Posted by
Michael Goodell on Wednesday, June 04, 2008 3:48:06 PM
Last night, as the dust settled from the herd of superdelegates stampeding into the Obama corral, a grateful nation sat before their televisions in rapt anticipation of Hillary’s concession speech. With more than the requisite number of delegates in hand, Barack Obama was finally crowned the putative nominee, and soon, our long, national nightmare would be over. Team Billary had run out of excuses. The race was over. The only remaining question was, would Hillary be as gracious in defeat as she was grating on the hustings?
Alas, it was not to be. Though at first it sounded like a concession speech, somewhere around the second paragraph the old, familiar tropes were back in place. Hillary had won more votes than the junior Senator from Illinois, because the people, her people, those bitter gun- and religion-clingers, knew she was more capable of leading and of winning. And so the race continues.
Political mavens nod knowingly and speak of leverage. Hillary is being coy. Holding out the prospects of a bitter convention fight in order to finagle a vice-presidential bid. Of course, this raises a couple of questions. The first is why anyone on Team Billary could possibly imagine that using electoral sabotage as blackmail will be effective. Surely Obama the Magnificent is stronger than that.
The second question is why on earth would Hillary want to be Vice President? A leadership position in the Senate would serve as a far more valuable post than being shunted off to the undisclosed locations where most Vice Presidents fester. One would think her ambitions are more lofty than making a series of appearances at foreign leaders’ funerals.
There are two answers to the second question. The first is that dreams of assassination spring eternal in the hearts of Hillbill. Given their essentially racist view of the world, they can’t imagine the first black President making it all the way through his first term without some crackpot right winger taking a shot at him. Once the deed is done, Hillary will ascend to her appointed throne.
The second answer is that Hubby Bill is driving the Veep-offer bus. Bill, the greatest President in living memory, is growing restive outside the corridors of power. Even though his lovely bride made a hash of her inevitable nomination, Bill can still achieve his objectives by finagling the second slot for his bride. The Clintons don’t have a lot of respect for Obama. They tend to view him as an empty suit, which makes his victory all the more galling. But once in the vicinity, Bill is confident that he can’t wrest sufficient power from the callow youth to get the job done.
It shouldn’t come as a surprise that Bill is eager to get back into the White House. Though his status as ex-President has been very lucrative for the Ole Houndawg, having raked in $109 million over the past ten years, it’s never been about the money with Bill. He didn’t go into politics to get rich.
Being President was about a lot of different things for him. It was about being a leader, solving problems, making life better for every American, and, of course, most important of all, it was about sex. As the old saying goes, power is an aphrodisiac, absolute power is like Viagra on steroids. If you’re President, plump little interns drop by the Oval Office to flash their thongs. You don’t have to lift a finger, the chippies come to you. As ex-President you are reduced to hanging around trailer parks waiting for that waitress to get off work. You have to keep yourself in shape, because without the trappings of power, you’re just another horny old fart.
So Bill is playing his final card in a desperate game of procurement. Whether it will work is anybody’s guess. If Obama has a brain he will understand that having a couple of Clintons in the White House is a formula for disaster. It will be hard to implement his real change you can believe in, taxing the rich, bombing our allies and appeasing our enemies, if he has to spend all his time watching his back.