Posted by
T. Thomas on Sunday, January 27, 2008 10:53:37 AM
Thousands of pundit-hours and gallons of printer’s ink have been devoted to figuring out how the Clintons would try and derail Mr. Obama. Mostly the guessing game as played among the media blatherati had to do with what dirt the Mr. and Mrs. would be able to dig up on Obama, and how they would use it.
Never in the wildest dreams of anchor or analyst was it imagined that the crime, the unpardonable indiscretion, the Clintons would use against Mr. Obama would be the color of his skin.
An AP story dated Jan. 26, reports that “Clinton campaign strategists denied any intentional effort to stir the racial debate. But they said they believe the fallout has had the effect of branding Obama as ‘the black candidate,’ a tag that could hurt him outside the South.” What a shabby piece of dissembling.
Mr. Clinton, America’s “first black president,” spent last week scurrying around South Carolina blaming his wife’s impending defeat on the participation of black voters. At the same time the campaign kept her safely tucked away elsewhere where she could issue shocked disavowals of his nasty race baiting should it become necessary. Now in a spectacularly tin-eared performance, the former president paints Mr. Obama’s triumph in South Carolina as reminiscent of Jesse Jackson’s dead-ended success there in the 1980s, and dismisses it as some sort of “black” thing.
It is not a little instructive to remember how Mr. Clinton devoted the last couple of years of his administration and the several since leaving office trying to personally define a legacy that could survive the scrutiny of history. Now he seems willing to throw it all away in service to the couple’s single-minded obsession to regain power. For that prize, they risk both his presidential reputation and the very fabric of the Democratic Party.
At long last, the Clintons have no decency left.