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Bill Clinton's Comment Fair
I'm an Obama supporter but I think this Bill Clinton comment that has some riled up is fair:
Clinton said today in Charlotte, North Carolina, that it would be great if the general election were between his wife, Democratic Senator Hillary Clinton of New York, and Republican Senator John McCain of Arizona. The vote would involve ``two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country,'' Bill Clinton said.
``People could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics,'' he said.
Obama has said from the beginning that one of the reasons to vote for him over Hillary is that Hillary brings a lot of divisive polarizing baggage -- whether her fault or not -- that detracts from talking abou tthe issues.
With the Wright flap, Clinton is noting that Obama now also brings in stuff that's polarizing and detracts from the issues that Hillary wouldn't bring in.
I think that's true and accusing Clinton of McCarthyism as some have done doesn't address his point.
I'm not pursuaded by his argument for several reasons:
1. Patriotism is an issue in itself that needs to be discussed and worked through. So having it brought up in the campaign is not a bad thing. The Right's abuse of this issue is something we need to address head on because it is used over and over again to affect policy. It must be dealth with.
And by the way, I think Obama's speech Tuesday suggested an answer. He stood by his pastor and community despite the fact that they said things he agreed were offensive. Isn't that the definition of loyalty? If he applies that same attitude toward America -- that he stands by his country even when it does things he disagrees with -- isn't that the definition of patriotism?
2. The polarizing nature of what comes in if Hillary is the nominee is worse and harder to deal with because it's all personal and revolves around issues of trust. You can't really turn anything like that around without trust.
3. Obama has, in my opinion, show this week that he response to such attempts at injecting this kind of stuff into the campaign far better than Hillary does and in ways that diffuse it rather than feeding into it.
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Comments (4)
I disagree. You are overlooking the first and most offensive part of his statements and focusing only on the second part. If he had only said ``People could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics'', you could make your arguments.
But he said first "two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country" and coupled with his second statement, this implies Obama is not part of the people who love this country and are devoted its interests.
In other words, he is not as patriotic as McCain and Hillary because of "all this other stuff".
That's pretty low from a democrat towards another democrat, even lower than the commander in chief threshhold comment by Hillary, in my opionion.
March 22, 2008 3:50 PM | Reply | Permalink
Sigh. I agree with you. And I'm also an Obama supporter. I think the candidates and all those working night and day on the campaign are quite honestly tired.
We're all so quick (myself included), but particularly the media, to jump on any statement that could be interpreted a number of ways, we forget this one simple fact:
We're all human. Sometimes the words that come out of our mouths aren't really what we meant. In normal everyday conversation, we forgive that, but somehow when we get caught up in all this, we don't give them any leeway.
I felt the same way about the fairy tale comment, the "as far as I know" comment, the "typical white person" comment, the "really proud" statement, etc. I have more, but I won't bother to go into them. You can argue with whether or not those statements have other meanings, all I'm saying is that I think sometimes we have to cut them a little slack - they're working night and day.
I hate getting so caught up in semantics constantly. It's making me look forward to the general, regardless of who our candidate is, because then we can get into some really meaty issue debates. (although I'm quite sure there will be loads of semantics throughout the campaign.)
March 22, 2008 3:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Watching him make those remarks at a podium emblazoned with a Stonewall Jackson plaque was disgusting.
March 22, 2008 3:53 PM | Reply | Permalink
The full text is far more damning to Clinton than the excerpt you include. I don't have it to post, but I saw it on the news. Clinton is not just saying that Obama can be characterized by the Right as someone who doesn't love the country, but that he actually IS unpatriotic. Clinton then says that this is the case he is making for Hillary's nomination (to voters and presumably to superdelegates), [that if Hillary is nominated we will have 2 candidates who love their country and therefore the campaigns can focus on issues.], implying that she won't be weakened by the Right Wing attack machine. In context, there's no doubt what he means, and it's not the same as saying that both candidates have baggage now. On news shows, the commentators who gloss over the comments are those who don't play them in full.
We all know that any Democratic candidate will be attacked from every conceivable angle, and there are benefits to exposing Obama to stiff challenges within the Party. But there should be limits to intra-party attack. No one should say that their Democratic opponent - in this case the front-runner for the nomination, is unpatriotic or unfit to be commander-in-chief compared to his Republican opponent. There must be some closing of ranks within the Party to combat attacks from the Right, that will surely come regardless of the candidate.
March 22, 2008 4:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
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