Yesterday, I said that Hillary Rodham Clinton is imminently qualified to be President of the United States. That’s why she is running for office. I believe that she is still running for office in large part because she thinks she is a better candidate than Barack Obama.
I’m not going to run
When Hillary Clinton was preparing to run for President after her reelection to the Senate in 2006, it was obvious that Barack Obama was an up-and-coming star in the Democratic party. Therefore, I believe Hillary sounded him out on his intentions regarding the Presidency. I imagine he told her that he was not going to run in 2008 and she believed him. After all, Obama had only been in office for less than 2 years in 2006 and will be in office just under 4 years on election day in 2008. Looking at other possible candidates like Kerry, Gore, Biden, Dodd and the whole lot, none really had the same credible national reputation that she did. Green light.
Actually I am running
Fast forward to 2007 and it soon was apparent that Barack Obama was running for President. In fact, despite the ‘inevitability’ of Clinton’s nomination, Obama was able to announce his run days before she announced her candidacy. This embarrassment foreshadowed the poor management of her campaign and her underestimation of Obama’s appeal down the road. However, at the time, Barack Obama could hardly be considered a serious contender to Clinton. Most polls showed Clinton with an enormous lead over all major competitors well into 2007.
Clinton believes she is best placed
Hillary Clinton must have believed that she was indeed an inevitable nominee because she ran her campaign like a frontrunner throughout 2007. And why shouldn’t she believe she was the best candidate. She had name recognition, first-hand experience in the White House, two terms in the Senate, a rolodex of current and former Heads of State, a money-raising prowess like no one, and a claim to national notoriety for nearly 40 years. Certainly, the likes of Dodd, Biden and Richardson had the experience, if not the appeal and name recognition. But Barack Obama had none of these advantages. He has less than 4 years in the Senate, 7 years as a State Senator and no public sector executive experience. And he was an unknown quantity on the national stage. Clinton must have thought little of him as a contender.
First impressions harden
Barack Obama once said of himself that he serves “as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.” And the view that many projected on this unknown quantity was one of ‘much rhetoric, more hype, little substance.’ Nationally syndicated journalist Froma Harrop of the Providence Journal said it best in a December 2006 article before Obama announced his candidacy.
Obama does seem to have an impressive resume and polish. And it’s not his fault that a mania for some new political face intrudes on every presidential election season. But one does wish, for the sake of democracy, that we could skip the crush and give less glamorous contenders who actually say something more of a hearing.
-Froma Harrop, 26 Dec 2006
This was the first impression Barack Obama made on the ’substance over style’ crowd, which includes Hillary Clinton. Therefore, Clinton had to believe that she was not only more qualified on paper, but also in terms of substantive knowledge about policy and procedure. Moreover, Clinton perfected the art of triangulation with her husband Bill Clinton in Arkansas and in the 1992 and 1996 elections. The resulting ‘centrist’ approach is seen as appealing to Reagan Democrats in a way that Barack Obama could not be.
And as is the way with people, those first impressions hardened. Eventually, people were calling Obama an ‘empty suit.’ Clinton herself questioned his qualifications for the job and ability to appeal to “hard-working Americans.” These were dangerous gambits because, in both instances, they touch a nerve with any American black due to American cultural stereotypes about Blacks regarding affirmative action and effort.
***I personally believe most of the ’substance over style’ debate has everything to do with natural human biases and less to do with Presidential mettle. It is a debate mostly about personality and psychological type. Obama is an intuitive-perceiver (NP) who comes across as strategic and innovative or vague and naive depending on the biases of your own personal psychological type.
So, here we are
So, we’ve gone through 16 months and (in my opinion) wasted probably $300 million watching these two Democratic candidates rip each other apart in their quest for the presidency. In the meantime, much animosity has developed between the two candidates and between their supporters. So much so that polls increasingly show large percentages of Democratic primary voters unwilling to vote for the other side in the general election.
At this point, Hillary Clinton must have an extreme aversion for Obama and his people indeed. It was unlikely that she believed he is a better candidate for office when she began. Sixteen months later, it is even less likely. Regardless of other motives, this is reason enough for her to continue her quest to win the nomination.
Sources
Hillary Clinton launches White House bid: ‘I’m in’, CNN, 20 Jan 2007
Poll: Black support helps Clinton extend lead, CNN, 17 Oct 2007
Hillary No Longer the Inevitable Democratic Presidential Nominee, Huffington Post, 7 Dec 2007
Obama Scores as Exotic Who Says Nothing, RealClearPolitics.com, 26 Dec 2007
Clinton praises McCain again, says he’s crossed ‘Commander in Chief threshold’, The Carbetbagger Report, 7 Mar 2008
Clinton makes case for wide appeal, USA Today, 07 May 2008
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