I think very few of her supers are going to cling to her for more than a week or so. They’re professional politicians…they know the importance of getting behind a candidate early. Most of them are not going to humor her if she continues to play her game. There’s got to be tremendous pressure from both Obama supers, Obama-supporting constituents and rank & file party functionaries to fall in.
Ed Rendell said an hour ago on NPR that Clinton would fully concede ‘very soon’ and mentioned that 90 to 95 percent of the people who voted for her will get behind Obama soon there after. He seemed quite confident of Obama’s chances this fall. They were buzzing on NPR that this could be a lopsided dem victory this autumn if Obama goes after the presidency with the verve and enthusiasm he had in the primaries. There is no reason to think he wouldn’t. His vp choice is crucial, but one this is for sure, it’s not going to be Hillary Clinton after last night’s charade.
This is pure idle speculation (with no added sugars or trans fats), but early in the day yesterday - even after the AP made its call, I think - Clinton’s reps were saying they didn’t think Obama could get to 2118 yesterday. Those remarks were posted here around page 46, I think. What if that’s true, and most of her speech yesterday was prepared before team Clinton, which was in denial and also working very hard, realized it was really and officially over? Maybe they really believed the superdelegates were more concerned about Obama and weren’t ready to line up behind him yet, and felt they had a little more time to make a case to them. I’m just thinking out loud, but it makes some of her statements seem less absurd.
Hillary as VP…
First, the main reason why she can’t be VP is that she’s terrible at politics. If she truly wants to be VP, she’s going about it in exactly the wrong way. She has run the worst campaign that I can ever remember. Not just damaging to the eventual nominee after we knew it was over, but also because her campaign killed itself. She’s 40 million in debt, and really really messed things up.
Hillary is poison, and can’t help with anything. I don’t want her near any lever of power whatsoever. I don’t like the fact that she’s my Senator.
People that suggest that she be the VP are simply ignoring reality, or don’t understand it. If you understand anything about what is is that has brought Obama to where he is today, then you understand that not only is he running against GWB, but he’s also running against the Clintons. We’re so tired of seeing Terry McAuliffe’s painful bullshit every day. We, as a nation, are finally starting to cut through this “hyper-spin” bullshit that Bush and Clinton brought forth. it’s this amazing ability that if you talk loud enough, it will come true. It does happen a good bit, but Barack eschews that approach and correctly gambled that candor is actually appreciated more.
Hillary can’t win for losing. She seriously screwed up her chances for anything. All Obama has to do is wait, and then people will be jumping off of roofs to attack her. She simply doesn’t understand just how much she’s been running on borrowed time and patience. I think it’s a gross overestimation of her political power. All Obama has to do is wait.
She is being completely disrespectful for all that he has done. She vastly overestimates her support.
ETA: Marley, she spoke today too, and also didn’t mention it.
Marley23 - I think they knew full well what had happened, and this was a calculated speech. Yes, they knew they were going to put Hillary up there and she was going to say everything she did. Sad but True. Terry McCaulliffe scares me. He doesn’t appear to be based in any reality I’m a part of.
And one more thing about last night. Why didn’t Hillary have her shindig at NYU or Columbia, or any of a hundred other very nice locations in Manhatten??? Why in a basement? Do you believe the cell phone/blackberry Chris Matthews mentioned?
For lack of any other reason, I’d chalked it up to the fact that they scheduled it on short notice.
It won’t go a week. Today or tomorrow. At AIPAC today, she looked incredibly tired and haggard. A reporter who has covered her for 16 months says she lives in “an alternate universe”, and she is in a sort of confused state, not really sure exactly why there’s so much commotion out there.
It’s almost sad.
Apart from all that if you add her to the ticket to get the (small imho) group of democrats who won’t vote for anyone but Hillary you lose the much bigger group that would do anything to keep her out of the white house at any cost. I think it would be a horrible mistake to even consider her, i rather lose her hardcore followers rather than energize all the people who hate her who now include plenty of democrats to vote against Obama.
That’s a possibility, I’ll leave my tin hat at home next time I look deeper into what happened last night 
For now I’m going with what my gut tells me, and I think Clinton is simply swallowing a tough loss and will concede very soon.
Just wanted to add, isn’t it great to have a guy who isn’t a pushover?
Barack is really going to impress us this season, let me tell you. When McCain invited him to go to Iraq, what would be the typical response from some democrat. I’ll give you a few examples here. Imagine them coming out of John Kerry’s mouth.
“Well, I’ve been to Iraq before, and I don’t need to go again”
“I don’t need to go to Iraq to understand that…”
“I don’t think it’s safe enough…”
P.S. I think John Kerry’s a great guy, just not Presidential material.
Which all would mean that McCain would win. It’s a challenge and meant to make him look weak for denying the trip. Hillary would probably go.
But what does Barack do? He takes it and throws it right back in his face. He challenged McCain to go to the inner cities of America and see what was going on there. It’s a very powerful message and really plays to his strengths. This is what I liked about Barack from the get-go. I noticed his amazing political instincts from the beginning of his campaign.
You know what? He’s going to wail on McCain in those 10 debates. It’s going to be merciless. All he has to do is hammer down about the fact that he and bush had a “secret fundraiser” with no cameras. He can say it every single time and immediately do two things:
A) Tie him to Bush in general
B) Insinuate that his current approach is a lie
McCain has no idea what he’s in for. Obama just finished fighting one of the hardest contests of recent memory. McCain will be a cakewalk. I can’t wait to watch it unfold.
this is from Atrios, talking about McCain’s New Orleans speech.
If it weren’t so goddamned satisfying.
It was a striking choice in any event, what with Baruch being Barack’s name in Hebrew.
Hell yes.
Because it’s a perfect metaphor for a mindset that’s cozy and insulated and out-of-touch to the rest of the world outside.
I think Obama’s best strategy is to not comply with any of her wishes, but continue to erode her high-profile supporters–some of which is already happening. The more delusional she appears, the more distance loyal-but-not-stupid supporters will want to create for themselves, and as she sees the savviest of her allies leave, one after the other, one can only hope that will reaffirm how her political capital isn’t what she thinks it is.
Obama has the smarts and the guts to do what’s right. Let’s hope he follows through on it.
Ten?!? Seriously??
I noticed them both, but didn’t pay much attention to Trion’s guy. The yellow/red stripey guy took all my attention. I don’t think he was anyone’s “special cousin,” but he was definitely…unique.
My thoughts on Hillary, and her ridicoulousness du jour (complete and utter armchair psychology, mind): She’s not happy to be in the history books as the wife of President Clinton, or one of 100 senators, both of which are minor blips. She wants to be the “First Female …” whatever it may be. She wants her own entry in the Encyclopaedia Brittanica, not as a mention in someone else’s.
That’s McCain’s proposal for 10 “town hall” style debates. Obama hasn’t agreed yet, I don’t think.
But as I said in the other thread… I thought Obama was a mediocre debater in the Democratic debates. Hillary trounced him. Unless McCain is bad, too, I don’t see him “winning” the debates.
And he’s already doing it. One of the NPR folks reported that Obama was in Appalachia this morning.
Something funny (also heard on NPR) – Obama is being described as the “presumptive Presidential nominee”. Hillary? She’s the “presumptuous Vice-Presidential nominee”. 
This is true and someone, I don’t remember who, remarked on it, essentially saying that, in all of the coverage and speculation about Hillary, we’re forgetting what a momentous occasion and historic event Barack Obama’s nomination is for the country, in terms of a first and in terms of being one of the biggest political upsets ever.
BTW, I did like former Hillary supporter, Hillary Rosen’s comments (said to be at Huffingtonpost.com) that were quite sane, logical and forward-thinking. She thinks Hillary should concede completely (no campaign suspension), that she’s hurting the party and no way will she be offered VP.
I was a black child in Mississippi in the late 60s and early 70s and remember all the hope I felt was possible for the country then and how that died.
I watched with tears in my eyes last night as the dream of a bright future, a coming-together and a chance of a last, great hope was before me once again.
McCain is notoriously monotonous, slow, and has no fuse to his temper. So In a way they are perfect for debating each other I think more people wish to see a similar vision for the US and Obama more closely ties that to a lot of people. But we’ll see. I know republicans have a difficult time with McCain right now, and are not all that enthused with Obama…but admit that Obama might be the lesser of two evils.