Hillary Invokes JFK
Lorie Byrd (Hat tip: Kim Priestap)
Is Hillary the JFK of 2008?
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton invoked the campaign of the nation's lone Catholic president, John Kennedy, last night as she talked about her challenge in becoming the first female commander-in-chief.
"He was smart, he was dynamic, he was inspiring and he was Catholic. A lot of people back then [1960] said, 'America will never elect a Catholic as president,' " the White House hopeful told the New Hampshire Democrats' 100 Club fund-raiser here.
"But those who gathered here almost a half century ago knew better," she said. "They believed America was bigger than that and Americans would give Sen. John F. Kennedy a fair shake, and the rest, as they say, is history."
Noting women are "the majority" of voters and are in the workforce in "record numbers," she added, "So when people tell me 'a woman can never be president,' I say, we'll never know unless we try."
Is the Democratic primary going to be a back and forth between Hillary and Barack to see which would be a bigger barrier to break, being the first woman or the first black president? ...
A Funny Thing Happened On The Way Home From The March
Ed Morrissey
Robert Novak points out some inconsistencies in Hillary Clinton's proclaimed personal history on the campaign trail. The woman who famously claimed to have been named after Sir Edmund Hillary after his ascent to the top of Mount Everest -- which happened when she was eight years old -- has attempted another bit of revisionism, this time on civil rights. After her attempt last week in Selma to drawl out her teenage epiphany from listening to Martin Luther King in 1963, Novak notes that she supported one of King's opponents:
While Hillary Rodham Clinton came out second best to Barack Obama in their oratorical duel at Selma, Ala., a week ago, the real problem with her speech concerned her claimed attachment to Martin Luther King Jr. as a high school student in 1963. How, then, could she have been a "Goldwater Girl" during the following year's presidential election?
The incompatibility of those two facts was pointed out to me by Democratic old-timers who were shocked by Clinton's temerity in pursuing her presidential candidacy. Barry Goldwater's opposition to the 1964 voting rights bill was not incidental to his run for the White House but an integral element of conscious departure from Republican tradition that contributed to his disastrous performance. ...
Hillary has shown signs of panic after the advent of Barack Obama as a potential contender for the nomination. This just provides yet another example of her anxiety. She expected the nomination this year to be a cakewalk, a coronation that would carry her on the shoulders of adoring throngs back to the White House. Now that she faces a real political fight, she appears unprepared and bumbling.
The Selma appearance reveals a little of the real Hillary. She has the same kind of authenticity issues that plagued Al Gore. The Edmund Hillary whopper showed that she has the same affinity for tall tales, but the Selma appearance puts her in a league of her own. She attempted a Southern accent that sounded more like Larry the Cable Guy rather than Scarlett O'Hara, and phonier than a three-dollar bill. If that wasn't bad enough, she attempted to assume the mantle of King while forgetting that her biography clearly shows her supporting Goldwater and, presumably, his opposition to the civil-rights legislation a year after her supposed epiphany. ...
