With the introduction of fear mongering hearkening back to the tactics formerly advocated by Karl Rove, Senator Clinton has shown how she reacts in a crisis. Her team is going all-out, not content to let the red phone ad be their only attack, they have spun 180 degrees to manage expecations about the March 4th primaries. Perhaps you recall after the debacle on the Potomac how Hillary cast down the gauntlet, saying they were ready to meet Obama in Texas? Well, they’re not even ready for a phone call.
…the most interesting moment in today’s Clinton campaign phoner with reporters. Responding to the release of HRC’s new TX TV ad, which asserts in no subtle terms that only she has the experience to deal with a major world crisis, and, relatedly, to keep your children safe, Slate’s John Dickerson asked the obvious question:
“What foreign policy moment would you point to in Hillary’s career where she’s been tested by crisis?” he said.
Silence on the call. You could’ve knit a sweater in the time it took the usually verbose team of Mark Penn, Howard Wolfson and Lee Feinstein, Clinton’s national security director, to find a cogent answer. And what they came up with was weak — that she’s been endorsed by many high ranking members of the uniformed military.
The rest of the article is here, but before you go answer me this: if her top advisors are so ill-prepared for such an obvious question, just who do you want as the nominee for the Democratic party this autumn?
I started this campaign “season” thinking either of the two Senators remaining would make an outstanding candidate for the Democratic Party. I’m much less certain now in the case of Senator Clinton. If she wins the nomination she will have to earn back my respect – she’s playing dirty, frankly, and sounding desperate, and evidently advised by fools.
Filed under: 2008 Election, Democratic nomination, presidential campaign, red phone | Tagged: Clinton, dirty politics, Howard Wolfson, John Dickerson, Lee Feinstein, Mark Penn, national security, red phone, vetted
