Has Hillary’s Prime Time Passed?

Those that know me well know I am quite a politics geek, although I have not really blogged about it before, as it seems so... mundane and earthy. :)

But this presidential election cycle seems so different to me than any I can remember. Granted, the first one I can remember is the 1984 Reagan blowout of Mondale, but still, that makes this the seventh one for me in my recall.

So am I a Republican or a Democrat? Well, my favorite president is Ronald Reagan, but I have always loved Bill Clinton, too, and my admiration for the sheer intellect and political genius of the Clintons encompasses Hillary, too. Plus, I just get a kick out of seeing a powerful political couple in which the woman is arguably just as smart if not smarter than her Rhodes Scholar husband. So, I've always rooted for Hillary because I just love to see a woman that has the moxie she has, with the brains she has.

Did she in fact ride her husband's coattails to get her where she is? Sure, to an extent. However, her rise to the position of political influence and power in the Democratic party has been just as much her own doing, especially since she could have easily become a unremarkable one-term US Senator. However, even her political foes have testified to her smarts, her work ethic, and her discipline. She has made her own name since winning her first election in 2000, and she clearly won re-election on her own name and did not need Bill in 2006.

Her presidential run is exciting for the country because for the first time, there is a female candidate with a campaign that has the resources, both political and financial, to actually win the White House. So on that account, plus the fact that I simply admire her strength and intellect, I am naturally inclined to root for her.

And yet.... I don't know... because there's this other fellow that inspires me in a deeper way than Hillary Clinton, and that's Barack Obama. I just notice that the great hopes I have for the future resonate more in me when I hear Obama than when I hear Hillary. While Obama is seeking to transform us and elevate us, Hillary plays by the old rules of Stretch 'N Twist The Truth Hardball Politics. She was all too willing to let that Reagan/Republican charge on Obama go too far, playing a clever, deceptive game of innuendo and fear. That message is not so much inspiring as it is fear-mongering. An constructive appraisal of the statements Obama made would have been to instruct about the dangers of his "bring everyone to the table approach", and that's that without the proper experience, you can let the thieves steal all your goodies at the table under your nose. This can be done creatively, and cleverly, without being deceptive, and to knowingly engage in innuendo ("Oooh, Obama is a closet Republican" was the not-so-subliminal message) is, quite obviously, deception.

Obama seems to me to be a bright beacon of what we can be: our future, if we choose it, while Clinton seems to me to more the culmination of our present. She is about four years late, if you view things in the light we see now: could it be that her time to run was four years ago when we needed a real fighter (and that she is), a tough opponent, to battle George W Bush and his administration's arrogant bunker mentality? (Thank you, Mike Huckabee.)

Am I alone in believing that she is executing methodically the plans she's had for at least 12 years? Maybe 35? :) And that in 2003, she made a political calculation and decided it would be "safer" to run in '08 because it was less risky since there would be no incumbent or near-incumbent (vice-president)? Her historical behavior shows that while she is an idealouge, a liberal at heart, she is also a disciplined pragmatist, especially after her failure in '94 with Clinton Care, able to bide her time and wait for the most opportune political timing. However, her calculations clearly failed to factor in the Obama factor, and we see the contrast in a rising star not afraid to take a big risk and run "early" (from a conventional point of view) because he saw that the time was ripe before he is perceived to be.

For Democrats, this contrast ironically parallels the divergent moods in the party that have arisen because of the Obama/Hillary divide: take a really bold leap forward that's also a big risk (a "roll of the dice", as Charlie Rose called it in his interview with Bill Clinton), or to go back to the comfort zone of the Clinton '90s which Democrats remember with warm hearts? Or more abstractly, whether to give hope a chance, or to stick to the old ways, to the old blue/red politics and just hire the most competent, efficient blue-banner raisers, even if it means they come with the baggage of the further polarization it will almost cetainly require?

Food for thought. :)