 DEMOCRAT grandees Jimmy Carter and Al Gore are being lined-up to deliver the coup de grâce to Hillary Clinton and end her campaign to become president.
| After all, who knows better when it's over than Al Gore and Jimmuah Carter? |
Falling poll numbers and a string of high-profile blunders have convinced party elders that she must now bow out of the primary race.
| Why? Obama's doing a nice job of wrecking the second half of his primary campaign. It's more than possible he'll implode sometime between now and the convention, and Hillary could be there to pick up the pieces, for whatever they're worth at that point. Hillary has to bet on that because — newsflash! — there's nothing waiting for her if she quits now. She's never going to be the 'Lioness of the Senate', and the idea of being junior Senator from New York and sucking up to Chuckie Schumer the rest of her life can't be too appealing. And it isn't as if the party ever is going to turn to her in four or eight years. So she's in to August. |
Former president Carter and former vice-president Gore have already held high-level discussions about delivering the message that she must stand down for the good of the Democrats. "They're in discussions," a source close to Carter told Scotland on Sunday. "Carter has been talking to Gore. They will act, possibly together, or in sequence."
| That about covers all the possibilities, doesn't it ... |
An appeal by both men for Democrats to unite behind Clinton's rival, Barack Obama, would have a powerful effect, and insiders say it is a question of when, rather than if, they act. Obama has an almost unassailable lead in the battle for nomination delegates, and is closing the gap with Clinton in her last stronghold, Pennsylvania, which votes on April 22. Clinton remains publicly defiant, insisting she will continue the battle with Obama all the way to the Democratic convention in August – when superdelegates, or party top brass, will have the chance to add their weight to primary votes.
But the party's top brass have concluded her further participation in the race can only harm the party as Republican nominee John McCain strives to take advantage of her increasingly bitter battle with Obama.
| Obama is quite capable of harming the party all by himself. |
Neither Carter and Gore are likely to object to the role of bringing down the curtain on Clinton. While neither man has formally endorsed either her or Obama, both have clashed in the past with the Clintons. Gore blames his loss to George Bush in the 2000 presidential election on the impeachment of Clinton triggered by his White House affair with Monica Lewinsky. Carter, who has carved out a successful career as an international mediator, is believed to detest the flashy style of the Clintons. He recently told an interviewer that his entire family are committed Obama supporters.
| Of course, if Al Gore had been a man in 1998 and had said to Bill, "you go or I go", he either would have been president right then or been in an unassailable position for the 2000 election. Instead of being a man of conviction, he's just another craven politican. |
A number of options are being considered by the higher echelons of the Democrats, but they fall roughly into two categories. One is for Carter and Gore to go to Clinton privately and ask her to step down.
| Hillary has more balls than both of them put together. She'd have their heads on spikes on her front lawn. Which, by the way, would bring in more Republician crossover votes. |
The other is for both men to appear in public and endorse Obama – a move which would see a majority of superdelegates go with them.
The campaign to force Clinton to make an early exit is being masterminded in Congress, home to the most influential of the superdelegates. Senate Leader Harry Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi ...
| ... neither of whom have enough to do ... |
... have called on superdelegates to hold an unofficial congress in early June to anoint a winner, rather than waiting for the convention in Denver. Pelosi has drawn withering fire from the Clinton camp for saying that these superdelegates must follow the national vote, with Clinton insisting that they should "vote with their conscience".
| If the party had wanted them to follow the national vote, they wouldn't have created 'superdelegates' in the first place. |
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