Is It Time...?

oy vey! this meshugana election will be the death of me yet....

i have so many contradictory feelings this week... i'm trying to sort them all out and i seem to come up with one consistent question.

the problem remains... i inevitably end up debating the one honest answer against the one bargaining answer.

the question is simple: is it time for hillary clinton to drop out of the campaign?

i realize obamaphiles have long felt she should. i continue to hark back to the fact that he has won twice as many states yet only leads slightly in the overall count.

the problem arose last friday after mike allen and jim vandehei of politico wrote the article "story behind the story: the clinton myth" in which they vivisect the clinton campaign.

One big fact has largely been lost in the recent coverage of the Democratic presidential race: Hillary Rodham Clinton has virtually no chance of winning.

Her own campaign acknowledges there is no way that she will finish ahead in pledged delegates. That means the only way she wins is if Democratic superdelegates are ready to risk a backlash of historic proportions from the party’s most reliable constituency.

and thus opened the flood gates.

david brooks of the times wrote "hillary clinton’s presidential prospects continue to dim. the door is closing. night is coming."

he goes on to reference the allen/vandehei article and a clinton insider that suggested she has about a 10% chance of winning the nomination. mr. brooks now puts that number at 5%.

chris cillizza of the fix quotes conference calls with wolfson and singer of the clinton camp and their determination to swing the story to superdelegates overturning the current wave based on "electability." but mr. cillizza, who is as wise as he is yummy, reminds us that superdelegates are mostly elected officials who are politicians looking out for numero uno. they'll follow the tide.

so the question begs to be answered: should hillary clinton drop out?

it pains me...but the answer is yes.

and yet the inner-turmoil continues. i attend senate district thirteen's convention this weekend and i will support my hillary.

and my argument has long been that if hillary can win the popular vote, she can then make the case she deserves the nomination. after all.... most dems are still stinging from the popular vote being stolen from al gore in 2000 by the electoral college.

and yet something happened over the past two weeks.... michigan and florida will not re-vote. their delegates...their votes... they will not count.

without florida and michigan... hillary cannot win.

as gail collins of the times wrote today:

The genius that is the Democratic Party has somehow managed to create a system in which two candidates can run for five months in all 50 states and neither one can possibly win enough delegates to clinch the nomination.

but as ms. collins goes on to point out in the ongoing struggle to seat delegates:

There isn’t a right or wrong to this argument — only strategy. Obama didn’t overexert himself to help find a way to let Michigan and Florida re-vote because it wasn’t to his advantage. And while ending the negativity would be nice, the Obamaites would mainly like to call a halt because they don’t want to risk something weird and undesirable happening. Hillary plans to continue in the hope that the weird and undesirable will occur.

but the media does not want to focus on the obama camp's unwillingness to recast votes in michigan and the ever-important state of florida.

instead they focus on hillary's hope in something "weird or undesirable happening" (another reverend wright?) and her gawdawful insistence on staying in the race.

i mean... the nerve!

but the damage is starting to stick. the latest nbc/wallstreet journal poll show hillary's personal approval rating dropping significantly. those that hold a negative view of her have reached 48% (the highest in that poll since march 2001). just 37% of respondents have a positive view of hillary....down from 45% two weeks ago.

meanwhile...obama's positives remain constant at 49% which means he has weathered the reverend wright firestorm.

and as i've mentioned earlier... i don't think the controversy will hurt him in the democratic primary... but i still firmly believe it will damage him far worse than predicted in the general.

but i have not mentioned my bargaining answer. if hillary wants to stay in the race... and if she continues to win in the upcoming primaries....as she most assuredly will in pennsylvania.... she should stay in. why not let the process run its course?

however...the negative attacks must end on both sides. both camps must speak only to the issues... they can draw contrasts...but both must remain above the fray.

continuing the attacks only embolden the republicans and supply them ammunition for the fall.

and as the recent polls show.... they only hurt hillary in the long run.

i have friends who can only focus on what hillary and her surrogates have said recently. never mind obama's willingness to stifle the voices of two voting populations or his surrogates' cheap shots, including the one aimed at bill clinton's reputation being "soiled worse than monica lewinsky's dress."

yeah...that's a clean shot.

no... the media only focuses on the attacks from hillary's side of the ballgame. after all... the male-dominated newsmedia of the hearst, murdoch and clearchannel ilk fear a strong-willed woman as much as the rest of this patriarchal country.

but having said all this...i still don't see hillary winning without a re-vote in florida and michigan.... and that looks next to impossible.

but if she remains in the race, she must maintain her dignity.

she must solidify her reputation so that she can return to the senate and wield power in that motherfucker so well that robert caro one day writes a book about her.

but if june 1st comes... puerto rico passes.... and she remains below in delegates and popular vote.... she must drop out.

no convention fight.

as my father says, "mccain will slip right into the presidency while the democrats fight amongst themselves."

in all honesty... with my blanche dubois paper lanterns smashed to the ground... the race is over for hillary.

what everyone must do now is act in a fashion that's best for the party.

i continue to believe barack obama is not best for this election. i still think the GOP and mccain will eat him alive in the fall.

and i believe mccain will win in november.

but in order to come back in 2012. in order to maintain the seats we currently have in congress and win even more... we most coalesce as a party and fight together in the months ahead.

blind idealism and an overwhelming desire to believe in hope may lose us the white house in november... but it is what our party is supposed to be about and we must move forward as one.

obama will have my vote. hell, i may even volunteer for him.

but my heart will always belong to hillary. and i will cast one last vote for her this saturday.

but i am no blind idealist. i am a realist. and hillary has lost.

it's time we face facts.

i just hope everyone can come together in november and give the dems a fighting chance to sit in the oval office come next year.

but only time will tell.....

in the meantime: if you pray...pray. or send positive thoughts out into the universe. rub your buddha's belly till you're sore. but hope that there is no other reverend wright. nor a terrorist attack on our country between now and november.

if these events unfold...we have no shot at all with obama topping the ticket.

but i am a democrat and i will vote democrat.

i hope the other dems will, as well.

obama '08. goddammit.

e.