|
of the caliber required to approach John Kennedy's level.
She is not as compelling a speaker as John Kennedy. Or Robert Kennedy. Or Mario Cuomo.
Or Barack Obama.
But she could have positioned herself as a candidate driven by ideas had she hired someone to help her express them.
"I'm Your Girl" is a bumpersticker, not an idea.
Since Feb. 5th, the tone of the Clinton campaign has tilted toward what's wrong with her opponent and not what's admirable in her. That's not from Obama's camp, or the media -- that's from Wolfson / Carville / Penn et al.
--Plagiarism the week of the Wisconsin primary.
--Drug experimentation before that from Billy Shaheen.
--Hillary herself telling a reporter that she doesn't think Obama was a Muslim, "...as far as I know," as if she had no idea on earth what church her opponent belonged to.
--her framing herself and McCain as patriots and publicly dismissing Obama as bringing a mere "speech" to the table.
--And Aunt Geraldine Ferraro braying like a jackass on FOX News to John Gibson about Obama's being where he is owing to is skin color.
All of that, and more, generated from Hillary Clinton's campaign.
A gifted speech writer -- and they are readily available all over the country -- could have put a focus onto her candidacy that she evidently felt her celebrity obviated. She had tremendous name recognition and no ideas to match that celebrity.
Why did she not hire a gifted man or woman to frame her as a thoughtful, visionary candidate? This was a campaign rolling in money all of last year. She's broke now, and in fact in significant debt. Ideas and language don't pay the bills, but they can generate inspiration and support which politically reduce that debt. The Obama campaign is rich in ideas and has plenty of cash on-hand. The Clinton effort is bankrupt on both counts.
Progressives do not discount Clinton's work in progressive causes, but do not perceive her as committed to them in the way they honor Obama's neighborhood building in greater Chicago or Edwards' work with labor issues, to cite two examples. They do not feel that she can match Biden or Richardson in command of international experience. She lacks the fire of Dennis Kucinich as well as his genuinely-earned profile for taking on big Corporations. What in anything she has said for the last year or so rivals anything Mike Gravel has said far better on the same issues?
Clinton is perceived as a "Me" candidate and not a "We" candidate. Grassroots folks flocked to Obama and Edwards in Iowa in January in record numbers significant enough to reverse a YEAR of commanding first-place polling for Hillary Clinton. She finished third. Had Vilsack and/or Bayh remained in the race she might have finished 5th. I wonder if she's paid off all those snow shovels.
She's broke. No one in the media took that money. Barack Obama didn't take it. The Kennedys didn't take it. Russ Feingold didn't take it. Jimmy Carter didn't take it. She lost it. She spent it unwisely and now it's gone and she's in the hole several million dollars.
A speech writer -- a very good one -- might not have won Hillary Clinton the 2008 Democratic nomination. But it would have made her candidacy compelling as it would have grafted her successes as a person onto the context of the times in which she sought support.
|