. . 
But he still managed a whole 4 electoral votes more than the more qualified Fritz Mondale did 12 years later.
Posted on 02/14/2007 12:57:06 PM PST by Anti-Bubba182
A specter was haunting Hillary Clinton as she campaigned in New Hampshire this weekend: the specter of Ed Muskie.
As the ancient or merely studious among us will recall, the Democratic senator from Maine, who'd been Hubert Humphrey's running mate in 1968, entered his party's presidential contest in 1972 as the front-runner. His prospects were dashed in the New Hampshire snows, however. As popular memory has it, an indignant Muskie started crying while refuting a silly attack on him (though whether he was genuinely upset or merely sniffling during a frigid outdoor news conference was never authoritatively resolved). Muskie's more serious problem, however, was the Vietnam War, which he opposed.
His opposition, though, had none of the fervor or long-term consistency of another Democratic senator and presidential aspirant, George McGovern. By 1972, seven years had elapsed since the United States had sent ground forces to Vietnam, and Richard Nixon, through his invasion of Cambodia and stepped-up bombing campaigns, had made clear that the road to de-escalation would entail periodic escalations, at least as long as he was president. The Democratic base was in no mood for temporizing on Vietnam.
Party voters wanted out, and they wanted a nominee who'd been right on the war (almost) from the start: McGovern. Sic transit gloria Muskie.
Today, Hillary Clinton seems almost uncannily positioned to become the Ed Muskie of 2008. She opposes the U.S. military presence in Iraq but not with the specificity, fervor or bona fides of her leading Democratic rivals. As Muskie did with Vietnam, she supported the legislation enabling the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and she has been slower and more inconstant than her party rivals in coming around to opposing the continued U.S. occupation....."
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
McGovern, of couse, got his ass handed to him in the general election.
That would be Great if it happened to the Dem this time.
And it was wonderful.
Never happen. I don't believe that Hillary has a tear within her, and the voters would just give a woman a pass, anyway.
Maybe she'll cry like he did..........
She blames Bush for having lied to her (but she voted for the authorization to go to war).
She blamed the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy for all her problems during Whitewater.
She blamed homemakers for the negative reaction to her taking an important public policy role during the Clinton Administration.
It's always someone else's fault. She's always being tricked into some bad position she's taken, some vote she now regrets, some bad outcome, some scandal that she was apart of, some associate who unfortuantely committed suicide while in the Clinton Administration, some stupid assistant who misplaced her billing records that went missing for months, some stupid underling who didn't fire the Travel Office as quickly and cleanly as she demanded, that stupid Craig Livingstone who was caught pulling all of those pesky FBI files together and putting them onto the White House database, that awful friend of hers in Arkansas who helped her make $100,000 trading Cattle Futures against the biggest commodities sharks in the land from a $1,000 starting point (in 10 months), and all those awful women who kept accusing Bill of misdeeds... Poor Hillary: all of these people have tricked her, cast her in a bad light, made her seem like a crook, and caused her and her hubbie grief... SHE'S BEEN BRAINWASHED!!!!!!
Muskie is rolling over in his grave, he is dead right :-)
Oh, and I forgot to conclude: even though she's been so easily tricked by Bush, the VRWC, political opponents, etc. she now expects us to hail her as a great leader who is prepared to negotiate our way out of all the problems in the Middle East and protect us in the War on Terror. And if we don't vote for her, it's because she's a woman and we all hold that against her. It's NEVER HER FAULT!
Not so unlikely a scenario IF the Repubs play it right (i.e., don't kill each other in the process), because you can be damn sure Hitlery and Osamabama are going to go at it like cats and dogs up until the convention. There's not going to be much meat on either carcass by that time, and the country might well get sick of it and look to the Repubs for a sniff of sanity.
And for a Hillary a light rinse would have sufficed.
She could go home and bake cookies and stand by her man.
Muskie didn't have the political apparatus working for him that Hillary can call on--the people that go out and destroy anyone who gets in the way of a Clinton's ambitions. No FBI files of his opponents.
Hillary may not be all that popular with much of the Democratic party, but the solution to that will be make all the other candidates non-viable (if they don't do it on their own, like Biden).
Great recitation and context!
. . But he still managed a whole 4 electoral votes more than the more qualified Fritz Mondale did 12 years later.
Fritz Mondale won Minnesota by the narrowest of margins... Reagan, by all rights, could have and probably should have challenged and gotten a recount but it was "Morning In America" and the Gipper has happy to just move on... but by all rights, Minnesota could have easily gone to Reagan.
Just a quick follow-up... I just looked it up: Mondale won Minnesota by less than 3800 votes. Not exactly a great endorsement of Minnesota's "Favorite Son"!
I have a hard time taking Obama seriously - in the general or even in the Dem primaries. If you look at Obama's Church's website, there is none of the happy BS about anything not being about race. Some of Hillary's people will work under the radar somehow, making sure that every white Democrat in the early primary states knows they wouldn't be welcome in Obama's church. And Obama's support will just ooze away. Nothing dramatic, no big blowup - just no traction for Obama.
I understand your point, but I don't see how the deification he's received thusfar doesn't translate into traction. Hitlery better sharpen her shivs, because if she doesn't, I believe Osamabama is going to steamroller her into oblivion.
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