Her angry defenders were chanting "Denver!" on Saturday, but Hillary Rodham Clinton is headed to Chappaqua late tonight for a somber and potentially momentous homecoming.
Clinton will huddle with advisers and husband Bill Clinton at her mansion tomorrow, according to people familiar with her plans. She will monitor results from the final 2008 primaries in South Dakota and Montana and decide whether, how and when she will end her campaign as Barack Obama nears the nomination threshold.
"The only real counsel to Hillary is Bill; it's not a wide circle, so we're not sure what they'll do," said one of Clinton's top supporters in New York.
The return home after 17 months of campaigning is likely to be an emotional one for Clinton. The former first lady's spirits had been buoyed by cheering, affectionate crowds and friends said they are unsure how she will react with the primaries behind her.
"But she'll have to make a decision either way on Tuesday," said a senior adviser.
Clinton is scheduled to leave New York late tomorrow or early Wednesday for Washington, where she will speak before a powerful pro-Israel lobbying group.
Clinton has repeatedly said she will campaign enthusiastically for Obama if he's the nominee, but thorny issues remain, including how to deal with Clinton's $20-million-plus debt and her apparent desire to be offered the vice presidential slot.
Obama, who stands within about 50 delegates of the 2,118-delegate benchmark for the nomination after his loss in Puerto Rico, could declare victory as early as tomorrow night. To do so he will need about two dozen of the 200-odd uncommitted superdelegates to endorse him.
Despite a public display of defiance following the Democratic National Committee's controversial decision to award uncommitted delegates from Michigan to Obama, Clinton's advisers downplayed the notion that the former first lady would appeal, dragging the process out for weeks.
"I don't think we're going to fight this at the convention," Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, a Clinton stalwart, told CBS' "Face the Nation" yesterday. "It would be a fight that would have no purpose."
Many in the Clinton camp see her Michigan defeat as a harbinger of the end, expressing shock that longtime loyalists Don Fowler and Elaine Kamarck OKd the pro-Obama deal before a DNC committee.
"Hillary couldn't even keep the Clinton backers on the committee - so how the hell is she going to hold this thing together?" asked one of Clinton's top campaign bundlers.
Still, she hopes to convince uncommitted superdelegates her claim on the lead in popular votes makes her the most electable Democrat.
"When the voting concludes on Tuesday, more Americans will have voted for Senator Clinton than Senator Obama," said spokesman Howard Wolfson.
"The last time the Democrats didn't give the nomination to the candidate who won the most votes was in 1972," he added, in a none-too-subtle reference to the disastrous candidacy of George McGovern.
And many of her supporters are vowing to fight on despite the odds. Some have circulated a 17-page critique of the party's primary rules prepared by Clinton supporter Stephen Herbits.
It's titled: "The 2008 DNC Presidential Nomination Process: A Crisis Of Legitimacy."
Monday, June 02, 2008
"Clinton expected to decide future of her candidacy"
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8 comments:
I don’t understand those who should have the decency not comparing Senator Obama’ s program, which nobody knows, even him, with Hillary Clinton’s or John Mc Cain’s possible economic policies. Obama may win the nomination, but this will be a boomerang for him, because most Democrats and independents wish deeply that Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton will be the DP nominee for this November, at least everybody knows much better her, than this opportunistic demagogue, without any plan or strategy to confront the recession and increasing economic and financial troubles in the USA and throughout the world. I am fed up with the New York Times or the Washington Post, newspaper who had cheated us continuously, regarding the war in Iraq, which was supported openly and vigorously by both papers, when that country was invaded. I did not back such illegal and immoral war as you did and many quasi patriots followed your wrong path. You are again attacking in a very indecent way Mrs. Clinton and supporting this nobody, who came out of the blue, and is supported by the most radical elements in American politics, a real danger for the Nation and the world as George Bush has been for eight years. I look forward to see HRC became the nominee soon, if not like some press releases are saying, many will know what to do this November, choosing the lesser bad of all alternatives, which is not BHO.
I don't know which more unbelievable: the comments or (her?) "name."
.If it is true that she will give up her nomination, no doubt that most of her supporters will cast their vote for John Mc Cain. Obama is a dangerous populist from the left like Bush was from the right, nobody can say that Mc Cain is a demagogue like Obama, and he is not a member of Bush inner circle and even the neocons don't like him, for me this is enough
Ms. or Mr. delatremoille:
Have you looked at McCain's record, his positions on issues like taxes, Iraq and social security?
What do you base your opinions on, anyway?
BHO has won the primaries, but he will loose the election, and this is not a matter of hate, is real common sense, the less common of all senses. Mrs. Clinton had won the popular vote in most decisive states for November, and Obama lost in all of them. The archaic DP big bosses almost ignored the results of Florida and Michigan, just because they voted earlier, people down there are quite upset. Though, is true there was too much hate in this campaign, especially from the ultra radicals from the Obama camp. You know something in my view his populist and demagogical rhetoric will not prevail in November. It is a real disgrace that Mrs. Clinton even with some mistakes not so terrible as you describe them in this article did not get the nomination. The DP will pay for this, many independents and moderate Democrats will turn their backs to Obama and will vote John Mc Cain or simply they will not vote at all. Obama is a loser, as I said many times his tailor made speeches are not enough to make him a good statesman and less a future president of the USA. Definitely a great opportunity to have a Democrat in the White House had been lost. My congratulations to that great lady and politician who is Hillary Rodham Clinton, in spite of some differences in the past, Iraq as first example that I have in my mind, at least she recognized before John Kerry, Edwards and others that she made a mistake, all of those support Obama now. Comparing the mistakes between both candidates I should say that those of Hillary were quite naïf, which is not the case of this gentleman Obama, a liar who will never fulfil any of his promises, first because he will not be at the White House this January and secondly in the worst case scenario, his presidency will be chaotic and a total disaster, worst than the one of George Bush. John Mc Cain knows that the Iraqi war was illegal, as John Kerry with I had spoken on February 10, 2003, most of the senators and Jurassic Park Democrats who switched their votes for this man who came out of the blue, were staunch backers of Bush’ s policies in Iraq for many years. I am sure that Obama will not only be defeated but most Democrats and Independents will turn their back to your clown candidate, who is a complete ignorant on international affairs and relations, he wanted to interview Raul Castro and the President of Iran, and now he is saying that he never said that, and I was in NYC when I heard him quite well. A terrible product of the lack of knowledge of the outside world of most Americans, who even never read a decent book, with the exception of the elite in New England, New York, Virginia and some places in California. For Christ sake he should never be president of the USA he is a liar and a complete fake. By the way, do you remember when four years ago many Democrats want John Mc Cain as candidate for the VP or you had forgotten?
Last but not least, Iraq was a crime, but would be a second crime, if you give up Iraq to Al Qaeda right now, troops should come back home step by step and replaced by the Iraqi army, including some of the previous regime officers, at the end yo know that they never had WMD as your friend Kerry repeated once and once again, even when Robin Cook said at the Commons that a war was wrong and criminal (March 17, 2003), I wrote an article at the time in Foreign Affairs saying the same. Yours Antoine Charles Louis Alexandre de la Tremoille a French chevallier.
"AntoinedelaTremoille"--You ramble on and on with your hateful and ignorant long-winded, ranting. I am done with you. Don't you know that McCain is the biggest supporter of this "illegal and immoral war"?
"your hateful and ignorant long-winded, ranting. I am done with you" This conclusion may apply to myself considering your extreme narrow mindness. By the way, I do not support John Mc Cain's international policy, but at least he is much more open minded in trade, he respects those agreements signed by the USA and approved by the Congress, which Obama rejects, which is a breach of International Law, like the case of NAFTA. He is a man who doesn't have the knowledge and "le physique du role” for a president of the USA, and this is it. I believe that you are a young woman, who hardly had finish, your college and doesn’t have any knowledge of international policy and the consequences of all what had done Bush. Obama cannot change his in two months, would be irresponsible and criminal, first the American command should transfer all their responsibilities to the Iraqis and you need at least a year or maybe two as a Lord Maud said in London during an interview with the BBC. A unilateral and speedy withdrawal of troops as Obama is suggesting, will benefit only to Al Qaeda, it is true that all the responsibilities are from Bush and his clique of liars, but most politicians and the Washington Post + The New York agreed with the invasion, against the UN resolutions and the open opposition of Germany, France, Mexico, Chile and other countries in the Security Council. Most of your new liberal friends backed the war, I had a quite disgusting discussion in Boston with John Kerry at the time, and he said that every patriot should support the war against a danger to the national security of the USA, which was false. But in the current circumstances the new Iraqi administration should be able to defeat Al Qaeda and all the terrorist who are acting there thanks to Bush, again from the strategic view point is suicidal any withdrawal of troops in a short time, lets say few months. Furthermore I don’t share Obama’s views about all the tyrants who he would like to have a nice chitchat. He is deluding himself and is completely crazy.
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