hillarynews
Joined: 24 Jan 2007
Posts: 2255
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 Posted: Wed Sep 19, 2007 3:00 am Post subject: Spineless Silence |
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 Spineless Silence
If there is a phrase more closely associated with both Hillary and Bill Clinton than "the politics of personal destruction," it does not come to mind. All the others -- "It's the economy, stupid," for instance -- are linked to one or the other, but "the politics of personal destruction" is a phrase both Clintons have used repeatedly -- so much so, it seems, that for Hillary it has lost all meaning.
Category: Commentary
When, for instance, Gen. David Petraeus was slimed as "General Betray Us," Hillary Clinton looked the other way. This was the politics of personal expediency.
The swipe at Petraeus was contained in a full-page ad the antiwar group MoveOn.org placed in the New York Times last week. It charged that Petraeus was "cooking the books" about conditions in Iraq and cited statements of his that have turned out to be either (1) not true, (2) no longer true, (3) possibly not true or (4) like everything else in Iraq, impossible to tell. Whatever the case, using "betray" -- a word associated with treason -- recalls the ugly McCarthy era, when for too many Republicans dissent corresponded with disloyalty. MoveOn.org and the late senator from Wisconsin share a certain fondness for the low blow.
Almost instantly, though, it got pretty hard to find a Democratic presidential candidate willing to dispute MoveOn.org. To his credit, Joe Biden did. "I don't buy into that," he said. "This is an honorable guy. He's telling the truth." But lonesome Joe, whose virtues have yet to come to the attention of the vast and apathetic electorate, was seconded only by Joe Lieberman, not a presidential candidate, and John Kerry, a man whose tomorrow is yesterday. When Clinton was asked about the ad, she avoided answering.
It may seem unfair to single out Clinton in this matter when the bunker in which she took shelter was crowded with her fellow quivering candidates. But Clinton is the front-runner, quite possibly the next president of the United States, so it is reasonable to focus on her and wonder if, as some allege, she does indeed have a spine. In this instance, it was nowhere to be found.
It is an odd standard Clinton has when it comes to smears. When the entertainment mogul David Geffen, once a Clinton supporter, called both Bill and Hillary liars, Hillary not only decried the remark as a particularly vivid example of the "politics of personal destruction," but she also demanded that Barack Obama do the same -- and return a $2,300 donation from Geffen. Yet when Clinton herself was asked to repudiate the abuse of Petraeus, she either saw no reason to do so or, much more likely, was afraid to alienate an important constituency, the 3.3 million members of MoveOn.org, who stand symbolically at the frontiers of New Hampshire and Iowa. She would, it seems, rather be president than be right.
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Source: The Hillary Project
Description: reporting the news about Hillary that the media refuses to |
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