You don't usually think of The Kinks when you think of presidential politics.
But among the more successful titles of the British pop band's offerings to the pop charts in the mid to late 1960's, "You Really Got Me", "Tired Of Waiting" and "All Day And All Of The Night", there is one moderate hit that practically cries out to be part of the electoral process.
"Who'll Be The Next In Line".
Enter Hillary Clinton.
Or, of course, to be more precise and avoid any accusations of fake news, re-enter Hillary Clinton.
For analysis and perspective on the reemergence of the Susan Lucci of American politics, we turn today to three seemingly unconnected individuals from three different vocations and/or walks of life who, as it will turn out, make up the perfect trifecta when it comes to talking 2020.
Timothy Stanley. William Edward Hickson. Carole King.
Stanley is an historian and columnist for Britain's Daily Telegraph. He weighed in, somewhat disapprovingly, online this weekend on the "return of Hillary."
Hillary Clinton is back.
Of course, Hillary Clinton is back. I am convinced she will run for the
presidency as many times as it takes to win -- even if she is still being
wheeled through the streets of Iowa at 108, kept alive by robotics and a
refusal to surrender.
She came to Georgetown University on Friday to give a speech
to some fans, and delivered a stinging attack on Donald Trump's budget. Clinton
is great at attacking others, dreadful at selling herself. This is a
presidential candidate who was beaten first by a man who they said couldn't win
-- because he was black -- and then by a man who they said shouldn't win --
because he was Donald Trump.
And even though the shock of Trump's
election victory is receding as we become more involved in just how bad he is
at governing, for Clinton it will never ebb as the most stunning rebuke
possible. Hillary Clinton was beaten by Donald J Trump. That is like losing the
Oscar for best picture to "Police Academy VI." After that kind of
humiliation, most people would quit politics and go live in a cabin. Not
Hillary. She still needs us to remember who she is.
This is typical of politicians. To
succeed in this game you need to be sensitive enough to need to be loved but
shallow enough to weather the hate. Trump is an extreme version of this. He
appears to feel criticism deeply and yet he also invites it. Perhaps it's
better to be talked about horribly than not at all.
A few presidents and presidential
candidates have walked away from the office into the sunset, but most try to
find a second life. Nixon was rarely out of the public eye. Bill Clinton
started a foundation and amassed a fortune in speaker's fees. Bob Dole did an ad for Viagra.
And, really, what's wrong with this?
Like Hillary, these statesmen all have experience to share, wisdom to impart.
As the country sails into uncertain waters under Captain Trump, doesn't it make
sense to stop and listen to the views of Hillary Clinton -- an intellectually
gifted former secretary of state, no less?
No. In this instance, no. And the
reason is quite simply that it's too soon. Too soon since Hillary Clinton lost
the election and gave the White House to Trump -- because, regardless of what
strengths Trump might have had, 2016 was ultimately an election for the
Democrats to lose.
I have no doubt that almost any
other candidate could have beaten Trump. Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, Alec
Baldwin, Big Bird. It turns out that the one candidate who could lose was
Hillary.
Yet she insisted on running.
Insisted that the party machine back her. Insisted on mounting a grimly negative campaign against
her opponent that most probably backfired. Now she has reportedly signed back on with the
speaker's bureau that handled her richly compensated appearances
before the election. My question is: Why would anyone pay to see a speech given
by her?! It would be as perverse as paying Trump to give a lecture on
university governance.
There is a post-politics role for
Clinton, but it cannot be just yet. Her party needs a period in which to
separate from her memory -- to rebuild, find new candidates, reestablish its
identity and delink itself from the entire Clinton philosophy.
She might go the route of
championing clean politics or could pick up the mantle of class war, for it can't be long before Trump's voters notice
that his proposed tax cuts are so generous to the rich. Whatever the Democrats
look like in the future, Hillary Clinton cannot be permitted to capture the
conversation and distract the press. America needs to move on. She needs to
pause and reflect.
Whatever else, Timothy has to offer up on the subject in the future, my personal envy will always be bestowed in his direction as the man who offered that being beaten by Donald J. Trump was like "losing the Oscar for Best Picture to Police Academy VI."
Yeah. What he said.
Meanwhile, we ponder the perspective of Mr. Hickson.
William Edward Hickson was a British educational writer who lived from the early until the late 1800's. And although both writers Thomas Palmer and Frederick Marryat included the familiar words in their writings, it was Hickson who is traditionally given credit for popularizing, as it were, the proverb which we all learn, and learn to live with, from our earliest recollections.
If, at first, you don't succeed / try, try again.
I'm not entirely on board with Tim Stanley's witty contention that Hillary will eventually evolve from Stronger Together to I, Robot, but the point is well made and certainly taken. Loath as I often am to fall back on anything Dr. Phil has to offer up, I am a subscriber to his little bumper sticker theory that "the best indicator of future behavior is past behavior". And Hillary's past behavior pretty much guarantees she is a faithful, and zealous, follower of Mr. Hickson's program, proverbially speaking, of course.
And while I readily admit, and am on every public record there is to be on, that I'm open to voting for just about anybody who isn't Trump (with the exception of, say, Sarah Palin, because even a libtard snowflake like me knows that a demagogue is still preferable to a doorknob), I'm not only in line with what Stanley preaches about Hillary being a distraction and not a distinction, I'm more than full of the sense that Tim didn't take it quite far enough.
Sure, there's something to be said for those who show the pluck and moxy to get up off the mat and get back on the horse, metaphors most obviously mixed. And you can hate Hillary all you want and/or need but no one is ever gonna make the case stick that she lacks pluck and moxy.
But there comes a time when the process has to move from Hickson to Einstein. And from "if at first you don't succeed' to "insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result each time."
Allowing for whatever positive contributions to American history in her, and our, time that Hillary has made, she does no service to anything or anyone with any attempt to return to the head of the line. Those who hate her are not going away anytime soon. Pretty sure bet they're not even going away in her lifetime (again, this assumes that she hasn't figured out a way to make her eternal candidacy the fourth law of robotics.)
And because she is such a polarizing figure, her presence in the process serves only to dilute and weaken any fresh, new formula that seems clearly needed to appeal to the tastes of the American electorate. At least that part of the electorate that wouldn't vote for Hillary Clinton if she handed out fifty yard line tickets to the Super Bowl with each ballot cast in her favor.
To everything there is a season. Every dog has his day. You only go round once. Pick your slogan, motto or catchphrase, the handwriting on the wall couldn't be any more readable if it had been put there with a Sharpie even Chris Christie couldn't get his hands around.
The greatest of the comedians in our history all share, at least, one skill. They know when the time is right to get off the stage. It seems not just a little amusingly ironic that a career politician should have the same skills as a career comic. Hard to see the line between the two occupations so much of the time and all that.
And of all the perilously close to cliche three word phrases that so often find their way into the political monologue/dialogue, "we, the people", "time for change", "the American people", even the simple, basic "vote for me", there is no three worder with more sincerity per syllable than this:
Timing is everything.
The lyric to the iconic love song tells us "the world will always welcome lovers / as time goes by"
It says nothing about welcoming either repeat customers or repeat offenders.
Tim Stanley writes that Hillary Clinton's reemergence, and potential return, is inappropriate because, in his words, "...it's too soon."
Due respect, Tim, I beg to differ. And by way explaining why, let me turn it over to someone who says it best.
Carole King.
No comments:
Post a Comment