Reply #50: The Club for Growth strategy

[frazzled]

Look, Clinton's "base" (at least in terms of the current and upcoming contests) consists mainly of blue-collar rust-belt workers and older voters. She seems to be trying to draw a distinction between "her" people and those who vote for Obama. To play an identity game.

But candidates aren't supposed to draw distinctions between "their" voters and their opponent's voters. They are supposed to draw distinctions between themselves and their opponents, on issues and character and qualifications. This insulting of Obama voters is very destructive: it's a Rove strategy that depends on pitting "us" against "them" and getting just enough of "us" to squeak by with 51%. This is devastating. I've never seen a Democrat insult another candidate's voters, or the states another candidate has won. It makes my jaw drop. I really have spent months and months trying not to dislike one candidate just because I prefer another. But it's getting really hard.

Obama is right to tell his people that Hillary is disrespecting them: because she is. And this is not just the words of one anonymous staffer--it's been an undercurrent to her own words for some time now (though obviously more subtly put).