Joe Andrew's Preemptive Strike Against Clnton Politics

http://liberalvaluesblog.com/?p=3221

Former Clinton Appointee to DNC Calls For Superdelegates To Back Obama and a New Brand of Politics

May 1st, 2008 by Ron Chusid

With Obama having an almost insurmountable lead in the pledged delegates the race increasingly centers around the superdelegates. Convincing the superdelegates to go contrary to the results of the primaries is the only chance Hillary Clinton has to win the nomination. Obama has gone into a prevent defense, attempting to get through the remaining primaries without a major shift in the race which could help Clinton. Hillary Clinton has no choice but to campaign more aggressively and to take advantage of opportunities which develop, such as the controversy over Wright. As a consequence Clinton shows some late momentum and it looks unlikely that Obama will be able to achieve a knock out blow in next week’s primaries. Some polls show Clinton leading in Indiana and North Carolina.

Despite the apparent shift in momentum and recent controversies, the superdelegates are not fooled. Obama continues to pick up more than Clinton, eliminating her lead in elected superdelegates and narrowing her lead in total superdelegates to sixteen. Today’s pick up for Clinton might be one of the more damaging ones, possibly shifting the momentum back in Obama’s favor in time for next week’s vote.

Joe Andrew, appointed to head the Democratic National Committee by Bill Clinton in 1999 has shifted his support from Hillary Clinton to Barack Obama. Andrew is arguing that it is time for Democrats to unify around Obama and that “a vote for Hillary Clinton is a vote to continue this process, and a vote to continue this process is a vote that assists John McCain.” He is calling on other superdelegates to also endorse Obama and put an end to the race.

Andrew was appointed by Bill Clinton and clearly knows the Clintons. He is preparing for the possibility that they will attack him personally, and uses this to make the argument as to why Democrats should nominate Barack Obama:

A New Era of Politics

My endorsement of Senator Obama will not be welcome news to my friends and family at the Clinton campaign. If the campaign’s surrogates called Governor Bill Richardson, a respected former member of President Clinton’s cabinet, a “Judas” for endorsing Senator Obama, we can all imagine how they will treat somebody like me. They are the best practitioners of the old politics, so they will no doubt call me a traitor, an opportunist and a hypocrite. I will be branded as disloyal, power-hungry, but most importantly, they will use the exact words that Republicans used to attack me when I was defending President Clinton.

When they use the same attacks made on me when I was defending them, they prove the callow hypocrisy of the old politics first perfected by Republicans. I am an expert on this because these were the exact tools that I mastered as a campaign volunteer, a campaign manager, a State Party Chair and the National Chair of our Party. I learned the lessons of the tough, right-wing Republicans all too well. I can speak with authority on how to spar with everyone from Lee Atwater to Karl Rove. I understand that, while wrong and pernicious, shallow victory can be achieved through division by semantics and obfuscation. Like many, I succumbed to the addiction of old politics because they are so easy.

Innuendo is easy. The truth is hard.

Sound bites are easy. Solutions are hard.

Spin is simple and easy. Struggling with facts is complicated and hard.

I have learned the hard way that you can love the candidate and hate the campaign. My stomach churns when I think how my old friends in the Clinton campaign will just pick up the old silly Republican play book and call in the same old artificial attacks and bombardments we have all heard before.

Yet, despite the simple and overwhelming pressure to do anything and everything to win, Barack Obama has risen above it all and demanded a new brand of politics. People flock to Senator Obama because they are rejecting the hyperbole of the old politics. The past eight years of George Bush have witnessed a retreat from substance, science, and reason in favor spin, cronyism and ideology. Barack Obama has dared not only to criticize it, as all Democrats do, but to actually reject playing the same old game. And in doing so, he has shown us a new path to victory.