How little surface does Hillary need for her fingernails to remain engaged to the ledge? Apparently not much - only a measly 2% margin of victory in Indiana. This is in a red state much like the ones she usually takes in a brisk walk. It’s in the same rust belt neighborhood as Ohio and Pennsylvania. The Clinton camp has to be disappointed. With Obama’s campaign being pummeled every direction by his showboating ex-minister and the Clinton campaign’s no-holds- barred, down and dirty Republican style tactics, as well as the talking heads puditacracy hammering Obama nightly, they only managed a crummy 51/49 victory in Indiana and got trounced in North Carolina by a double digit spread.
Obama is now in an ascendant mode again. With the wind at his back he should soon pick up more of the wavering, wind direction sensitive super delegates and hammer a few more nails in the coffin of the Clintonian hope of dynastic glory. The numbers have been against her for a long time but there was always the perennial hope of a monumental Obamaian fuck up or freshly dug up smelly new canard disinterred and then amplified by the talking head jackals-with-bullhorns on the tube.
How far the Clintons will try to push things is now the question. Will they try to change the rules to seat delegates from the two disqualified states (Florida and Michigan?) Do they have some October surprise to detonate underneath Obama’s bus? Can they convince the uncommitted super delegate to line up behind Hillary because some recent polls now show (which didn’t in the pre-Wrightgate days) that she stands a better chance against McCann than Obama? Not likely. From now it is shear inertia (and draw down of their life savings) for Hill ’n Bill.
The numbers are simply not working for them. They are not losing by a lot but by enough. But that should do it. Everyone is sick of this thing. We have had too many debates and too much sterile analysis and windbag pontification. We’re bored. They are not different enough in their policy nostrums for it to be a real argument and thus interesting. Let’s move on. Sure Hillary can play alpha male and almost schizophrenically shape shift to alternately ingratiate, charm, intimidate and finally stoop to conquer by pandering. But who cares. If she wasn’t a Clinton it might have worked. She would have been a new phenomenon on the political scene – like Barack Obama. But she is a Clinton. Her name recognition via marriage to ex-President Slick Willie is both her best political asset and her Achilles heel. We already had our Clintonism - 8 years of it. His triangulation and pro business neo liberalism in a lot of ways paved the ideologically for our descent into Republican de-regulatory and privatization madness (of course Bill Clinton seems like Abe Lincoln compared to the clown in there now.)
The thoughtful sectors of the Democratic Party - the (non-Republican) educated upper middle classes, the left intelligentsia, the college kids and the African-Americans all agree – at this juncture Barack Obama for better or worse is our best bet. Let’s get on with it.
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