There is nothing worse than hearing the sound of footsteps coming up from behind you, when you think you are alone. Hillary Clinton is starting to hear it, but it isn’t the pitter-pat of tiny feet, it is heavy boots.
Iowa and New Hampshire can either make or break a candidate, and neither of these states is playing nice with Hillary. Her poll numbers continue to lag in both both states and she is pointing her finger right at the right-wing conspiracy.
After being involved in politics for a few years, politicians seem to lose all their shame, their ability to see what the people see, and even lose touch with reality. Receiving and spending massive amounts of money might have something to do with that.
In an interview Sunday on “Meet the Press,” Ms. Clinton said Republican operative Karl Rove was behind the smear ad aimed at turning Iowa caucus-goers against her.
If that is true, Rove wasn’t the only one causing problems for Hillary. Chuck Todd, “Meet the Press” moderator pitched in too, bringing up Hillary’s huge speaking fees. When Todd asked whether she thought that the $200,000 speaking fees from big banks had hurt her credibility. In response, she said that after leaving her position as Secretary of State, she had spoken to a “wide array of groups.”
Surprisingly, Todd then piled on and asked about her speeches to the wealthy and Wall Street. “You don’t think they expect anything in return?” he asked. This zinger obviously stunned Clinton. She said, “Absolutely not,” and noted that while she was a New York Senator, she had taken on Wall Street.
She skillfully turned the conversation back to Rove’s negative Crossroads Super Pac political ad, and she cleverly sunk the boot into them. “And it’s really interesting to me that now Karl Rove is taking money from the financial interests who run an ad against me to try and influence Democrats not to support me. Why? Ask yourself why? Because he knows, one, I know what needs to be done, and two, I know how to get it done to make sure Wall Street writ large, not just the big banks but the investment banks, hedge funds, and everybody else, can no longer wreck our economy the way they did in 2008.”
The ad accuses Clinton of using money from Wall Street interests to pay for her massive TV ad buys. One of the graphics in the ad shows her receiving $6.4 million from Wall Street speaking fees and a paltry $118,000 in campaign contributions from Iowans. A voice-over in the ad says, “Hillary rewarded Wall Street with the $700 billion bailout. Does Iowa really want Wall Street in the White House?”
Nasty!
No word yet on whether, or how much that is hurting Hillary.
