Two things Hillary Clinton could say and do at the Convention (and thereafter) to get her supporters to back Barack Obama

August 25, 2008 
Category: Keys to Victory

There is no doubt Hillary Clinton has been highly ambiguous in her support (or lack thereof) of Barack Obama since finally giving up her bid for the presidency of the United States of America back in June (Well, she did not actually give it up; she suspended her campaign). Because of this ambiguity, which never translated into a true acknowledgment of defeat, nor into a true expression of closure, Hillary Clinton has, directly or indirectly, contributed to the fueling of the rampant speculations that have presented the Democratic Party as highly divided going into the August 25 Convention in Denver.

But now that the Convention is on, there is need for more clarity, and there are only two things that Hillary Clinton needs to say, and do, in order to put her supporters squarely behind Barack Obama:

1) Hillary Clinton must publically and unambiguously acknowledge defeat. This means she needs to tell her supporters, in very clear terms, that:

- She, Hillary Clinton, cannot be a sore loser, and wants nothing to do with supporters that are sore losers. Further, she refuses to be used as a pretext for not voting for Barack Obama. Because elections are meant to be won or lost, there had to be a winner and a loser, and she lost squarely to Obama. In other words, Hillary Clinton simply needs to explain to her supporters how and why she lost, and shift the burden to herself and her campaign, so that her hardcore supporters can understand that her defeat was not due to some crazy conspiracy theory against women or herself. Rather, she lost because her campaign was simply bested by Barack Obama’s. This is the only way she will be able to convince her supporters that her loss was not due to some sort of injustice from Obama. She needs to hammer away the fact that Obama and his campaign played it clean, fair and square, just as she herself did. At the game of electoral politics, Barack Obama simply outsmarted and out-campaigned her, and that’s why, with that kind of judgment, especially for someone so new to politics, he deserves to become president of the United States.

- She, Hillary Clinton, has moved on already and her supporters need to do so too by supporting Barack Obama. Yes, it is always hard to lose, but there are things bigger and more pressing than Hillary Clinton losing the primary to Barack Obama. This election is not about Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama. This election is about restoring the United States to its greatness, both nationally and internationally. This election is about the United States of America. The stakes are therefore too great for her supporters to be preoccupied with personal or emotional feuds. Because of this, Hillary Clinton needs, on top of the preceding, to tell her supporters why they are better off voting for Barack Obama than for John McCain.

2) Hillary Clinton needs to undo the harm she did to Barack Obama during the primary, especially as it pertains to her statements that John McCain was prepared to be Commander-in-chief, but not Barack Obama. Clearly, the McCain campaign has now seized upon these statements to paint Barack Obama as a candidate unfit to become the next president of the United States. Recent ads by the McCain people have shown that they intend to fully exploit Hillary Clinton’s statements from the primary season. The only way to blunt these McCain attacks is for Hillary Clinton to come full circle to the first item of this article, that is, issue a straightforward acknowledgment of defeat, but with a twist.

How would she do this, more specifically?

Tell America, and John McCain, that she has now been proven wrong by history. In other words, she must tell the nation that Barack Obama, who began his candidacy as a political novice, and ended the primary as a political stalwart, has undeniably proven how qualified he is to be president of the United States. The proof of his unbelievable journey comes from the very performance he produced during the primary season, against all odds. First, it takes a winner and a great leader to come out of nowhere to outdo, outsmart and out-campaign the most experienced field of politicians this nation has had to produce on the Democratic side. It takes a great amount of cleverness, judgment and initiative to achieve such a feat. Second, it takes an incredible amount of good judgment to have opposed the Iraq war at a time when one risked being painted as unpatriotic. Barack Obama has therefore earned, during the course of this campaign, and for all the things he has achieved in his young political experience, the right to lead this nation. What this election has proven is therefore that the ability to be a good Commander-in-Chief is not always about experience. Sometimes, it is all about judgment, wisdom and audacity.  As a result, she, Hillary Clinton, proudly swallows her tongue to declare that she was wrong, and that, after 19 months of campaigning, and after she herself gave Obama the most momentous test of the primary campaign, Barack Obama is now pronounced fit to become the next president of the United States of America. He has earned it and he has proved it.

Should Hillary Clinton do this, this move would take the teeth out of McCain’s attack machine, and blunt the advantage he has seemed to gain out of the whole Clinton quagmire. This could help create a new form of forward-looking narrative for Obama, not only during the Convention, but also in the few months until the November showdown.

This is all it would take for Hillary Clinton to deliver her supporters to Barack Obama. This is all it would take for Hillary Clinton to blunt the McCain attack machine. This is all it would take for Hillary Clinton to redeem herself and her name for posterity. This is all it would take for Hillary Clinton to help Barack Obama win the presidency of the United States. 

But the real question is: is Hillary Clinton humble enough to swallow her pride and do the right thing for her party, and for her country?

Only history will tell.

CONVENTION UPDATE: Tuesday, August 26: Hillary Clinton has just spoken. Great speech, but which lacks the keywords which, in my opinion, would have driven home the message that she really needed to drive home, especially for those hardcore supporters who may still have a hard time deciphering her message. Her speech basically lacked the following lines: “I lost, Obama won” (acknowledgement of defeat); “And because he won by beating a field of candidates much more expereinced than he was, Barack Obama has shown not only that judgment matters, but that he has the type of resiliency it takes to win this election against John McCain. There is no need for further proof that he is fully qualified to be president of the United States” (This would represent an undoing of her statement during the primary that Barack Obama is not qualified to be president).

I believe that, on those two fronts (acknowledgement of defeat and proclamation of Obama’s readiness to be president), Hillary Clinton may have failed. Let us now hope that she can do this on the campaign trail, and perhaps in some campaign commercial). I believe that, so long as she will not clearly acknowledge her defeat and, by so doing, assert Obama’s ability to do the job as a great Commander-in Chief, her position will always remain ambiguous. I can even venture to assert that these ambiguities will come back to haunt Obama after the Convention. The Republican reaction which was read tonight on MSNBC was already indicating where the McCain  people intended to take their attacks: they argued that, because Hillary Clinton did not say that Obama is qualified to be president, her speech did not achieve its goal of elevating Barack Obama’s stature, but, rather, confirmed that she still thinks Obama is not qualified to be President. 

Which goes on to explain why Democrats always lose elections. They are too cerebral with their speeches and expect the electorate to be smart enough to parse the speeches and derive from them the needed message. The reality, unfortunately, is that if you do not use every day’s language to talk to the electorate, and tell it exactly what you mean in layman’s words, you will lose it. Until such time as Democrats can learn to use Republican electoral methodology (character assassination, caricature of opponents, direct speech and sound bites), they will not be able to put one of theirs in the White House for a while.

 

Dr. Daniel Mengara
The author is an Associate Professor of French and Francophone Studies at Montclair State University (New Jersey). He is also the leader of Bongo Doit Partir (Bongo Must Go), a movement of expatriated Gabonese citizens opposed and seeking an end to the 41-year-old dictatorial regime of Omar Bongo in Gabon.

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