I do not want to waste any more breath on that beautiful dream (before the winks and nods to racist tactics, the say-anything-do-anything strategy to win) that was the Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign for the Democratic Party nomination for president of the United States.
By all rational measures, she is now finished, “toast,” in the inimitable word of the New York Post. Just try telling that to her, or that hidebound husband of hers, Bill Clinton.
“I’m staying in this race until there is a nominee,” HRC proclaimed on Wednesday.
Some wonder why she does not put the good of the party before her own ambition. Why would she want to damage the almost certain nominee, Sen. Barack Obama, and swing the race to Sen. John McCain by persisting? Some see keeping Obama from the presidency is keeping the way clear so she could run again in 2012.
They’re assuming that HRC would go away for a while when she finally gives up the ghost of her current fight for the Democratic Party nomination.
There’s even some noise being made about voting for both of them, with HRC as Vice Presidential candidate. I should say that HRC on the ticket undercuts many of Sen. Obama arguments against McCain. He simply does not need her to win. All talk of a “Dream Ticket” is just that, talk.
Besides, HRC does not want to be vice president.
But what if that is not the end of her in this election cycle? The race for the Democratic Party nomination may be over but what prevents her from launching a third party bid for the presidency?
A friend, in an exchange of e-mails, is having a hard time seeing it. If Bill is not a former president, maybe, he offered. “I just cannot see her leaving the Democratic Party. I think it would be too wrenching,” he said.
Teddy Roosevelt did bolt the Republican Party to run again for the presidency, so it’s not unheard of.
Also, the Clintons have never felt at home in the undisciplined, fractious and bickering Democratic Party. They are, afterall, charter members of the Democratic Leadership Council, basically the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, with Bill famously triangulating Democratic members of Congress to go a “Third Way” most of the time as president.
The only thing that brought him back to the fold (and into the embrace that most Democratic of demographics, African Americans) was the impeachment imbroglio. Hillary inveighed bitterly against the Democratic Party base for their disdain of her.
Let’s not forget: three-way races delivered Bill to the presidency both times.
Both Clintons are highly ambitious, have their eyes on history, and besides not wanting their dream of the presidency to die to just yet, what if they could use this chance to launch a true third party in this nation? Get the remnants of the old DLC and mold it into a center-right party that scoops up conservative Democratics and liberal and disaffected Republicans.
Bill Clinton knows America better than anyone. He’s heard those people who say they would vote for McCain, or stay home, if HRC is not the nominee. He does not believe this nation is ready to elect a black man president, no matter how transcendent a figure that person is. That belief accounted for a lot of his haughty behavior toward the Obama candidacy. And the longer Obama persisted, and the more success he enjoyed, in pursuit of the presidency, the more bizarre Bill Clinton’s behavior became.
HRC certainly did not behave as a Democrat these last several weeks. So, for those who think she is softening Obama up for McCain, I say they’re wrong. She is softening him up for herself because she intends to run in the fall.
Ok, I’ve been asked where she’s going to get the money for such a run. From the Geraldine Ferraro set. The votes will come from feminists who feel HRC was done wrong and those alleged “blue-collar”; “white, working-class” voters who still cannot cotton a black man as president. And anywhere where there are votes, money will surely follow.
Obviously, this is a nightmare scenario that I do not want to see come to pass. But it is not a crazy idea. And I would not put it past the Clintons.
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