I tell ya kids, I'm beginning to resent being called an elitist-latte-drinking-Volvo-driving-liberal-egghead by wealthy campaign surrogates/pundits in the Democratic party. Hearing that kind of right-wing framing of those of us left of center, by Democrats no less, is really beginning to piss me off. Especially considering that as a college educated person; my middle-class household has only one car that costs less than what Paul Begala makes in a month. And no, it's not a used Volvo. I wonder what that little troglodyte drives, hmmm? A used Ford Focus? My ass he does. Dollars to donuts Begala drives a recent year Beemer to fit his college education, fancy Beltway abode and above the five percentile income range.
And can someone please tell me what is with this meme being offered by Hillary's campaign that only white voters, especially the male ones, are hard-working? How can these supposedly smart people be so goddamned stupid? They have no real idea what America is really like and yet they have the nerve to say her opponent is out of touch.
The middle-class is not the only hard-working segment of this society. We have millions of people of all races classified as 'the working poor' stuck in low-wage jobs yet living at the poverty line. Most college educated people are members of the middle-class, not all of them are white, not all of them are men, and they all bust their asses working long hours 24/7/365. It's as if her campaign and it's surrogates are trapped in one 30 year long episode of 'All In The Family'.
To be fair, it isn't just the Clinton camp pigeonholing all of America. Every night some fool punditute from the Mediacracy plugs us into some role in the Bunker household. Edith and Gloria naturally support Hillary because she's a woman, Archie won't vote for a black guy, and Meathead is the lone Obama supporter because he's a lazy liberal unemployed college graduate.
If that dated sit-com allegory the politicians and pundits take as gospel were true: Hillary would have won soundly in overwhelmingly white states early in the primary. She'd have been running her campaign against her friend John McCain for three months now and Obama would be back in the Senate with his tail between his legs. But that's not how it's all worked out is it?
Aren't Democrats are supposed to be the party that believes all Americans regardless of race, gender, class or sexual orientation are equal and valuable? The party that is supposed to respect and encourage education instead of mocking it? The proudly liberal party that doesn't use the word liberal as an insult like right wing thugs?
Hillary's problem maintaining her 'inevitability' this election season didn't stem from chauvinists' leery of her gender or even a deep-seated Clinton animus; it was that she campaigned like a Republican in a Democratic race and that she listened to the idiots around her that told her only The Bunkers matter.
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3 comments:
Like it or not, what she said is true. It's not about the early contests. On the contrary, since Obama’s Pastor Disaster, racist “bitter” remarks against working-class whites, and saying in his Philadelphia speech that whites had an “untrained ear”, Hillary has been clobbering Obama with this massive demographic. Democrats have no shot in the General Election if they lose badly among this demographic, and there’s no way they are going to forgive Obama. These are the hardest people to win over, and once you lose them, the hardest to get back. These are precisely the voters who have handed the Republicans the White House 7 of the last 10 contests--they're the majority. If you don't respect them and treat them with kid gloves, you are going to get hammered. If Obama is bleeding these votes when they are Democrats, what do you think is going to happen when "working-class white" Independents and Republicans are voting in a General Election? I'll tell you--President McCain. They like their War Heros and POWs too.
Lexi
If that demographic was so overwhelmingly important in all of the states that you believe matter then why didn't she win bigger in those states? None of her victories have been by more than 10%. None of her victories even took place until after the whole guilt by association theme for Obama came to the fore. She couldn't even take him out after his pastor damned America.
The numbers really don't shake out to make her the one who can beat McCain. Odds are that even if she was the Nom, many from the demographic you say is so important could be easily swayed to McCain in a heated general election where the GOP would go to town on all of the Reverend Wright/Bitter comments in Hillary's past. And there is a lot of that around to be used.
While the Clintons were 'vetted' in the 90's, Hillary's really not been vetted yet by the GOP in this primary season. They've been going after Obama and leaving her alone. Which also tells me that if the GOP is going after Obama, it's Hillary they believe they have the best chance against.
Bitter-gate is a two-edged sword because lots of Americans are bitter and not all of them are rural white god lovin gun owners.
That comment may have insulted the rural population which is not all that big compared to the suburban and urban populations that are the majority. The urban/suburban middle-class/lower income struggling folks who don't hunt are bitter as all get out. They saw no insult in that remark. They agreed with it and they vote in larger numbers.
It certainly did not help Hillary to go this route in a partisan primary at all. She's alienated segments of the Democratic voting block she can't win without and that's why she is losing/lost this nomination battle.
I highly doubt the African American vote is going to run back into her arms at this point. And neither are many of the college educated white middle class Democrats she thinks don't matter.
The point of my post was that at one point Hillary had this nomination in the bag and her campaign told her to screw over the wrong people at the wrong time. She chose to try and win over the population she may have needed to woo in the general election but did not need in a primary election. Not smart. And if she loses that will be why.
p.s.
While Bill may have been the only Democratic president since Carter, he's also the Democratic president that lost Congress and the Senate for the Democrats for the last 14 years. That's not exactly a ringing endorsement of the Clintons. The Democrats won in 2006because they promised to end the war. Because they campaigned on inclusive Democratic values. Hillary voted to go into Iraq. That's a problem.
Happy Mother's Day to all ladies!
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