Will Clinton Try to Force a "Dream Team?"

Posted by Jill Hussein C., Brilliant at Breakfast at 5:01 AM on May 12, 2008.

I vote for nightmare. After trying mightily to do what she can to make Barack Obama unelectable, from sending black surrogates out to brand him as an ex-drug dealer to telling newspapers that the IMPORTANT people, the WHITE people, will ONLY support HER, Hillary Clinton has not been running the kind of campaign that should be rewarded by giving her the VP nod. And frankly, the so-called "feminists" who are supporting her and threatening to vote for McCain if she isn't nominated ought to be ashamed of themselves, particularly if a President McCain gets to nominate a few more Sammy the Stem Cell Alitos to the Supreme Court and they or their daughters end up back in the coathanger-and-drinking-lye days of reproductive self-determination.

Now it seems she's going to strongarm her way into the #2 spot:

Clinton "is trying to figure out how to land the plane without looking like surrender," a prominent figure in the Obama camp said Friday. This means, in all likelihood, bringing her campaign to a close in the next few weeks and trying to leverage her way onto an Obama ticket from a position of maximum strength, said several knowledgeable sources.

A person close to her, with whom her campaign staff has counseled at various points, said this week, "I think the following will happen: Obama will be in a position where the party declares him the nominee by the first week in June. She'll still be fighting with everybody -- the Rules Committee, the party leaders -- and arguing, 'I'm winning these key states; I've got almost half the delegates. I have a whole constituency he hasn't reached. I've got real differences on approach to how we win this election, and I'm going to press the hell out of this guy. ... Relief for the middle class, universal health care, etc.; I'm Ms. Blue Collar, and I'm going to press my fight, because he can't win without my being on the ticket.' "

Another major Democratic Party figure, who supports her for president, agreed: "It's not going to be a quiet exit. ... Obama has got a terrible situation. He marches to a different drummer. He won't want to take her on the ticket. But he might have to, even though the idea of Vice President Hillary with Bill in the background at the White House is not something -- especially after what [the Clintons] have thrown at him that he relishes. I believe she'll go for it."

However, several important Democrats aligned with Obama predicted that he -- and Michelle Obama -- will vigorously resist any Clinton effort to get on the ticket. Rather, Obama is more likely to try to convince Clinton to either stay in the Senate or accept another position in an Obama administration, should he win the presidency.

Several Clinton associates say there is still a ray of hope among some in her campaign: that a "catastrophic" revelation about Obama might make it possible for her to win the presidential nomination. But barring that, Hillary and Bill Clinton recognize that her candidacy is being abandoned and rejected by superdelegates whom she once expected to win over and that, even if she were to win the popular vote in combined primary states, she will almost certainly be denied the nomination

So the Clintonistas are going to try to dig up dirt on Obama in a final bid to knock him out of the race so they can claim what they think is rightfully theirs, but if they fail, they want to be rewarded with the VP nod?

These people are absolutely despicable. Historically opponents have managed to put aside their differences when one chooses the other for the VP spot. But you never saw John Edwards trashing John Kerry when he was Kerry's running mate. Somehow I can't imagine megalomaniacs like the Clintons suddenly deciding that Obama is OK if Hillary gets the #2 spot. It's more likely that they'll do whatever they can to cut him off at the knees if he's elected, and he'd be a damn fool to fall for it.

You know, I defended the Clintons for eight years when people told me they were dirty, they were corrupt, they were power-mad. But you know what? Maybe they were right.

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Tagged as: hillary clinton, barack obama, vice president