jennings rampage

A concise political opinion.

Dear Hillary Clinton supporters,

I mean this: I’m just absolutely sick that the first viable female candidate for President of the United States is so completely wrong for the time and the place. I’d love to pull the lever for a woman, and I know one day I will, but I really doubt I’ll be voting for Clinton.

And it’s not even my lovable misogyny talking — I don’t doubt for a moment Clinton’s capacity to do the job. If she gets it, she’ll do it well. I’m not criticizing her for being “brassy” or “ambitious” or anything that would fail the “but you’d never say that about a man!” test. My problem with Clinton is that she’s surrounded by total scum and represents the status quo of party machine politics and therefore is not at all equipped to provide the progressive leadership she promises.

I mean, Mark Penn? Terry McAuliffe? And the rest? Really? We want to give the keys back to these guys? Sure, Bill Clinton’s administration presided over an incredible peacetime economic expansion and was by any reasonable measure a success. But it took these guys exactly two years to lose control of Congress to Newt Gingrich and company (and will history concede he was a worthy foe?) and managed to be incredibly divisive considering Bill Clinton never cracked 50% of the popular vote. The book that the Clinton team plays from is the same one that Cheney and Rove and those goons use — we just don’t always notice because we happen to agree politically. I mean, Hillary Clinton’s team is actually trying to make hay out of a completely inconsequential real estate deal, apparently oblivious to the literary concept of irony.

I’m also not here to beatify Barack Obama. He’s a human, and he’s a politician, and he wants to be President of the United States, which almost certainly requires mild-to-moderate megalomania. We can nitpick his political dealings, who he’s taken money from, what deals he’s made to get ahead. We can nitpick his policy positions, many of which I disagree with completely, and a couple of which I think Clinton has a better handle on (e.g. health care).

But Obama doesn’t need to be flawless to pitch a stark contrast to Clinton. I want my President to carry himself the way Obama does — dignified, positive, hopeful, above the fray. If you think that makes me somehow less than pragmatic, that’s fine, but we’ve tried it the divisive way, we’ve tried it the 270 Electoral votes way, and I want something different. I want a fifty state strategy. I want a President who appeals to Republicans and independents. I want unity and excitement and hope, goddamnit. Hillary Clinton, as smart and capable as she is, just doesn’t do that for me. Is that so fucking wrong?

There aren’t many reasonable people who believe Clinton can recapture the lead in pledged delegates, so it’s not hard to reason that she’s still in the race to continue to rack up delegates and be the keystone to any deal that gets made. That’s also a little bit of a turnoff. Sure, Team Clinton has the requisite megalomania, but it’s not encouraging to see her ad people OJ the debate footage, or cry foul and disenfranchisement a few hours before winning, or intimate that the “red” states Obama does well in “don’t matter.” Seven more weeks of winter, at the very least. There’s plenty of silver lining to a protracted nomination process, but the silver gets scuffed easily.

So that’s the choice that I’ve made, and I feel very good about it. I was happy to explain it. If you’ve chosen Clinton, that’s fine by me. I remain confident that Obama will be at the top of the Democratic ticket, and if it ends up somehow being Obama/Clinton, won’t that be a gas? I sure think so.

Your pal,

Scott