Much ink (actual and virtual) has been spilled this campaign season about how the Clinton legacy is impacted by Hillary's run. A win obviously does wonders for it - the first husband and wife ever to be elected. The first woman ever elected president.
It is in losing that things would get more complicated. A blow out would have been both unlikely and devastating to the legacy - proof that the very notion of a legacy was absurd.
The worst of all possible scenarios is the one Sen. Clinton currently faces - in the race, down on delegates, facing a bloody, brutal uphill climb to "victory." It is a climb that she could make, a climb she might win, but a climb that could do enormous damage to the Democratic party.
She has another choice. Drop out now. It would be legacy making and it could be very smart politics.
Fair or unfair the rap on the Clintons is that they are ruthless politicians willing to say or do absolutely anything to win. Hillary could change that in an instant.
Tonight's momentum is on her side even though there is virtually no way for her to get enough delegates to win the nomination. She has proven the naysayers wrong by winning big in Ohio. Texas is still too close to call as I write this but she is leading there as well.
She could go on to Pennsylvania. She could, as she said tonight, "go all the way" to the convention. But she shouldn't. She should pull out now.
To do so would give the Clintons three things they desperately want:
1. It would guarantee their leadership position in the Democratic party for years to come.
2. Should Obama lose in November it positions her as the presumptive - and noble - nominee in 2012.
3. It would put all the Clintons in an entirely new light - suddenly she (and they) would become the family more interested in the unity of the party and the good of the country than in personal gain and ambition.
Three good things. I'm not holding my breath.
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David Kuo has always hated Hillary. Check out his past comments on her, from years back. She could still win, why drop out now? Let the voters, not Mr. Kuo, speak. He is a Republican. They took the popular vote from us(dangling chads and an "altered" result in Florida from Governor Bush who said he would "bring in the vote for W in 2000" and look what has happened. Obama's people said Hillary should drop out if she lost in Texas and Ohio. Well, she WON in Texas and Ohio. Time for Mr. Obama to withdraw. He cannot get the vote to win California, Ohio, Texas, New York, Pennsylvania, Florida, etc. Does he deserve "special treatment?" Ohio elects Presidents, they spoke for Hillary.
Obama gives us a pipe dream while getting an insider reduced-price deal on his mansion with a lot of help from an indicted alleged criminal--first chance he has for a handout from the political system--what does he do--tells Resko to help him get a sweet deal on the house by buying the house and lot next door then selling just the house without the extra lot for a nice "deal", and he has only been a Senator for a scant 2 years. Now his campaign person calls Hillary horrible names? Obama is only interested in Obama. Hillary saw the health care problem when Obama was still in High School. Will his wife go back to not being proud of America like she was before he won in teeny tiny Iowa? Some people cannot handle an older woman in power, so they bash her for being older and not a man.
James Curtis -- couldn't agree with you more. I have noticed rather thinly veiled Hillary insults in David's writing and find his bias against her troubling. I also find remarks like Thinker's about Hillary having reprehensible tactics troubling. Thinker usually comes pretty close to the mark, but this ia a generalized disparagement without any specific FACTS. Too much of the political discussion consists of unsupported opinions that seem to be just passing along of gossip. That is especially true of the MSM which seems to only care about reporting what they consider juicy tidbits, and in fact I have heard reporters decline to discuss candidates' statements on the big factual issues because they are boring.
I have been watching more of this campaign than any human should have to and I don't see that any one candidate has the corner on negative or hard-nose campaigning. In fact, it seems pretty tame so far.Words like reprehensible should perhaps be reserved for outrageous conduct like the blatant lies we all remember from the last go-around, swift-boating, smearing of McCain by the Bush campaign in the south, etc.
Looks more like the MSM and the Republicans are really just trying to create a fight where there's only a tiff. Nothing else will help the Republicans at least hold some power next time around and of course the MSM wants us all to keep tuned in for the next installment of today's skirmish.
Speaking as someone who is not a Democrat, I don't really like Hillary Clinton. I didn't like Bill when he was the President, but he seems to have done well for himself as an ex-president. Then again, who cares if an ex-president cheats on his wife or what his position is on Universal Healthcare? He's an ex-president. There are 41 of them.
Ultimately I think that the Democratic Party will have to reject Hillary for her to withdraw. Without that, no one is going to be able to tell her that she can't win the nomination. All party politics aside, its not over until its over for Hillary Clinton.
Umm, with regards to this idea that Obama and Clinton are virtually the same. Yes, the media is saying that. But I remember in 2000 how the media said that Al Gore and George W. Bush were 'virtually the same'. i.e. - Moderates. They implied that it really didn't matter which one won the White House.
They were wrong, as the last painful six years have shown us as our Constitutions and any moral authority we once claimed as a nation has been shredded.
WE DO NOT NEED ANY OF THEM FOR PRESIDENT. THEY ARE NOT THE ONES TO LEAD A COUNTRY WHO NEEDS TO TURN BACK TO GOD. I WOULD NEVER VOTE FOR A WOMAN PRESIDENT!!!! IT WOULD BE WORSE THAN A MUSLIM. THIS COUNTRY IS GOING TO THE DOGS ANYWAY. WE NEED SOMEONE WHO KNOWS HOW TO GET US OUT OF THE PIT OF DEGRADATION. JLF MAR. 26
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