A Very Cynical Attitude

Paul Weyrich, determined to become a prophet with honor, has written a new article about the Democratic field of candidates. As is standard forh im, he tries to take a very scholarly route, so it's not as fun to write about as say "Why Liberals Hate Christians."

Instead he says that Conservatives don't like Clinton, which is not a shocker, and that they think she's cold and divisive. I think she's divisive at the very least (for which I will be chided by The Daily Howler (see below)). He gives Edwards and Obama marks for not being the front runner and therefore having the opportunity to move up.

Front runners have only one place to go - down. Whereas Obama or Edwards, reasonably close to Hillary in the latest Fox Poll, can look forward to going up if they gain traction.

He notes that Bill Richardson is a strong candidate and will probably be Clinton's pick for Vice President (assuming we get that far). And he takes Biden to task for not being interesting enough on the senate floor.

He does praise Nancy Pelosi on the other hand - a safe move considering she's not running for anything.

Turning back to Hillary Clinton and divisiveness, The Daily Howler went on a bit of an extended discussion about this very issue yesterday.

Is anyone dumber than our Dem Party activists? In fact, even as these party stalwarts spoke, Newsweek released another national poll. This poll, conducted last Wednesday and Thursday, showed Clinton leading McCain by six points (50-44) and Edwards leading McCain by four (48-44). In fact, it was the third straight Newsweek poll, in a span of two months, which showed Clinton ahead of McCain; she also leads Giuliani by three in this latest survey (49-46). But so what! Nothing stops us liberals and Dems from reciting the types of defeatist points which reporters then rush into national papers. Hillary Clinton is unelectable! Because of “her political baggage!” (Sometimes, we’re such perfect tools that we say it’s because she’s “too polarizing.”) In short, the RNC doesn’t need to exist. We liberals and Dems are now quite pleased to recite their talking-points for them.

. . . We’ll discuss other spins this week and next, including the utterly matchless spin-point: Hillary Clinton is soooo polarizing. But then, we’ve even seen major Dem Party strategists repeat that bromide on the air! Could we possibly get any dumber? Could our “leaders” be any more clueless?

I'm a big fan of the Daily Howler, and have been for a while now, but I'm not sure I agree with their analysis here. I do agree that we shouldn't say that Hillary Clinton is unelectable. But I do think those polls aren't the whole story. What I've always said, is that the campaign of Hillary Clinton will energize the Republican Base to fight meaner and uglier than they have in the past (and it's not like they held much back in the last two elections). But her grass roots support is not that strong.

I also don't understand why he is so upset that we describe Hillary Clinton as a polarizing figure. It strikes me as the simple truth. Now I happen to live in the south, where perhaps resentment of her is a bit higher. And if it is the truth, why shouldn't it be said? Particularly at this juncture, when we are deciding who will represent us in the 2008 election. If one sees flaws in Hillary Clinton (and I do, both from a political and from a governance stance), why shouldn't one express them?

Somerby promises to get back to this subject, so perhaps a more complete analysis will be forthcoming.