/* Am I A Pundit Now?: Hillary's Coronation Will Have To Wait

Wednesday, July 27, 2005

Hillary's Coronation Will Have To Wait

Hillary's path to the White House is looking a bit treacherous these days.

Last Monday, at the annual summer meeting of the Democratic Leadership Council, Hillary Rodham Clinton called for a "ceasefire among warring factions of the Democratic Party."

The DLC was a great innovation for the Democrats, and it helped put Bill Clinton into power in 1992. But other than Bill's reelection, the Democrats have lost every White House, House and Senate election since, and many Democrats blame the DLC. They accuse the DLC of being 'Republican-Lite', pandering to big business, and acquiesing to Bush adminstration policies on the War on Terror.

They have a point. Why vote for a pale imitation of the Republicans, when you can vote for the real thing?

So Hillary ordering the rest of the Democratic party to stifle their ideology and fall in line behind her did not go down well with the Democratic base. It appears that Hillary has pushed her 'inevitability campaign' a bridge too far, and it now alienating a large part of the Democratic party. It was inevitable that parts of the party would eventually savage her in the name of a purer ideology - but Hillary and her strategists probably did not count on it beginning this soon.

My guess is that Hillary will be forced to creep Leftward to stem this assault. Her impressive poll numbers and standing in the party will not be enough to preserve her from the caterwauling Deaniacs - and Dean is more or less in charge of the party now.

The Democrats have proven that they value liberal ideology over electoral victories, and it would take a masterful politician to find that golden mean between Leftist bona fides and practical centrism without arousing the ire of the true believers.

Hillary Clinton is too clumsy a politican to pull that one off.

6:44 AM | | |