The Clinton campaign is now pushing the idea that Obama’s stepped-up attacks on Hillary Clinton are mere rehashes of the Republican hit jobs that Clinton has endured for so many years. “Imitating Ken Starr is not the way to win the Democratic nomination,” the campaign wrote in a memo to reporters.
It’s a really crafty and well-designed line. I get the sense that there are Democrats voting in these primary states that don’t necessarily want to see Hillary Clinton win the nomination, but they don’t want to see her lose it either. Every time she is on her way out, they pull her back in (see NH, OH, TX). That’s because after years of taken beatings at the hands of bullies and jerks on the right, she’s an incredibly sympathetic figure to millions of Democrats. The Clinton campaign isn’t going to convince anybody that Barack Obama is as bad as Ken Starr or Newt Gingrich, but they can remind voters that Clinton doesn’t deserve to get trashed all over again.
