Tuesday, June 3, 2008

Un-menschlike

I know I'm way too close to this and my bias is obvious, but I really feel like Hillary Clinton had a chance to go out with style tonight. She gave a wonderful speech about her campaign and her career, she praised Obama, she praised her supporters and the many people she met during her campaign. There's been a lot of bad blood between the two campaigns, but this seemed like a rich opportunity to patch some of that up. Obama had already clinched the nomination. She had the attention of the nation and had a chance to bow out gracefully and call for the unity of the party.

And instead, she decides not to leave. She hypes her own claims to electability. And she asks people to write in to tell her what to do.

There was a moment for her to be a mensch. That moment is gone.

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

Quick ruling:
Obama backers Ted Kennedy, Gary Hart and Jesse Jackson all took it to the convention. None of them had close to the support that Hillary does. Mensches?

We are about three months from the Convention. The people of South Dakota just rejected Obama by a 10 point margin. Relax for a minute. Hillary will be campaigning for Obama long before the Convention.

Seth Masket said...

Hillary will be campaigning for Obama long before the Convention.

From your lips to God's ears.

Anonymous said...

what about the idea that some of the analysts pointed out that it's premature by common standards for her to concede before she and Obama have had a one-to-one, she's formally thanked her supporters, and done whatever backroom chit chat is expected? i don't know how these things go, but that makes sense to me. (n.w.)