinton dismissed Obama’s South Carolina victory by highlighting Jesse Jackson’s success in the state in the 1980s, I thought it was probably the dumbest thing the former president has said throughout the campaign. Saying his wife and McCain love their country isn’t even in the same league.

Perhaps we can save the outrage for real outrages?

The more I hear from Bill the more I wish “that women” would have bit his dick off.

  • And besides, don’t we have two candidates – Clinton and Obama – and two candidates Republican and Democrat?

    Wouldn’t it be weird to say three candidates?

    Wasn’t he just saying wouldn’t it be nice if we looked at the issues and not things like the Wright flap?

  • So now the Clinton campaign is obligated to talk about their opponent?

    Geez, it was bad enough when the rule was simply that Clinton was not allowed to actually campaign against Obama; now it appears they are supposed to campaign for him.

    Bill was framing the general as a match between his wife and McCain. Obama was intentionally not included, so how could he be called “unpatriotic”?

    The problem with the independent nature of the Obama campaign is that his supporters – including campaign chairs – think nothing of comparing the only Democratic president (two terms, no less – and left with 60% popularity) in 30 years to McCarthy. Does no one see how this hurts the Democratic brand in general and makes the election of any Democratic president less likely?

    Can the outrage overdose in this election season get any worse than it has been the past month? Maybe we just need to add valium with the flouride to the nation’s water supply so everyone can chill a bit.

  • I disagree.

    It’s obvious that in this election year we will have two candidates “who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country.” Isn’t it obvious? If it’s not obvious, who could Bill Clinton be referring to who doesn’t love America? McCain? Hillary herself?

    Granted, some of the reactions to Bill’s words that you have quoted are over-the-top. But during a week of the endless playing of The Worst of Jeremiah Wright, this is clearly and unambiguously a jab at Obama’s patriotism.

    The question left hanging in the air: WHY does Barak Obama hate America.

  • You know, this is a bitch. All last week everybody complains about Hillary and Barack tearing at each other because the Democrats haven’t picked a nominee, while McCain goes scot free. So the Clinton campaign decides, rightly, to focus their attention on Senator McCain, saying nice things about him in some areas so they can attack him on our ground (economics anyone?).

    And what comes out of the Obama campaign, moaning and bitching and comparing President Clinton to Senator Joseph McCarthy.

    Everything is a slight to these people, but they of course are pure and innocent.

  • As an Obama supporter, I thought McPeak grossly overreacted on this one.

    Still, I’m annoyed by the pattern in the Clinton campaign of praising McCain and attacking Obama in the same breath. Whether it’s this somewhat innocuous comment, or the much worse “commander-in-chief threshold” bullshit, this is party politics 101 — you do not ever state or even imply that the opposition party’s candidate is more qualified, more patriotic, or better in any way than one of your own party’s contenders.

    No one’s saying Clinton can’t attack Obama, but she shouldn’t be providing glowing sound bites for McCain’s ads in the process.

  • The text is far more damning than the video and seeing the excerpt certainly changes the context of what Bill was saying. Bill was obviously making a point that was meant to be reminiscent of Obama’s remarks about how campaigns should be about substance and not the distractions.

    But the Clinton’s give far too much credit to McCain again and again. McCain’s warmongering talk, economic ignorance and constant denial of reality for the benefit of his campaign don’t speak of his love for this country. McCain’s feelings are far more narcissistic than that.

    The issue here is not about alleged dissing of Obama as un-American, it’s about how the Clintons are now regularly portraying the Republican opponent, who is casting himself as the third coming of Bush, as being a far more noble person than the Democratic front-runner. I’m aware that in unscripted public speaking diarrhea of the mouth sometimes occurs, but for a guy who has been dogged by accusations of triangulation for his own benefit and the detriment of his party, I’d expect him to be careful enough not to throw more logs on that fire. Bill, you really do belong in the doghouse.

  • It’s not the patriotism part that’s ridiculous, it’s Bill’s claims that if Hillary is the nominee we won’t be deluged with swiftboat-style crap. What a joke. Bill’s fundraising for his foundation and library, plus Hillary’s own sketchy contributors, plus her silly exaggerations about her experience, plus all the baggage from the 90s will be trotted out with such regularity the American populace will want to collectively jump off a bridge. Maybe if the Hillary campaign had been an exemplar of taste and issues, I would give him the benefit of the doubt. But is Bill trying to tell us their general campaign will be LESS sleazy than the last couple months? To quote his wife, Get real.

  • I took it as a swipe against Obama but not to the point of being “McCarthyite”. What’s more important to me is what Petorado @ 7 said:

    “But the Clinton’s give far too much credit to McCain again and again.”

    That’s the problem.

  • “But the Clinton’s give far too much credit to McCain again and again.”

    Exactly. In many ways, it’s an extension of the idiotic 17-state strategy. Abandon most of the political field and don’t challenge your opponent — in certain states or in certain issues — and hope you can squeak out a win in the remaining turf.

    We need to challenge everything and everywhere. Every state matters, every district matters and every issue matters. McCain shouldn’t get a pass on the issue of national security experience and he shouldn’t get a glowing endorsement from our side on his patriotism either.

    (No, I’m not saying he hates America or anything else Hannityesque, but as Edwards reminded us, it’s time to ask Americans to be patriotic about something other than war, to make sacrifices for the common good and the future of our country. A man who embraces more tax cuts for the rich and the rest of the Republican agenda isn’t patriotic by that standard.)

  • Hillary says she and McCain have passed the test to be commander and chief. Now Bill says she and McCain love America. Is Hillary going to ask McCain to be her VP.

    Bill also puts his foot in mouth again.
    That’s the question John McCain must be asking himself after hearing a strange assertion from Bill Clinton about Hillary Clinton’s qualifications. Bragging that “the girl” has more former military commanders endorsing her than anyone else, Bill said that her unique experience among all of the candidates on the Senate Armed Services Committee made the difference. If so, the commanders must be as bad at research as Bill, because McCain has served on that committee since before Bill and Hillary ever came to Washington:

    He continued to highlight the military issue later in Cary, accentuating his wife’s gender to emphasize his point that more generals have endorsed Clinton than both Obama and Republican candidate John McCain.

    “You might wonder why that’s so: Why did they endorse the girl for president? All these generals?” Clinton said.

    He said that’s partially because she’s the only member of the Armed Services Committee in the race and also because of her support for wounded veterans.

    Er … what? A quick check of the ASC committee page on the Senate website to prove Clinton wrong. At the top of the column of Republicans sits John McCain, ranking member on the Committee. According to Wikipedia, he’s been there since 1987, or about four times as long as Hillary, who joined the committee in 2003.

    It’s going to be hard for Bill to claim that he wasn’t aware of McCain’s presence on that committee. McCain served on the ASC every year Bill Clinton was President. Hillary supposedly attends the committee meetings, for that matter. If she never noticed that McCain sat at the same table she did, it’s fair to ask what else went over her head at the meetings.

    Are the Clintons making this up as they go along? Were their lies always this threadbare, as with Hillary’s claims of facing down deadly danger on her USO trip to Tuzla in 1996? The Democratic race appears to have descended into a contest to find the least-worst option, and both candidates are working hard to lose that contest.

    http://www.hillaryproject.com/index.php?/en/story-details/does_hillary_attend_her_committee_meetings/

    I am so confused!!! Are Bill and Hillary supporting McCain for President or is Bill just so ego absorbed that he can’t tolerate his wife becoming President therefore equal to his position?

  • I think the Democrat’s Great Communicator’s got a communications problem, because at first blush I took it as narrowing the race to proven America-lovers like McAin’t and Hillary. One served in the military (or at least was tortured there), and the other served eight years as First Lady.

    How does one fit Obama into Clinton’s set-definition? Especially since many in the press and even in the Democratic Party have raised (erroneous) doubts about Obama’s ties to Wright (whom I like, btw) and even Farrakhan.

    Here’s what’s more disturbing to me in Clinton’s (let’s hope flippant) remarks: “… instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics.” He speaks as though it’s an external, alien force instead of something (many things) actually cooked up in the Clinton War Room to gain momentary advantage for the Clintons regardless of the harm done to Party and Nation.

  • How can all of you criticize Bill Clinton. He is one the finest leaders the Democratic party has ever had. He left office and has been idolized ever since. Now, everyone turns their backs on him. He and Hillary deserve another 8 years in the White House. Maybe they can return America to the greatness they brought to us in the 1990’s.

  • Given that it was only a month ago, I find it very hard to believe Clinton wasn’t taking advantage of the flag lapel pin crap and building on it. And if he did it on purpose as a way of backhandedly questioning Obama’s patriotism I don’t think Macarthy-like is too strong a criticism.

    That said, it is past time we moved past this kind of fake outrage bullshit and started talking about issues. Even if Clinton was intentionally slighting Obama it is more a sign of the lack of class which has characterized Hillary’s campaign than it is something to get upset over. If others who still have the stomach to watch Bill speak don’t think that was his intention then I will accept that and move on too.

    The praise for McCain? Another example of that lack of class and party loyalty. Bill and Hillary have both made it clear over and over who they feel would be a better President if she doesn’t get the nomination, and that alone is reason to question their judgment for most liberals.

  • ” 13.
    On March 22nd, 2008 at 1:12 pm, Oregon said:

    How can all of you criticize Bill Clinton. He is one the finest leaders the Democratic party has ever had. He left office and has been idolized ever since. Now, everyone turns their backs on him. He and Hillary deserve another 8 years in the White House. Maybe they can return America to the greatness they brought to us in the 1990’s.”

    Oregon, I KNOW you are missing the point. I think Bill was a GREAT President, but what he is doing today is putting family ahead of both country and the Democratic party in his shilling for Hillary. We are supposed to tear apart Republicans, not the possible Democratic candidate for President. And when I talk about tearing apart Obama, I am talking about tearing down Obama in comparison to McSame, the ENEMY party’s candidate.

    I will vote for Hillary, because even a dog is better than the scum that the Repugs throw at us as candidates, but Bill is tearing apart the party by smearing Obama in comparisons to McSame!

  • Bill Clinton MAY have just expressed himself awkwardly in his comment about patriotism, but taken in conjunction with all his other “awkward” statements, it seems suspicious.

    Throughout his presidency I supported him wholeheartedly, and I still think he was a damn good president. But ‘was’ is the operative word–that was then and this is now. Many of the Clinton campaign strategies are just contemptible, and worse, they show terrible judgement. Bill Clinton is heavily involved in those strategies, and that really disappoints me.

    When this whole campaign started (God, it seems as if it’s been going on for decades), I wasn’t persuaded by either candidate. But the Clinton people have convinced me who I DON’T want to be president, so you could say they pushed me into Obama’s arms.

  • I’m not inclined to jump to any conclusions, but it is worth noting that multiple reports have suggested the Clintons are pushing the Wright flap to Superdelegates as proof that Obama as unelectable. At a time when Fox News and friends is going after Obama’s patriotism viciously, Bill longing for a race “instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics” sounds a lot like “see: Obama hasn’t been vetted, and we’re just getting to the tip of the iceberg of the crap we’ll have to deal with if he’s the nominee.” That in conjunction with praising McCain’s patriotism and leaving Obama conspicuously out…it just jives too neatly both with the attacks on Obama’s patriotism and the Clintons’ whole argument about how there’s all sorts of scary stuff in Obama’s past that we don’t know about that is going to be fodder for the right wing, making him unelectable and turning him into a sideshow.

    Of course, that’s about as soft a criticism as one can make, by omission during a positive statement in hope of a substantive campaign, so I’m not inclined to get too angry about it. However, I would note that the Clinton supporters who hoped Wright was the beginning of the end for Obama will be very disappointed. The first Gallup tracking poll who’s rolling 3-day average includes only days post-speech but Obama up 48-45. The latest Rasmussen tracking polls also show Obama to have completely recovered.

  • Steve,

    While I wouldn’t call it McCarthyistic, I think that indeed, the correct interpretation of Clinton’s comments is that he’s suggesting Obama isn’t patriotic. The money quote is

    “I think it would be a great thing if we had an election year where…”

    which means that he is intimating that there could be two candidates where that weren’t so. It is suggesting that Obama isn’t patriotic. Which is idiotic, and which deserves to be pointed out as such (though it’s not the sort of thing deserving more than a moment’s attention).

    Tom

  • Ah, carpetbagger Hillary and her hub, lonesome cowboy Bill. What a lovely pair of sliming and smearing Republicans they’d make; oh, wait, they are already Republicans in action and character, remaining Democrats in name only. This is the dream of the right-wing corporate media: to limit us to a “choice” between war criminal A (McCain) and war criminal B (Hiillary). McCain and Hillary both voted for the war on Iraq, both cheerleaded for the war, and both voted to give persmission and cover to Bush to bomb Iran. Two war criminals.

  • Back when I was a Catholic (several lifetimes ago) I would have called Bill Clinton’s statement a sin of omission. Now, as a tutor of undergrad essay writers, I would just point out to him, should he ask, that he might think about how people “hear” what he says. I will accept that he most likely meant that whichever Democrat was selected and McCain are both people who obviously love their country.

    But a perhaps unintended meaning of what he said, given that we have 3 candidates right now and not 2, is that one current candidates doesn’t quite make it. Taken in the context of Ms. Clinton’s praise of McCain’s experience at the expense of her Democratic rival, no one should be surprised if this implied ignoring rubs some people the wrong way.

  • Bill was campaigning for Hillary so I don’t think it should come as any surprise what he was talking about here and this excluding Obama. Their campaign is desparately short of money so Bill knows the game, say something that can be interpreted two ways, and hey presto you have the Clintons back on the front page, or first blog page, whatever the correct term is these days. Remember the Clintons undestand the fact that there is no such thing as bad publicity, if they did they would have been long retired.

  • Steve – You’ve got your head in the sand.

    The Clintons are always very slick about these slurs directed toward Obama.

    They always leave themselves room to say that’s not what I meant.

    But the pattern is clear and distinct and each denial becomes less and less plausible.

  • People are missing an equal, OUTRAGEOUS problem.

    THE CLINTONS CONTINUE TO LEGITIMIZE MCCAIN!!!

    They have long stopped acting in the interest of Dems securing the White house and more Senate and House seats… which is also key for getting the Judiciary and the Supreme Courts somewhere closer to moderation.

    The Superdelegates need to put a stop to this for the sake of the Party.

    It is clear that the Clintons will sacrifice the ENTIRE PARY for their remote chance to return to the White House. Why continue to enable that???

  • If I were with the Clinton campaign, I’d be looking at the “Wright flap” and the speech that arose from it. I’d be asking myself; “do we want to make Obama give another speech like that?”

  • I think Bill Clinton didn’t imply that Obama wasn’t patriotic, As far as I know.

  • No matter, how you try turn it, Bill Clinton meant that Obama was not patriotic and that both his wife and John are. And McPeak was right to have reacted the way he did!

    The Clintons are quite ready to destroy the Democratic party should Hillary fail to become the nominee. This would be the first time I would see a presidential candidate praising her opponent against a fellow party member. The presidency is not the exclusive preserve of the clintons and they should stop making it a do or die affair!!

  • Finally, I am starting to see the true essence of a dialog about the “HillBillies”of
    the 90’s. But given the situations that have been crafted by The Bush-n-Cheney
    00’s the Dem(s) could run a cartoon character and win. But if that Dem is Hillary
    I.m not sure that we would get “Change We Can Believe In” but we would cer-
    tainly get much of the Same Believe it or not.” They owe too many people. Pay
    back is sure to be coming.

    Hillary on day one when Slick was President went behind closed doors and tried
    to get Health Care Reform. I know she will try again, but you can not get it done
    with your paper in one hand and your other hand in Pharmaceutical pocket. She
    will most likely create a storm and a fury “Shame on You . . . ” kind of arm twisting
    and “Kitchen Sink Mud Slinging” effort and when she tries that from the Oval or
    Square office she will fail again.

    The issues that we face are going to require an intellegent, open minded, calm.
    polite kind of person to work through the issues. Almost allow the parties to feel
    the ideas are their own inorder to accomplish a means to an end that we so
    desperately need. I am willing to do my part. And have never been so engaged
    and you know I even listen to Rush and Hannity. Ha Ha then I know who to be
    for. When they start trying to get the HillBillies as our Nominee then I really got
    serious about Sen. Obama. “Yes We Can” trust him. Please help me.

  • Can’t Billy Bozo do us all a favor and become the Guest of Honor at a single-car fatality?

    Anybody who thinks he wasn’t doing what General McPeak says he was probably believes in the tooth fairy and that the sun rises in the west.

  • On March 22nd, 2008 at 1:12 pm, Oregon said:

    How can all of you criticize Bill Clinton. He is one the finest leaders the Democratic party has ever had. He left office and has been idolized ever since. Now, everyone turns their backs on him. He and Hillary deserve another 8 years in the White House. Maybe they can return America to the greatness they brought to us in the 1990’s.”

    God, what is it with Clintonistas, that they are so goddamned stupid???

    Kindly point out the “greatness” these two brought us. Just point out one. Show one thing they accomplished policy-wise that wasn’t a triangulation of some Republican plan??

    Bill Clinton, the best Democratic president of the past 28 years…

    Nope. Just the boy who wanted to grow up and be president, who never grew up.

  • Yes, Clinton was saying Obama does not love this country.

    This from a guy who put his own self interest for pleasure and Monica Lewinsky over the country’s own security. So I don’t take him for much anymore. As no one should.

    Selectively using only the latter part of the quote leaves the reader to scratch their head wondering what is the problem. That seems to have happened here. But lately, using only a snippet of a quite has proven good business for many media outlets. But we can search for the truth. http://blogs.abcnews.com/politicalpunch/2008/03/was-bill-clinto.html?cid=107973484#comment-107973484

    “Former President Bill Clinton, laying out “the three reasons” for his wife’s candidacy at Charlotte, N.C., VFW post 1160 Friday, said, “She’d be the best for the veterans, she’d be the best commander-in-chief, and she’d be the best at managing this economy.”

    Then he got into some trouble with a fourth reason: electability. Citing hypothetical match-ups between the Democrats and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., the former president said his wife beats McCain in Ohio, Florida and Arkansas, while Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., would lose to him in those states.

    “So she can win this election,” he said to applause.

    “And we need to change the direction of this country,” he continued. “But it won’t be an easy race. John McCain is an honorable man … and he and Hillary are friends. They like and respect each other.”

    He then told about how she and McCain had worked together on global warming.

    “I think it would be a great thing if we had an election year where you had two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country,” Clinton said, “and people could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics.”

    As I recall the explanations, he was depressed because of the Monica Lewinsky scandal when there was that option of taking out Bin Laden. But one reason he didn’t, it has been argued, is he felt people would think he was starting a war to cover up the affair. The whole ‘wag the dog’ sequence. He didn’t love his country enough to believe his country loved him at the time. Enough to defend it from what became 9/11. And the bombing of the U.S.S. Cole. All leading to the quagmire of Iraq. He did not love us enough to tell us the truth. Either time : Monica or Bin Laden.

    So I refuse to accept the press release or conference call of a surrogate who wants to make Bill’s veiled attack on a much better man, Senator Barack Obama, into something other than what it is. Nor should any other American.

    And the real reason the Clintons are so upset about Wright is he, like Bill Richardson, WAS a Clinton supporter. Especially when Bill needed him. During the period of Monica Lewinsky.

    Bill Clinton, the manipulative liar, wants us to believe Hillary, whose Bosnia ‘experience’ is also a lie, is a better candidate. Astounding. He just keeps breaking the country’s heart when it fits his needs.

  • I’ve always admired your restraint and levelheadedness, but I think it’s serving you poorly here. Yes, some of the reaction has been excessive, but it’s not off-base.

    The idea out there that Clinton “omitted” Obama is really a canard. There’s no reason at all for him to mention Obama in anything he might want to say on the campaign trail. But what he was doing was making a primary contest appeal to vote for his candidate. That is an either/or situation. He was saying if you vote for Hillary, then you’ll get this great general election where each candidate loves their country and will conduct their campaign solely on the issues. If you do not vote for Hillary–you won’t get that. It’s a fundamental implication, really the only reason to have said it.

    But I don’t believe that’s all he was trying to get across. This is where I disagree with your comment that “At face value, his comments were harmless.” Should we only ever take anything a politician says at face value? If anything, we know that Bill Clinton is one of our modern masters at saying something without precisely saying it.

    If you follow his thread, then you quickly ask yourself: Why wouldn’t you get that kind of general election by voting for Obama instead of Hillary? It must be because, at the very least, Obama is not as devoted to the country’s interest, and does not love his country as much as Bill’s extraordinary wife and the war hero, the veterans’ brother in arms. Did you hear he doesn’t wear a flag pin? And someone said he doesn’t hold his hand to his heart during the national anthem.

    Remember who he’s addressing here: 80 veterans at a VFW in Charlotte, North Carolina, one of the most military-friendly states in the country. 80% could very well be McCain supporters.

    But wait there’s more. Bill implies that if you vote for Obama, he’ll bring “all this other stuff.” Like what? Well, I heard that his pastor–his mentor–shouts “God Damn America”; his wife admits she was not proud of our country until Obama started his campaign; and last week he just promised to keep talking about race for the next 6 months–about how we all have problems getting along.

    Finally, there is another interesting way to interpret Clinton’s remarks. He could be saying, “Democrats always nominate good people who love their country and have its best interests at heart. This year, isn’t it wonderful that we finally have a Republican nominee who does too.” That’s a subtle but firm indictment of George Bush.

    These interpretations are not mutually exclusive. Taken together, it’s a classic multi-level Clintonian attack:
    1. With state polls showing the race much tighter, keep tilling the older, whiter North Carolina soil for Hillary votes (his first 30 minutes on Hillary’s policies were quite well conceived and delivered).

    2. Keep sowing the seeds of Obama doubt.

    3. Keep sowing the seeds of McCain praise, which he’s been doing for weeks now. I’m convinced this has been a significant factor in boosting McCain’s poll numbers and favorables, which at this moment hurts only Obama.

  • You Obama lovers, you’re getting too sensitive. You interpret Bill Clinton as if he was another Jeremiah Wright. If he were the real Joseph McCarthy, he would not go around the bush but would directly attack Obama’s devotion to his pastor who hated America. However, he prodded his wife against McCain like just any politician who would prod on Obama and trash on Hillary. At this point, I think Obama will win the nomination, if that is what you want to hear. However, he turns off the other democrats who looked at him as pure “opportunist”. He has not done anything significant in the Senate that merits his promotion to Presidency. I think Geraldine Ferraro was right in saying, he’s popular among Democrats because he was black and say the good rhetorics that democrats wanted to hear. In a General Election, where the Clinton followers are turned off on Obama’s diatribe and questionable character from childhood, from affiliation with Resko, from affiliation with his pastor, from claiming that he’s the resurrection of another Kennedy…would rather stay home, his candidacy might be jeopardized in the long run. McHain will harvest from Obama’s baggages, it will be another McSame just like the John “Coward” Kerry. We suffer as a party because of our negativity in putting up with controversial nominees. If you think Hillary and Bill are polarizing couples then, Obama is a divisive candidate among Democrats that America does not need. His administration will be a polarizing ritual between black or white, unfortunately, there are other colors involved in America today.

  • I am terribly disappointed. I keep trying to tell myself that this is politics and they will get together eventually. There is some really bad blood b/w Hillary and Obama….and (for that matter) McCain and Obama.

    Obama is fighting on both fronts. That takes guts. I’m impressed. Bill does not look presidential anymore. He definitely has diminished himself in my book. Hillary comes across as too desperate. Almost mean.

    Can’t help but feel like Obama is crashing a McCain / Clinton party. All the better. They’re not “entitled” to the Presidency.

    Bill talks about external noise / disturbances from the important work of…..He should know.

  • I am so tired of the Clintons. A lot of the things Reverend Wright mentioned in his now infamous speech (such as three strikes and you are out, record breaking prison population of blacks working in the “prison industry) were brought to us by Bill Clinton. I know the Dot com economic boom came during Bill’s administration, but how much credit can he get for that? Bill and Hillary both worked to promote NAFTA.
    Is Bill unwisely criticizing Obama? I guess the Clintons would say it depends on how you define “is”. Does anyone remember that great remark?
    Hillary’s insulting statements about Obama supporters “hypnotized, latte drinking elitists” are getting tiresome, too.
    I am a Jewish American educator, 30 years of working in the inner city. The Clinton tone reminds me of the worst of middle school “he said/she said” rhetoric. The goal of these adolescents is to stay in the social worker’s office and avoid class work. Fortunately most outgrow this by 9th grade. Setting an example is part of the job, and the Clinton’s are a disgrace.
    Go Obama!

  • What we see here is “Slick Willie” at work. After shrewdly injecting race into the campaign dialogue with his South Carolina remarks about Jesse Jackson being a black candidate, Clinton is now saying that he’d prefer a presidential contest on the issues “instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics.” Let’s be clear: “all this other stuff” means the discussion about race in America. Eliminate the Black candidate and “all this other stuff” will go away. THAT was the major message from Slick Willie. Bill Clinton believes his spouse is owed the presidency of the United States — by some sort of Divine Right. He, and she, will do ANYTHING to win the Democratic nomination, as ought to be abundantly clear to every reasonable observer. His remarks about the patriotism of McCain and his wife were part of the slickness. The REAL point was to add more color to Obama’s portrait as the BLACK candidate, because this is Hillary’s best bet for winning in Pennsylvania and perhaps in other states where racial bias remains strong. In my judgment, your reading of Bill Clinton’s remarks misses his key purpose. L. O’Brien

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