What we know is the Clintons are out there; the Clintons got Wesley Clark in the race; they got him in the race to take out Howard Dean, because Howard Dean was going against these guys. He was making threats against the Clintons, making threats against Terry McAuliffe. He was going to get a hold of the party. If he got hold of the party he got hold of the apparatus by which the Clintons hold onto power and relevancy. Can’t let that happen. So Clark goes in there and his goal was to destroy Dean. But Clark didn’t do it, the Clintons had to do it, Clintons had to leak a bunch of data on Clark, had to get Bob Torricelli involved and they took out Dean. The Clintons’ fingerprints are all over that so that got rid of Dean. That launched Kerry. Kerry then starts sweeping to victory. He won this nomination, winning the Iowa caucus. He won it then winning the New Hampshire primary. When it was over at that point, his Democrats are choosing somebody they think can beat Bush. They don’t have any idea who Kerry is; it doesn’t matter to them right now. They don’t know what his record is. It’s going to come back and bite them.
For some reason now, when he’s on the verge with no opposition other than John Edwards, and John Edwards, he doesn’t have a chance, either, he’s not showing well enough in any pre-polls. Now, this could be designed to elevate his candidacy while Kerry stays in, any number of possibilities here, but the one thing we do know is somebody is trying to take Kerry out and it’s a Democrat doing it. The Democrats or a Democrat is taking Kerry out, it’s not us, it’s not the conservatives, and we know that the press has known about this for a while but they haven’t wanted to report this because this is their guy, and they don’t want to be first. Well, they’re not first now. Drudge has leaked it. Drudge has let the cat out of the bag, so now the networks are free to chase this down and be the second to report it. So the Democrats can’t accuse the press of turning on them and savaging and sabotaging one of their guys.
Now, nothing in the mainstream press yet on this. There’s a story in the UK Guardian today, it’s actually an Associated Press story date-lined out of Milwaukee, and I said yesterday to you people that the Democratic campaign before this Kerry stuff hit needs Edwards to stay in this race. And just briefly, they need it because they need the media coverage, the horse race of the primaries so the press can portray Kerry as winning big and smoking the competition, and really building up momentum. If there’s no viable opponents opposing Kerry in the rest of these big primaries there’s no reason to cover it on TV; there’s no reason to praise him for a big win because he’d be unopposed so they’ve got to convince Edwards to stay in there. But at the same time they’ve got to tell Edwards, don’t start ripping Kerry to shreds, just stay in there and use this as an occasion to get your issues out there set yourself up for whatever you want in the future, but don’t hit Kerry. And apparently Edwards is going to stay in, to give them the horse race.
Well, this story indicates Edwards, who said that he has not been pressured to bow out, even received some encouragement from a crucial Democratic stalwart. Former President Clinton, in an interview with USA Today, Clinton said there are reasons for Edwards to stay in the race. “A lot of times things happen late in the race. I mean look at the elections the last 30 years and ask yourself, is this election the same or is this election different?” So Clinton is out there suggesting, and if he’s doing it publicly there might have been something, you know, message, note passed or whatever, The Torch might have called Edwards, you never know, but Edwards is going to stay in the race, at the behest of Slick Willie, and that happened before today. This story is USA Today interview is either today or yesterday, I’m not sure which. And then this brouhaha sits today.
So there’s something going on in this party, but whatever is going on, folks, it’s not healthy. These people are not a happy bunch. The long knives are out for themselves. What this tells me is there’s some sort of huge internal battle going on in the Democratic Party, and I can tell you, if there is, the battle going on between the Democratic Party is between the Clinton faction and whoever else is out there, because I’m here to tell you, there have got to be some Democrats that are fed up with the Clintons owning this party and doing nothing with it but running it into the ground. You can say all you want, folks, about the press covering the Democratic primary and Kerry and how the Democrats are made to look like they are running the show, but the fact is they don’t win elections anymore. They’ve lost all these governorships and big statehouses, they’ve lost the House of Representatives, the Republicans are gaining on their majority advantage in that house, they’re going to lose the Senate again and they’re going to lose Senate seats. The Democrats are losing elections. And up until a month ago it looked like they had no hope and prayer of getting the White House, and I, frankly, still, I mean it may be a close election. This is going to come back and bite me. I got to take the bets off the table. I was going to say if Kerry is the nominee, I’m not worried. They’d nominate him for all the wrong reasons but I don’t know if he’s going to be the nominee now, but I still don’t think they’re going to win the presidency. I don’t care how close it is, I don’t think it’s going to happen. So they’re losing elections. There have to be Democrats that know this, there’s a big battle going on in this party.
You know, don’t think everybody loves the Clintons and don’t think all these people are just going to lay their own ambitions and their own desires and their own careers, just laid down and put the their jackets in the mud puddle so Hillary can pass. They’re not just going to lay out of the way and let Hillary have what she wants. It’s not how this works. You know, the quest for power does not take second place to anybody else. You fight ’em for it, and the idea that this party is just going to continue to, you know, do whatever the Clintons want, I never thought that that was sensible, and at some point it had to blow up. Now, whether this is it or not, if it isn’t it, it’s going to be at some time, but it looks like something’s going on here, somebody is trying to destroy John Kerry. Somebody, and it ain’t the Republicans.
