PHILADELPHIA, April 16, 2008
Poll Shows Erosion Of Trust In Clinton
Washington Post: Majority Of Voters Now View N.Y. Senator As Dishonest
-
Photo
Democratic presidential hopeful Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., addresses the Building and Construction Trades Department union, Wednesday, April 16, 2008, in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)
-
Photo Essay
Hillary Clinton
A look at a life and career full of firsts.
- Stories
- McCain Echoes Clinton's Attacks
From Our Partner:
Lost in the Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign's aggressive attacks on Barack Obama in recent days is a deep and enduring problem that threatens to undercut any inroads Clinton has made in her struggle to overtake him in the Democratic presidential race: She has lost trust among voters, a majority of whom now view her as dishonest.
Her advisers' efforts to deal with the problem -- by having her acknowledge her mistakes and crack self-deprecating jokes -- do not seem to have succeeded. Privately, the aides admit that the recent controversy over her claim to have ducked sniper fire on a trip to Bosnia probably made things worse.
Clinton is viewed as "honest and trustworthy" by just 39 percent of Americans, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll, compared with 52 percent in May 2006. Nearly six in 10 said in the new poll that she is not honest and trustworthy. And now, compared with Obama, Clinton has a deep trust deficit among Democrats, trailing him by 23 points as the more honest, an area on which she once led both Obama and John Edwards.
Among Democrats, 63 percent called her honest, down 18 points from 2006; among independents, her trust level has dropped 13 points, to 37 percent. Republicans held Clinton in low regard on this in the past (23 percent called her honest two years ago), but it is even lower now, at 16 percent. Majorities of men and women now say the phrase does not apply to Clinton; two years ago, narrow majorities of both did.
Advisers argue that her positive ratings have dipped as she has been defined by her opponents -- a normal campaign occurrence -- and that her honesty problem reflects the pounding she took from Republicans in the 1990s. But the Bosnia incident and the way the campaign handled it have left advisers divided over what a candidate can do after such a steep drop in trust.
Some of her aides believe that after Clinton told the Bosnia story -- of having run from her military aircraft into a hangar to avoid sniper fire -- when television images of the event showed otherwise, the campaign had no choice but to say she "misspoke." Communications director Howard Wolfson first did so on a conference call with reporters, and Clinton repeated the explanation over the course of several days.
Other Clinton advisers thought that response did not come quickly enough -- and that when it did, without further explanation or talking points for surrogates to use, it only worsened the perception that she had lied. Making the situation more difficult was a split within the campaign over whether Clinton had exaggerated, or simply confused the landing with another trip. One Clinton insider announced in a strategy meeting it was ridiculous to have imagined the first lady ever having been in danger, or for Clinton to have thought she was -- a slap at the senator from New York that other advisers described as disrespectful.
At the same time, die-hard Clinton loyalists thought her communications operation did not defend her heartily enough, which press aides said they thought was impossible. "Continuing to say it did happen when it didn't happen is not a strategy," one adviser said.
The problem was exacerbated when Bill Clinton, in defending her confused memory of the Bosnia event, got key details of the incident wrong, before later saying his wife had told him to stay out of it.
Two staffers from the Clinton White House years, Lissa Muscatine and Melanne Verveer, wrote a New York Times op-ed article recalling the perils of the trip, trying to justify why Clinton had gotten the story wrong. "As has been reported, Mrs. Clinton's trip to Bosnia included a U.S.O. component with the comedian Sinbad and the singer Sheryl Crow. The helicopters that carried them to performances at American base camps zigzagged just above the trees to avoid potential ground fire, according to Carey Cavanaugh, who was then a State Department official traveling with Sinbad, and helicopters flew alongside to deal with the threat of anti-aircraft fire or snipers. These facts explain why many of us, including the first lady, believed that the conditions on the ground were precarious. We were worried about sniper fire and were prepared to rush off the tarmac when we landed," they wrote.
Senior Clinton advisers argued that the Bosnia story would not have developed the way it did if it were not for a story line about Clinton that goes back to the 1990s, when scandals involving the first lady, including the firings in the White House travel office and her financial dealings, resulted in widespread doubts about her trustworthiness. That framework, they argue, made it easier for Clinton to be perceived as dishonest, a problem that first arose in her presidential campaign in a debate last fall when she gave conflicting answers on whether she supports allowing illegal immigrants to obtain driver's licenses.
The new poll suggests that much of her problem is with men. Nearly two-thirds of men said Clinton is not honest and trustworthy (an increase of 19 points), compared with 53 percent of women (up 12 points). Democratic men, in particular, have shifted: About four in 10 now do not believe Clinton to be honest and trustworthy, nearly triple the percentage saying so in 2006.
The percentage calling Clinton honest has dropped steeply among whites with higher incomes and levels of education. And while majorities of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents across demographic lines said she is honest and trustworthy, the class divisions remain: The percentage of white Democrats without college degrees calling Clinton honest hardly budged in two years, while those with college degrees have dropped off significantly on the question (from 82 percent to 53 percent).
Among whites, the percentage saying Clinton is honest and trustworthy has declined 10 points, compared with 26 points among nonwhites. That number has declined more sharply among liberals (down 30 points) than among moderates (down 13) or conservatives (down 4 points). Head to head with Obama on honesty among Democrats, Clinton faces a 23-point deficit overall, 17 points among whites and nearly 50 points among African Americans.
Cohen reported from Washington. Polling analyst Jennifer Agiesta in Washington contributed to this report.
By Anne E. Kornblut and Jon Cohen
© 2008 The Washington Post Company
|
|
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
...
- 16
- next
See all 759 CommentsRead Why they don''t Trust her.
The Clintons are 1000% Elitist and Bill Clinton has said far Worse about Rural People !!
H. Clinton, Titled Liar, Watch her Squirm when Tim Russert Bust Her A!! on Lie after Lie !!
Yeah...Inexperienced at Fleecing the U.S. People, while they get Rich and become Vacationing Family Friends with the Bush Family...Fact
Its Simple...Noone wants another Lying Clinton in the Oval Office and they know Clintons are Notorious LIARS !!
Bill Clintons Saudi Arabian & United Arab Emirates (Dubai Ports Dealing)
Bills Many Communist Chinese Ties (Norman Hsu & other Communist China Deals)
The (Elitist) Offshore Cayman Island Account.
The (500 Million Dollar Arab Chaired, Financed & Supported) Bill Clinton Library !!
Bill & Hillary (109 Million Dollar Bank Roll) Elitist Money.
Bill Clintons: Dubai (United Arab Emirates) Business Partnership, that Bills says he will End or Dissolve ONLY(IF) Hillary Wins the Presidency...
Only then, will Bill Dissolve this Dubai (United Arab Emirates Partnership)
Note Saudi Arabia & United Arab Emirates Countrymen Piloted the (911 Attacks) on American soil...
If Barack Obama had such Business Dealings with such people, the Mass Media & The Whites Only in the White House Racist, would be having a Field Day !!
But Bill & Hillary are White & Christian, they can F--K You and this Great Country, their White !!
Titled: Bill-Clinton-Flashback
Then Bill Clinton must be a White- Elitist- Racist...Huh
Bill Clintons words are far Worse, Wheres Your... Outrage !!
As the rumination continues over Barack Obamas comments about Economically-Depressed small town voters, statements made by Bill Clinton on the same topic --
Uttered while he was running for president in 1991 -- have now surfaced.
Bill Clinton: "The reason (George H. W. Bushs tactic) works so well now is that you have (All these Economically Insecure White People) who are Scared to Death," ...
Clinton was quoted saying by the Los Angeles Times in September 1991.
A couple months later, Joe Klein, writing for the Sunday Times, reported that Clinton made the following remarks...
Bill Clinton : They find the (Most Economically Insecure White Men) and Scare the Living Daylights out of them !!
If she wins by more than 10% then the blush may be off the Obama rose.
Look for a big turnout.
She is a total fabrication as far as her national life is concerned.
She is a New York State Senator even though she wasn''t born, raised, or educated - nor lived in New York State. She had absolutely no interest in New York excapt for how it could serve her purpose of trying to become president. Since that is all she has focuseed on she had done nothing for the state either. She is a total fraud through and through and the American people have caught up to it and are making sure she is stopped dead in her tracks.
Just over a month ago Hillary had a clear 20 point lead in PA but the latest polls show that down to 4-7 points, but whatever they want us to think and however hard they try to fool the voters, Pennsylvania has real power on Tuesday.
Karl Rove has been mothballed. The Swift Boaters have been decommissioned. But conservatives need not despair. The Republican presidential nominee won''t be needing their special political services this time around.
Because Hillary Clinton is doing their campaign dirty work for them.
Duck hunting, pistol packing, whiskey swilling Hillary says its me or no-one!
Hillary supporters have their heads in the sand and their fingers in their ears and simply keep repeating that superdelegates can save her because of electability.
But the superdelegates can see that her electability is poor. Why? Because if she cant even beat an inexperienced, elitist, america hating, no good newcomer like Obama then she will be useless to the Democrats in november.
She only has a lead in superdelegates because they jumped on board with her last year before real campaigning had begun and when everyone automatically assumed she would win the nomination.
So, her POOR ELECTABILITY, explains why Obama has gained a massive advantage in superdelegates since super tuesday compared to duck hunting, pistol packing, beer swilling Hillary. And its her poor electability that completely deflates the superdelegate argument of the hanging by the fingernail Hillary supporters.
Go home Hillary; drop out with your head up high. Unless of course you''re ducking sniper fire again.
His refusal to answer questions until they reach out and bite his behind hasn''t been real good judgment either.
And his not knowing and breaking the DNC rules wasn''t good judgment either.
He''s always about 3 bottles short of a sixpack.
lol, The point is she''s not losing to Obama, why do you think the DNC hasn''t called it?
Posted by RowdyTexan2 at 01:14 PM : Apr 16, 2008
+ rep
I sometimes think he has hypnotized the media,and now the American population, Why is Hillary''s population eroded Hmmm maybe the media did the same thing to her only the opposite,they crucified her and she died and is buried.Well we will see won''t we?
This comes from a woman who has lived rent-free in government mansions for most of her adult life. No one in politics is more swaddled in the cocoon of power, wealth and privilege than she.
For 15 years, Clinton has not so much as strolled down the block without an armed security detail. Yet still, she managed to remember coming under sniper fire in Bosnia.
When was the last time she pumped a dime''s worth of gasoline into her own car? Or went grocery shopping? When was the last time she shopped at Wal-Mart? Or waited in line for stamps at the post office?
Has she ever waited in an endless line at the airport, only to be groped by the federal government before boarding a packed plane?
The elitist is Hillary, the woman with 109 million dollars bulging from the back pocket of her solid gold pant suits !!
The party is over Hillary, time for you to get off the dance floor, get your coat and go home. And take your pant suits with you!!
Of course, one could argue that anything ANY politician says has to be taken with a "bag full of salt", but Clinton''s stories have been on a par with the stories from the Great Emperor Bush II and John "McBush" McCain!
As a result, the former First Lady has ordered her husband, "Wild Bill", to shut up, and has ordered a guard placed on Chelsea when out in public to keep reporters away from her. Hilliary herself has decided Not to say anything about her other "adventures" as first lady, such as wrestling alligators in the Everglades, and being abducted by aliens from Alpha Centrai!!
SIG HEIL, BUSH!!!!
sig heil, (more of the same) John "McBush" McCain!!!!
She knows she cannot win the pledged delegates or popular vote; and she knows superdelegates will not destroy the party by backing her, so she is simply hanging around with a begging bowl asking for the nomination in case Obama makes a fatal mistake.
What kind of a leader would prefer to win a Presidential Election on account of her opponents mistakes rather than her ability? How can Sen. Clinton manage the United States when she can%u2019t even run her own campaign.
If you go count all the votes, look at the states HIllary has won...you can see Obama''s lies.
But if you just take Obama''s campaign shill you will believe Obama has beaten her! Whatta joke!
Of the two of them out there, she''s the only one addressing the issues.
Obama is out there shooting his mouth off too busy trying to get his arse out of a crack to speak to the issues.
Talk about really bad judgment!
And, as someone who used to toss down more than his share of shots, I have even more trouble imagining an evening at the local bar tossing back shots and beer with the Democratic Presidential pretender.
Yet claims of a hunting heritage and downing shots of Crown Royal and chasing it with a beer is part of Clinton''s pathetic attempt to prove she''s just one of us.
Memo to Hillary: You ain''t one of us, especially not with 109 million dollars in the pockets of your solid gold pant suits; so drop the charade, you are looking like a fool. We''re not looking for one of us. We''re looking for a leader.
Besides, if the phone rings at the White House at 3 a.m. and Hillary is spreadeagled across the bed, passed out in an alcohol-induced stupor, no one is available to answer the phone.
Posted by RowdyTexan2
Oh now you just plain need to lie...eh? You GOP tool........Lets see what Bush lied about:
WMD, Al Qaeda; mobile weapons labs, terrorist training facilities, missiles that could reach New York, 45-minute ready chemical weapons, none of which were there.
People are dying you F-ing tool of a propagandist.....
People like you make me sick......I hope you vote for Republicans......
http://www.cbsnews.com/stori
es/2008/04/11/opinion/main4009369.shtm
l
n
Posted by Obama8years at 09:12 AM : Apr 16, 2008
Actually, this is a story about McCain - not Obama.
Second, that story is an OPINION PIECE - ****NOT**** an actual news story.
You''''re dismissed as irrelevant. Go away.
------------------------------------------------
And how do they write this Opinion stories, with Facts. Everything he wrote is based on Facts. I am sure you want us to go away, hide the truth, move on, pretend nothing is going on, right. Just like most of the press out there not even doing there journalistic dutys.
I have this vision of Hillary tumbling down a cliff and grabbing the little tree stumps on her way down, hoping that one of them will stop the fall, and keep her from crashing%u2026.can you smell the desperation wafting from Camp Clinton?
They know they have to beat Obama by over 20 points to give themselves even the most remote chance of catching him in the rest of the few remaining primary states. So they mount another desperate ploy from their hanging by a fingernail campaign, but ultimately this is much ado about nothing. ? It may cost Obama a few votes in Pennsylvania and it looks likely that Clinton will have her last hurrah by winning that state, but unless the superdelegates have a death wish for their party, he will still win the nomination; and finally Hillary will go home and take her pant suits with her.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Posted by starleo14672 at 01:20 PM : Apr 16, 2008
-Don''t even try. She won''t raise among the dead! Actually she should''ve been buried a looooonnnnng time ago. Hilary is hiding an agenda that is not her''s! She is only a puppet. The only pro-American People is OBAMA, despite all what the silly right-winger blog-bots say.
war in iraq costing us how much a month, millions. the price of oil soaring because the middle east is so unstable because of us being in iraq. don''t blame the democrats who have a very slim majority in the congress. this whole mess goes right on bush''s doorstep.
Votes reflect the will of the people, not delegates, and I think the DNC is FINALLY waking up to that.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stori
es/2008/04/11/opinion/main4009369.shtm
l
n
Posted by Obama8years at 09:12 AM : Apr 16, 2008
Actually, this is a story about McCain - not Obama.
Second, that story is an OPINION PIECE - ****NOT**** an actual news story.
You''''re dismissed as irrelevant. Go away.
------------------------------------------------
And how do they write this Opinion stories, with Facts. Everything he wrote is based on Facts. I am sure you want us to go away, hide the truth, move on, pretend nothing is going on, right. Just like most of the press out there not even doing there journalistic dutys.
By cynically twisting Obama''s comments about small town voters in a way that confirms every right-wing demagogic caricature of her own Party, Hillary Clinton has adopted the frames, lies, stereotypes and destructive clichis long embraced by the likes of Lee Atwater and Karl Rove.
She has clearly decided that the road to victory runs through scorched earth. The question is, if she succeeds, what kind of Party will she be left to lead? She''s burning down the village to save it -- or to prove that she would make the best fire chief. But the village won''t be saved; only one house will be left standing. A house with room for just two occupants: Hill and Bill.
Instead of a Wall street firm (easy to do for a Harvard Law Review editor) Obama worked for a small local firm. With her husband as governor, Hillary worked for the Rose Firm, the biggest corporate firm in that region. Obama donated his time, Hillary sat on the Wallmart Board of Directors, making anti-union and anti-worker decisions. Obama writes books, Hillary hires others to write them for her.
It just begs the question: JUST WHO THE HELL IS ELITE HERE.
Sure people are dying! That''s why we need strong leadership in the White HOuse...not some incompetent do nothing! You just haven''t got it!
The man has done NOTHING for this country! And in an 8 year senate seat, he passed legislation in ONE year!
In trying to make HIM UNELECTABLE, she has made HERSELF UNELECTABLE!!
Unbelievable!
Instead of firing Mark Penn for double dipping with Colombia, she merely changes his title. And all the while, she attacks Obama for no being strong enough on trade issues. Worst of all, Howard Wolfson also takes Colombian trade money, leaving Hillary as the only individual in her entire campaign that seems to have missed out on free money.
But she is against the trade agreement. Honestly. Trust her. Really.
I must admit that as a parent, it is all too easy to confuse a hug from a little girl with the terror of running from sniper bullets.
Posted by RowdyTexan2
You are a liar.....plain and simple.......tool....
Obama uses constructive compromise to get things done.
Barrack''''s 800+ bills from 8 years in the Illinois senate are far more extensive than Hillary''''s entire elected record. Barrack is the ONLY candidate to pass Healthcare reform.
http://www.nytimes.com/imagepag
es/2007/07/29/us/politics/20070730_OBAMA
_GRAPHIC.html
His first year in the U.S. Senate, he authored 152 bills and co-sponsored another 427. These included:
**the Coburn-Obama Government Transparency Act of 2006 (became law),
**The Lugar-Obama Nuclear Non-proliferation and Conventional Weapons Threat Reduction Act, (became law),
**The Comprehensive Immigration Reform Act, passed the Senate,
**The 2007 Government Ethics Bill, (became law),
**The Protection Against Excessive Executive Compensation Bill, (In committee),
and many more.
You wanna get some?....lets go.........other wise go sit in the corner with your talking point spewing fallacy of a constituency.....
Misspeaking is one thing, repeating something over and over makes it a FLAT LIE !!
The Clintons simply cannot help themselves; they tell a big lie when a small lie will do. And they tell a small lie when the truth will do. After careful training from Bill, Hillary can lie out of both sides of her mouth at the same time even when there''s no particular reason to. She has told so many lies she cant remember the truth.
Lets face it, it takes a bare faced liar to confuse a hug from a little girl in Bosnia with the terror of running from sniper bullets. Not convinced? Perhaps you think she confused it with one of those other occasions she had to run from sniper fire !!!
If you are inclined to overlook Clinton lies just because Hillary is your favorite for nomination then please take a moment to look at the trouble the country is in because of the lies of President Bush: one million Iraqis and over 4000 American servicemen dead; that%u2019s right DEAD, all because of lies. So you see, the lies of a President really do matter. God help America and the rest of the world if the misspeaking Clintons get elected.
HER ABSENCE!
- 1
- 2
- 3
- 4
...
- 16
- next
See all 759 Comments