Frank Rich explains why Clinton's Town Hall on Hallmark May Have Been a Bust (Scathing)

[Tatiana]

WHAT if a presidential candidate held what she billed as “the largest, most interactive town hall in political history” on national television, and no one noticed?

<snip>

The same news media that constantly revisited the Oprah-Caroline-Maria rally in California ignored “Voices Across America: A National Town Hall.” The Clinton campaign would no doubt attribute this to press bias, but it scrupulously designed the event to avoid making news. Like the scripted “Ask President Bush” sessions during the 2004 campaign, this town hall seemed to unfold in Stepford. The anodyne questions (“What else would you do to help take care of our veterans?”) merely cued up laundry lists of talking points. Some in attendance appeared to trance out.

But I’m glad I watched every minute, right up until Mrs. Clinton was abruptly cut off in midsentence so Hallmark could resume its previously scheduled programming (a movie promising “A Season for Miracles,” aptly enough). However boring, this show was a dramatic encapsulation of how a once-invincible candidate ended up in a dead heat, crippled by poll-tested corporate packaging that markets her as a synthetic product leeched of most human qualities. What’s more, it offered a naked preview of how nastily the Clintons will fight, whatever the collateral damage to the Democratic Party, in the endgame to come.

For a campaign that began with tightly monitored Web “chats” and then planted questions at its earlier town-hall meetings, a Bush-style pseudo-event like the Hallmark special is nothing new, of course. What’s remarkable is that instead of learning from these mistakes, Mrs. Clinton’s handlers keep doubling down.

<snip>

The Hallmark show, enacted on an anachronistic studio set that looked like a deliberate throwback to the good old days of 1992, was equally desperate. If the point was to generate donations or excitement, the effect was the reverse. A campaign operative, speaking on MSNBC, claimed that 250,000 viewers had seen an online incarnation of the event in addition to “who knows how many” Hallmark channel viewers. Who knows, indeed? What we do know is that by then the “Yes We Can” Obama video fronted by the hip-hop vocalist will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas had been averaging roughly a million YouTube views a day. (Cost to the Obama campaign: zero.)

(more...)

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/10/opinion/10rich.html?ei=5087&em=&en=8603c6542881bd98&ex=1202792400&pagewanted=print

Edited to add: This is a pretty scathing article; just as much as Krugman's. I find his title a bit ironic. There not only seems to be a "civil war" in the Democratic party, but perhaps among the columnists at the NYT as well (NYT's endorsement of Clinton excepted)

[Radical Activist]

1. It seemed staged and fake.

Which reminded people of her biggest weakness as a candidate. Its amazing that she called it the most interactive event. The fact that you had people watching in the audience doesn't make it interactive beyond the dozen or so people who got to ask questions. Maybe she doesn't know what interactive means.

[truedelphi]

21. I had a hard time understanding how a candidate would even do such a contrived event

Teenager prepped to ask Clinton a question, "Now as a young American who likes kittens, and who knows tht you like kittens, I was wondering if you also like puppies?"

The whole affair really cracked the saccharine meter.

[ginnyinWI]

2. Mrs. Clinton is not managing the media very well. n/t

[Colobo]

3. Nobody except her supporters watched that.

[Jim Sagle]

4. Kevin Drum dismisses this piece of shit as a hit piece by a wack job:

http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/

FRANK RICH....I've never quite understood Frank Rich's popularity among liberals. He's always struck me as a guy who has an OK prose style but otherwise does little except regurgitate conventional lefty wisdom at far greater length than it deserves. And when it comes to the Clintons, he's completely unhinged. Check out today's column where he complains about Hillary's pre-election special on the Hallmark channel:

The campaign's other most potent form of currency remains its thick deck of race cards. This was all too apparent in the Hallmark show. In its carefully calibrated cross section of geographically and demographically diverse cast members — young, old, one gay man, one vet, two union members — African-Americans were reduced to also-rans. One black woman, the former TV correspondent Carole Simpson, was given the servile role of the meeting's nominal moderator, Ed McMahon to Mrs. Clinton's top banana.

So Hillary chooses a black woman to moderate the show and Rich insists that what she's really doing is putting her in a "servile role"? Jeebus. The guy's got a serious screw loose. And the rest of the column is no better, just a 1,500 word harangue of tired anti-Hillary screechiness. Andrew Sullivan probably loves it, but why would anyone else want to read this nonsense?

Well said, Kevin. And for those who think Rich is pro-Democrat, go read the Daily Howler and refresh yourselves on how Rich has unloaded juvenile smears on Al Gore for about a decade. Fuck'm.

[Tatiana]

9. I don't think he's pro-Democrat at all. But he does bring up some important points.

Namely, he highlights what a piss-poor campaign Clinton is running and why Penn is toxic to her candidacy:

On Thursday afternoon, Mrs. Clinton’s top adviser, Mark Penn, appeared on MSNBC with Mr. Obama’s top adviser, David Axelrod, and John Edwards’s top adviser, Joe Trippi. They argued with one another, and it was there that Mr. Penn dropped the word “cocaine,” saying that the Clinton campaign had not raised the issue of “cocaine use.”

That seemed to infuriate the others. “This guy just said ‘cocaine’ again,” Mr. Trippi said.

And yet, the campaign for Mr. Obama, an Illinois senator, has been using the Shaheen comments as part of a fund-raising appeal, keeping the issue alive because Obama advisers say they believe it will backfire against the Clinton campaign

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2007/12/14/the-early-word-off-camera-antics/

They tried to smear Obama with his own honest account of past drug usage and Obama's campaign manages to use the smear to its advantage, pulling in $32 million in January. That just seems to illustrate just how bad things are for the Clinton camp with Penn at the helm.

[Jim Sagle]

12. No smear, just fact. How like an Obama fanboy to conflate the two.

[Tatiana]

16. If it wasn't a smear, then why did Clinton PERSONALLY APOLOGIZE?

And why did her national and NH co-chairman quit?

In the Clinton case, William Shaheen, a co-chairman of Mrs. Clinton’s national and New Hampshire campaigns, told The Washington Post on Wednesday that the Republicans would probably go after Mr. Obama for having used marijuana and cocaine, indiscretions that he wrote about himself. Mr. Shaheen went on to suggest that Republicans would probably also question whether Mr. Obama ever shared drugs with others or was a dealer.

Mrs. Clinton, a Democrat from New York, apologized to Mr. Obama on Thursday morning when they ran into each other at Reagan National Airport in Washington as they were both headed to Iowa for the last Democratic debate before the Jan. 3 Iowa caucuses.

Later in the day, Mr. Shaheen announced that he had quit the campaign.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/14/us/politics/14clinton.html?_r=1&oref=slogin&ref=politics&pagewanted=print

[Cha]

5. Yeah, I'd like to see her and her

bullshit rove tactics go down..

More snips..

"The Clinton camp does not leave such matters to chance. This decision was a cold, political cost-benefit calculus. In October, seven months after the two candidates’ dueling church perorations in Selma, USA Today found Hillary Clinton leading Mr. Obama among African-American Democrats by a margin of 62 percent to 34 percent. But once black voters met Mr. Obama and started to gravitate toward him, Bill Clinton and the campaign’s other surrogates stopped caring about what African-Americans thought. In an effort to scare off white voters, Mr. Obama was ghettoized as a cocaine user (by the chief Clinton strategist, Mark Penn, among others), “the black candidate” (as Clinton strategists told the Associated Press) and Jesse Jackson redux (by Mr. Clinton himself).

The result? Black America has largely deserted the Clintons. In her California primary victory, Mrs. Clinton drew only 19 percent of the black vote. The campaign saw this coming and so saw no percentage in bestowing precious minutes of prime-time television on African-American queries.

That time went instead to the Hispanic population that was still in play in Super Tuesday’s voting in the West. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa of Los Angeles had a cameo, and one of the satellite meetings was held in the National Hispanic Cultural Center in Albuquerque. There’s nothing wrong with that. It’s smart politics, especially since Mr. Obama has been behind the curve in wooing this constituency.

But the wholesale substitution of Hispanics for blacks on the Hallmark show is tainted by a creepy racial back story. Last month a Hispanic pollster employed by the Clinton campaign pitted the two groups against each other by telling The New Yorker that Hispanic voters have “not shown a lot of willingness or affinity to support black candidates.” Mrs. Clinton then seconded the motion by telling Tim Russert in a debate that her pollster was “making a historical statement.”

It wasn’t an accurate statement, historical or otherwise..

[Jim Sagle]

7. Actually it WAS an accurate statement, and everybody goddamn well knows it.

[Colobo]

10. You sound angry.

[Jim Sagle]

14. I tend to get angry when people lie.

[Alexander]

17. So I take it your anger is directed entirely towards yourself?

[Jim Sagle]

38. You're as funny as a piece of shit.

[sniffa]

26. Yeah he does

too much so for my tastes.

[Bolo Boffin]

6. If Hillary Clinton's nomination has any resemblance to Bush's "election" in 2000

There will be a civil war in the Democratic Party, and it might result in John McCain getting 44 beside his name.

She needs to win it clean, with pledged delegates and without Michigan and Florida. Most Democratic grassroots activists have had enough of tilting the political pinball machine to win.

And I say this knowing that we would be lucky to have Hillary Clinton as President of the United States. I think that about Barack Obama as well. I think they have both proven themselves worthy of the office.

But enough of the dirty pool, Mrs. Clinton. Win it fair and square.

[angie_love]

8. I wonder who the genius was that suggested her to do a "town hall" on the hallmark channel?

No wonder her camp had a shakeup, that idea seemed very dated and didn't appeal to anyone but her base anyway. Wouldn't you try to spend money wooing undecided's? Bad idea, just a bad idea. I didn't watch it, and I don't know anyone who did.

[Tatiana]

11. And the contrast Rich draws to campaign management is a valid one.

You know she spend a HUGE amount of money to do that town hall: satellite linkups, paying for air time, etc. And then here is some pop/hip-hop artists that is so motivated by Obama's candidacy that he puts Obama's own words to music, creates a video with some celebrities and the thing gets over a million views a day on You Tube.

And Obama's campaign didn't have to spend one cent for that advertisement of his message.

A controlled paid for advertisement versus a citizen-created freely distributed message: that's a big contrast.

[Radical Activist]

13. Considering how much they played it up

they obviously thought it would give her a bigger boost than it did. I'm sure someone on staff looked like a fool afterwards.

Or else it was one of those ideas the staff had to do even though everyone thought it was stupid because the idea came from the candidate. I've dealt with some of those on campaigns.

But then again, maybe she would have lost by a bigger margin on Super Tuesday if it wasn't for the town hall.

[Cha]

15. Especially, since hallmark cut

them off before she delivered all that Potemkin Village had to offer.

[Radical Activist]

22. Did it really happen mid sentence?

That sounds so horrible and amateur. They could have at least stopped to say goodbye to the TV audience and ask them to go online.

[Tatiana]

19. Actually I'm thinking it may have been Patty Solis Doyle's idea.

And maybe why she got demoted and replaced by Maggie Williams.

[Colobo]

30. If it was, she deserved to be demoted.

[Stephanie]

43. I'm guessing they thought of it as a sort of mini Live Earth

You know, they were going to have simultaneous events from all over the country and simulcast it and interact between the events. But they just did not pull it off. It was as phony as a QVC infomercial.

[FrenchieCat]

18. I didn't know about this Town Hall? Was it on cable or on Network TV?

:shrug:

[Tatiana]

20. It was on the Hallmark Channel. Here's a link to the video if you want to watch it.

http://townhall.hillaryclinton.com/

I tried, but... I couldn't make it through more than 15 minutes.

[FrenchieCat]

23. Thanks, but not thanks. I'm good!

:hi:

[nomorewhopper]

24. my takeaway: hillary's media people don't get the internet

i read the piece in the nytimes with great interest. yes it was imo overboard with the anti-hillary language, but honestly, it just hit the nail on the head with how the world truly sees hillary.

but i digress, i am in the business of developing strategy for companies looking to launch online websites. marketing, e commerce, online communities, etc.

and i love the comparison of Obama's "yes" video compared with hillary's "hallmark" town hall.

hillary's decision to buy tv time on the hallmark channel is decidedly old-school. definitely not 2008. the best thing that the internet does is TO CONNECT people. with a hundred fifty channels on cable, you've got to hope a) that they even have the channel b) that they tune into that channel and c) that they sit down at exactly the right time to watch it. I bet the ratings were terrible, and i bet it cost them big bux.

of course this is totally irrelevant from a political discussion, but the difference in how hillary is marketing herself vs. obama is very interesting to somebody who is well versed in that industry.

[Recursion]

25. Bingo

Even 4 years after Howard Dean "got it", the only two candidates I see who get the Internet are Obama and Ron Paul.

[TexasObserver]

27. I've been saying the same thing!! The Obama fans live there.

The Clintonistas are working with a 1996 gameplan, and it is not viable. They have a bunch of people who are over 50 and probably have never been to youtube, even though they hear about it. They see the internet as something that is out there generating crazy stories and porn. They don't realise it's the plasma of the current body politic.

[Tatiana]

29. *Very* good points. n/t

[WinkyDink]

37. I don't even get the Hallmark channel! Plus, look at its shows: all from my Baby Boomer youth!

Hayley Mills movies, e.g.

Or old-people shows, such as "Murder: She Wrote".

[Hart2008]

40. Right, Hillary is running a 90's campaign, but is now 2008!

She is behind the times in many ways.

[bvar22]

31. It was on "The Hallmark" Cable Channel.

Thats the cable channel for people who find "Lifetime"and "Oxygen" too violent and edgy.

[ellisonz]

28. Frank Rich is one of the good guys.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frank_Rich

[papau]

44. True - but he is also anti any Clinton and in 08 very pro-Obama - giving no reason why he is so

[D23MIURG23]

47. And Krugman is exactly the inverse.

Ive disliked his collumns for the first time I can remember in the past few weeks.

But this election will end soon, and things will go back to (more or less) the way they were.

[demokatgurrl]

32. I was stunned that Frank Rich would stoop so low

I've completely changed my mind about him.

[DemBones DemBones]

33. Frank Rich is a tool of the right wing.

Almost everyone in the media is. Wake up, people!

[demon67]

39. Really???

Frank Rich??? Tool of the right wing??? I have been reading his columns for years. Am I missing something? Some support for your critique would be helpful.

[THUNDER HANDS]

45. ...

:rofl:

[demokatgurrl]

34. I was stunned that Frank Rich would stoop so low

I've completely changed my mind about him.

[Tatiana]

41. I a bit surprised, too.

But then I remembered all the columns he wrote during Al Gore's campaign in 2000.

[grantcart]

35. I saw Hillary on a "Nightline" appearance 10 days ago and she

was fantastic. Totally natural and unpackaged. She was warm, funnny and engaging. I just do not understand why the Clinton's didn't just throw away the pollsters, the handlers, the packagers and put Hillary out there and run. I was an Edwards supporter and now an enthusiastic Obama supporter but would have been interested in that Hillary had she run for president. Doubt that there would be much of a campaign.

[bigtree]

36. what a pathetic attempt (by a very good journalist) to speak for us

I liked the production, and she did manage to win a few the next day . . .

[Freetospeak]

42. Right on sir!

[LittleClarkie]

46. I was going to post this but decided to do a search instead

Thought it was an interesting piece, and it articulates much of my unease about the Clintons.

Hence, kick.