filed under Daily Dose | Election 2008 | Politics | Women
Why Hillary should/will stay in (for now)
12:40PM ON
05/19/2008
BY
Ari
For those who have been clamoring for an immediate HRC exit, a counter-proposal, from someone who has been wishing she’d drop out since February: Hillary should stay in.
Not only does she have the right to stay in, but she should. It serves the interest of all Democrats and indeed America itself for her to stay in the race and champion her cause, at least for now. Sure, there are caveats: she should not stay in until the convention, she should run a positive campaign, and avoid reopening the wounds of Florida and Michigan that are just beginning to mend themselves. Basically, she should run, and is perhaps even now running, with the implicit understanding that she cannot and will not win. But for now, maybe for the next month or so, she should stay in.
Why?
1. Money. Hillary needs it. Still. Always. Forever. In West Virginia, a kid sold his bike and video games to raise money for her campaign and, as Jon Stewart said, she took it. Sure, staying in might give her the leverage to get Obama to help cut her debt, but that’s a contingency plan - and not one that serves the interest of the Dems in 2008.
The money issue is potentially a thorny one. Eating an 11 million dollar loan, getting your opponent to bail you out on your 20 million dollars in outstanding debt, being the one who does the bailing - all of these options cause either HRC, Obama or both to lose face. The best possible scenario is that Hillary is able to raise enough money to pay off her debt, and at least a portion of the loans she made to the campaign, without Obama’s help.
Obama giving HRC money would work, but it would irk his supporters see their grassroots contributions go to paying back the money she pumped into the campaign. He could ask his big dollar donors to give to HRC, whose moneybags have all maxxed out. But it’s less than ideal, especially if it threatens the coalescing of the fundraisers already in progress. She needs to stay in to keep bringing in cash, and she needs to bring in cash to help the Democrats avoid the embarrassment of having to deal with her campaign finances.
2. She has states left to win. Yes, the West Virginia drubbing that Obama received was troubling, or, depending on how many interviews with the voters of West Virginia that you watched, deeply disturbing. On Tuesday, after the votes in Kentucky and Oregon are counted, Obama will probably clinch a majority of the pledged delegates (not counting MI and FL). It’s an important milestone. But he will certainly lose Kentucky, though not by 40. Even if Hillary dropped out today it wouldn’t change her margin there. And it just plain looks bad when you lose a race after your opponent has dropped out.
The other expected HRC “state” left is Puerto Rico in June. While HRC’s hopes of running up a big popular vote margin there may be misplaced, the fact is, she is the favorite. Why not stay in at least until then? If she drops and still wins, it looks bad for Obama; If she stays in and he wins - a possibility, given that her “advantage” is conferred based on demography and speculation rather than public polling - then Obama gets to claim that latino voters are coming into his camp, and maybe gets a little bump that he wouldn’t have if the competition had ended already.
Either way, with so few states left, staying in the race - if done with some humility - will not adversely affect Obama. Heck, it makes the wins that he’ll pick up more meaningful, especially in prairie/mountain states like South Dakota and Montana that might just flip in a big-time change election. And, until Obama hits 2025 delegates, it’s tough to marshal a compelling argument that HRC should not actively campaign for the nomination, so long as its done with class. More to the point, it’s that kind of argument that sows enmity among the democratic ranks. Forcing HRC out of the race would be a strategic blunder for the Dems - a bitter bomb that would make healing harder in the long term.
3. Competitive primaries across the country are helping the Democrats. Ok, so HRC’s low road through OH and PA primaries was not all that fun to watch. But ultimately, the primaries have been increasing turnout, and convincing all kinds of voters to register as dems. Obama may have lost PA, but his massive voter registration effort flipped the state blue, and energized dems have taken three republican house seats in special elections since March, all in states where the democratic primaries had rolled through in the previous months. FairVote’s Rob Richie has the argument:
Looking first at the partisan impact on the two major parties, we already have seen a near certain connection between the Democrats’ competitive primaries and their success in special congressional elections this spring. Democrats understandably may worry about the negative tenor of their campaign, but they have engaged far more voters than Republicans this spring - and have months to heal any wounds.
Of course, HRC’s final hole card is the ability to damage the party and the nominee by taking this all the way to the convention, and/or by going hard negative on Obama and campaigning to gin up a racial divide within the democratic party. But if she doesn’t do that, there is actually much to be gained from the primary season. Let’s milk it for all it’s worth. Obama certainly is, drawing 80,000 jazzed up Obamites in Portland, Oregon in advance of Tuesday’s vote there.
4. There is good left to be done. Hillary’s comment about “hard working white voters” some weeks ago may have indeed been an honest mistake (John Dickerson convinced me.) But the comments are obviously damaging. Obama will run strongest on his core message of change and unity, and the long pivot back to that message, in which the party as a whole embraces change, will be crucial. Hillary is a big part of that pivot. The biggest If of all is not whether HRC will quit hitting Obama below the belt. She has basically done that already. The question is whether she will be part of the healing and reconciliation.
For most people, it’s much easier to compromise from a position of strength. For ego-laden presidential candidates, that’s triply true. The stronger HRC feels she is, the easier it will be to come together.
So don’t drop Hillary. Not yet. Obama is about 120 delegates shy of 2025. He will hit the magic number soon - but not today, and not tomorrow. Bide your time, raise that cash and energize voters. Then, when the dust has settled, you can quit.
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