Patterico's Pontifications

3/27/2008

Slate Says the Race is Over for Hillary

Filed under: 2008 Election — DRJ @ 10:03 pm



[Guest post by DRJ]

Slate has looked at Hillary Clinton’s chances of winning the nomination and declares that she has no more than a 12% chance, if that. Thus, they’ve started the “Hillary Deathwatch, a daily update on Hillary Clinton’s dwindling chances of winning the Democratic nomination.” Slate plans to continue its watch until Hillary realizes it’s over.

From the first edition:

“At the moment, polls indicate that Obama has survived the Jeremiah Wright flap (for now). Clinton’s Bosnia blunder has metastasized from a headache into a five-day circus. Bill Richardson finally climbed down from his fence onto Obama’s side. And a Michigan court yesterday deemed the state’s Jan. 15 primary unconstitutional and declined to order a revote, effectively smothering the last glimmer of hope for a deus ex Michigana bailout. Meanwhile, a new poll puts her favorability rating at 37 percent—its lowest since March 2001.”

There’s more at the link on how Hillary might pull victory from the jaws of defeat.

— DRJ

22 Responses to “Slate Says the Race is Over for Hillary”

  1. well, i am just loving every min. of it, it doesnt get any better than this. add in that hillys money people are threatening pelosi lately and i say, let the hits just keep on commin.

    james conrad (7cd809)

  2. Its great watching, the Democrats, the great uniters, have a total meltdown.

    Retired Cop (7cfd24)

  3. I don’t understand what she is thinking. The Clinton’s aren’t stupid. That means they either have something else up their sleeve or are willing to torpedo the Obamessiah in the general election in hopes that a 2012 victory will be hers.

    Demetri (c3f397)

  4. Only 12%. In Clinton speak Hillary practically has a lock on the nomination.

    Perfect Sense (b6ec8c)

  5. I find it disquietting that everyone wants to reduce the role of the conventions to an annointing party. This was even more egregious with the Republicans.

    Am I right in saying that the US taxpayer foots a large part of the bill for the Republican and Democratic conventions. If so, we ar paying for a love fest instead of a political process.

    davod (5bdbd3)

  6. It’s not over until she gives up (which will probably mean, when she tells her lawyers to quit).

    That’s true even after the vote at the convention. If the vote at the convention itself can be construed as unfair, she might keep fighting. (It would have to be palpably unfair, but it’s not hard to imagine that party elders would ram through an unfair vote in a misguided attempt to put a stake in Hillary and get on with things.)

    Slate can say “she’s finished” all it likes, but that won’t change the fact that Obama can’t get enough delegates to end the race. Hillary will have her chance to make her case at the convention.

    This is POLITICS. Anything can happen. Everything will happen. Every gaffe by Obama between now and then helps Clinton. A political noob like Obama will continue to make gaffes. He doesn’t even have much experience in politics, let alone any executive experience.

    Sen. Obama recently said that he wished he had three months before the convention to “pivot,” and Clinton was robbing him of this. WTF??? Did Obama just say outright that he wanted to move to the middle in a crass, opportunistic way to get more votes in the general, and that he’s only saying crazy left-wing things now in order to get votes from Dem primary voters and superdelegates???

    What does Sen. Obama even believe, anyway? This is going to come back to haunt him. I think he believes in himself. I want someone who believes in America.

    The man tells us he can transcend race and politics. But he has yet to transcend irony.

    Daryl Herbert (4ecd4c)

  7. Sure, things look grim for Hillary, but I’m through predicting this primary season.

    And Slate puts a new meaning to the term “liberal media bias.” It’s near impossible to take any of their politics seriously most days, and they’ve been pulling for Obama for the past couple months now, which makes anything they say on Hillary immediately suspect.

    Joe M. (01035a)

  8. It’s near impossible to take any of their politics seriously most days

    Except Mickey Kaus, of course. His honesty and independence is refreshing, and his insights are valuable.

    Daryl Herbert (4ecd4c)

  9. Hillary Clinton is evil.

    Hillary (0283e2)

  10. Regarding Hillary’s taking sniper fire comments, she is saying she just mis-spoke. As one who was shot at several times during his police career, I can tell you that you recall being shot at very vividly. It’s not something you mis-speak or forget about. She lied, she got caught. There is nothing more too it. It’s what the Clinton’s do, lie.

    Retired Cop (7cfd24)

  11. To add to post #10, Obama lied about his knowing the timbre of the right Rev. J. A. Wrights sermons. He donated thousands of dollars to that church. Is he saying he did not know what the pastor had preached for 20 years? Looks like all the Democratic candidates lie, profusely.

    Zelsdorf Ragshaft III (e18128)

  12. Say hey–welcome to the Billary world.

    Every vote
    –for Clinton–counts; about the rest of the votes, well maybe.

    Mike Myers (31af82)

  13. ZR III…
    “…Looks like all the Democratic candidates lie, profusely.”
    They were moving their lips, right?

    Another Drew (f9dd2c)

  14. I think Hillary’s take-no-prisoners alive ambition is being seriously understimated. As someone has previously mentioned, she is like the Monty Python character who has his limbs whacked off by a sword, one by one, and yet still belligerently demands his enemy to keep fighting.

    On a sidenote, Obama is on The View this morning and on top of addressing Rev. Wright, perhaps he’ll lay odds on Hillary’s possible ‘retirement’.

    Dana (fba430)

  15. +1 for deus ex michigana.

    assistant devil's advocate (960af0)

  16. Slate says? who cares? The race was even more over a few weeks ago.

    PA is key now, cuz PA is where Obama’s post-Wright electability will be tested. The superdels will watch PA and, if the Obamessiah is defrocked there, have sufficient excuse to to switch to Hillary.

    ras (fc54bb)

  17. Except Mickey Kaus, of course. His honesty and independence is refreshing, and his insights are valuable.

    You’re right. I don’t read his stuff much, but what I’ve seen has been good.

    Joe M. (5d215f)

  18. … or are willing to torpedo the Obamessiah in the general election in hopes that a 2012 victory will be hers.

    And you find this hard to believe because … ?

    Anyway, Hillary is narcissistic, tearing down opposition is standard operating procedure. And if it severely damages the Democratic Party, well she just doesn’t care. The DP’s valuable to her only to the extent it puts her in power.

    LarryD (feb78b)

  19. Patrick Leahy has called for her to step down. It will be interesting to see who follows:

    “There is no way that Senator Clinton is going to win enough delegates to get the nomination. She ought to withdraw and she ought to be backing Senator Obama. Now, obviously that’s a decision that only she can make. Frankly I feel that she would have a tremendous career in the Senate.”

    http://tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com/2008/03/obamasupporter_patrick_leahy_c.php

    Dana (fba430)

  20. If you count by general election “electoral votes” in the primary states (so far) Clinton leads Obama 219 to 202. If you give her credit for Florida, give him credit for Michigan (he would probably win a re-vote there) and add in results for the next 5 primary states (based on current polling), Clinton leads Obama 279 to 245. If you count only BLUE states Clinton leads Obama 121 to 86. Add in Florida, Michigan, and the next 5 primary states: Clinton leads Obama 149 to 103.

    This is the kind of thing that superdelegates are looking at right now . . . and isn’t it great to watch the Dems implode? Pelosi tells the superdelegates to completely disregard the reasons why they were created in the first place; Howard Dean reminds everyone how much of a spineless bimbo he truly is (after weeks of doing absolutely nothing he comes out today to say “Hey, guys. Let’s figure it out before the convention, okay?”). She isn’t out of it AT ALL, and she certainly is not going to drop out. All the better for McCain!

    Missed It By THAT Much (784175)

  21. One problem with the primaries being so early, is there is too much time between the vetting and election. It is a long time between March and November, and many health or other things can come up which knocks out a candidate. Hillary is playing the actuarial tables. Her mission is to beat John Edwards, not Obama, so it makes sense to stay in forever. If Obama is out, she is in.

    The actuarial tables would also tell us how likely someone as old and with McCain’s health history is to have a problem before November. Shit happens.

    Wesson (e1c2e2)

  22. Enough has been said by others about Hillary Clinton’s made-up story about landing in Tuzla, Bosnia under sniper fire in 1996. I don’t need to add any new details. I would like to make one observation based on my own life experience.

    During my career as a DEA agent, I was involved in three shooting incidents: In one, a fellow agent was killed when he dropped his gun, and it accidentally discharged. In another incident, a fellow agent fired a shot at a suspect who was attempting to run him over with his car. Only the third incident was a full-blown shoot-out, in which three cops were wounded and the main suspect was killed.

    My purpose in drawing on these experiences is simply to point out that when one is involved in a shooting incident it stays with you for the rest of your life. Not only does the memory remain, but the details remain clear. There is no honest explanation for “remembering” shots being fired when none were. (I should hasten to add that my experiences were as a law enforement officer as opposed to those of a soldier who may have engaged in numerous firefights in a war zone such as Viet Nam, Afghanistan or Iraq.)

    Many of Hillary Clinton’s defenders are attempting to pass this off as an “honest mistake” or a “misstatement”. She herself has attempted to describe it in those terms. It is neither. On at least three occasions, Hillary Clinton has recounted this story, which clearly never happened. Only when the videotape of her arrival in Tuzla surfaced has the truth been revealed.

    There is only one clear explanation for this story. It is an intentional lie, and it is a direct reflection on Hillary Clinton’s veracity, credibility and character.

    gary fouse
    fousesquawk

    fouse, gary c (7b7c7c)


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