The morning after Hillary Clinton proved to the world that pollsters don't always know what they're doing, I sat down at my desk to the Yahoo! headline, "Comeback kids create chaos". Chaos? I'll click on that. Puh-leeze. Ron Fournier writes for Associated Press, dateline Washington:
In the land of comebacks, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and John McCain revived their sagging campaigns Tuesday night and catapulted the Democratic and Republican presidential races into a surprise state of chaos.Neither could afford to lose New Hampshire. Suddenly, the fallen front-runners look like winners again.
Is it just me or is the MSM deeply disturbed because, novel as it may seem, this time it might take more than two li'l ol' states to decide who the nominees are? That's got to be much healthier than our usual, two and out system of allowing the voters in Iowa and New Hampshire the opportunity to meet all the candidates face to face and decide for all the rest of us whose television commercials we're going to watch ad nauseum for the next year or so.
Everybody's saying Hillary's nearly tears on Monday humanized her, at least to New Hampshire's women voters. I'm sure that had a little something to do with it. Personally, I believe it started earlier, during last Saturday's debate, when she coyly feigned offense taken to the question suggesting that she wasn't as "likeable" as Senator Obama, "Well, that hurts my feelings (pause), but I'll try to go on." More important, though (in my humble opinion) was Obama's miffed, humorless response, "You're likeable enough, Hillary," followed by a clearly unhappy expression. I think we want our candidates to give each other their due when points are scored, as they clearly were here. I think we want that because we want our presidents to be fair, to be endowed with not just intelligence but also generosity of spirit. He seemed as much like a spoiled sport as anything else.
I've made no bones about it. I'm supporting Edwards until he's out of the game. He's the only candidate who's made much of an effort to include New Orleans in the dialogue, although he failed to bring it up in last Saturday's debate. Also, I think he's right. I do think that corporate greed is out of control and rapidly eroding (eradicating) our nation's middle class. I'm pretty sure it won't be stopped by continuing in our present profit-obsessed track. They can say the money trickles down to those of us who are not CEOs or corporate board members all they want to, but no amount of saying it can make it so, if it doesn't actually trickle down.
After Edwards, I was really undecided between Clinton and Obama, seeing strengths in both of them, caring mostly that the Democratic nominees defeat the Republican nominees next November. I surprised myself last night, suddenly rooting for Hillary, not knowing exactly where it came from. It wasn't so much her almost tears, or her funny feigned debate pout. It wasn't even her experience or knowing what she's going to do on day one. It wasn't her being a woman and it certainly wasn't his being a black man. It was that expression on Obama's face when he looked down after she scored, that tell-tale sign of a spirit seeming less than generous.
It's still anybody's game; and, this time, in the primaries, some of us in the other states will take part in choosing the nominees. What a shame. I'm sorry that the MSM's in a tizzy and thinks it's chaos. It will be an interesting change to think my primary vote might count. Oh, please don't throw me in that briar patch.
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