Brooks: Clinton should quit now or risk handing McCain the White House

[helderheid]

David Brooks
The New York Times
Article Last Updated: 03/25/2008 07:12:37 PM MDT

Last week, an important Clinton adviser told Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen (also of Politico) that Clinton had no more than a 10 percent chance of getting the nomination. Now, she's probably down to a 5 percent chance.

Five percent.

Let's take a look at what she's going to put her party through for the sake of that 5 percent chance: The Democratic Party is probably going to have to endure another three months of daily sniping. For another three months, we'll have the Carvilles likening the Obamaites to Judas and former generals accusing Clintonites of McCarthyism. For three months, we'll have the daily round of resume padding and sulfurous conference calls. We'll have campaign aides blurting ''blue dress'' and only-because-he's-black references as they let slip their private contempt.

For three more months (maybe more!) the campaign will proceed along in its Verdun-like pattern. There will be a steady rifle fire of character assassination from the underlings, interrupted by the occasional firestorm of artillery when the contest touches upon race, gender or patriotism. The policy debates between the two have been long exhausted, so the only way to get the public really engaged is by poking some raw national wound.

For the sake of that 5 percent, this will be the sourest spring. About a fifth of Clinton and Obama supporters now say they wouldn't vote for the other candidate in the general election. Meanwhile, on the other side, voters get an unobstructed view of the Republican nominee. John McCain's approval ratings have soared 11 points. He is now viewed positively by 67 percent of Americans. A month ago, McCain was losing to Obama among independents by double digits in a general election matchup. Now McCain has a lead among this group.

Much more ...

http://www.sltrib.com/opinion/ci_8696144

[CTyankee]

1. I'm getting a sinking feeling...

that this time David Brooks is right.

We still have time to get this thing back on track but Hillary has to step up. I am hoping her donors and big backers will see the light and help her see it too but that is going to be a hard thing for her to do. She's won a lot of votes (including mine in our primary Feb. 5) but this is one of those situations that cannot be resolved without someone giving up. Since she has so little chance of getting the nomination in a way that is fair to most people she should consider the welfare of this nation and graciously leave...

[helderheid]

2. I will have a new found respect for her if she does, but I fear this is about 2012 for her now.

[CTyankee]

3. God, I hope not.

The reasoning behind the 2012 thing is such a stretch. She'd have to be convinced that there would be NO way McCain couldn't win over Obama, then she'd have to be convinced that McCain's presidency would fail after 4 years and he couldn't win a second term (defying the reality of what happened in 04). That's two big "ifs" out there.

[Mme. Defarge]

14. That has been my theory, however,

she appears to have blown that one as well. This is what I think is going on at this point, to paraphrase Doc Holladay (played brilliantly by Val Kilmer) in "Tombstone", it isn't revenge she's after, it's a reckoning.

[helderheid]

4. more >

When you step back and think about it, she is amazing. She possesses the audacity of hopelessness.

Why does she go on like this? Does Clinton privately believe that Obama is so incompetent that only she can deliver the policies they both support? Is she simply selfish, and willing to put her party through agony for the sake of her slender chance? Are leading Democrats so narcissistic that they would create bitter stagnation even if they were granted one-party rule?

The better answer is that Clinton's long rear-guard action is the logical extension of her relentlessly political life.

For nearly 20 years, she has been encased in the apparatus of political celebrity. Look at her schedule as first lady and ever since. Think of the thousands of staged events, the tens of thousands of times she has pretended to be delighted to see someone she doesn't know, the hundreds of thousands of times she has recited empty clichés and exhortatory banalities, the millions of photos she has posed for in which she is supposed to appear empathetic or tough, the billions of politically opportune half-truths that have bounced around her head.

No wonder the Clinton campaign feels impersonal. It's like a machine for the production of politics. It plows ahead from event to event following its own iron logic. The only question is whether Clinton herself can step outside the apparatus long enough to turn it off and withdraw voluntarily or whether she will force the rest of her party to intervene and jam the gears.

If she does the former, she would surprise everybody with a display of self-sacrifice. Her campaign would cruise along at a lower register until North Carolina, then use that as an occasion to withdraw. If she does not, she would soldier on doggedly, taking down as many allies as necessary.

[DemGa]

5. Damn they want Obama ---NT

[EFerrari]

6. Help me. I agree with David Brooks!

lol

[helderheid]

7. No shit! My exact reaction when I read it this morning!

[demokatgurrl]

8. what is the world coming to

when Brooks is quoted on DU?

[EFerrari]

9. No kidding! But he's only saying what a lot of people are saying.

The governor of TN was on Washington Journal yesterday and he said the same thing. He's a super delegate.

[helderheid]

10. thanks for that info!

[EFerrari]

11. He was also on MSNBC this afternoon.

He has a plan that apparently was published in a paper -- I'd look it up but don't remember his name.

He wants this to be over and he's making the rounds trying to get support for the idea.


eta: Here's one link.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89...

[helderheid]

12. thanks!!

[EFerrari]

23. A link from LBN:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.ph...

[undeterred]

13. The way she is handling herself right now- she shouldn't be a Senator

If she is making up lies on the campaign trail, she is really losing it.

[helderheid]

16. I hate to have lost so much respect.

[helderheid]

15. deleted

[bigtree]

17. I always take advice from pompous right wing shills

he's sooo concerned about our party. touching.

[helderheid]

18. shocked me when I agreed with him.

[Beacool]

19. Oh goodie, the umpteenth post on this subject.

Give it up already!! Hillary is not dropping out to suit Obama.

[helderheid]

20. I never expected her to, certainly not for Obama nor the Dem party.

[Beacool]

21. She has millions of supporters and we are all telling her to hang in there. n/t

[BenDavid]

22. that peckerhead Brooks wants to go after obama so damn

bad he is getting stupid....or mashugga.

[depakid]

24. So, Obama supporters would cite (or listen to) the likes of David Brooks?

Wow.

Yep- he's sure got our best interests at heart....

[Tom Rinaldo]

25. "Second, Obama's lawyers successfully prevented re-votes in Florida and Michigan."

Right there at the top of his column. Brooks isn't equivocal about it, but then again the Republicans never had a problem with disenfranchising voters, especially in Florida.

So is he right about everything else that he wrote, and just wrong about that one tiny thing, or is it something to be proud about, that Obama's lawyers successfully prevented re-votes in Florida and Michigan? The DNC had no problem with re-vote plans. Do you?

[cbayer]

26. Doesn't something about David Brooks' agenda make you just a little uncomfortable?

He's smart. I listen when he talks. But I listen with a keen ear to his agenda.

I beg you not to be fooled. Just because someone says what you want to hear does not mean they say it to help you.

[Bodhi BloodWave]

27. i will fully agree with the fact that just because somebody says what you want to hear

does not mean that they are saying it to help you. However, every word said might still be accurate and true

[cbayer]

28. Accurate and true do not apply to opinion.

He gives his opinion. He has no more facts than we do. He frames it to suit his agenda. I respect him, but i do not trust him.