Deconstructing Hillary...

Giving these little reality checks on the Clinton rehab project is getting tiresome, but here goes:

Successful? She lost a primary contest for the democratic nomination that, when she started, was practically in her pocket.

In that 2002 vote, there were 21 democratic senators who, in the midst of an agitprop campaign worthy of Joseph Goebbels, UNLIKE Hillary Clinton, voted against authorizing the invasion which is at the root of most of the problems which are bedeviling us now, and which has resulted in the deaths of hundreds of thousands of people who had nothing to do with attacking us and who were no threat to us. It has also cost us $600 billion...and counting, with, realistically, no end in sight. She helped George Bush drag us into a bloody cesspool of pseudo-patriotism and testosterone-driven foreign policy decisions, and she was part and parcel of the worst elements of the american political scene.

She ran a campaign that, for scurrilous bullshit, was straight out of Karl Rove's playbook.



If you'll watch the whole thing, you'll see that her flacking for McCain to try to raise her flagging campaign, was used BY McCain against Obama. And, worst of all, she was scorning Obama for this GREAT speech he made in Chicago, 8 days before Clinton climbed on the bush war-wagon. If you haven't read it, you should. As you do, keep in mind that at the time, most of the rest of the country, just like Hillary, was drinking the patrio-koolaid like it was their mother's milk.

The simple fact is, in her primary campaign, Hillary Clinton never risked one atom of political capital on behalf of those of us who were against the war. She never took a single stand that went against the prevailing winds of the bush administration's kneejerk nonsense that was permeating the political landscape at the time.She co-sponsored, with one of the worst conservatives in the Senate, the amendment to make flag-burning a federal crime.She voted for the measure which would have declared the Iranian Republican Guards to be a "terrist" organization, which was nothing but the same kind of bullshit that bush used to gin up clusterfuck #1, as he was striving to find the political support to go after Iran. Here's the piece about her sucking up to Rupert Murdoch


With the calls for her to withdraw from the race so that Obama could begin gearing up for the general election, growing, she found a new low to stoop to, when she openly speculated about the possibility of political assassination as a reason for staying in. Given the degree of hatred that was, and is, directed against Obama (If I hear another word about Hillary's "persecution" I'll have to buy MYSELF a new keyboard.) it was unconscionable for her to say that.

Here's Bill, in the middle of the general election, 6 weeks before the vote, as McCain was enjoying a lead, speaking of his admiration for McCain and calling him a "great man":



He also exculpates Palin for her fundamentalist shit, by saying that she wouldn't REALLY inflict it on us.

Does anyone here think that Hillary wasn't aware of this effort to slip one into Obama's ribs and enhance Hillary's chances to run in 2012? I am tired unto nausea, of hearing about Hillary's "political savvy".With the war hanging around bush and the repubs necks like a bloody albatross, she threw her natural constituents, and a lot of her best support, squarely under the bus, while she went haring off after rightwing votes that simply did not exist for her in anything like the numbers which she lost by moving to the right.

It was, I am proud to say, the progressive community which derailed her coronation express, NOT the conservatives. She got absolutely hammered on every straw-vote that was taken in the progressive community. It was fine work, and I'm also proud to have been a small voice to help make it happen.

Other people, outraged by Clinton's tactics and positions, were saying THIS in the primary campaign. It bears repeating:

If she were a male Senator named "Smith" running a primary election, the women bloggers flacking for her would be asking for donations to help defeat her.

But because she's Hillary, they largely ignored her wretched tactics in the primary, or at best, issued lame apologies for them, while continuing to support her.

We have gone down the line with her supporters.The democratic party, led by the progressives, rejected her republican-lite bullshit and her support of the war, until late in the campaign, when her futzing around with bailing on her vote was killing her politically, and she finally had to eat it, straight up.I also think we helped keep her off the second spot on the ticket. I'll do all I can to try to remind people that for Obama to pick her for State would be a major brainfart. She has the blood of this war dripping off her hands, and she was too diligent in supporting it and too ready to pronounce Obama as an unfit commander-in-chief, for him to even consider putting her in his administration.

That some people are speculating about what might happen if, down the road, Obama has to can her, is a VERY relevant question. She (and Bill) are arrogant and condescending, and when it comes to chasing power, totally unscrupulous.The notion that she could serve as a lightning rod is laughable. With every press conference she held; every public statement she made; she would be leaching power and influence from Obama.

Digby talks about her drawing hatred from the right. I'm not worried about that; what worries me is the mindless, emotional, attachment to her from supposedly progressive democrats who, just like the supporters of bush and HIS policies, are utterly detached from the reality of Clinton's positions and tactics, as well as her abysmal political decision-making that was so prominently displayed in the primary race. People talk about Obama not wanting to waste political capital by pushing for Lieberman's punishment, or by making appointments that are too "librul". Picking Hillary Clinton for Secretary of State will cost him a BUNDLE, before he ever takes office.