One other issue with the Clinton argument is this - she claims that experience is critical; that you need someone who has faced down the wingnut attack drones.

Remember this is the person hoping to run against John McCain.

A couple observations about that Pew survey:

(1) The Dems actually placed themselves closer to Hillary than to Obama ideologically.

(2) If you assume that the "all voters" assessment is correct, and that the Republicans are unhinged in making Hillary far too liberal, then that leads to the additional conclusion that the Democrats are unhinged in making Hillary far too conservative. Personally, I think the answer is somewhere between the "all voters" and Democratic assessment. Then again, I also consider myself to be somewhat independent.

and why, now that I mention it, am I not a superdelegate?

I don't think that DNC rules allow candidates, even for Veep, to be superdelegates.

But this argument always overlooked the fact that the right-wing noise machine has, in fact, scored a few very palpable hits. Thanks to all that machinery and all that noise over the course of two decades, millions of people now seem to believe that Hillary Clinton will nationalize American industry, institute Wicca as the official state religion, and castrate all firstborn males (Chris Matthews and Tucker Carlson get especially squicky about this last bit).

I think the mocking tone here shows a failure to grapple with the real source of Clinton's vulnerability. Your suggestion seems to be that we wise and canny ones know that all of the charges against Hillary Clinton are bunk, but that we have to acknowledge that the right-wingers have nevertheless managed to dupe a lot of the rubes.

But the right wing hits that have really scored - and which would be used to greatest effect in the fall campaign - are not the crazy ones about drug-dealing, secret Socialist cabals and Vince Foster murder conspiracies - but the not insignificant number of charges that are actually true and for which Clinton will be able to offer know convincing defense.

Dan K:

The right wing hits on HRC haven't just duped "a lot of the rubes." Those "highly educated, upscale" Dems who support Obama are just as likely to grab onto those brickbats and beat her with them. It's too nasty out there for me to want to play with those folks at the moment.

The human urge to demonize one's opponent is hard to resist. Just goes to show you, the leftwingnuts ultimately have reptile brains just like the rightwingnuts. Hopefully, the former cause less damage.

Regarding the attack campaign from the Clinton camp. Observing some of the campaigning down here in San Antonio, the line which I heard expressed yesterday on NPR at the Clinton campaign headquarters was delivered by political figures Henry Cisneros and Mayor Villaraigosa of Los Angeles. Cisneros message to the supporters as recorded by NPR was to the effect that the Clinton years had been good for the Hispanic community and that the Hispanic voice has a place at the table in a Clinton administration. Her message on the air, well as far as time warner cable goes, is emphasizing her record in providing healthcare to veterans and those in our military. So I have seen very little out of her campaign in San Antonio thus far which would mean that she would start going negative.

I believe the preferred nomenclature is superdelega-licious.

I don't think this superdelegate thing is a real problem. if Clinton's superdelegates insist on playing "we're the judge and jury" game to over turn the popular votes and elected delegate votes, the democratic party will have a bigger problem than McCaine. I really do not think the demoratic party leaders even consider going that way.

Well Michael the point is unavoidable: she has not only been battered by right wing "wingnuts" as you say, she has been battered by so-called Liberal Democrats like right here at the TPM Cafe, at Huffington Post, at Daily Kos , by Chris Mathews and practically all of MSNBC and CNN. So it seems unavoidable to conclude that the fix is in. For that, I'm called a Paranoid crank. Well maybe it takes a paranoid to unravel the level of opinion manipulation that is going on. And all the criticism of her is rife with personal attacks and innuendo. Of substance what she did wrong, there is little. It is as if she is not allowed to campaign as anyone else. She has to be a "lady" and not get rough; otherwise she is a "bitch", so she can't win. And you have absolutely NOTHING so say about that. In fact you are on the bandwagon with it all

In Comparison Obama has gotten a free ride despite the fact that he has numerous shortcomings that are not picked up by you media types
The whole thing is UNFAIR and INJUST and I'm inclined to surmise along with some of the women here who think it is some hidden misogynism at work, although my preferred alternative theory is that it is a conspiracy to throw the presidency for Mc Cain.

Extra Extra: Hillary's campaign is Attacking Obama Obama. I'm shocked!! What a vile woman to do such a thing. That's the level of discussion with you leftwingnuts for Obama. You are like groupies, either for one or the other, blind as bats to anything more complicated than that..

Problems such as where her money is coming from and her experience myth.

For example Why is she holding back her tax records?

Who Was Hillary Clinton?
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120191002786436761-search.html?KEYWORDS=%22judicial+watch%22&COLLECTION=wsjie/6month

She claims she's for Universal Health Care and again the the experience to get it done -- But How?

She refuses to release her experience she lauds in the 90's when she first tried to get health care through, coupled with the fact she has more money coming from the corporate Health Industry than any other candidate? (Also the MIC!)

DoJ Confirms: As of Jan 31, 2008, Bill Clinton Holds Key to Release Hillary Clinton’s White House Records
http://www.judicialwatch.org/doj-confirms-jan-31-2008-bill-clinton-holds-key-release-hillary-clinton-s-white-house-records

And, as for learning from her experience regarding her Iraq Vote -- I haven't seen any evidence that she's worked through that major foreign policy gaff? Remembering Foreign Policy is a President's purview -- and then her NOT reading the NIE... wow... that's not going to go well against McCain.

The republicans have honed their attack skills since the 90s so, Hillary would probably have a surprise or two. The gop and/or their surrogates feel free to make things up if all else fails.

Andrew Strat is a paranoid crank if he thinks there is some "fix" between Obama supporters and the media. As if Josh Marshall, Kos, Chris Matthews, and Wolf Blitzer got together to figure out some way to sink Hillary (I'd have included you in this, Berube, but we all know you're just a flunky taking orders from above). The idea of this is so laughable that it only makes Hillary's candidacy look all the more suspect, in that even her supporters can't find nonlaughable points to support her with.

But so it is with her whole campaign. At this point, nobody is up in arms because Hillary is attacking Barack. They're laughing at her because her attacks are so lame. When she's not shooting herself in the foot, she's at best wasting money on ads that will convince no one. Her biggest problem is just that there is no good reason for us to pick her over Barack, and no amount of spin from her campaign can fix that. She wasn't a bad candidate, but Barack has proven to be far superior, and had she not already started off with huge advantages (name recognition and money), we wouldn't even be talking about this at all. She'd have dropped out after Iowa and Barack would already be focused on beating McCain.

BTW, it never helps to point out how much the media hates your candidate; particularly not for Dems who already have a hard enough time getting fair press and don't need a candidate who is especially hated by them. I'd much rather be on the side the media is helping than the one they're attacking. Yet another example of pro-Clinton points that only make her look worse.

The good professor's post brings to mind the question that while yes, Mrs. Clinton remains a playa despite the most potent propaganda money can buy, has she displayed the gumption to pwn the mighty wingnut machine? Any one-liner, riposte or comeback to ridicule the cretins? None that I've noticed.

Jon Stewart, Glenn Greenwald, Digby, Atrios and many more have created a vast repository of terse anti-wingnut rhetorical ordnance, fat and juicy for the picking. Why, a few phrases from M. Bérubé's above post would serve.

Alas, Hillary, like most in her position, fear their own instinct for original speech. Meanwhile, Obama has been zinging McCain to where the poor old coot can barely react the tracer.

An Obama-McCain debate is a dream come true. A Clinton-McCain debate will be yet another national embarrassment of irrelevant careful-talk.

Professor,

I am a little disappointed with this post. All this deconstruction of Hillary v. Obama, old memes, I've come to expect you to be more on top of the breaking movements.

Seems to me that the "wingers" have already moved on to working on "Obama is the new Hillary" not just by conservative pundits but already posted on sites like TPM Cafe. (I hope he knows not to talk about "the children." :-)) There is already the extreme angle (ala Vince Foster conspiracies,) with Bill O'Reilly attempting to paint Michelle Obama as a sort of female Malcom X.

Meantime, the New York Times just this evening is creating a Jennifer Flowers for John McCain. First impression of that: I am not at all convinced yet that this is not coming from the McCain campaign itself, in attempt to make him "sexier." :-)

Michael

Yes Hillary is yesterday’s news. But you Michael want to savor the last moments of her defeat; like drinking yesterdays cold cup of coffee.
Sure you cover your ass Michael. I even quoted you in one of my posts. The point is the glaring ASYMETRY in your scrutiny of Hillary and your lack of scrutiny of Obama.
You throw Hillary a bone….”she has endured vile attacks blah blah blah and they have been effective’ That gives you away. Sure they have been effective but a beeter conclusion to come to is that it is UNFAIR of the Obamamaniacs who we all know are sanctioned by the Obama campaign.

Why don’t you scrutinize Obama’s record-- his bloviating rhetoric. His obvious manipulation of the feeble latte drinking yuppy mind? You seem to give Obama a total pass. What else can the rest of us reasonable liberals thinks other than there must be some misogynistic motive somewhere underneath all that asymmetric concern with Hillary’s shortcomings and only adulation for Obama THE MALE?

I don’t want to be too hard on you but why don’t you condemn these vicious leftwingnuts attacks right here in this thread and elsewhere in your posts at TPM? Some of us want to know. Why the pass on them and the schadenfreude at Hillary’s predicament? I don’t get it. Help me understand you better. I’m willing to learn. I’m a liberal and open to new ideas if they make sense
What is it about Hillary that motivates you to kick the woman when she’s down?

These other Hillary bashers over here are beneath me to respond to but you are a Professor of Literature. I don’t understand.

The good professor's post brings to mind the question that while yes, Mrs. Clinton remains a playa despite the most potent propaganda money can buy, has she displayed the gumption to pwn the mighty wingnut machine? Any one-liner, riposte or comeback to ridicule the cretins? None that I've noticed.

Exactly. I call it Battered Democrat Syndrome. Hillary is by no means the only one to suffer from it -- in fact, it's afflicted most of the Beltway Democrats in the past 7 years. First, they cave to the GOP on things like the Iraq War or torture because they fear they'll be attacked as "weak" (even though caving probably does more to reinforce the "weak" meme than voting no would).

Then after giving in for so long, they turn around and talk about how THIS time, they're going to stand up to those nasty bullies. But the common thread is that they're still defining themselves in relation to Republicans. I mean, after all the crap the GOP has pulled this decade, now we're supposed to let them determine who we nominate?

What I like about Obama is that he doesn't seem caught up in this dynamic. He recognizes that the you don't neutralize bullies with bluster. You do it with confidence.

Doctor Biobrain writes

I'd much rather be on the side the media is helping than the one they're attacking. Yet another example of pro-Clinton points that only make her look worse.

Spoken like a true sycophant

He starts out calling me a paranoid crank and winds up agreeing that the media "helps" one candidate over the other....

You make an excellent point. The right fringe think Clinton is a socialist but progressives consider her republican-lite.

Andrew - You, sir, are a schmuck. In fact, I wrote an entire blogpost centered around your schmuckiness. And I can understand why you find it impossible to make friends, but if you have no intent to influence people then you're just wasting everyone's time.

You wrote: 1) The Media does NOT hate Democrats per say and my evidence is Obama (you say is an exception, which seems absurd thing to say in the face of disconfirming evidence for your assertion).

And I have no idea what you're talking about. I've written on my blog and elsewhere repeatedly my theory that the media doesn't hate all Democrats, but only the ones we've recently nominated for President (which includes Bill's wife by default); and I've backed up that opinion. Now, I don't expect you to have read my blog, but jesus christ, don't sit there and try to tell me what I think. You don't know a thing about me and insist on telling me what I believe? That's what we in the business call a "schmuck."

I'm not saying that because I dislike Hillary or her supporters at all, as I don't. I'm saying that because you're an absurdly laughable person who demands to be taken seriously while consistently attacking people you don't even know for having opinions they don't agree with. I'm generally a very nice guy, even to people I disagree with, but I have no problem saying these things about you as I know they'll just make you feel better inside for having insulted me first. You've been proven right by demonstrating that you can incite yet another Obamaniac to go bonkers and insult you, so I guess you can chalk up yet another victory in your quest to undermine Hillary's candidacy.

BTW, I should mention that I do appreciate the blog fodder you provided for me. I'm not sure if my readers will get as big of a hoot out of you as I did, but it was fun all the same. I geniunely support the work you're doing in making Hillary supporters look stupid and can't wait to see you join the anti-Obama side in the general election. I don't think they really need your help in looking dumb, but I sure don't want you on our side. Good luck!

Here is a sample of the parade of insults from the fatuous Obama knee-jerk boosters

Reality Check:
"Obama has trounced Hillery in the last ten contests.
Hillary has not had the grace to even thank those who came to vote for her in those ten contests.
Now she is insulting the intelligence of all those who voted for Senator Obama.
Why should any of those who voted for or against Hillery in those ten states, vote for her in November, after she has spit in their faces now."

Posted by liam

By Reed Hundt - February 20, 2008, 5:42AM

The Clintons will attack Obama in harsh, personal terms for two main reasons: they hope to attract attention from the media, which they need to overcome Obama's advantages in paid ads, free media coverage (like the extraordinary coverage of his extraordinary Houston speech last night), and field organization, and they want to instill doubts about Obama in the voters in Ohio and Texas who threaten to follow the pattern of the last ten votes, where in the last few days across all demographic groups there has been a decisive change of mind among the Clinton-leaners to move to the Obama side
[Reed is totally off base on this given the Austin debate, but he's not going to issue any apologias any time soon]

Here is a gem by Michael Bérubé - February 20, 2008, 8:57AM
I just want to add two thoughts to Reed Hundt’s post below.
Yes, it’s possible (as Hundt says) that “the Clintons will attack Obama in harsh, personal terms,” and that Clinton and McCain “will go low and will be outrageous.” (Though after Billy Shaheen’s inquiry into whether Obama might have done a little drug dealing, exactly how much lower can a fellow Democrat go?
[ Another fantasy cooked up in a feverish Obamamaiac’s mind]

Consider this

"Weathered attacks or attracted them? Hard to parse that."
Thank you, Tom!
That, and the way one is perceived if they armor up and go out with guns blazing... She's come to symbolize some kind of Rambo... and it just doesn't become her. Or look good in contrast to the competition.
Makes Hillary and McCain, actually, look like mirror images of each other. As if Barack was running against twins.
Posted by TheraP

Look at this recherché comment by the professor

“Good point. Clinton would have to retool for the general, and run as the outsider, the new arrival to the Senate -- or argue "I'm ready and tested, but there is also such a thing as being too ready and too tested."
Posted by Michael Bérubé

“Let me tell you why Hillary's constant whining about Senator Obama's oratorical skills is not gaining any traction:
In a Nutshell:
People will always choose to listen to the song of Nightingale, rather than listening to the bitter squawking protests about it from the Crow.”
Posted by liam

“Andrew Strat is a paranoid crank if he thinks there is some "fix" between Obama supporters and the media.”
Posted by Doctor Biobrain

[Note; Never said such a thing. I said the Media has it’s “ Obama in Hillary out” Agenda. ]

“The good professor's post brings to mind the question that while yes, Mrs. Clinton remains a playa[sic] despite the most potent propaganda money can buy, has she displayed the gumption to pwn [sic] the mighty wingnut machine? Any one-liner, riposte or comeback to ridicule the cretins? None that I've noticed”
Posted by dswift

I totally agree that the media hates the Clintons more than just about anyone (though I don't think the media gave Obama the free pass you people insist they did).
Posted by Doctor Biobrain
[he says that with a straight face, ha!]

Then there is this juvenile comment
“Please disabuse yourself immediately of the radical notion that you are conducting any kind of 'rational' discussion. In fact, isn't it time for you to rejoin your 4th grade class?”
Posted by seashell

Andrew - You, sir, are a schmuck. In fact, I wrote an entire blogpost centered around your schmuckiness
Posted by Doctor Biobrain
Charming

Then he goes on to say

Oh, and for anyone interested, here's a link to the post I wrote on Andrew Strat:
Paranoid Cranks for Hillary
Doctor Biobrain
In short

The Anti Clinton Vitriol had no end and no rational cause.

Oh, and just so y'all understand, I haven't been staking out this site waiting for a reply. I mentioned the whole thing in my post about Andrew and one of my readers mentioned that he replied back to me. But it's unlikely I'm going to keep checking here for an answer, no matter how funny I'm sure it will be.

Pandora Schmuck Laden Deutschland, Armband,pandora, Anhänger, Ohrringe, Onlineshop,pandora armband, weltweiter Versand.