How Hillary Clinton has lost my vote

It's kind of funny to think that back in October, I was prepared to caucus for Hillary Clinton.  I thought that Barack Obama was perfectly acceptable as a candidate, though I was concerned that he seemed so overwhelmingly popular among university professors -- hardly a representative subset of the general voting population.  I was also a bit disappointed at his performance in the YouTube debate, although that was primarily a function of inflated expectations, I think.  In any event, the point is that I did not suffer from any instinctive, visceral "anyone but Hillary" pathology.  I saw her (and still do) as very smart and competent, ruthlessly so.

But by the time the Iowa caucuses rolled around, my support had shifted to Obama.  The big reason was that Clinton really courted former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack, naming him co-chair of her national campaign and promising to pay off his nearly half a million campaign debt.  More ominously, in the days leading up to the caucuses, a colleague of mine heard from a top local Democrat that Vilsack was the leading candidate to be named Secretary of Education in a Hillary Clinton Administration.

The fact that Hillary Clinton would seriously judge Vilsack to be an asset to her campaign raised grave doubts in my mind about her judgment of people.  I've come to the view that the policy issues that a candidate favors matter less than the candidate's judgment about people -- who does the candidate listen to, who would the candidate appoint to cabinet positions and judgeships, and so on.  On that score, Vilsack is just terrible.

Let's review briefly the disaster that was the first round of the University of Iowa search to replace David Skorton, who was driven off by the Board of Regents.  The Regents were led by Michael Gartner, a Vilsack appointee.  Unlike past presidential searches, in which the Regents had no involvement until a slate of four (or so) finalists were presented to them, this time, the Gartner-led Regents inserted themselves into the search process itself, with Gartner and three other Vilsack-appointees on the search committee itself.  That search concluded with four finalists, all of whom were rejected by the full Regents.  Why?  Supposedly, none of the finalists had any experience in health sciences management -- a necessary requirement, according to the Regents, given the immense presence of the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics.

Of course, one would think that this absence of relevant experience would reflect a failure on the part of the search committee to have included that requirement in its job description -- and hence, the four Regents on the search committee themselves were responsible for wasting the entire process.  Not surprisingly, the Faculty Senate issued a vote of no confidence in the Regents.

What was Governor Vilsack's response during this fiasco?  He merely asked the Regents to see if they could work something out with the faculty.  Hardly decisive leadership, particularly when the Regents decided only to offer the presidency to one of the four -- no doubt someone who had already decided that he/she would never work for this Board of Regents, and not surprisingly turned down the offer.

Back to square one.  Minus more than $100,000 in expenses incurred by the search firm retained to help in the process.  Minus a good deal of reputation.  Minus a year of effort by various faculty, staff, and students.  (For more detail about this, you have to go to my colleague Nick Johnson's blog and search for the voluminous blog posts he had on the presidential search.)

Anyway, judgment about people matters, and Vilsack demonstrated extremely poor judgment with his Regents nominees, and Hillary Clinton demonstrated poor judgment by chasing Vilsack's endorsement.  (Of course, all in my humble opinion.)

So that's why I decided to support Obama instead of Clinton.  But what if Hillary Clinton were to get the Democratic nomination?

I might have been willing to hold my nose and vote for her, as I did in 2004 for John Kerry.  But after the disgusting and dishonest attacks that the Clinton war machine -- particularly, those by former President Bill Clinton -- I just can't stomach the thought of rewarding this sort of reprehensible behavior.  There's something somewhat George W. Bush-esque about the Clintons, in that their personal power is more important than principles, their political party, or even the nation.  Just as Bush has (as far as I can tell) left the Republican Party in disarray, the Clintons' attacks on Obama threaten to rend the Democratic Party.

If the election were tomorrow, and Obama were the Democratic nominee, he would get my vote.  If Obama were not the Democratic nominee, but John McCain were the Republican nominee, he would get my vote.  If neither Obama nor McCain were nominees, then I'd probably just write in Michael Bloomberg.  What is clear is that Hillary Clinton is not getting my vote, not after this last week.

UPDATE: Wow, I forgot to mention this:

Sen. Hillary Clinton, in an about-face, said on Friday she wants the Democratic Party delegates in two states that were barred by the national party to be reinstated and counted in the race to determine the party's U.S. presidential nominee.

Hmm, could it be that, unlike Obama and John Edwards, Clinton kept her name on the Michigan ballot and hence "won" that state's primary?

This is so transparently ridiculous -- since neither Edwards nor Obama contested the state, in what way could it be said that the delegates there represent any sort of preference for Clinton over the other two?  Yet, Clinton is able to argue with a straight face that she is entitled to have those delegates counted.

Disgusting.

Comments

[WhoseLoss]

And who do you think would lose? The Clintons? Wake up! You use emotion rather than your mind. What if you vote for McCain, you continue the war? If the Clintons did not say anything, some people like you would continue to be misinformed. The country has an opportunity to get back the prosperity of the 90s... you'd rather take a chance on a person with very little experience or another Republican who would increase the deficit? The Clintons are not going to suffer except disappointments. They will continue to have a good life as they are capable of earning as much money as they want. They are very bright people willing to serve the country.

[john]

I am surprised the way media and bloggers have been talking about Clinton attacks. If you are indeed as objective as you claim to be, you will realize the Obama campaign has been attacking Clinton all the time as well. In fact, they have often initiated the first attacks. Just like Bill has talked about Obama, likewise, Mrs Obama has talked about Hillary often with contempt. So to take a stance on this election using "negative campaigns" as a criteria can be called naive at best.

I am a democrat and I will support whoever wins the nomination. Right now, I would choose Hillary or Edwards depending on how I feel the day of the primaries here in California.

[June]

I didn't know about the Vilsack matter, and I agree with your assessment of the Clinton's campaign tactics. I've not figured out why they felt it necessary. Even after it was apparent that Obama was a force to be reckoned with, Hillary's got the resume and knows the issues well enough to let her positions stand on their own merits. Still, there's NO WAY I'd not vote for her should she be the nominee. I think McCain's the best of the R bunch, but I don't agree with his solutions to the mess W has left us.

Whatever you "yellow dog Democrats" may think of Tung's choice of McCain over Clinton in a two-way race, you do have to at least think a bit about the following:

1. Hillary Clinton started off this campaign with among the highest "negatives" of anyone in the field.

2. As one Democratic political pro put it to me nearly a year ago, "Any one of the Democrats could win in November 2008. That's not the issue. The issue is who could lose. Hillary is the one who could lose."

3. What she and her husband have done -- especially during the last few weeks -- has raised those negative numbers and turned a number of independents from neutral/maybe to outspoken hostility and opposition. During the last two or three days I have encountered a half-dozen people (who, so far as I know, have not talked to Tung) who have expressed precisely the same sentiment as he (not including the Vilsack comment, but including the switch in vote to McCain). Honestly now, haven't you?

4. My personal encounters are only anecdotal and not statistically significant. But Peter Hart's (national) poll, released over this last weekend, is statistically significant. And what it shows is that Obama can beat any of the Republicans -- including, by a significant margin, McCain. It does not show Clinton beating McCain.

5. Can you imagine what the Republicans will pull out to use against the Clintons if she's the candidate -- to which I've recently been led to believe they have now added a whole new batch of material they've been accumulating for just such a day.

Stick with Hillary if you must; just be aware that you -- and the Democratic Party -- may end up paying a very heavy price indeed for doing so.

[John Neff]

I guess I would place the Clinton/Albright conduct of foreign policy in the top five. In my opinion there was no effective leadership on other issues during the Clinton administration. What little was accomplished was tossed out with the trash when GWB moved into the White House.

I don't think Hillary has the horsepower to repair the damage done to our foreign policy by GWB even if she wants to (evidently she wants to keep the blood flowing in the Iraq civil war). It is hard for me to believe she can improve on Bill with respect to other issues.

Clinton versus McCain? Yuck!!!

[John]

Some of the comments raise another problem I have with the Hillary Clinton campaign or (the Clintons' campaign(s)). Her supporters seem to assume Hillary Clinton will be as competent/effective as her husband, or that somehow they will govern as equal partners. While I have no doubt Hillary Clinton is highly intelligent and competent, a great deal of her support seems to be rooted (at least in part) in a desire for a third term for her husband. This troubles me for some reason, maybe it shouldn't, but it does.

[Ned Baker]

I used to be pleased to have three solid candidates, but the more McCain speaks the more idiotic he sounds. He is not a fiscal conservative (he wants to cut hundreds of billions of dollars in taxes and balance that by eliminating unspecified "earmarks"), his gas tax holiday is populist foolishness that will relieve no-one's burden but will help entrench our dependence on oil, and he will clearly not be the leader for sustainable development that Clinton or Obama will be. I could go on.

So I ask you: Is your beef with Vilsack worth this trade-off?

[saifulla786]

Hi everyone:

Until the past few weeks,I was going to vote for Hillary Clinton.I had several good reasons for wanting her to be the next president of the United States,one of which was she would be a woman in the White House leading this great nation in a way that was very unlike many of the men who have been president.
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Manthas

Addiction Recovery Iowa

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