The second Clinton comeback kid

Clinton’s speech yesterday in Washington was by far the best she’s given in the entire primary process. A half an hour speech in which she showed passion, charisma and political standing. In a post yesterday I argued that Obama had to be more determined to get Clinton off the news to focus the attention on his new national campaign. No doubt Clinton’s speech yesterday will help him a great deal to get her supporters behind his candidacy and Clinton should be praised for that.

But as most people are going to be talking about what a great person she is, I thought I would give the story a different twist. That twist is that after her speech yesterday Clinton has a) become the frontrunner for the VP spot in the ticket and b) she has placed herself as the likely Democratic nominee in 2012 if Obama is to lose in November. Firstly, Clinton in her speech showed responsibility and generosity towards Obama’s candidacy beyond what most people expected of her. As I’ve said she delivered a great speech and now many Democrats will be expecting Obama to reciprocate giving her the VP spot. Secondly, even if Obama was to resist to bring Clinton in as his VP, he would have to give her something big enough (Senate majority leader?). If this is the case then she would position herself as an even stronger leader than she was in 2008 as well as the antithesis of Obama’s inexperience campaign (if he’s to lose).

My view is that Clinton’s image was very deteriorated by the end of this race, the Clinton brand had been contaminated by her forceful campaign. Her speech yesterday has given her a boost of sympathy all across the Democratic Party and beyond. She has comeback in the last minute of the eleventh hour to position herself as the alternative leader of the Democratic Party and the saviour of its unity in one of the most important elections in recent US history. Another comeback kid is named Clinton 16 years later.

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Obama needs to move on

First it was if Clinton was to stay in the race even if she was losing. Then, she was going to lose and why wasn’t she quitting. Now, she’s finally pulling out but she wants the VP spot.

It seems to me that Clinton could fatally wound Obama’s candidacy for November in the months up to the Denver Convention. Obama is going to be the nominee, but Clinton still believes she has some kind of ‘supra-democratic’ right to be there, to run the show. She’s not going to get off the horse until she gets off and for Obama to see pushing her out it’s not going to look pretty with her blue-collar and women support. She’s trying to play him by waving her support at him and warning that without it he can’t win in November. This is actually true, Obama needs the support of his party’s traditional electoral base but he also needs independence as a candidate to be able to win over the necessary swing voters in Ohio, Michigan, Nevada…

Should Obama choose Clinton as his running mate? I don’t think he should because she has proved not to be trustworthy enough. She wants his spot and there will be endless rumours about plots, smears and others every time something goes wrong between the two of them. But if this is the case, if he’s to choose someone else he should do it as quick as possible. Put the person out there immediately (after a proper vetting process of course, we don’t want another Tom Eagleton type). If he waits the media will keep writing about Obama v Clinton rather than Democrats v Republicans.

CNN released a poll yesterday on what Democrats think about Clinton as VP. This is the kind of divisive speculation that could hurt Obama’s potential for November. If the media and the Clinton camp keep fuelling the debate on the American electorate, this will force people to takes side and when a final decission is made by Obama, he could find some voters he will need in November strongly disagreeing with his choice.

He needs to make clear to Clinton that he’s the winner and he’s now the party’s leader, he should push her out from the central stage soon so he can fix the damage it will cause before Denver and start after the Convention at full speed. He needs not to pull his punches anymore, he’s after all the nominee now.

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The end of the road for Clinton

The New York Times is reporting that Democratic Party lawyers are proposing that the number of delegates attending the party convention from Michigan and Florida are cut in half. Both state parties were punished by the DNC for disobeying party rules and calling their primary elections earlier in the season than the pre-set dates.

If this is the final decission by the party Clinton would have close to no chance to win the nomination in Denver. There are three primaries left, Puerto Rico (63 delegates), Montana (24) and South Dakota (23). If Clinton was to win all the delegates for Michigan and Florida (157) and all those from the three primaries left (110), she will still need to add 157 more superdelegates to her tally to win the nomination. Needless to say she won’t be getting all the delegates out of these five primaries as polls are projecting victories for Obama in both Montana and South Dakota and not all Michigan and Florida delegates will be allocated to her.

The DNC is taking a final decision on Tuesday. If the outcome is this one we could be finally looking at the end of a long and tough primary season that has hurt Obama’s electoral prospects for November.

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