It's our role in politics to bring her to a different place, to show her that progressive politics can be done with progressive structures, and that the perceived double-talk on single issue micropolling is no longer necessary or productive.  Ultimately, and this may not be possible though I think it will be,

How?  What do you propose?

we will have to figure out how to work together as strong allies.

Why?  Are you saying that you believe her nomination to be inevitable, or are you speaking less about Senator Clinton, the presidential candidate, and more about the party establishment in general?

I don't understand what you're getting at.  For my part,I've been inclined to steer clear of primary candidate endorsements, while pressuring any of them as seems most appropriate, and in that context, I'm just not sure what you're saying.

Senator Clinton obviously has a strong inclination to engage in politics, but I've never noticed that she has any real aptitude for it.

I like anyone with a proven track record with getting Democrats elected, including Mark Penn.

It's our role in politics to bring her to a different place, to show her that progressive politics can be done with progressive structures, and that the perceived double-talk on single issue micropolling is no longer necessary or productive.

This aspect of Hillary gives me strong flashbacks to Gore 2000. Everyone I know who's been close just loves her, and in the rare unguarded moment that gets captured by the wider world, I imagine I can see why. But her public persona is so obviously a constructed facade, and not even a very well-made facade, it causes me to recoil.

Penn is a fucking neocon! come on people!

I like Hillary personally as well, she is a great senator and would make a fine majority leader, I don't believe she had great qualities for a president though even though I would vote for her in the general. I think she is a terrable candidate for 2008 when dems have a chance for a kickass win and her base of support is in the Northeast which has been the problem of our losing nominees for decades.

I like what you have to say here. Clinton is not my favorite of the Dems by a long shot, (maybe fourth out of eight?), but that said, she'd be a solid nominee, I would say, better than Kerry (who was a perfectly decent and plausible nominee). We are fortunate this cycle to have a really strong raft of candidates, certainly the strongest in my short voting lifetime (although a little before my time, Clinton, Tsongas, and Bradley wasn't too shabby a slate, I guess) with a number of viable candidates with compelling stories. I prefer Richardson, personally, but would have no real objections to any of the top-tier candidates, except a distaste for the hawkish rhetoric I hear from Clinton (duh) and at times Edwards (viz. Iran, a few months ago. Ick.).

Clinton may well be our nominee, and if and when that happens, we need to fight tooth and nail to get her in. It would be good to be already thinking about the (substantial) common ground she shares with those of us to her left.

Thank you. I agree most-heartedly! (We should cut campaigns some slack for their employee choices; can we not find faulty staff in each camp?)

I agree with Joe Biden that Republicans are foolish to wish for Hillary's nomination. Do not doubt the Clintons will hit back hard against attempted Swift Boating. I'll add I think she would do well in a bar fight. Part of the pressure we put on her, though should remind her that we will have her back if she has ours.

That said, I understand the appeal of our other choices.

I don't agree with her policy choices and judgment, and I often question her character in this context. But she's also a gutsy and
extremely intelligent politician, and we ought not to forget that. You cannot discount what it means to have a woman running for
President, and how she brings intelligence, resolve and poise to that role. It's our role in politics to bring her to a different place,
to show her that progressive politics can be done with progressive structures, and that the perceived double-talk on single issue
micropolling is no longer necessary or productive. Ultimately, and this may not be possible though I think it will be, we will have
to figure out how to work together as strong allies. Both Clinton and the blogs went through the crucible of the right-wing
smear machine, and it's hard to discount that.

You "don't agree with her policy choices and judgment,"
and you "often question her character in this context"?
What other context is there?

We "cannot discount what it means to have a woman
running for President, and how she brings intelligence,
resolve and poise to that role"?
Do you mean she's clean and articulate?

We "will have to figure out how to work together
as strong allies"?
Because...?

This is a democracy, not a monarchy.

This is an election, not a coronation.

This is not Hillary Clinton's "turn." She has to earn the presidency.

Like everybody else.

Hillary's been beating men at their own game for most of her life.  To do that, she has had to be twice as good, twice as smart, and twice as tough to even be considered their equal.  

Is it any wonder that she appears guarded, calculated, or tough?  

She has a long history of progressive causes on her resume: including work on behalf of migrants, the poor, children, and women's rights.  She campaigned out west for McGovern, and, her first job as a lawyer was as a member of the inquiry staff advising the House Judiciary committee during Watergate.

She took every sling, arrow, and punch thrown at her and her husband by the GOP and still ended up beating them.  If she wins the Democratic primary, I don't doubt that she would beat them again.

I will take a large Hillary Kool-Aid to go please.

My problem with Clinton is the same as my problem with Gore in 2000 and Kerry in 2004 -- she's running hard to not blow it.  With each election, there is more and more pressure on Democrats to win the election and with that comes the pressure to play to not lose.  That's what Clinton is doing by playing it safe.  I think she'd be a great President, but until she breaks out of this shell, and, to use the baseball term, tries easier, Clinton won't win.

Hillary Clinton voted for the Iraq war,  which by itself isn't a deal-breaker since other establishment Democrats did the same.  She is a failure, not because of the mere fact of her vote, but because she keeps trying to justify it using the excuse of  "what she knew then."

Like hell. This is just BS.

I'm one guy sitting in my living room in Colorado just  before the war. I could see the Bush war-propaganda machine coming down the tracks like a locomotive. I'm not privy to Congressional hearings and I'm not part of Bill Clinton-administration war councils, so I don't have any special insider information.  Even so, I knew at the very beginning that George Bush was lying and Iraq was a fiasco waiting to happen. WTF when our Democratic, political leaders are so blind. This is even more true for Hillary Clinton who was on the receiving end of a lot of right-wing nonsense, and should have seen it coming.

In other words, if she is claiming that "what she knew then" justified voting for the war, then she really is saying that she trusted George Bush, Cheney, the neo-cons, and the Republican Party. Why was she so stupid or craven to buy their line?

I think she was just trying to roll with the political waves. This does not demonstrate appropriate leadership skills. And even today, she still wants to be against the war, but not really be against the war.

Either stand up to Bush, or get out of the way.

1)rssrai, the ONLY reason people would be tired of the Clintons, is the garbage piled onto them during Bill's administration.  You have MUCH to complain about due to Bush Sr's and Bush jr's tenure, but Bill?  He did ok...

2)Ok Calculus, so who ya gonna vote for then?  The pickings are pretty slim, and please please please do not throw out "well, Obama's" blah blah blah.  Have you LOOKED at his voting record side by side, in comparison to Hillary's?  They're identical.  IDENTICAL.  Except for 4 votes, which were not big issues...the major votes they weighed in on, formed the basis for predicting their voting trends.  Obama would have voted the same damn way as Hillary, and I suggest you get over the "she voted for the war" mantra, cuz that dog ain't huntin.

3)What's good...THIS is what's good; ok, maybe by extension, but if you want to know why Bill Clinton was essentially a good President, do two things..one, pick up a newspaper from his administration days, and notice the G8 summits..7 other world leaders were all somber, but there's Slick Willy smiling as big as can be.  America needs that right now.  Ok, more tangible to his effectiveness, read the ABA's report on signing statements.  There is one in particular that shows Bill's complete delineation for individual American civil liberties, and in comparison, bush really is a power hungry prick. Go ahead, read it.  So Bill, attached to Hillary, and vice versa..America at this point NEEDS two Presidential-caliber people.

I am NOT saying disregard the huge f*ckup that has been Iraq, and all the people with blood on their hands, but I'm saying deal in reality, and go for the greater good.  If Russ Feingold is not running, you're pretty much not voting then, huh?

Hillary '08

"Thats pretty much how I feel about her.  She probably wouldn't be a bad democrat, but she is bad at campaigning."
_________

I have been impressed with the way Hillary has been campaigning since she threw her hat in the ring three months ago.  In townhall format and smaller venues, she is well received and has been getting her message out effectively.  She has certainly been successful when it comes to reaching out to union members - great performances in all the forums and conferences thus far; and she clearly did well during the debate in S.C. last Thursday.

I expect she would also do very well in debates against the Republican nominee, if she makes it that far.  

Whether one likes Hillary or not, for whatever reasons, she is the consummate politician; knows her stuff; can recite from years of experience with policy issues.  I also appreciate that she is strong and manages, probably better than any other candidate, to distance herself from the madness of the media.

Great post. As a Clinton supporter I  respect your analysis, especially your unease with the endless strategic tacking and triangulation around Republican and corporate agendas. Not a very satisfactory means to the end, but a necessary skill to have given the structure of mainstream legislative politics bar a sizeable Democratic majority next time round.  I do agree that progressive blogs such as MY DD would have a crucial role to play in a Democratic administration not only in terms of keeping the Democratic establishment honest and not distracted, but also in terms of policing the media and healthcare and environmental corporate interests. I hope whomever wins the nomination (Hillary I hope) will seriously engage with the liberal and progressive blogosphere.

The argument goes that somehow 'amateurs" and others sitting around with a beer in hand  "knew" that the WMD threat was false and that Bush et al were lying; so "pros" like Hillary must be either stupid or venal to have given authorization.

The problem with that analysis in my mind is that early anti-Iraq war beliefs on the part of many emerged more from preexisting ideological biases rather than objective looking at data.

It's fine to believe that it's never ok to respond militarily to a national security threat, but I think most Americans would not agree with that viewpoint.

I think that a leader-progressive or not-who refused to look at "what I knew then" from existing intelligence estimates around the world because it didn't fit idealogically is not one I'd be comfortable as president.