I watched the speech last night, and what I saw was in some ways sad, and in some ways enlightening. She gave a great speech, but we knew she could do that already. What was sad was realizing how far her candidacy could have gone if she was not tied to her husband’s gang. And yes, that is how I perceive the DLC, as a gang.
It’s clear that as a politician she has a galvanizing effect on women of all ages, and she had that effect even when she was merely the First Lady. But the need or desire to establish a power base from within the Democratic Party required her to seek out and enlist in the same group of people who had backed her husband, a deeply flawed and frankly overrated President. And that is the tragedy of her campaign and of her political career.
And the continuing tragedy will be if she remains tied to this same old tired brand of Republican Lite politics. Because she doesn’t have to do so. Like Al Gore, after 2000, she can reinvent herself, and become a major figure on the world stage whether she chooses to stay in the Senate or do something else entirely. Gore only broke out of that old mindset after he lost, and lost in the worst way, by allowing himself to be led around by the nose by the same establishment consultants and DLC hacks who parasitically rode Bill Clinton’s charisma to electoral victories and claimed them as their own successes. When Gore stepped away from that group of illegitimate power hungry fools, he became his own man, and a far better human being.
Yet, the question remains: will she? Will she willingly divorce herself from Bill and his gang of old style, lobbyist ridden, “play the game just like the wingnuts” group of DLC “Bubba Bill” loving men (and a few women, too) who destroyed her own chance at the brass ring of American politics with a flawed and divisive strategy of campaigning? Or will she break free of them, both literally and figuratively to emerge as a new force, with a new persona all her own? She has that opportunity. There are millions of people who would follow her in pursuit of whatever goal she sets for herself, and those people will do so regardless of any financial support or political insider backing she might lay clam to as Bill’s heir.
She doesn’t need Bill anymore. Frankly, she ought to divorce him. Literally. It would be the best thing she could do for herself as a person. He’s the dead albatross around her neck in every way imaginable; politically, personally and spiritually. He sucked away all the decency and integrity from her primary campaign, and he will always do so. He can’t help himself. He didn’t acquire the name “Big Dog” out of nowhere after all.
I’d like to see her do that. Leave Bill in the dust of his legacy and move on. I don’t think she will, but for herself and the millions of American women for whom she has become an icon, a symbol of all their own hopes, dreams and desires for freedom and equality and justice, it would be the best thing that could ever happen to her.
