Law Students

Clinton for…… Anything BUT VP.

By Steve Pirates

Let’s all get real for a few moments here. Obama supporters, Clinton supporters, moderates, Republicans…. everyone.

The truth is, Barrack Obama NEEDS Hillary Clinton’s support to get into the White House. Without her support, he’ll find it impossible to convert enough of her supporters to his cause. Now, before McCain supporters get too excited about the prospect of 17 million Democratic voters choosing McCain at the ballot box; it’s just not going to happen. What will happen is that traditionally reliable Democratic voters will stay home. Not all of them. The traditional wisdom is that most of Hillary’s supporters will vote for Obama, and quite a few of them will. But there will be many of them who will stay home. Some will stay home out of anger at the way that Hillary was treated in the primary. Some of them will stay home out of indifference between the Change Republican and the Change Democrat. Some will stay home because they personally identified with Hillary’s campaign and now feel personally defeated along with their candidate. So many Obama supporters view Obama as “our Kennedy”. But, so many Clinton supporters view Hillary as “them”. That’s a powerful emotional attachment that probably can’t (and shouldn’t) be severed. But it can be harnessed.

It can be harnessed by including Clinton in the process. Not just the campaigning. I can’t think of anything worse than finishing second and then having to campaign for the person who just beat you. Take it back to your junior year in high school. Imagine growing up the hardworking smart funny but kinda dorky girl. Now imagine that like in every teen movie ever, you fall in love with the charming rogue-ish senior class president/prom king. You’re on top of the world right? You’re nominated for homecoming queen…. and we all know how this movie ends right? Ok, now imagine that some new freshman shows up somewhere in the last thirty minutes of the movie. And they turn a lot of your friends against you, and they win the homecoming queen election by one vote. Now, imagine that for the rest of the movie, you have to talk about how pretty the new freshman girl is, and how she should win prom queen against the girl that you thought was going to be YOUR archrival at prom. You get to follow her around complimenting her non-stop and energetically…. and for all of that you get a pat on the back and a “way to be a good team player”. Bullshit, right? Now, imagine that instead of homecoming queen, we’re talking about something actually really important both personally and nationally. That’s where we’re at right now.

Of course, in the movie, the two girls would become BFF and team up and pull zany pranks on anyone who got in their way and they would conquer the world. But no one really thinks that’s going to happen.

First, Obama has to shape his own ticket. To have the terms of his own victory dictated to him by the loser of the contest undercuts the “primary” idea. A negotiated surrender is too late. If the Obama-Clinton ticket had been floated a few months ago as a term for Clinton dropping out, then that might have had some legs to it. But now, the victory is complete. The only leverage Clinton has left is her supporters (and let’s be honest, that’s HUGE.) But, to capitulate to Clinton’s demands now does double damage to Obama. It makes him look less than “strong”, which he needs to look in order to balance out his lack of experience, and to appeal to the independents who are concerned with security and national strength. It also has the side-effect of putting Clinton on the ticket. Clinton in the second spot would help bring out a lot of her supporters. But not all of them. Many of her supporters would feel that it was a slight to offer her a “powerless” role. They would feel it was a ploy, a “prize” with no value. So, I don’t think it would energize her base as much as people think. It WOULD energize her old friends the “vast right wing conspiracy”.

One of the arguments for Obama over Clinton is that in a year where Republicans are likely to stay at home after eight years of Bush, and a less than perfect Republican candidate the LAST thing you want to do is put the name “Clinton” on the ticket to encourage them to come out to vote not FOR McCain, but AGAINST a Clinton. If this level of visceral name-based hate seems foreign to Democrats, imagine if instead of Obama v. McCain, it was McCain v. Jeb Bush. Two Republicans, so you don’t really care right? Well, except that one of them is a Bush, so you’d vote for McCain, not because you like him, but because you don’t ever want another Bush to be in the White House. Heck, you don’t even want any Bushes to paint their private houses white.
So, Clinton as VP might do more harm that good.

But, Clinton deserves a whole lot of respect. She ran an excellent campaign, she has a veritable army of supporters. She played hard, but when the math got impossible she stopped the hard attacks. On top of that, she’s really got some great policy ideas. To ignore that would be monumentally stupid. Clinton does deserve to have some input in this Presidential race. And Obama would be foolish to try and completely cut her out of the process.

Obama should give Hillary the pick of any position she wants OTHER than vice president. And he should consult with her to help decide who he should look at for VP; which of her “battlestate governors” would be the most likely to carry their state as VP, and also connect with Hillary’s supporters. Lastly, he should adopt one of her policy proposals. Picking her healthcare plan would open him up to a flip-flop attack. But some other policy that matters to Clinton that Obama’s position is close to already would be great.

Personally, I think that Hillary Clinton would make an excellent Secretary of State, or any of the Cabinet seats involving what became Hillary’s core issues, Labor, the Interior, Health and Human Services. Heck, Supreme Court Justice Clinton even seems like a none too shabby idea. And I think that the best Vice is probably Ed Rendell. One of Clinton’s strongest supporters (and thus a good surrogate), Governor (executive experience, but no taint of “Washington as usual”) of a battleground state (to, you know, help WIN that state).

Full post as published by Jolly Lawger on June 05, 2008 (boomark / email).