This Democrat not getting on board the Hillary "Love Train"

As some of you may have heard, two television networks—CNN and NBC—are working on programing plainly aimed at shamelessly promoting Hillary Clinton in anticipation of her presumed entry into the 2016 presidential sweepstakes. "CNN Films,” CNN fatuously proclaims, “a division of CNN Worldwide, commissioned a documentary about Hillary Clinton earlier this year. It is expected to premiere in 2014 with a theatrical run prior to airing on CNN. This documentary will be a non-fiction look at the life of a former First Lady and Secretary of State,” while NBC announced that it is putting together a “miniseries” to star Diane Lane, last seen at the tail end of a forgettable run of films. Since both of these productions are quite blatant in their attempt to sway voters’ minds in favor of Clinton, both are likely to rely heavily on fiction, and in CNN’s case, a whole roster of Clinton disciples and sycophants. 

Look, I’m a life-long Democrat, and I think the people who are heavily promoting Clinton need to be set straight on a thing or two. I didn’t vote for Clinton in the 2008 primaries, and don’t plan to in 2016 (if Washington actually reinstates primary voting). I admit I wasn’t too thrilled about Barack Obama, and was hoping that Al Gore would come to the “rescue." But left with a choice between Clinton and Obama, I chose the latter because I, like many Democrats, was put-off by the self-promoting Clinton and wanted an alternative; supporting Obama was only about “race” insofar that he personified the “change”  that many people were looking for after the disaster that was the Bush Administration (the reality of Iraq today proves that the Bush people had no clue about the sectarian problems there, and we actually had a balanced budget until the Republicans got their greedy hands on the budget and tax process). 

Clinton, however, did not represent “change” but a variation of stubbornly redundant “New Democrat” polices that were little differentiated from Republican policies. And then there was her sense of “entitlement”--that she was "owed" preferential treatment. What was she, and where would she be, without Bill and his “aura”? Where was this “experience” people kept talking about? Her handling of the 1993 health care reform process was a disaster bar none, and the Democrats subsequently lost both houses of Congress for the next 12 years. After that she was persona non grata insofar as policymaking was concerned. And this wasn’t anything “new.” When Bill Clinton lost his first reelection bid as governor of Arkansas, internal polling showed that a major reason for this was because of negative perceptions of his wife; among other things, more “traditional” voters were put-off by the fact that she referred to herself as “Hillary Rodham.” By the time he won back the governorship, Bill had a “new” wife: “Hillary Clinton.”

 As a U.S. Senator, Clinton’s own reputation was mostly fumes running on her personal conceits; during the presidential primaries, her remarks about “Hard-Working Americans, White Americans" and that bizarre crack about the RFK assassination demonstrated her lack of strength, coolness and grace under pressure. And finally there was her stint as Secretary of State. What exactly did she accomplish, other than being a traveling “rock star”? Absolutely nothing; her successor, John Kerry, has accomplished  more in six months than Clinton would have had she stayed on for eight years. Yet people are incomprehensibly fascinated by her.

And it goes without saying that I find many of her supporters personally offensive; there was Harriet Christian of "inadequate black man" infamy, and feminist Bonnie Erbe urging Obama to "step aside" even after he won the 2008 primaries, because white people (presumably like her) wouldn't vote for him.

The reality is that Clinton’s one hope in 2016 is that no other Democrat emerges who can neutralize her advantage in gender politics, which is primarily what is behind CNN’s and NBC’s efforts to promote her. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen any names on the current roster that can save us from ourselves.