Blowback

Whether it was hubrus or stunning political miscalculation, Hillary Clinton's refusal to acknowledge Barack Obama's victory, in both word and deed, quickly diminished much of the goodwill and leverage she enjoyed after her historic primary campaign. As a result, the calls to officially end her campaign (coming mostly from her staunchest supporters) grew loud throughout Wednesday. And now, reports from various news sources indicate that Hillary has decided to listen. She will formally suspend her campaign on Friday and endorse Obama.

But the blowback from her truculence may cost her dearly.

While the Obama camp silently seethed at her graceless speech Tuesday night, more friendly folks were simply left scratching their heads. Starting with Terry McCauliffe introducing Hillary as "the next President of the United States" and continuing with her own proclamations of the campaign's successes, viewers across the country were wondering if she had received the news that Barack Obama had clinched the delegate total needed to secure the nomination. After she told the crowd at Baruch College in New York that she would make no decisions about her political future that night, she urged her supporters to write and email and call to tell her what to do.

And, boy, did they ever. According to Newsweek's Howard Fineman, some of Hillary's aides secretly implored eight Senators, including Chuck Schumer, to convince her to get out of the race. A group of Congressional supporters, including New York Congressman Charlie Rangel, told her flatly that she needed to release them so that they could now get behind Obama. And with every new revelation of strong arming to get her to do the right thing, her stature and leverage diminished.

So what was she thinking? Detractors will point to their long held belief that the Clinton's are self deluded and self-centered; this episode is just another brick in the wall. More generous observers may say that it's tough to come down from such a grueling campaign. All I'll say is that I thought Hillary was a more savvy political animal than she has demonstrated.

It well may cost her. If she seriously wanted to be a VP, she's made it a tougher hill to climb. If she wanted to throw around the weight of the 18 million people (her number) who voted for her, the rest of the Democratic Party will now push back any attempts at hostage taking.

And the most damaging aspect of her behavior is that it has embarrassed her own supporters. She may have done the impossible and given them Clinton fatigue. Fortunately, they may have done the impossible and rescued her in time. If Hillary does all the right things on Friday, she will be forgiven.

I doubt, however, that Barack Obama will ever forget. What that means for Hillary's political future remains to be seen.

Blowback 2
I can't sign off without mentioning the biggest non-story of the day. Tony Rezko was found guilty on 16 felony counts, including bribery and fraud. For you conspiracy theorists out there, ever wonder about the timing? Convicted the day after Obama clinched? What impact would this story have had if he had been convicted 2 weeks ago? Or two days ago? Verrry interethting.

So what was Hillary thinking? Please, anyone, lay it out for me. Talk about this or anything else by clicking on 'comments', bypassing the Google sign up and hitting the anonymous or nickname button.