A Sense Of Betrayal

Jonathan Chait admits to being sick of Bill and Hillary Clinton. The sense of betrayal in his column is quite obvious.

I crossed the Clinton Rubicon a couple of weeks ago when, in the course of introducing Hillary, Clinton supporter and Black Entertainment Television founder Robert L. Johnson invoked Obama's youthful drug use. This was disgusting on its own terms, but worse still if you know anything about Johnson. I do — I once wrote a long profile of him. He has a sleazy habit of appropriating the logic of civil rights for his own financial gain. He also has a habit of aiding conservative crusades to eliminate the estate tax and privatize Social Security by falsely claiming they redistribute wealth from African Americans to whites. The episode reminded me of the Clintons' habit of surrounding themselves with the most egregious characters: Dick Morris, Marc Rich and so on.

The Clinton campaign is trying to make it seem as if the complaint is about negativity, and it is pointing out that Obama has criticized Hillary as well. That's what politicians are supposed to do when they compete for votes. But criticism isn't the same thing as lying and sleaze-mongering.

Am I starting to sound like a Clinton hater? It's a scary thought. Of course, to conservatives, it's a delicious thought. The Wall Street Journal published a gloating editorial noting that liberals had suddenly learned "what everyone else already knows about the Clintons." (By "everyone," it means Republicans.)

You can read the rest. Chait sill believes some of the stuff the Clintons injected into politics in this country – like the 'vast right wing conspiracy' meme. But he appears to have woken up to the Clintons and isn't happy with them at all. He points out that many of the party faithful would still vote for her if she wins – which is exactly what the Clintons are betting on. But he makes an interesting observation:

If Hillary wins the nomination, most of us will probably vote for her because the alternative is likely to be worse. But what happens if she's embroiled in another scandal? Will liberals rally behind her, or will they remember the Democratic primary?

The Clintons and scandal are riveted tightly together at the wrists and ankles. That one will arise is practically a foregone conclusion. I'll only point out again something that a number of my commenters disagree with. The behavior of the Clintons stands a chance of fracturing the party and could potentially keep some people away from the polls. Their behavior also stands to disgust a number of moderate and non-party voters.

When a candidate has the high negatives of Hillary Clinton, she cannot afford to bleed off very many votes before the damage is too great. It would not take the loss of very many votes to cause her to lose.