As a story with supposed political impact, this is beyond silly. As rude as stiffing servers would be and as hypocritical to Democrats’ overall pretense of championing the underprivileged, such an oversight hardly rises to the level of vital public policy debate. Any bloggers who tried to play “gotcha” with such a rumor deserve to be the object of a raucous point-at-you-and-laugh session.
What may be more important, however, is the frantic nature of the Clinton response. Bill Clinton was famed during 1992 for the concept of the “perpetual campaign” featuring a “war room” that existed for no other purpose than to instantly mount scathing and often personal and petulant counterattacks to any incoming challenge or criticism. The rumor always was that Hillary Clinton was the driving force behind this escalation in standardized political tactics. This rumor now appears to be true, as the Hillary Clinton campaign appears to be taking it to another level with this incident and, previously, with accusations that challenging questions directed towards Ms. Clinton during a debate were unfair acts of boys “ganging up” on a defenseless girl.
As Hillary Clinton appears poised to seize the Democratic nomination and then engage in a closely fought battle for the White House, count on the tone of reaction towards any and all challenges or questions to be increasingly personal and angry. The “cult of the offensive” has moved off of World War I battlefields and has come to dominate American political campaigns. No question is fair, no disagreement is principled, and every challenge is a evil plot by the ultimate enemy.
It’s going to be ugly. And Clinton campaigns of the past have shown to be experts in winning ugly.
UPDATE by MvdG: Clinton just received a major endorsement: Ohio Governor Ted Strickland, a “first-year governor with sky-high approval ratings.”
Strickland said: “She is the strongest candidate that our party can put forth, and she is the candidate who can win the presidency.”
The Swamp explains the significance of this endorsement: “His support could provide a counterpunch to Clinton’s rivals’ claims that she is too polarizing to win a general election. A new Ohio Poll from the University of Cincinnati today pegs the governor’s approval rating at 69 percent, including 65 percent among Republicans and 68 percent among independents.”
Obama is our Lincoln, returned to reunite America.
O h and Obama also received a significant endorsement, important to elderly voters in NH
I personally see gender as a non issue. but if Clinton wants to play the gender card than I think it will backfire. For no one wants a defenseless girl in the oval.
Yeah, that’s what made the whole campaign to cast her critics as unfair bizarre to me. It seemed a knee-jerk angry and petulant reaction to the temerity of those who would DARE to question the Great Lady more than a consequence of any rational calculated political maneuver.
And that means that the tone it represents (angry and hostile towards criticism) might very well persist and strengthen over time, including if and when Hillary Clinton is sworn in as President.
I see it as gender neutral (like Interested) though. It’s actually a bit unfair to her, that if other people who support her play the gender card then she gets charged with doing that. To me, she is playing the victim card, as she’s always done- but I don’t see why gender has to be brought into it.
Radical feminists believe females have been victimized by the patriarchy. This is settled dogma.
[...] Steck, in The War Room is Back « The Van Der Galiën Gazette, writes: What may be more important [than the tip itself], however, is the frantic nature of the [...]
Unfortunately, a “War Room” and a “Rapid Response Team” are now essential elements of a modern political campaign (especially at the presidential level). Nutty stories like the “stiffed waitress” are tailor made for a lazy media who are looking for stories that feed pre-existing narratives. Any campaign that DOESN’T respond rapidly to this kind of crap WILL get buried.
“Radical feminists believe females have been victimized by the patriarchy. This is settled dogma.”
Oh. Okay.
Anyway, Clinton and those that work for her know -after the sickening swiftboat blah et al.- that there are right-wingers who will say anything all the time just to harm her, be it true or not. The fact that Clinton could be attacked over perjury and sex *despite his other sins* but that Bush/Cheney have not got their just desserts suggest to me that the marketplace of ideas and the information flow in the US is based on volume volume volume, tenacity tenacity tenacity, screaming screaming screaming and avalanches of repetition, creating cosmologies of pure emotion-tugging spin.
Clinton can be as ruthless, sharp, “frantic”, finicky, domineering, quick and paranoid as she wants, as long as she uses facts against the torrent of attacks - most of which will be absolute bullshit. Which she will not always do, and *then* I will criticize her. I still feel that Obama is five times the person and candidate simply because he isn’t scared of the voters, and is ready to stop the issue-creating stuff where everything that matters is getting your side out first and snarl at those who try to break your narrative (See “They will leave our troops fundless!!!” or “Bush did most of the mistakes pre- and post-Katrina!!!!”)
But this whole “oh my wooooord she’s just this big triangulation politricks machine who just *jumps* on all her critics and rumors EEEEEEEK!!!!” routine could be sold as a Maalox-substitute.
Hilary over *any* of the goppers save Paul.
Like it or not, Hillary Clinton has been accused of one item of crazy bullshit after another. If she’s going to step up to the plate and defend herself from unfair charges, that doesn’t exactly make her the Wicked Witch of the West. It is not only the intelligent thing to do, but it will serve to elevate the intelligence of the news industry. We would like to hear about substantive issues, not about waitress tipping in Iowa. If news reporters know that their lazy asses are getting fact checked, then perhaps they will not make such a big deal of this kind of nonsense.
Oh, and another thing. Does anyone seriously think that, after a campaign appearance, Hillary or any candidate actually asks for the check and signs it her or himself? If a mistake of this sort ever IS made, it is going to be made by some staffer. There are certain things that will be characteristic of a certain campaign or a certain candidate, but this sort of thing would be something that could potentially happen to anyone–or in this case, NOT happen.
It should, but it does not matter. Nobody could seriously expect George H.W. Bush to have seen or know how a bar code reader at the grocery store worked either. But it made him look out of touch, and that is that.
Panic in Hillaryville?
Rasmussen again showed that she was hemorrhaging points in NH…in September 18th, she held a 23 point lead, October 27th, that lead dropped to 16 points and November 7th, that lead dropped to 10 points.
If there was no war room there would have been no rapid response to the stiffed waitress, and the silly story would have dominated the news cycle. Ms Clinton is being attacked from all sides, as she is the frontrunner for ‘08. It only makes sense that she is ready to respond to attacks-even the silly one about the waitress.
Kerry lost in ‘04 partly because he didn’t feel that the swift-boat attacks warranted a vigorous response.
In this day and age of non-stop political noise, a politician has to be able to keep a non-issue from gathering steam. Remember the Edwards haircut? How long did that nonstory run?
“Kerry lost in ‘04 partly because he didn’t feel that the swift-boat attacks warranted a vigorous response.
In this day and age of non-stop political noise, a politician has to be able to keep a non-issue from gathering steam. Remember the Edwards haircut? How long did that nonstory run?”
B-b-b-b-b-but she *triangulates* and attack her critics and stuff! DYNASTIES!!! DYYYYYYYNAAAASTIIIIIIIIEEEES!!!
xel- what will you have to say when the next George Bush (there is a nephew with that name) makes his run? LOL
I do think its dangerous when political power is so concentrated among the powerful few. It seems to be a self-perpetuating phenomena. Even populist dissatisfaction with the status quo evidenced in the kind of money Obama and Ron Paul have raised doesn’t seem to put a dent in it. Are we just to yield to the inevitable?