angelic moo

There was speculation that Hillary Clinton’s combative speech last night was intended to secure a place for her either on the presidential ticket in November or in Obama's cabinet. On the other hand, others opined that Clinton simply needed time to end things at her own pace and that in a couple of days she will do right thing and concede the nomination to Senator Obama. Hillary Clinton supporters proffered a third explanation for her refusal to concede to Barack Obama last night: last night had to be Clinton’s night. I thought that was incredible and Jeffrey Toobin’s reaction as a panelist on CNN was priceless : CNN’s pundits, on the other hand, were pretty much agog. Gloria Borger related an email from a Hillary supporter explaining why she had not conceded her loss or endorsed Obama: “This needed to be her night,” she quoted. To her left, Jeffrey Toobin’s jaw pretty much hit the desk—”What?!” he interjected, suggesting that the night arguably belonged to the candidate who, you k...

Nobody expected Hillary Clinton to concede tonight (the end of the primary season) even as Barack Obama earned more than enough delegates to become the Democratic Party’s nominee for the 2008 Presidential election. Still, her speech after winning the South Dakota primary was startling and even unnerving. Hillary Clinton opted not to do the honorable thing: to concede and to move on to help prepare the Democratic Party for the general elections in November. What Clinton did tonight was answer the question which has been lingering since her odds of winning her Party’s nomination virtually disappeared many weeks ago: What does Hillary Clinton want? What she wants, evidently, is to remain relevant to the party. She stayed in the race not to win the nomination—but to broaden her base—to have a large enough number of voters to wield as a weapon. She has crafted a weapon from the votes of 18 million Americans and is using it to threaten her party. Hillary Clinton reminded her party that she c...

Senator Hillary Clinton's bid for the White House has ended and even she knows it. The math has not been in her favor for some time now. She tried to run on her strengths as a US Senator and her "34 years of experience" in government service to no avail. Her record could not stand up to Senator Obama's charm. She was unlikable; he was eloquent, even enchanting. His record is not so bad either. She was part of the old Washington crowd that was part of the problem. Obama was a fresh face who promised change "we can believe in." So Clinton tried different angles. She tried drama by shedding tears and launching sharp angry attacks against Obama. She tried comedy--by doing the comedy circuit on television. She tried adventure by claiming to have survived sniper fire during a visit to Bosnia. All these tricks worked a little; it kept the campaign alive, if barely. They tried to change the rules--bring in Florida and Michigan despite the fact that they were penaliz...

Hillary Rodham Clinton’s victory in the New Hampshire primary was a costly one. Not for her campaign—it was reinvigorated—but to the cause she had always been associated with: feminism. Since then, Clinton ’s campaign for the White House has used the same formula: make Hillary feminine. Reeling from her loss to Senator Barack Obama in the Iowa caucuses and behind on every poll, Hillary Clinton came into New Hampshire knowing she needed to turn the tide in her favor. She was unlikable, said many, so her campaign machinery turned from an icon of the feminist movement into a blubbering contestant. It worked, sadly, suggesting that Americans are uncomfortable with the idea of a strong woman. She was not any more aggressive than any of the candidates, but she was a woman usurping a role reserved for men and that did not sit well with voters. She has to assume the role we reserved for her. She had to become “the weaker sex”. Still uncomfortable with Obama’s popularity, the Clinton ...