In some respects I'm glad Hillary won the New Hampshire primary. It brought home how full of hot air the pundits can be and how wrong in their pontificating.It means Iowa and New Hampshire alone won't determine the Democratic candidate, and for that matter the Republican.
Not that the Republican race doesn't deserve scrutiny, it's just that the Democratic one is so intriguing. So I'll leave the Republicans for another post.
Women made it clear they didn't like Hillary being pilloried. Personally I don't think it's because she's a woman, but more because she's so programmed and "Clintonian." That being said, I'm glad circumstances forced her to start taking real questions from real people. Perhaps now she will actually start saying something other than touting her dubious experience and putting down Obama's "lack" there of. That argument doesn't hold much weight with me. It's why the President has a cabinet. I should think the reason is to surround him/herself with the best and the brightest in their areas of expertise, solicit and weigh their advice and act on it. Judgement. Unfortunately our current President has surrounded himself with cronies of dubious qualification. As, I might add, did President Clinton in large part.
As for Obama. I'd hate to see anyone swept into power strictly on the strength of charisma and oratorical skills. He now will be forced to defend his positions against Hillary's. In many instances they don't differ a great deal, but where they do, each needs to explain why theirs is preferable and convince us.
As for changing the way things in Washington work, has there ever been a candidate that hasn't claimed that's why they are running? Has any one of them ever succeeded? The President can only get done what Congress will allow and until we have a President strong enough to control at least his own party, and a Congress that's willing to reach across the aisle, that is not likely to change.
What is a positive sign to me is the success in getting the young and the previously uninvolved interested enough to participate.
For the moment it appears we might have an actual campaign of ideas and solutions rather than "Inevitability" versus "Impossibility".
3 comments:
In many ways, I think it is more important to concentrate our efforts on the Congressional and Senate races. If we can elect enough Democrats to stop the constant filibustering and override the constant vetoes, we'll be in a pretty good position to have some meaningful change.
THANK YOU someone else understands that lack of "experience" is something that can be taken care of with a Presidential Cabinet... And I am still not sure that being first lady counts for as much experience as Hillary thinks it does.
Doc, I certainly hope we're not the only ones looking at Hill's "experience" with raised eyebrow!
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