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Peggy Noonan Nails It
Damsel of Distress
May 9, 2008
This is an amazing story. The Democratic Party has a winner. It has a nominee. You know this because he has the most votes and the most elected delegates, and there's no way, mathematically, his opponent can get past him. Even after the worst two weeks of his campaign, he blew past her by 14 in North Carolina and came within two in Indiana.
Martin Kozlowski
He's got this thing. And the Democratic Party, after this long and brutal slog, should be dancing in the streets. Party elders should be coming out on the balcony in full array, in full regalia, and telling the crowd, "Habemus nominatum": "We have a nominee." And the crowd below should be cheering, "Viva Obamus! Viva nominatum!"
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Comments (21)
David Kurtz was right about this column. It was right on. Paul Krugman on the other hand, although finally accepting that Obama is the nominee, still attacked Obama supporters rather than doing the right thing and telling Hillary to stop hurting our party. Ironic.
May 9, 2008 12:15 PM | Reply | Permalink
Amber: I'll see your "ironic", and raise you a "pathetic."
May 9, 2008 12:56 PM | Reply | Permalink
Interestingly enough, the problem that this column speaks to is that the Dems have no leadership qualities. The Party Elders could step in and end this in a variety of ways...and you might offend a *minority* of the Dem voters, but they are a *minority*. The longer it goes on, the more chance you have of growing that minority.
Ironically, Obama does have leadership qualities and hence the enthusiastic response to him. If elected POTUS, he might have profound changes on the image of the Presidency and how things will be done in Washington. At very least, it might be possible to build up a Camelot-style myth about him like was built around JFK.
May 9, 2008 12:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
Yes. Exactly. The Dems, once again, are proving themselves utterly ridiculous and irrelevant. It's a sad day when Peggy Noonan speaks more sense than Dems, and a sad day when a Reaganite is the voice of clarity on race-baiting.
May 9, 2008 1:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
It's also a sad day when we're getting more sense out of Thomas Friedman than Paul Krugman.
May 9, 2008 7:06 PM | Reply | Permalink
Maybe they're waiting for the 20th.
May 9, 2008 3:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
They could. I guess they don't want it to end.
May 9, 2008 9:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
Please try to refrain from cutting and pasting copyrighted materials into TPM. It will get Josh in trouble and will probably get him pissed. Josh has been a strong defender of giving people credit for their work. Please, remember the Fair Use laws. A short blurb and a link. Lets keep TPM in everyones good graces.
May 9, 2008 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Someone of stature (Hello Al Gore) needs to pull out the McCarthy ("have you no shame?") speech on her. Soon!
May 9, 2008 1:00 PM | Reply | Permalink
"At long last, have you left no sense of decency sir?"
May 9, 2008 3:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
http://tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com/talk/2008/05/nevert-thought-id-see-it.php
Vomiting now. Sure, lets follow Peggy Noonan. Yeah, she is SO SO SOOOOOOOOoo much of a Democrat.
May 9, 2008 1:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Louisville 1975 misses point.
Dog bites man.
May 9, 2008 1:52 PM | Reply | Permalink
Interesting, I've had the same reaction to your post comments. I'll bet you thought the same thing when Hillary publicly kissed up to Richard Mellon Scaiffe or when David Brooks, Bill Kristol and Charles Krauthammer were writing love columns to Hillary.
May 9, 2008 4:58 PM | Reply | Permalink
People from both sides of the aisle can have good ideas.
For example, Obama realized that Indiana GOP'er Dick Lugar was smart to say we should contain Russia's loose nukes, so he worked with him. Was that bad? I think not. It's just one reason why Obama has many moderate Republicans coming over to his side.
I think Noonan was spot on. And she wasn't too far off what lefties Joe Conason and Rep. Clyburn were saying. All 3 articles of theirs about Clinton's USA Today interview, which I read today at lunch, basically said the same thing. I could've hidden the author bylines before reading and agreed 100% with each article.
May 10, 2008 12:54 AM | Reply | Permalink
Peggy Noonan. Nothing else can or should be said, except lay down with dogs and wake up with fleas.
May 9, 2008 2:08 PM | Reply | Permalink
Peggy has her points, but, really, I think it's time to relax. We're so close to the end that party leaders are willing to let the show play itself out. Then those "hard-working white people" in WV and Kentucky won't feel that they were muzzled. Hillary will withdraw and support Obama in early June, then we'll get all the "vivas" we can handle.
Anyway, watching the way BHO was greeted on the Senate floor the other day, I don't see any slump-shoulder Democrats. They just want the voters to feel they made the final call.
May 9, 2008 2:09 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks a lot Peggy. We needed that.
I voted for Obama , if he and HRC swapped places I'd want him to continue until it was clear that by continuing he could only harm the party without any realistic chance of winning. That's not yet the case as Jay Cost describes in Real Clear Politics: essentially winning Oregon could keep her in play.
So she should continue. That doesn't mean anything goes but anything never should have gone irrespective of the vote totals. The Florida and Michigan caper seems dubious to me. A revote would be fine but not a nomination in which the margin was provided by two uncontested states.
May 9, 2008 3:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
and reinforcing her points, check out Eugene Robinson in today's Washington Post
`The Card Clinton is Playing`
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/05/08/AR2008050802807.html?nav=hcmodule
May 9, 2008 5:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
This is basically off topic, but I've always thought Peggy Noonan was pretty good lookin'.
Just wanted to put it out there.
May 9, 2008 10:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
More performance art.
May 10, 2008 12:13 AM | Reply | Permalink
joehigashi - That's just Springtime getting to you. Arianna's been knocking my socks off lately too, and then it occured to me that the change in seasons is affecting my judgment.
May 10, 2008 3:21 AM | Reply | Permalink
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