Hillary Clinton said what?YouTubeBy Sheldon Alberts
May 23, 2008
The remarks are stunning when read on the printed page. Citing reasons she is staying the Democratic presidential race, Hillary Clinton had the following to say to the Argus-Leader newspaper of Sioux Falls, S.D.
"My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary, somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June (1968) in California."
Is it unreasonable to think Clinton was suggesting she's continuing her campaign because Obama might be the target of violence?
Not if you're a black person in America.
Immediately after Clinton's already-infamous remarks, it was African American commentators - including radio host Roland Martin and Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson - who were most outraged on the cable news shows. They remember what happened to Martin Luther King Jr., having marked the 40th anniversary of his killing just last month.
They know about the heavy security at Barack Obama's campaign events, as does every journalist who has followed his campaign for the past five months.
Though it is rarely written about, here's the fact: the security presence around Obama is far tighter and far more visible than for either Clinton or John McCain.
Obama was the first presidential candidate to receive Secret Service protection last year, specifically because of credible threats against him.
That's why Clinton's remarks have been denounced as reprehensible.
.....
Her campaign insisted she referenced Kennedy's June 1968 assassination as a way to note that presidential primary campaigns frequently enter the summer months, so there's no reason to end this one. ..... If that was Clinton's intent Friday in South Dakato, she could not have made her point in a more hamfisted, ugly and inflammatory way.
At every turn in this campaign, Bill and Hillary Clinton have cast themselves as victims whenever inferences are drawn from remarks some believed were made with barely veiled intent.
Bill Clinton's likening of Barack Obama's campaign to Jesse Jackson's failed candidacy? It was the media's invention that Bubba Bill was trying to marginalize Obama.
Hillary's recent comment that Obama can't win among "hard-working Americans, white Americans?" Again, it was just a slip of the tongue, taken out of context. No disrespect to black people intended.
The Clintons have received the benefit of the doubt every time. But maybe not this time, not when many in the Democratic party already believe Hillary's main goal in staying in the race is to seize the nomination if Obama's campaign implodes.
Many Democrats, whether fearful of the Clintons or respectful of them, have been content to see Hillary continue campaigning so as not to stir division in the party. They were prepared to see Clinton exit the campaign on her own terms, gracefully.
But one wonders how much longer Democratic elders will stay silent.
"This is beyond the pale," Rep. James Clyburn, an undeclared superdelegate and the third-ranking Democrat in the House of Representatives, told the New York Times.
Clinton just made a phenomenal political mistake, whatever her intent. Absent a primary or another significant political event over the Memorial Day weekend in the U.S., the assassination remark is all anyone will be talking about.
In the past few weeks, Clinton has repeatedly appealed for more time to make her case to voters, more time so Florida and Michigan could count.
She just gave Democrats a reason to say no.
Printer-friendly format
Email this thread to a friend
Bookmark this thread
(1000+ posts)
Send PM |
Profile |
Ignore
