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Campaign May Leave Blot on Clinton Legacy [“has in many ways hurt their legacy.”.....]
New York Times ^ | June 9, 2008 | JOHN M. BRODER and ROBIN TONER

Posted on 06/08/2008 12:52:50 PM PDT by Sub-Driver

Campaign May Leave Blot on Clinton Legacy By JOHN M. BRODER and ROBIN TONER

WASHINGTON — Bill and Hillary Clinton have stirred virulent passions in their nearly two decades in the national spotlight. They have been known as many things, good and bad — brilliant policy analysts, manipulators of facts and friends, tireless campaigners, skillful political tacticians, monumentally self-absorbed baby boomers. But most of all they were known as winners.

Until now.

While the Clintons will almost certainly play a continuing role in the nation’s political life, and Mrs. Clinton could yet emerge as this year’s vice presidential nominee, a major chapter in their vertiginous public biography was closed when Mrs. Clinton conceded the Democratic presidential nomination to Senator Barack Obama over the weekend. Their complicated legacy is all the more complicated now.

Mrs. Clinton, who survived public humiliation as first lady and then easily won two Senate races in New York, entered the 2008 Democratic presidential primary as the odds-on favorite because of money, connections and celebrity. But through a series of blunders and the appearance of a once-in-a-lifetime opponent, Mrs. Clinton saw the prize slip through her grasp despite a valiant personal effort that lasted through the final contests in South Dakota and Montana.

Both Clintons often seemed out of touch with the political times — cautious when they should have been bold, negative when they should have been inspirational. Exquisitely attuned to the political winds in 1992, they watched Mr. Obama almost effortlessly ride the wave in 2008.

(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: billary; clintonlegacy; x42
oh boo hoo......who writes this nonsense - oh wait - the New York Times....never mind.
1 posted on 06/08/2008 12:52:50 PM PDT by Sub-Driver
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To: Sub-Driver

What legacy??? is this a joke?


2 posted on 06/08/2008 12:56:08 PM PDT by Unicorn (Too many wimps around.)
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To: Sub-Driver
"Mrs. Clinton could yet emerge as this year’s vice presidential nominee"

Fixed it. It ain't over until it's over. Ask Big Brown.

3 posted on 06/08/2008 12:57:05 PM PDT by Paladin2 (Huma for co-president!)
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To: Sub-Driver

Shillary won NY because the NYC Dem machine annointed her. She can’t win heads up since she’s a fat shrewish lesbo in a black crusty pantsuit.


4 posted on 06/08/2008 12:57:29 PM PDT by VRWC For Truth (No mas Juan "Traitor Rat" McAmnesty)
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To: Sub-Driver
Only conservatives will remember the Clinton's behavior during this campaign.

After this election is over, saying anything but platitudes about the Noble actions of the Clinton's attempt to help slay the evil Republicans will be considered mean spirited.

5 posted on 06/08/2008 12:58:13 PM PDT by R_Kangel (`.`)
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To: Sub-Driver

Hurt their legacy? Yeah, right!


6 posted on 06/08/2008 12:59:01 PM PDT by dmw (Aren't you glad you use common sense? Don't you wish everybody did?)
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To: dmw

Bubba simply showed his true colors.


7 posted on 06/08/2008 1:03:15 PM PDT by Tensgrrl
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To: Sub-Driver

Many of us saw, and mistrusted, both Clintoons way back in 1992 with their “twofer” presidency. It’s hilarious to see the dems finally seeing them as they really are, instead of the king and queen they thought they were.


8 posted on 06/08/2008 1:16:53 PM PDT by Theresawithanh (PUMA - Party Unity My @ss - - - Best. Tagline. Idea. Evah!!!)
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To: Sub-Driver
"...Campaign May Leave Blot on Clinton Legacy..."

Don't worry, no one will ever notice another blot on the ol' legacy!

9 posted on 06/08/2008 1:22:52 PM PDT by skimbell (The United States Constitution © 1791. All Rights Reserved.)
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To: Sub-Driver

Oh, I’m sure Bubba has added a splat or two himself in the meantime.


10 posted on 06/08/2008 1:24:11 PM PDT by RichInOC (No! BAD Rich! (What'd I say?))
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To: Sub-Driver

Yeah, this article really brought a tear to my eye.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!


11 posted on 06/08/2008 1:30:14 PM PDT by popdonnelly (Does Obama know ANYONE who likes America, capitalism, or white people?)
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To: Sub-Driver

[“has in many ways hurt their legacy.”.....] Exactly how does one make a pile of excrement stink even more?


12 posted on 06/08/2008 1:31:15 PM PDT by Da Coyote
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To: skimbell

Well, there was the blot on the blue dress, now another blot on the legacy.

What exactly is Bill Clinton’s legacy, anyway? Seriously, what lasting or historic achievements took place from Jan. 20, 1993 to Jan. 20, 2001? Were there any events of historic note, or did he just mark time in the White House? Will history look to the Clinton presidency as significant in any way?


13 posted on 06/08/2008 1:35:33 PM PDT by Dilbert San Diego
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To: Sub-Driver

Clinton campaign legacy, a smear on a blot, wrapped in a stained blue dress.


14 posted on 06/08/2008 1:39:43 PM PDT by tet68 ( " We would not die in that man's company, that fears his fellowship to die with us...." Henry V.)
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To: Dilbert San Diego
Were there any events of historic note, or did he just mark time in the White House? Will history look to the Clinton presidency as significant in any way?

No, yes, and no.

15 posted on 06/08/2008 1:40:09 PM PDT by Rummyfan (Iraq: it's not about Iraq anymore, it's about the USA!)
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To: VRWC For Truth

Hillary won the NY senate seat because some other, more qualified, candidates were pressured to ‘step aside.’


16 posted on 06/08/2008 2:00:28 PM PDT by Continental Soldier
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To: Sub-Driver

“Campaign May Leave Blot on Clinton Legacy”

Seriously....do these people even partially understand the enormity of what’s just happened here?

The winds blowing at Obama’s back are practically gale force 5 at this point. No one’s seen anything like his candidacy in a couple of generations. It’s truly a once in a lifetime phenomenon.

We don’t call him the Obamessiah for nothing. His campaign has reached nearly biblical proportions, and he’s almost worshiped as a god by his followers. Obama has become a living saint, the anointed one, the savior. The secular Left has finally found the Moses who can lead their Mother Gaia, materialistic, socialistic religion, and “take them higher.”

Think about what’s just happened with Hillary Clinton’s concession in the presidential race. The Clintons have been, for twenty years, the undisputed Emperor and Empress of the Democrat party. Hillary had a 20 point lead over the Democrat field of candidates when she entered the race. The presidency was hers by design (and manufacture). It was locked. A certainty. She was going to be the next president.

Then something happened that neither the Clintons, or anyone in the Democrat party could have predicted. A relative newcomer - a rookie, and a black man(!) from Chicago took the momentum away from her. He gathered steam and support, week after week, until, to everyone’s shock and amazement, he knocked the Clintons off their thrones.

You really have to appreciate the absolute depth and breadth of control and power that the Clintons have wielded over the Democrat party these last twenty years to understand what a remarkable accomplishment this is. It’s historic, and it has turned Washington politics upside down.

Obama has actually carried out a coup’ de gras against the most hardened and dangerous political machine of the last half century, and (so far) lived to tell the tale.

In so doing, he’s also stripped the Clintons of their air cover. He has gained the allegiance of almost all of the most powerful Democrat politicians, to the most entrenched Democrat bureaucrats, to party operatives, to the liberal mainstream press, to liberal opinion makers, down to the liberal Democrat base. They’ve almost all switched loyalties to Obama now.

The Clintons are now left with virtually no protection against justice. In time, they will pay for their many crimes against the state.

See, you can’t just go dethroning the King and Queen, then leave them to peacefully retire. No - if you want to live, you had better put them in the grave as well. You have to know that unless you do that, they will quietly gain strength, then come back to kill you in your sleep.

Expect some serious fireworks to come out of the ongoing campaign finance case against Hillary Clinton. There are enough crimes in that one case to put her away for 20 years. And even that won’t be the end of it. Expect to see expose’ after expose’ on the Clintons hit the newsstands in the coming months. The mudslinging and character assassinations haven’t even started yet, but they will. The new regime has got to drive a stake through their beating heart, if they’re going to make this stick.

Too many people in Washington circles understand the stakes, and know that they’re going to be targeted by the Clintons if they don’t go after them with everything they’ve got. There’s a war going on just under the surface, and boy is it deadly.


17 posted on 06/08/2008 2:04:41 PM PDT by Windflier (To anger a conservative, tell him a lie. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.)
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To: Unicorn
The Clintons were/are a joke played upon the American people by the "fourth" estate.

Any honest reporter/editor would have called the Clintons out long ago.

Only because the Clintons aren't creating problems for Americans in general, and Republicans in particular, has the "press" abandoned them.

18 posted on 06/08/2008 2:21:12 PM PDT by Calvin Locke
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To: Sub-Driver
when they should have been inspirational.

There are many other candidates who fell into that trap.

19 posted on 06/08/2008 2:23:50 PM PDT by Pikachu_Dad
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To: Windflier

Well said ............. FRegards


20 posted on 06/08/2008 2:54:25 PM PDT by gonzo ( What Part Of "Shall Not Be Infringed" does anyone have a problem with? The USSC will soon wonder ..)
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To: Calvin Locke
Clinton never won a majority of votes in a National election and would never have been President except for Ross Perot's antics.
21 posted on 06/08/2008 2:56:02 PM PDT by Old North State
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To: Old North State
Is that really true?

I heard that is a myth, that GWHB would have lost anyway.

22 posted on 06/08/2008 3:08:10 PM PDT by Calvin Locke
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To: Old North State

That’s GHWB..., aka Bush 41.


23 posted on 06/08/2008 3:09:28 PM PDT by Calvin Locke
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To: Sub-Driver
I can think of a few other things that have left a blot on the Clinton .............

oh, nevermind.

24 posted on 06/08/2008 3:17:54 PM PDT by Jackknife ( "The Bureau of Alcohol,Tobacco, and Firearms should be a department store, not a gov't agency.")
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To: Paladin2

Heck, while you’re askin’, ask Ron Brown.


25 posted on 06/08/2008 3:35:45 PM PDT by healy61
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To: Windflier; All
Good points all, none of them really mentioned in this article, which is so bland as to be almost journalistic malpractice. For example, FTA: “If McCain wins a race that Democrats expect to win, a lot of people will say ‘If she had won the nomination we would have won,’ ” said Michael Kazin, a historian at Georgetown University. That could set the stage for a Clinton candidacy in 2012. Many of Mr. Obama’s loyalists, however, would attribute his defeat to her relentless campaign against him. Such division among Democrats could persist through the next presidential cycle and leave her weakened.

If there's ever been an understatement, like calling Napoleon a significant French general of the late eighteenth century, that's it. The DemonRats are like a bunch of evil, spoiled children who've been anticipating the greatest Christmas present in the whole world even since 2006. They've divided themselves into two warring camps fighting over that present. If McCain wins the election, they will go for each other's throats in a white hot orgy of frustrated desire, with each group having compelling arguments against the other, essentially the ones mentioned in the quote. Hence, there will be no chance for the Witch to get the 2012 nomination if Obama loses because she will be correctly viewed as having irreversibly flushed the Messiah into a political septic tank, an utterly unforgivable sin. Indeed, this disruption of the DemonRat party is one of the best things to come from a McCain victory, and probably the largest reason why I've decided to hold my nose and support him.

26 posted on 06/08/2008 3:47:11 PM PDT by libstripper
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To: libstripper
...there will be no chance for the Witch to get the 2012 nomination if Obama loses because she will be correctly viewed as having irreversibly flushed the Messiah into a political septic tank, an utterly unforgivable sin.

That's a mighty big "IF".

McCain --- the frail, the bumbling, the uninspiring, the back-stabber, the meandering, the ancient, the under-funded, the bland, the mealy-mouthed, the "right-winger", the sell-out, the strange, is up against ::: The Obamessiah!, the Bringer of Hope!, Change! and Light!

Explain please, how McCain is supposed to beat THAT, when most of his base dislikes him?

Please ~ put your efforts into pressuring the RNC to accept a replacement nominee for John McCain. We need someone who can galvanize our base and pull off what will likely be a miracle this November.

27 posted on 06/08/2008 4:15:12 PM PDT by Windflier (To anger a conservative, tell him a lie. To anger a liberal, tell him the truth.)
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To: Sub-Driver
The NYSlimes has changed the title of the article to read: "Campaign Adds to Complicated Clinton Legacy." Apparently, they got too many complaints about putting another "blot" on the Clintons' legacy.

The NYT global edition (the International Herald Tribune) still has the original title.

28 posted on 06/09/2008 1:34:28 PM PDT by Bubba_Leroy ("What's up with Whitey?" - Michelle Obama)
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To: Sub-Driver

“I, I, I, Me, Me, Me”

Like Hillary’s concession speech, Clinton’s are all about them.

Their legacy? Self-indulgence.


29 posted on 06/09/2008 1:45:49 PM PDT by P.O.E. (Thank God for every morning.)
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To: Calvin Locke
Is that really true?

In 1992, Clinton won with 43% of the popular vote. In other words, 57% of the voters voted AGAINST Clinton for President.

In 1996, Clinton won re-election with 49% of the popular vote. 51% of the voters voted AGAINST Clinton for President.

For a detailed breakdown of each election, see Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections.

By the way, here is a little trivia quiz you can try on your Democrat friends. In 2004, Bush won with just under 51% of the popular vote. Can you name the last three Democrat Presidents who won with MORE than 51% of the popular vote? [Hint, only two were in the 20th Century.]

30 posted on 06/09/2008 2:05:53 PM PDT by Bubba_Leroy ("What's up with Whitey?" - Michelle Obama)
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