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WORD COUNT
663
JUNE 11, 2008
THANK HEAVEN THAT’S
OVER – by Donald Kaul
I told you after the
Indiana primary that it was over, didn’t I? Well, it was and still is,
although you wouldn’t know it from Hillary’s concession speech, which
was remarkably indistinguishable from a victory speech.
After winning the
South Dakota primary, she told a crowd of supporters “Even when the
pundits and the naysayers proclaimed week after week that this race was
over you kept on voting. You have voted because you wanted to take back
the White House. And because of you, we won together the swing states
necessary to get to 270 electoral votes.”
Say wha'?
Ironically, she was
claiming victory at almost the moment that Barack Obama (remember him?)
was going over the top in the delegate count. Apparently, Sen. Clinton
doesn’t know the meaning of the word “lost.”
Also “class.” Her
graceless election-night speech was interpreted, credibly, as a bid to
strong-arm her way onto the Democratic ticket as the vice-presidential
nominee. Essentially, she was telling Obama “If you don’t make me the
No. 2, I’ll take my angry middle-aged women, my disaffected Hispanics,
my swing states and go home.”
Which put Sen. Obama
in a bit of a bind because while Hillary would bring a good deal to the
ticket, she’d also take away a good deal. In addition, she has spent
much of the past five months trying to emasculate him in the minds of
the voters. How strong a leader would he seem now if he allowed her to
push her way onto the ticket?
That seems a moot
point right now. Hillary’s supporters, Harlem Rep. Charlie Rangel chief
among them, sat her down and talked sense to her, saying:
“You lost, Hillary.
It’s time to wave bye-bye and play nice.” Or words to that effect. And
so, at long last, she threw in the towel, after praising Obama as a
friend of Israel to an important Jewish group. End of melodrama.
In the meantime, we
got a glimpse of the fall campaign in the speeches of John McCain and
Obama on election night. It was like watching a Model-T Ford race
NASCAR’s Car of the Future.
McCain is at best a
lame speaker. His smile flashes on and off like a highway construction
blinker without much relation to what he’s saying. His jokes are, for
the most part, stale, and it is painfully obvious that he is reading
from a script. His arguments aren’t that hot either, particularly his
attacks on Obama. He said of his future opponent; “For all his fine
words and all his promise he has never taken the hard but right course
of risking his own interests for yours, of standing against the partisan
rancor on his side to stand up for his country….he hasn’t been willing
to make the tough calls.”
Well, actually, he
has. Speaking out against the war before it happened was an extremely
bold thing to do for a politician with national ambitions. If you don’t
believe me, ask Hillary.
Obama’s enemies have
labeled him unpatriotic and naïve for his failure to support the
president but in light of the fact that he was right on the war the
charges sound hollow.
And it was Obama,
alone among the candidates, who spoke out against the proposed “gas tax
holiday” put forth by McCain and Clinton. It was a pandering proposal
that would make the situation worse rather than better, he said, and he
was right again.
Obama’s speech was
the best, conciliatory and lavish in praise of Sen. Clinton, respectful
but critical of Sen. McCain. He was particularly good at dismissing
McCain’s attempt to shoplift his “Change” theme, saying:
“While McCain can
legitimately tout moments of independence from his party in the past,
such independence has not been the hallmark of his presidential
campaign…there are many words to describe John McCain’s attempt to pass
off his embrace of George Bush’s policies as bipartisan and new. But
change is not one of them.”
Right again, again.
--
Don Kaul is a
two-time Pulitzer Prize-losing Washington correspondent who, by his own
account, is right more than he's wrong. Email:
dkaul2@earthlink.net --
A photo of Donald Kaul is available at
www.minutemanmedia.org
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