Here are the slogans Hillary Clinton should have based her campaign on:
* Hillary Clinton: Battle-tested
* I have scars because I've been in the fight
* We've got a fight on our hands and I'm the fighter you need in your corner
* Actions speak louder than words (she has briefly used this one)
* I've been taking the fight to the bad guys for the last 35 years
* I have hope born of experience, a hope we can achieve
One of Hillary Clinton's main problems was that Barack Obama was so damn likable. They should have Karl Roved him by turning his biggest asset into his biggest disadvantage (as they did to John Kerry's service in Vietnam).
They should have said that everyone liked him because he never got into the ring, never fought hard for his side, never took a swing at the opposition, never got his uniform dirty and never got tested in the heat of battle. This isn't Pop Warner; this is the majors. And in the majors you have to fight hard enough for your side to get the other team's attention. If they like you, you must not have done anything to upset them.
Does Barack Obama want to hold hands with Karl Rove and Dick Cheney and sing kumbaya? Are those the guys he wants to get along with? The last thing we need is someone who is going to play patty-cakes with these Republicans. We need someone who is going to roll up their sleeves and clean house -- the White House!
Instead she has gone on this strange negative campaigning binge over the last couple of days because they saw they couldn't catch up to Obama by playing nice. But if you're going to play dirty, you have to play it just right. Any misstep and you're going to turn everyone off. And that's exactly what it looks they've done now.
The random angry diatribe about a campaign mailer that's been around forever and now mocking Obama's message of hope looks as desperate as it clearly is. You don't attack hope; that makes you look like you are wishing against people's dreams and aspirations. It makes you seem like a grumpy old man telling people they'll never get the government they want. No one wants to vote for someone who tells them, "Stop dreaming, young man."
There is a way to attack Obama and not attack his followers. Tell them you want the same things for our government and our country, but you know how to fight for them. If Barack had fought for any of these changes, wouldn't he have gotten his nose bloodied at least once by now? Why haven't the Republicans attacked him? Because he poses no real challenge to them and the way they do business!
The Republicans can't stand Hillary Clinton because the Clintons have been kicking their ass up and down Capitol Hill for the last 15 years. They don't mind Barack because he is not a threat to them.
If you're going to go negative, that's the way to do it. But luckily, it appears to be too late for that. I say "luckily" because I don't believe what I've written above. I don't believe Hillary Clinton has fought the Republicans at all since she's been a senator. And she certainly hasn't won any battles against the Bush administration. I think she's been afraid to really challenge Bush because they would have called her a liberal. I think she has no right to stake a claim to being a real fighter. But politics isn't about reality, it's about perception.
I don't want her to win because I think she has learned all the wrong lessons since the one time she did fight -- for health care reform in the early '90s. She lost that fight, but I didn't mind. At least, she fought. The lesson to learn was not to accommodate the special interests, the lobbyists and the Republicans. It was to come back at them with a smarter and tougher plan next time. But for Hillary, there was no next time. She hasn't taken on a real fight since.
But since Obama's image is that everyone loves him, she should have used that against him. That would have been smart politics. What's decidedly not smart are these last minute desperation thrusts at Obama and his supporters. This is not the way to go out. Now that she has finally decided to fight, she's picked the wrong fight.