Hillary’s kiss to McCain may become her own kiss of death

BuzzFlash's Last Chance Democracy Cafe

http://www.lastchancedemocracycafe.com/?p=1294

You have to give the Clinton campaign a lot of credit — in a Gordon Gekko sort of way. It really has been masterful how they’ve backed Barack Obama into a corner. “Poor Barack,” you can almost hear them chuckle among themselves, borrowing from Karl Malden’s words in the old commercials for American Express travelers checks, “What will he do? What will he do?”

There’s no denying it, Clinton’s “kitchen sink” negative campaigning has put Obama into a world class crack: if he just turns the other cheek and allows Clinton to bludgeon him Democrats will think he’s a wimp. But if he goes too far negative himself he loses the crown of being the champion of a new kind of politics. Meanwhile, John McCain, with no remaining nomination concerns of his own, is free to throw his own fireballs Obama’s way.

What’s a Barack to do?

Well, here’s my thought: how about taking Hillary Clinton at her word in her expressions of love for John McCain? How about seeing just how well that’s going to play with Democrats when she’s forced to confront those words?

Clinton’s first big kiss to McCain came on March 3 when she infamously said:

“I think that I have a lifetime of experience that I will bring to the White House. I know Senator McCain has a lifetime of experience to the White House. And Senator Obama has a speech he gave in 2002.”

With a big go screw yourselves to the many Democrats who had been expressing concerns that such adulation of McCain might hurt the party in November, Hillary followed up two days later by singing him the exact same love song during a CNN interview. Using essentially the same words as before, Hillary once again portrayed McCain as the great oracle, with Obama the childlike upstart.

But Clinton was only getting started in her McCain love: very soon, she planted her third — and by far biggest — kiss yet directly on John McCain’s political lips:

I think that since we now know Sen. McCain will be the nominee for the Republican Party, national security will be front and center in this election. We all know that. And I think it’s imperative that each of us be able to demonstrate we can cross the commander-in-chief threshold,” the New York senator told reporters crowded into an infant’s bedroom-sized hotel conference room in Washington.

“I believe that I’ve done that. Certainly, Sen. McCain has done that and you’ll have to ask Sen. Obama with respect to his candidacy,” she said.

Calling McCain, the presumptive GOP nominee a good friend and a “distinguished man with a great history of service to our country,” Clinton said, “Both of us will be on that stage having crossed that threshold.”

I’ve been out of the dating scene for a long time, but I’ve heard tell that the new cultural norm is that the third date is when a couple today often decide it’s time to take the relationship to a new level. Surely, in the case of Hillary Clinton’s political love affair with John McCain, with her three separate kisses to him recounted above, that moment is at hand. And who better to play the role of the minister officially declaring the happy couple to be political husband and wife than Barack Obama?

Far from the disaster many Obama supporters seem to think this is, it’s actually manna from heaven to Obama — a first class ticket out of the box he’s been put in by other attacks less likely to backfire with Democrats. It provides the perfect way for him to fire back without appearing to crawl in the mud. The Obama campaign purportedly is unhappy because they wanted to be running against John McCain by this time, instead of allowing him to get a head start while the Democrats continue to bash each other’s brains out. Then why not run against him now anyway, while bringing Hillary along for the ride?

If Hillary wants to heap praise onto McCain, then let her live or die in the Democratic nomination contest on McCain’s record.

Instead of getting angry at Hillary’s quasi-endorsement of McCain, Obama’s campaign should be thanking their lucky stars. My guess is that six months from now this will be remembered as one of the biggest political blunders in recent memory.

In fact, Obama’s campaign should stop worrying about the possibility that McCain may run ads featuring Hillary’s comments in the fall, and start running those same ads themselves now. Ask the Democratic electorate if they agree with her that John McCain has the kind of wisdom and experience we need. Ask if they agree that having supported the war in Iraq and advocating other similar unnecessary wars is the passing answer on the Commander in Chief test.

Let’s find out whether Democrats agree with Hillary that McCain’s advocacy of staying in Iraq 100 years is the sort of experienced leadership the doctor ordered.

I’m guessing I know the answer. And it’s not the one the Clinton folks had in mind when they launched this stupid gambit.

And, yes, there are a lot of other things Obama needs to start doing better, including finding a stronger way to speak to working class economic concerns. But calling Hillary Clinton out on McCain would be a hell of a good place to start.

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