Adjusting

When bowling a player may find his ball is drifting to one side or the other, often missing the headpin.  Logic might incline the bowler to compensate; if I’m rolling far left, I need to move my body to the right. However, professionals will argue that the player should move their stance toward the drift to adjust and correct.  Being counterintuitive will more likely brings success.

I somehow doubt Hillary Clinton bowls. However, I suspect that if she did her advisors might be telling her to move in the opposite direction of her previous bad deliveries. That seems to be her response to Bernie Sanders’ populous appeal.  If highlighting her differences with Bernie isn’t working then double down twice as hard.

As the presumptive favorite, Hillary’s has routinely been missing the headpin with each challenge she has faced in her attempts to generate enthusiasm for her quest to secure the Democratic presidential nomination.  Such failures may be given short shrift by her campaign due to continued confidence that when all the votes (primarily delegate votes) are counted she’ll prevailed.

The real danger is that her actions in this primary may adversely affect the outcome of the general election.  At the very least they might cripple her Presidency by crippling the success of Democrats in Senate, House, Governor, and state legislature contests.

The first and major misdirection has been her failure to understand the Bernie Sanders phenomenon.

This was beautifully illustrated by one of the last questions asked of her in the February 4^th debate on MSNBC.  She was asked if she would consider Bernie as her running mate should she get the nomination.  Her response was dismissive, again moving away.  She should have said: absolutely, I would place him near the top of any list of candidates I might consider. He is insightful, consistent with my values, and I hope he would remain one of my closest advisors. It would also need to be (and should be) the truth, or close to it.

Because of her trivializing response, she may, regretfully, not be asked this question again…a lost opportunity.

My son, a two tour Iraqi veteran, now a student, who has been for years particularly non-political, recently posted on Facebook that he had displayed his first bumper sticker ever: Feel the Bern. It is simply a current reality that Bernie’s supporters love him, and for some very good reasons.

Sanders has elevated a message of empowerment to a National level. He has become, for this election cycle, the rational counter-balance to the power brokers who use the Republican Party to control the less educated, irrational, or just plain stupid electorate with fear mongering. He has done it with the rhetoric so many hoped would come out of Obama’s mouth, but never did.

More than that, to younger and relatively educated voters, men and women, Bernie represents the antithesis of the curmudgeon grandfather who watches Fox News and says that anything governmental (other than the military) is bullshit.  Saunders is more like the Grandfather who works as a college professor and throughout his life has been consistent, perceptive, independent, and admired. He’s the one they not only look forward to eating Thanksgiving dinner with, but also the one they want to spend time with after the meal.

Could Sanders win the Presidency? Not likely against a moderate Republican who could, with half a billion dollars, turn him into a doddering old Communist in the pivotal states of Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Florida (where the entire election will be decided). Perhaps he could win against the lunacy of a Donald Trump, but even with Trump, Bernie might be just one terrorist attack away from handing the keys to the asylum over to the insane.

So how have Hillary and Bill Clinton responded to this heady yet emotional following for Sanders?  They have decided to use the old line political hack jobs that have been the political modus operandi for generations: attack the man. This is Hillary moving away from the strike zone and I would guess that she, her husband and advisors are currently trying to come up with anything they can to undermine Sanders’ candidacy, which will move her even further off the mark.

Hillary needs to legitimately become part of the Bernie Revolution, but add the construction that Sanders leaves out.  For example; instead of attacking him for suggesting a universal single-payer health care system, agree with him that a single payer system may in fact be the final step on the journey begun by Obamacare. She is the one to continue that journey by reintroducing the Public Option that the medical insurance industry (via the Republican Party) kept out of the Affordable Health Care Act.

With her considerable wins on Super Tuesday Clinton may calm her rhetoric (if she would just stop shouting it would help).  It is to her advantage if Sanders stays in the race, but only if she begins to feel the bern herself.  For Hillary to be an effective president she needs to do more than just win.  She needs to bring out an electorate which will put her in office, but also make changes down the ticket and force an evolution in the Republican Party.