Hillary Clinton, Please Exit With Dignity

(The Nation)  This column was written by Katrina vanden Heuvel.

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Check out CNN.com for Bill Clinton's vent about how a "cover up" is hurting Hillary Clinton's chances of becoming the Democratic nominee. This is a man who has trampled on his spouse's voice every time, in this campaign, that she's found it.

The women of The Nation are the first to deplore the sexism in media commentary this primary season, but a "cover up"?

Hillary Clinton started this race last year as the one to beat--she had the money, the machine and the name recognition that assured her of quasi-incumbent status. And, indeed, she ran as a quasi-incumbent, an establishment candidate in a change-year election. Yes, there were the Chris Matthews and the Tucker Carlsons and the Mike Barnicles and the Rush Limbaughs and the women who were working out their Clinton hatred through Hillary's candidacy.

Betsy Reed's superb May 19th cover story, "Race to the Bottom: How Hillary Clinton's Campaign Has Divided the Feminist Movement," documents those sexist remarks--and explains how Clinton's campaign has divided the feminist movement. But Clinton's losses cannot be attributed solely or largely to a sexism that still runs deep in our political culture.

Clinton made the mistake of running a top-down campaign in a rules-changing year, and acceding to a sexism within her campaign that advised her not to apologize for her disastrous vote supporting Bush's war resolution. Yes, she was in charge. She could have rejected the guys' advice. But Clinton appears to have bought into the idea that a Commander-in-Chief has to play by "men's rules"--and be tougher than the toughest. If she'd been smart and right, not strong and wrong, how in her right mind would she not have said, I made a mistake when I accepted the word of a man who, it is now widely accepted (except in FoxLand), lied us into a war that has gravely undermined the US's security? John Edwards managed to issue an apology--and he was dueling with a media that had pegged him as "the Breck Girl." Could it be that macho boys like Mark Penn and Bill Clinton counseled Hillary that if she issued honest regret she wouldn't be macho enough to be treated as a serious Commander-in-Chief?

If Clinton had listened to alternative voices --if there'd be some "woman- common-sense" over in her campaign--they might have suggested that she reframe what a commander-in-chief for the 21st century means. That what's needed to deal with the challenges of this world is not more militarism and macho swagger, but a commitment to smart, principled use of non-military tools. After all, how does military might address genocidal conflicts? Or the worst pandemic in world history (AIDS)? Or staggering and destabilizing global inequality? Or, for that matter, the spread of weapons of mass destruction?

Hillary might even have given a speech about what it would mean to elect the first women president. She might have given a superb gender speech--one that people, generations to come, might be talking about just as they will be talking about Barack Obama's magnificent speech on race. But she chose not to. Instead, Clinton chose a different route. And while, on some level, I like Clinton's "I'm fighting for you" persona, and her fighter instinct, that stance came too late in the campaign and needed an anchor in a larger fight than the fate and future of her campaign.

So, opportunities lost, squandered. So, it is with sadness that one watches these last days of what began as an energizing and historic campaign.

The last 72 hours of this campaign, I believe, have given renewed meaning to the term "move on." Ironically, that's a term that first gripped the national imagination at a very different moment in the Clintons' political history. It was in 1998, as rightwing forces converged on Bill Clinton, salivating about the possibility of impeaching a President for improprieties that, while grotesque, never rose to an impeachable offense, that the rules-changing internet operation MoveOn emerged on our national landscape.

It is now time to move on, again. That is not to say that Hillary Clinton doesn't have every right to campaign through the last primaries on June 3. After all, it's been a long time since millions of citizens were participants-- not simply spectators--in our mess of an election process. And that is exciting--as is the record-breaking turnout, the grassroots mobilization and registration of new and once-alienated voters in this campaign.

But when the polls close on June 3, superdelegates should move, expeditiously, to make their decision so that this campaign can refocus on what is at stake in this defining election. And their decision should follow the will of the people--that is, the pledged delegates who are the backbone of a party that --under Howard Dean has crafted a spirited fifty-state strategy seeking to connect with ordinary Americans in every part of this country. That decision, to follow the will of the pledged delegates is in sync with a party that should see its future linked to throwing off the establishment mantle that is truly elitist. After all, as The Nation's Ari Berman has reminded us in his close reporting on the delegate race this charged season, those supers were created as a firewall to protect the party establishment.

And at the end of the day, while Hillary Clinton has the grit, she ain't got the numbers. And the longer her fight drags on--with outlandish attempts to equate the status of the Michigan and Florida delegations with the fraudulent Zimbabwean elections or with the fraudulent Florida recount of 2000--the greater the disservice to the party, the people and the country.

Bill Clinton liked to say-and let me paraphrase-- we are a country in which people who play by the rules should get ahead.

The rules were the rules when the DNC laid them down to all the campaigns. At the time, the Clinton team, like all the others, agreed to abide by them. The rules are rules. Yet, in these last days, with Bill Clinton out there crying "coverup," it's as if Team Clinton has moved the goalposts so often, they're not even in the ballpark--they're somewhere out in the parking lot.

We have big issues and big differences to thrash out in this election. On June 4, I hope Hillary Clinton exits this historic race, gracefully, with dignity. That exit should win her the respect due her from all those in the Democratic party, whether they are Hillary or Barack supporters. It is an exit that is in the interest of the party and the nation. And she must know that how she exits will define the winner in November 2008.

It is time to for this election to turn to the defining issues.

By Katrina vanden Heuvel
Reprinted with permission from The Nation

[b-easy63]

Katrina
Sounds like an appropriate name for a devastating huricane.
When Hillary exits it will be with grace and dignity. I wish you could do the same with your biased views.

Posted by patriot12436 at 01:20 AM : May 30, 2008


If and when we are slated to have an even more devastating and horrible hurricane than Katrina, I''m sure a majority of Americans will secretly think it should be named Hillary. LMAO

[patriot12436]

obama is another story. You cannot exit with something you never had.

[patriot12436]

Katrina
Sounds like an appropriate name for a devastating huricane.
When Hillary exits it will be with grace and dignity. I wish you could do the same with your biased views.

[b-easy63]

I do not want an intern running our country, we need someone that brings solutions not speeches.

Posted by mercy031 at 09:58 PM : May 29, 2008


And instead you and other Hillary supporters appear stuck with a race baiting, class divisive liar. Mores the pity. One thing about it--you never know what a liar and oath breaker will do or not do. After all, if they cheat and do not keep their promises to get in, you don''t know what they will do or not do once they are in. Because they LIE...you know. LOL

[mercy031]

I am disgusted with all these clinton haters. We would be very lucky to have Hillary as president. The media has been pro Obama fron the beginning. He has no experience, no judgement when he lets his, children listen to his pastors sermons, he lied about not not being in church while pastor wright was giving anti american sermons. Obama makes a lot of speeches about bringing the country together but he is yet to explain how he plans to do that. Just because he is Obama is no reason that republicans are going to agree with him on issues. I do not want an intern running our country, we need someone that brings solutions not speeches.

[b-easy63]

"The rules were the rules when the DNC laid them down to all the campaigns. At the time, the Clinton team, like all the others, agreed to abide by them. The rules are rules. Yet, in these last days, with Bill Clinton out there crying "coverup," it''s as if Team Clinton has moved the goalposts so often, they''re not even in the ballpark--they''re somewhere out in the parking lot."

By reneging on her pledge and pretending to care about the voters, HRC is showing she can back out of bad decisions (evidently to her and her campaign that DNC pledge was the wrong decision) when it suits her.

So how come we don''t get the same kind of reneging and denouncing of her vote for war? After all, this is simply about a nomination process, in her other "signing" she helped enable hundreds of thousands to lose their life--and yet..she is strangely silent on admitting that was a huge mistake and that she should not have done that. Wonder why? No votes to be had for championing right and life over the death and lies of the Iraq WAR?

Talk about priorities.

[b-easy63]

Hillary has to try to denigrate--because she cannot stand on her own morals and record. Because she is a liar--who falsely claimed she raised 10 million in the first 48 hours of April, who falsely denied ever supporting NAFTA, who lied repeatedly about being under sniper fire, who lied about her part in Bosnia and Ireland, who claims she can manage the budget of America when she can''t even manage the budget of her own campaign, who repeatedly says things so egregious, that even many of her supporters cringe as they scramble to try to spin the kraaaap. She''s revealed to be a horrible person--she does not even own up to or keep her promises even if they are in writing. It is as if she is so removed from reality that people even have to tell her when to apologize or admit a mistake--as if, on her own, she is tone deaf to the horrible things she says or implies and to the consternation of all around her after her remarks. A liar, prone to do anything or say anything who cannot admit they are wrong and who stays the course and keeps their bad people as long as possible. The GOP has already given us one of those--we don''t need to know the Dems would also like to visit their version of THAT on us too.

[b-easy63]

Posted by mediahack1 at 08:41 AM : May 29, 2008


If stating that Clinton worked on the board of Walmart or that she and Bill routinely double team Obama is tearing her down--that is weak indeed--those are not lies nor are they making fun of Bill''s words or her policies or positions--that was just a fact--now Hillary making fun of Obama''s message of hope and change and having her staff make robocalls that lie about his record --those things are a bit more than pointing out that she was on the board of Walmart (she was, wasn''t she? or that Bill is stumping hard for her and Obama has to defend against both---he does, doesn''t he?)

[b-easy63]

To win solely due to disenfranchisement, makes for an illegitimate nominee for sure.

Posted by kmb08 at 07:57 PM : May 28, 2008


To win by disregarding written pledges and rules and changing the rules midstream--would make an even more illegitimate nominee, but more importantly could destroy the party and definitely destroy much of the chance for a Dem win in Nov. Try removing Obama and kiss the black vote and much of the new voters goodbye. Try changing the rules to suit Clinton who is breaking her pledge and kiss the Independent and a substantial part of the Obama support goodbye.

Don''t be surprised if you get your way--that you have a candidate who can only garner 18% of the ge vote--the same amount she got in the primary--because no one except those who cheat with her--would want to embrace the DNC actions or that candidate. If you really feel rules are made to be broken or not honored --no matter what your justification, you sound like you would be more at home in the Republican party.

[b-easy63]

The superdelegates have only one choice for the Democratic presidential nominee: Sen. Clinton, on the unyielding principle of qualifications as the best qualified and the strongest candidate to defeat McCain and win the general election in a landslide hands down.

Posted by crat3 at 11:51 AM : May 29, 2008


Uh oh--looks like someone else has a huge case of Rowdywicca--you are going to have to flush your system you know--being full of Rowdywicca is prone to cause mental and political septicemia--and that is akin to political death. Might we recommend either a laxative or an integrity generating *** for this condition? LOL