Seeds of Destruction (What exactly are Hillary and Bill trying to do?)

[ProSense]

Hillary Holds Private Conference Call With Her Super-Dels: "I Know This Is Not Easy"

By Greg Sargent - May 10, 2008, 2:55PM

Hillary held a private rally-the-troops conference call with her super-delegate supporters this afternoon, urging them to believe that "this race is not over," vowing to them she'd promote Dem unity after the primary, and conceding that she knows what they and the party are going through "is not easy."

Somewhat tantalizingly, Hillary also claimed that there were back-channel talks of some kind going on between the two campaigns, possibly about how to maintain Democratic unity after the primary. Asked by a super-delegate whether there were discussions going on between the two camps about what would happen after the voting concluded, she said:

"There's a lot of communication between both of the campaigns all the time. I don't know how specific it is, but we have very open lines of communication...I know that both Senator Obama and I are committed, and the campaigns are as well, to making sure that when this is resolved" we will do everything we can to "unify the party." She didn't elaborate further.

The call -- convened for super-dels committed to supporting her -- provided a glimpse into the campaign's behind-the-scenes efforts to prevent supporters from bolting even as her prospects grow bleaker by the day.

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“I think the tipping point was reached around midnight last Tuesday,” said Representative James E. Clyburn of South Carolina, predicting a “significant and steady movement toward Obama” by superdelegates.

Clinton advisers say attacks on Mr. Obama are no longer enough to change the momentum or the outcome of the nomination race. So continuing to attack him on the campaign trail, at this point, would probably inflict more long-term harm on Mrs. Clinton than on Mr. Obama, her advisers said.

Mr. Obama made his own peace offering to the Clinton camp, albeit a tactical one, suggesting he would be open to helping her retire her campaign debt. “I’d want to have a broad-ranging discussion with Senator Clinton about how I could make her feel good about the process and have her on the team moving forward,” he said. “But as I said, it’s premature right now. She’s still actively running, and we’ve still got business to do right here in Oregon and in other states.”

The tonal change in Mrs. Clinton’s campaigning away from sharp engagement with Mr. Obama could reflect cold political calculation: with elements of the party now coalescing around him, her own political legacy may be at stake in the few weeks remaining before primary voting comes to a close on June 3.

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Bill Clinton's Message to Rural America

May 10, 2008 2:43 PM

As Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., avoids any real campaigning in West Virginia, the former president of the United States is out there ginning up resentments.

Bill Clinton has the right to say whatever he wants, of course. But he's a smart man. Brilliant, even.

He can do the math. He must know that it's quite improbable that his wife, Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., will be the Democratic presidential nominee.

So what purpose does it serve for him to barnstorm a state like West Virginia and tell rural voters that Obama and his elitist political/media cabal allies are mocking Appalachia?

He's using the kind of language Democrats typically use against Republicans -- as in, stuff you say when you don't want voters to vote for the other guy under any circumstance.

This is tough stuff to walk back from.

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I don't get it. Do they know it's over? Are they going to stop the race baiting? Hillary has a significant lead in WV and KY so why continue making divisive statements?

Op-Ed Columnist

Seeds of Destruction

By BOB HERBERT
Published: May 10, 2008

The Clintons have never understood how to exit the stage gracefully.

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The Clintons have been trying to embed that gruesomely destructive message in the brains of white voters and superdelegates for the longest time. It’s a grotesque insult to African-Americans, who have given so much support to both Bill and Hillary over the years.

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But it’s an insult to white voters as well, including white working-class voters. It’s true that there are some whites who will not vote for a black candidate under any circumstance. But the United States is in a much better place now than it was when people like Richard Nixon, George Wallace and many others could make political hay by appealing to the very worst in people, using the kind of poisonous rhetoric that Senator Clinton is using now.

I don’t know if Senator Obama can win the White House. No one knows. But to deliberately convey the idea that most white people — or most working-class white people — are unwilling to give an African-American candidate a fair hearing in a presidential election is a slur against whites.

The last time the Clintons had to make a big exit was at the end of Bill Clinton’s second term as president — and they made a complete and utter hash of that historic moment. Having survived the Monica Lewinsky ordeal, you might have thought the Clintons would be on their best behavior.

Instead, a huge scandal erupted when it became known that Mrs. Clinton’s brothers, Tony and Hugh Rodham, had lobbied the president on behalf of criminals who then received presidential pardons or a sentence commutation from Mr. Clinton.

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The Clintons should be ashamed of themselves. But they long ago proved to the world that they have no shame.