Hillary Clinton and the Kitchen Sink—Desperation Politics that Threaten to Divide a Party

In watching the events of the last two weeks, I am reminded of a scene from one of my favorite movies “Any Given Sunday”. In this scene, the coach, Al Pacino, is addressing his team as they struggle to make the playoffs to face their dreaded rivals. He says “[m]en we are at war, we are in hell right now, if we don’t come together, put aside our differences and play as a team, we will be torn apart….piece by piece, limb by limb”. Even if you are not as much of a sports fan as me, the power of this analogy should be clear. We are at a crossroads in the Democratic Party. After 8 years of a very bad, on many levels, Bush, Republican White House, we, the Democratic Party should be poised to seize the Presidency. However, rather than standing united behind one candidate, the party is on the verge of being thrown into disarray by the desperate politics of Senator Clinton. If we can not find a way to come together, and quickly, I fear we are the ones who may be torn apart, and if so, the Presidency, which is well within our reach, may also be torn from our grasp in the process.

The 3am Call
Hillary’s now famous commercial that aired just days before the contests in Texas and Ohio. Hillary suggests, by showing images of people’s children sleeping, that if a call to action came in the middle of the night, presumably a terrorist based emergency, that she is the best candidate to take that phone call. Setting aside her deplorable scare tactics, I am wondering, hopefully with the rest of the Democratic Party and nation, what makes Hillary so qualified to answer that call. The fact that she was the first lady? The fact that she has been a Senator slightly longer than Senator Obama? When pressed on this question, she struggled to give one tangible example of where she has been the central leader in a crisis, and managed and solved that crisis situation. The question of readiness to answer the 3am call may perplex any current candidate. It may be the case that only someone who has served as President and received such calls, has the experience to authoritatively say they credibly know what to do in such a situation. That being the case, I believe it comes down to judgment. The kind of judgment I think we need is someone who stands in the face of a challenge, and against the great weight of his peers, as Senator Obama did in first opposing the Iraq war, and has the courage to stand up and say when something is wrong. Someone who has not only the desire, but the courage and the judgment to lead.

Legal Challenges Abound
Senator Clinton first challenged the rules about where hotel workers in Nevada could vote. She did this in the wake of the strongest union in Nevada endorsing Senator Obama. She did this after the rules had been agreed to more than a year prior. She threatened to challenge the caucus rules in Texas when it became clear she would not fair as well under that format. She now threatens to sue, or otherwise challenge, agreed upon rules regarding the Michigan and Florida primaries. Sanctions against this states were imposed by the Democratic leadership, agreed to and known by all candidates. Now, Senator Clinton wants to spend time, energy and most importantly money re-opening this issue. As an African American, the last thing I want to do is disenfranchise anyone, however, we do have rules for a reason. If these are not followed there are consequences. These consequences were known to the states of Michigan and Florida, as well as to Senators Clinton and Obama. Now desperate for voters and delegates, Senator Clinton seeks to challenge these previously understood rulings. Other than declaring herself the victor in those states, I don’t remember Senator Clinton raising issues of fairness or voters being dis-enfranchised at the time. This position, at the least, seems disingenuous.

Senator Obama as VP
Senator Clinton suggested that Senator Obama would make a good VP and she might consider such a proposition. I applaud Senator Obama for his response, and frankly for stating the obvious, which is that he is running for President, and second, when does the person in second place in a race offer the VP job to the person in first place. That is audacity, and not the good kind. A last footnote here. If Senator Obama is not ready to answer the 3am call as President, why would he make a good VP, where he stands next to be President should something happen to the then sitting President.

Ferraro and Spitzer
Earlier this week, Ms. Ferraro, a prominent Clinton fundraiser, said "If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position," she said. "If he was a woman [of any race], he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept." My apologies, but I have seen few instances, and none involving a person seeking the Presidency of the United States, where being African American is an advantage. Quite the contrary, I think Senator Obama’s impressive rise has come almost completely without playing the race card. His credentials, Harvard Law, University of Chicago Law Professor, Illinois State Senator and US Senator, his positions on the issues and the powerful way he can use his rhetoric to inspire millions, I think, is why he is in “this position”. The fact that Senator Clinton has not rebuked, and summarily dismissed Ms Ferraro after such remarks, to me, shows she is willing to stop at nothing to tarnish Senator Obama as she attempts to regain the party lead. By contrast, senior foreign policy aid Samantha Power was dismissed from the Obama campaign for calling Senator Clinton a monster.

On an unrelated note, the conspiracy theorist in me can not help but wonder about the timing of the Spitzer indictment (separate blog on this topic). Very strange to me that this announcement and resignation has dominated the news at a time where Senator Obama won two more states, and captured enough delegates to erase any gains made by Senator Obama on March 4.
Whether or not one agrees with Ms. Power, it is clear that Senator Obama means what he says when he states that he will not promote politics as usual, nor tolerate those that do. Senator Obama is a unifier and seeks to unite the party at time when is badly needs unification. One would hope that Ms. Clinton would realized that her actions are not shifting the election in her favor, and are in fact, dividing a party that should be celebrating and unifying behind the only Democratic candidate that can take the White House in the fall. To do otherwise is to engage in a futile exercise of Hubris, and to further waste valuable capital that can be put to work in the general election.