A nice analysis by Kevin Drum on whether Hillary is really the “polarizing” candidate some Dems worry about.
Hillary, by contrast, is polarizing not because she wants to be, but because the right-wing attack machine made her that way. She’s “polarizing” only because a certain deranged slice of conservative nutjobs detest her.
And guess what? By this standard, Jimmy Carter is polarizing. Bill Clinton is polarizing. Al Gore is polarizing. John Kerry is polarizing. Do you see the trend here?
There are plenty of good reasons to oppose Hillary Clinton. But anyone who opposes her because she’s polarizing is allowing the bottom feeders of modern movement conservatism to dictate who gets to run for president and who doesn’t. If we want less polarizing politics, the answer isn’t to oppose Hillary Clinton, who, outside the cartoon universe invented by the Wall Street Journal editorial page, holds almost relentlessly orthodox center-left opinions and expresses them in relentlessly garden-variety politician-speak. The answer is to send the right-wing rage machine back under the rock it crawled out from. Anything else is just caving in to bullies….
Hillary isn’t actually any more polarizing than anyone else. She just has more unhinged enemies.
I argued a while ago that “the last thing a Democrat should be doing is giving any kind of validation to the grotesque actions of the Clinton-haters back in the 1990s.” I still think that.
Sure all politicians are polarizing, but the degree to which she is polarizing is frightening to the GE prospects of the dems. Its assumed that in every presidential election both parties get 45% each as a base with 2% leaning towards the party leaving that crucial 5-6% thats undecided on election day. In order to win the election one needs to carry that demographic. Hillary Clinton has a built in dislike percentage hovering dangerously close to 50% (most polls have averaged 47-48%) meaning that the GOP candidate has an easier job and only has to gain 2-3% of the undecides to win.
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I dont want to make the election easier for the GOP, especially a “moderate Reagan Democrat attractor” like Rudy.
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And yeah we could argue that no Republican could win thats fine, but with such an “easy” election why nominate the safe and boring centrist candidate and instead nominate a real liberal because we can get away with it? Especially if that safe centrist candidate is in fact far more polarizing than any of the liberals in the race and could make an easy election close.
I think perhaps you have bought into their whole scheme. It’s the old trick Bush has used from say one. Say something with conviction repeatedly, and people start to believe it. Ad to that some lingering sexism in this country, and there you have it. But “it” is a load of crap.
Where’s that Republican going to get the extra 2-3% of people to suddenly dislike her? Conservatives have been attacking Hillary Clinton for 15 years now, and it doesn’t seem to me that they’ve been holding back. I think they’ve driven her negatives as high as they’re going to go. It’s close to 50%, but it’s not there. And when you look at the fact that she is gaining support in the primary, who’s to say she can’t do so in the general? On the other hand, we have no idea of the negative “ceiling” that Edwards, Richardson, and Obama are vulnerable to, and none of them have showed any real positive momentum beyond the first splash of their announcement.
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And if looking at some recent polling, for every three “moderates” Rudy can bring onto his side of the boat, four conservative will hold back from voting the GOP line.
…but i reserve the right to detest hillary. i loathe her very being. this country is ready for a woman president. i want a woman president.i want to vote for a woman for president.
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but i want it to be a woman who can look me -and the american people- in the eye and not send a creepy shiver up my spine.
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i want the first woman president to be a woman who has actually achieved something outside the shadow of her husband. I want a woman president whose adulthood triumphs are the result of her own hard work and diligence.
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I first met this hollow woman in 1987 and wasn’t fooled by her then and I’m certainly not now.
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if ever there was a candidate without a soul it’s the little girl from chicago who wasn’t named for sir edmund hillary.
do you wish were running for president right now?
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i take it that hillary hits you on a gut level. it’s been interesting – each debate i see her in i see her commanding presence and intellect captivating a previously reticent room. not that everyone becomes hillary backers, but the effect on the audience of her magnetism and skill are palpable. i have my own bones to pick with her just as i do with the other candidates. but i do find her quite fascinating.
…a word of what you say, it reads like a BS pretend to be on your side swipe job to me. And she’s a Senator for crying out loud, how much more accomplished does a woman need to be for you. Would you prefer one who has already been elected president.
But I don’t oppose her because she’s “polarizing”, which is really just another word for “unelectable”, which is all BS.
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It really is her policies, being just to the left of Joe Lieberman. And her ‘inevitability’ attitude pisses me off, because all arguments of ‘electable’ and ‘unelectable’ piss me off. Vote for what you want, not what you think someone else wants.
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So, between policies I don’t like and rhetoric I don’t like, there’s not much there to like.
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Also, there’s data to back up her polarizing effect. Every month when dailykos has its straw poll I run one in parallel where people can rate each choice on a —10 to 10 scale, and Hillary regularly gets a big pile of —10 ratings. Other candidates get normal distributions of some strength of support, but Hillary gets a bimodal distribution. Polarized.
I tend to agree with the comment above.
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1. It may be true that Hillary provokes a similarly high level of antipathy from far-right…
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2. …and yet there are certain moderates who react to her persona in an unusually hostile way. Drum is wrong. You can’t just wish this away.
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3. I’d speculate that this is more reaction to the memory of the old “shrill” Hillary persona. For better or worse, that’s been sanded down by her team, both during her Senate tenure, and during the campaign.
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As more people tune into the election, her negatives will fall a bit.
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A) Her policy positioning in the Dem primary — right of her main challengers — will also help her PERSONA (moderate = not shrill). Moreoever, the coming attack ads from Obama and Edwards will NOT portray Hillary as shrill. They’ll portray her as not-left-enough.
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B) Know-it-all is annoying, but Bush’s know-nothing approach makes Hillary’s raw brainpower look more attractive in comparison.
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I wonder if HRC Team already has the folksy general election “Reintroducing Hillary Clinton” ad ready to inoculate her. Wonder what it’s like.
Hillary is no more polarizing than Al Gore, John Kerry, Bill Clinton, George W., Dick Cheney, John McCain, Mitt Romney, et al.
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The difference between them and her is that she is a smart, strong, tough woman. I hate to say it, but sexisim lives on in this great country of ours…and in the case of Hillary, “polarizing” is code for “smart, strong woman”.
I have heard from a few long-time Democrats– that “Hillary is too polarizing.” I find it always incredible that they are mouthing the Republican attack machine without any thought. Thanks for giving us the opposing, more reasonable view. In addition to not being anymore polarizing than the other Democratic candidates, Hillary Clinton actually should be less subject to attack if she is the eventual Democratic nominee because there really is nothing that people do not already know about her and Bill Clinton. In other words, an “October” surprise should be less likely. As for those people who just do not like her because she is ahead in the polls, well that is just nuts. BTW, the latest Iowa poll shows she is ahead there now too.
…As far as I can tell, this ridiculous “shrill” epithet is applied by male commentators and their female enablers solely against female candidates. Since when have they applied the epithet to male candidates? Probably never.
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The “shrill” epithet reminds me of one thing: banshees. They were the female-like characters who would wail and wail, particularly when someone was dying. It’s fairly obvious that what the male political commentators and their female enablers are doing by crying “shrill” regarding female candidates is to raise the “banshee” metaphore.
First off someone said above that Hillary is hovering near 50% negative approval and that is before the general again this means any GOP candidate just needs to siphon 1-3% away a much easier task than the 5% normally needed.
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-Sure the right wing has attacked Hillary but merely because the right wing has attacked her does not make the attacks irrelevant, I’m sick and tired of hearing ppl attack me for “using GOP talking points” when the GOP WILL USE THOSE TALKING PTS IN THE GE its very stupid to dismiss them
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-Sure they will “polarize” any Dem nominee but it will be harder to push any of the other nominees into the 50% territory by November, Hillary is there now and they might even push it higher
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-Sure she could have reached her ceiling and might scale it back but its not a chance Im willing to take with a sure election, especially when the least electable candidate is also the least progressive the decision is very easy to make
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-Someone else said
do you really think four conservatives that are to the right of Rudy will vote Hillary? Either they stay home allowing him to move further to the center to outflank Hillary or Hillary becomes the big reason to go to the polls even if it is Rudy.
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All in all wrong candidate, wrong party, wrong time.
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Not at all. It’s easier because voters know nothing of Obama or Richardson, not much on Edwards. Public opinion is extremely malleable on those, and the GOP has a proven track record of doing it. If they can make Kerry a coward, they can do whatever they want with someone as fresh-faced as Richardson or Obama.
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Hillary isn’t progressive, I agree with that. But not electable??? Poll after poll shows her striking deep into red territory, including the fact that she makes Texas competitive! That, my friend, is true electability.
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Oh, and I believe you misunderstood what I said earlier. When you have over 20% of the GOP — supported by James Dobson — saying that they would refuse to vote for Rudy Giuliani as a nominee, that is a much greater loss than the few moderates we coudl swing from Hillary.
“…few moderate he could swing from Hillary”