Too Many Burned Bridges

Senator Hillary Clinton has run a good campaign, one that in many election years would have secured her the Democratic nomination.

But not this year.

The problem is that from the beginning she thought the nomination was hers.  She assumed it would be handed to her, a gift, and that there would be a coronation.

But the voters had something different to say.  And now she can’t accept the fact that the country has chosen someone else.

This election has long since stopped being about what is best for the country, what is best the Democratic Party.  For Hillary Clinton, it is now only about what is best for her.

And apparently, she can’t even figure that out.

When Senator Ted Kennedy’s run for the Presidency came up short, he returned to the Senate without burning bridges, without looking to wound the party or the nominee, and rededicated himself to becoming a Senator and a statesman.  And in this role, he has made an enormous difference in lives of every American.

At this same fork, Hillary Clinton has so far decided not to show what kind of leader she could be, but rather to put on blinders and burn bridges.

When she says she leads in the popular vote, it requires such a tortured way of looking at the facts that it calls into question her honesty.

To arrive at this hollow conclusion, she counts votes from Michigan, where Senator Obama wasn’t even on the ballot; she estimates numbers for caucus states like Iowa, Nevada and Maine, where there were no official popular vote totals; and she includes Florida where both candidates pledged not to campaign.

This is the same twisting and distorting of facts for personal gain that has driven the national desire for change.

And Hillary Clinton has now become an example of what she has attempted to campaign against:  the same old politics.

Posted by Bernie Campbell on Monday, June 2, 2008
Permalink: Too Many Burned Bridges