As Barack Obama's campaign notes (along with many bloggers), Hillary Clinton is pushing opposition research quoting an essay he wrote in kindergarten:
In kindergarten, Senator Obama wrote an essay titled 'I Want to Become President.' "Iis Darmawan, 63, Senator Obama's kindergarten teacher, remembers him as an exceptionally tall and curly haired child who quickly picked up the local language and had sharp math skills. He wrote an essay titled, 'I Want To Become President,' the teacher said." [AP, 1/25/07]
Did you know he cried once when he fell and scraped his knee? Clearly this man isn't tough enough to be president!
On a more serious note, I agree with the Chicago Tribune's Eric Zorn, who writes that Hillary has "blundered into illustrating one of the more unflattering caricatures of her ... in a way that invites not sober criticism but mockery." It's a great illustration of the pathologies of both opposition research in general and the hyper-aggressive post-Bill Clinton, post-Swift Boat Democratic "war room" mentality in particular.
You think a hyper-aggressive war room mentality is a post-Bill Clinton, post-Swift Boat phenomenon?
Sure, in 1992 you were young, a tad, a sprout, but surely you're seen "The War Room," the documentary of the hyper-aggressive 1992 Carville-Stephenapoulos Clinton campaign operation. And surely you remember the very same Mr. Carville saying of Paula Jones, "Drag a hundred dollar bill through a trailer park, you never know what you'll find." Hyper-aggressiveness isn't post-Clintonian, it's the very essence of Clintonianism.
Posted by: Rob | December 03, 2007 at 06:21 PM
I'm actually saying it's gotten worse since then due to Clinton's experience in office and the Kerry/Swift Boat controversy, among other things. Democrats have gotten so much bad press that many have become convinced that the only way to fight back is to be over-the-top aggressive, which is often a strategic mistake (as in this case).
Posted by: Brendan Nyhan | December 03, 2007 at 07:43 PM
Ah, this isn't really anything.
It's like the Republican candidates stumbling over each other to see who can disavow evolution the strongest without looking the fool.
At heart it's a funny battle because "experience" is a strength but then so is being "a Washington outsider" or a "new voice".
This is pretty tame stuff if you ask me.
Posted by: Howard | December 04, 2007 at 02:22 PM