Missing The Point Of "Game Change"

I first became aware of the book that is making waves, Game Change, when a part of it appearing in NY Magazine was referenced by faithful No Quarter reader, Mountainaires, in terms of Elizabeth Edwards. Basically, the authors, Heilemann and Halperin, dispel the myth of "St. Elizabeth." What an eye-opener this excerpt was, especially for those of us, like me, who only liked John because of Elizabeth. Assuming half of it is right, it is pretty bad.

But what is not being focused on in this book, at least so far, is how clearly it asserts the fix was in AGAINST Hillary Clinton. In each piece thus far, there has been something about the DNC not wanting Hillary Clinton to be the nominee, or the senators with clout secretly backing Obama. In the NY Magazine article, "Saint Elizabeth and the Ego Monster," there are passages like this:

Edwards never expected to be the third wheel in 2008. The race was going to be Hillary versus him. That was how he saw it from the start. She would be the front-runner, of course. But as sure as night follows day, there would be an alternative, an anti-Hillary, and he would be it.

The Democratic Establishment agreed that there would be—and certainly should be—a viable challenger to Clinton. The party’s pooh-bahs on Capitol Hill were privately terrified about the prospect of Hillary rolling to the nomination. They feared that she was too polarizing to win, that she would drag down House and Senate candidates in red and purple states; and they worried, too, about Bill’s putative affairs (emphasis mine). But while the Clintons themselves regarded Edwards as Hillary’s most formidable rival, there existed a deep wariness about the North Carolinian among his fellow Democrats. In the Senate, in particular, Edwards was regarded almost universally by his former colleagues as a callow, shallow phony. Quietly, the Establishment began a quest to find a different alternative, eventually settling on the unlikely horse that was Obama—with Harry Reid personally, and secretly, urging the Illinois senator to run against Clinton.

So much for the people choosing our nominee, right? I just love that the "pooh-bahs" decided that Hilary was too polarizing. THEY created this hype, along with the Republicans during Bill's tenure, and with the MSM. But the people who listened to her, who read her policies, who saw how she worked, knew she was exactly who we wanted to run for president

This isn't the only example out of this book. There is also the claim by the book's authors that Chuck Schumer secretly supported Obama, though he publicly claimed to support Hillary Clinton. Needless to say, Schumer's people claim this isn't true, but again, even taking what the authors wrote with a grain of sand, this doesn't sound good. The book goes on to claim Schumer encouraged a "get tough" policy against Clinton, and enlisted another senator to support Obama, presumably in his stead:

The book reports that in the summer of 2007, Schumer and others wanted Team Obama to get tougher on Clinton.

At one point, the authors contend, Schumer felt "Obama needed to take a two-by-four to Hillary," the book says.

Missouri Sen. Claire McCaskill was tapped as the messenger from the worried senators to the Obama campaign.

She denies feeling any such pressure.

"It wasn't like he [Schumer] came to me and said, 'Be for Barack Obama - I gotta be for Hillary,'" McCaskill told the Daily News Saturday. "He never, ever said a word to me that would give the kind of impression [this book seems] to be giving. He was never giving advice to the campaign on how to undermine her."

What a bunch of back-stabbing conniving Brutus' these senators are. And the DNC, too, if you ask me.

The glaring fallacy with the logic of the DNC and its minions are the number are Republicans who crossed over for Hillary Clinton. Former dyed-in-the-wool Republicans becoming caucus captains for Hillary in Texas, for example (an example relayed to me by the person who crossed over). All of the post voting showed Hillary Clinton got the majority of Democratic votes AND a large number of Republican votes. Yet the DNC in its infinite "wisdom" decided Hillary Clinton could NOT be the nominee, and worked their asses off to break every rule necessary to make that so.

No doubt, there will be more to this book after it is released this week, but there are some glaring omissions mentioned thus far. Ben Smith noted that Obama was pretty much the same throughout the campaign, thus most of these revelations are about the Clintons, the Edwards, et al. But as one commenter noted:

Where are the stories of how the campaign handled Jerimah (sic) Wright?

Where are the stories about how they had to put a muzzle on Michelle Obama?

Where are the stories about 'sweetie' and calling his grandmother a 'typical white person'?

ANd who did Obama think he picked when he picked Joe Biden? He must be stupid if he is surprised by how he has acted!

The secret to Obama winning was the media and frankly Mark Halprin doesn't want to blow that gig.

No kidding. Don't forget the "Obama and Biden Can't Stand Each Other" part of this book referenced above, which is sure not getting much play by the MSM:

The relationship between Barack Obama and Joe Biden grew so strained during the 2008 campaign, according to a new book, that the two rarely spoke and aides not only kept Biden off internal conference calls but refused to even tell him they existed.

Instead, a separate campaign call was regularly scheduled between the then-Delaware senator and two of Obama’s top campaign aides – “so that they could keep a tight rein on him,” write journalists Mark Halperin and John Heilemann in “Game Change,” a long-awaited account of the 2008 campaign.

Uh, yeah. So, the bottom line as far as I can tell from this book so far is this: the Democratic Party committed massive fraud in 2008, costing voters millions of dollars in campaign donations to candidates they had already determined were not going to get the nomination. That is fraud, pure and simple. Not only did I give donations (in the beginning to John Edwards), but I gave a LOT to Hillary Clinton.

If the DNC knew they were never going to let her get the nomination no matter how she performed, no matter how many people voted for her, no matter WHAT, that, to me, is fraud. And they damn well better be held accountable for that, don't you think?