Maybe Bill Clinton should stay home

There's a new poll out today from the Wall Street Journal/NBC News that shows support for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama has remained tight nationally, with Obama edging ahead within the margin of error. There's good news in the poll for Republicans -- voters seem to like John McCain more than they like the Republican Party in general, suggesting a tighter race than the Democrats are hoping for.

But a more interesting nugget is buried deep in the poll. It seems that the more voters see of Bill Clinton, the less they like him. The poll shows a significant shift in his approval rating from a year ago. In March 2007, some 48% of those surveyed had a positive view of the former president, and 35% had a negative view. Now his negatives outpace his positives, 45% to 42%.

Over the same time span, Hillary Clinton's positive numbers rose from 39% to 45% while her negatives remained static, sliding up from 43% to 44%.

As for Obama, the more voters saw of him -- or, at least the more they learned about him -- the more they liked him. In March 2007 his positive numbers were 37% and his negatives were 17%. But some 26% said they were "neutral" about him and 20% said they didn't know -- nearly half of those surveyed. Now, Obama's positive-negative numbers are 51% to 28% with only 18% neutral and 3% undecided.

There. Something to talk about over your morning coffee (West Coast) or lunch (East Coast).

-- Scott Martelle

Comments

[Valjean]

If O and C are smart they'll forget about shooting at each other and begin showing how they can push McCain around and into defensive no-win positions. The one who can do that best will carry the day at the convention. Pushing each other around is little different that the old pushing chairs around on the deck of the Titanic. It's no longer Clinton-vs-Obama. It's either of them-vs-McCain. Otherwise the Dems just send a severely wounded nominee to the real battle. Maybe a stalemated Dem convention needs to release delegates for their required votes and select someone who could unite the part, something likely beyond the reach of either O or C.

[Jeff in Orlando]

I predict Hillary will win because the Clintons will do anything and say anything to win the nomination. In doing so, they will destroy their chances to get back the White House. If they see the nomination slipping away, we are bound to see a lot more fireworks from Bubba.

[Kevin deBruin]

I never liked Bill Klintoon, but only saw him as a buffoon. Now I think he's a complete ass.

As for Shrill Hillary, she is the public figure I detest most. Everything about her!

Obama in '08!

[ADAMS]

BARACK HUSSAUIN OBAMA CONTINUES TO BE A THREAT TO NATIONAL MATURITY.

OBAMA IS RUNNING LOW ON THE POOR ME AND RACE CARDS.

THE HARD COLD TRUTH THAT WE AS A NATION MUST FACE IS BLACKS ARE VOTING OBAMA AT 90%
THESE FIGURES ARE A STRONG INDICATION THAT BLACKS AFTER YEARS OF SUPPRESSION ARE RACIST. AT THIS RATE WE MAY NEED A WHITE M.L.K.

[verycold]

If Hillary wanted Bubba to stay at home she would tell him so. It is her candidacy to win or lose. So far from my perspective he has cost her the lead she once had. Now unfortunately another racial blunder will further erode her chances. Of course Barack knows what it is like to experience those blunders. He has Samantha and his wife Michelle and now his mentor Pastor Wright. Very often it is hard to figure out how much the friends and family are actually speaking for the candidate. If a questionable supporter that is not a friend or family member endorses a candidate how much responsibility does the candidate have for that person and their views.

[kat]

The one thing you do not want to do when it comes to race is speak the truth - and thats what Clinton did in South. Carolina.

Although inartfully put, Clinton's observation that So. Carolina would vote in any person with a black skin is right and true of blacks in general. Blacks unconditionally supported O.J. Simpson despite overwhelming evidence that he slaughtered two unarmed people.

The blacks in DC re-elected Marion Barry after he pulled a stint in the federal pen. Whenever a crooked black elected official is busted, blacks cry racism.

When it comes to a united front, blacks are given a free pass to be racists by invoking mantras like "it's our turn" or "see how it feels". Blacks are free to say they are supporting Obama because he's black and they do.

Bill Clinton's observation that even Jessee Jackson could win in So. Carolina was right. The black voters weren't voting for Obama, they were voting for a black man.. . .the same with Jackson.

And Ferraro is right to. No white person would be given the free pass Obama is. Everyone is afraid to be accused of racism if they criticize Obama and he knows it and so do blacks. They won't hesitatate to intimidate both the press and Obama's detractors with threats of hurling cries of racism.

Why should Ferrarro or Clinton apologize?

[Bill]

Barack Obama is nothing more than the little man behind the curtain pulling the levers and making the speeches. But once you pull the curtain back, there is no substance to back up the talk. Obama is no different than any other politician that's selling pie-in-the-sky dreams, he smiles while he lies. Perhaps he has a career in selling used cars ahead of him. The reason a lot of people don't like Hilliary is the exact reason I do like her. She can be very straightforward, abrasive, and even abrupt, but you never have to guess on where she stands on the issues. Obama is doing nothing more than sellling financial dreams of prosperity to a country that's clearly headed for bancruptcy. Sort of like the guys playing the sweet music while the Titanic was sinking...that's your Obama.

[Rosetee]

My wory is if Obama becomes president he will apoint Hillary as something, possibly Supreme Court Justice.

Obama seems to be too nice to Clintons. If Obama doesn't know how to stop this Clinton non-sense , the best way is to elect Maccain.

[Ross]

Why do Clinton supportes tend to write long blog entries. Is there a gender issue here?

[Kevin Brown]

Hillary is the most detestable person in politics today. How can Dems run someone more polarizing than GW?

It's nuts that someone attached to the shirt-tail of a cheating husband is seriously considered for DogCatcher, let alone Senator or President!

[fatdave]

neither the left or right have a clue, the only thing they do well is lie. If I hear one more political remark about what they are going to do about this country that has absolutely no substance I voting for myself. None of the candidates in office at the present time can tell you what there job is and who elected them and who they are to report to. If we pay there exorbitant wages shouldn't we be able to tell them what to do? Just asking a question. Also why do we not punish the corporations for sending the jobs across the water I have stopped purchasing anything that I can from any foreign companies. Also send back all the illegals I don't care if they have offspring that are citizens let them have dual citizenship, and this is still the United States and we speak english. I served our country in the 60's and if I new what these turncoat politicians where going to do I would have run for office, they give are country a black mark they has tarnished every good man that has served. War is not a game quit acting like it is.

Send all of the politicians home and get a whole new group and start over.

Fatdave

[Jodi]

Barry, I am a Michigan voter and this mess is not a result of the Democratic party, it is a result of our legislators who were warned that our votes would not count if we moved our primary and they did it anyway. It is our own legislative bodies who have disenfranchised us, not the Democratic Party. Votes should only count when they have been placed fairly, and having only one name on the ballot does not constitute a fair election. Jennifer Granholm (Governor of MI) desperately pushed to have the primary moved (knowing that Hillary would win because voters here had absolutely no exposure to Obama) because she has her eye on Hillary's cabinet. Plain and simple.

[Rose]

Katy,
You speak my mind too. The reason why I don't want Hillary to be the president is 50% Bill and 50% Hillary. Probably Hillary has been with Bill for a long time to be a nice person. Hillary has turned really into a monster.

[rose]

Lea,
No one will hire you if you are not likable even if your resume is great. ( It is not that Billaries resume si gereat)
Both Bill and have made huge errors in their judgement. How can you say that they can be trusted?

[Fork]

Teri B. - The primaries in Florida SHOULD NOT COUNT for the simple reason that ONLY Hillary was on the ballot.

Because the DNC was pulling Florida's delegates from the convention, all of the Democratic candidates agreed to pull their names off the Florida ballot as a show of good faith in their party. Except Hillary waited until everyone else took their names off the ballot and left her name on.

Florida went to Hillary because Hillary was the only Democrat they could vote for in the primary. Talk about an unfair advantage! I'm all for making sure everyone's vote counts, but only if they have CHOICES when they go to vote. I'm fine with a do-over in Florida, but allowing in the primary results as-is would only show that the DNC thinks cheaters and backstabbers should win the most powerful office in the nation, and the idea of that frankly disgusts me.

[Valjean]

Why do I get the feeling that many of those commenting are really shills for the campaign they are promoting, either by pushing their candidate or disparaging the other...posting from the office of "their" candidate even.

[hillaryis44]

Faulty polls. There is no way that Hillary's negatives are only 44%. Maybe 44% in the democratic party.

[Ellie]

Some times I truly do wonder at the ignorance of the people in our country. And Fork, you are retarded if you think Hillary's name was the only name on the ballot in Florida. That is very bad information you are attempting to give people here. All of their names were on the ballot in Florida. It was Michigan where Obama and Edwards had their names removed from the ballot. In a normal election both states would have been seated regardless of the outcome. Now because it might put Hillary either ahead or neck and neck with Obama they won't seat them. Probably because all of the black politicians and people will call the DNC racist. Even though Hillary will beat John McCain because Hillary is not afraid to fight for it. I really don't understand the hatred for Hillary Clinton by some folks posting on these boards. I have read lots of books both for and against Hillary as well as a couple of books she wrote herself. The only things possibly in question would be those of money transactions and taxes. LOL. And even those were investigated quite heavily and never found to be anything wrong that the Clintons didn't later correct. I can only deduct that you are voting solely based on personality and not issues or who is more qualified and knowledgeable for the position. They are obviously not bad people by any stretch of the imagination and so I'm at a loss as to how folks come up with this conclusion. You can vote for Barack Obama but not Hillary Clinton but yet call yourself a democrat? That doesn't make any sense. Hillary is not running on a gimmick as is her opponent, she is running on common sense and purpose and experience and more knowledge than any politician that I've seen in recent years. Obama had to tweak the way even he speaks to keep up with her policy wonk and genius of politics knowledge. Good grief the woman deserves to be president. She has worked the last 8 years preparing for it like no one else. Both people have done wonderful things for minorities, chidlren, women, etc etc over the years. Hillary was publicly devoted without being paid for it for pete's sakes. That, to me, is a person that should be president. As for Bill....Bill has issues but he is still loved as all in all I do believe he is a good person and that people should try not to judge him. So he's charming and likes women. Get over it. If it doesn't bother Hillary that much then why the hell should we care? Ya'll need to think before you post this childish name calling nonsense. Even Barack Obama is probably cringing at a lot of these posts his supporters are posting. You just don't see the same type of strong hate from Hillary supporters that you do Barack Obama supporters.

[Matha Davidson]

Haven't we seen this movie before? Barack Obama has just proved his chasm-wide appeal again by conquering another Republican-red state - Mississippi - yet the battle for the Democratic nomination is set to stretch out on to the far horizon. As the comedian Bill Maher says, in a reference to John McCain's age, "It's a bad sign when the Democratic campaign is set to last longer than the Republican nominee." But the looming ending to this story feels flatly familiar -- like a slo-mo remake of Florida in the year 2000.

It is clear the Clintons are determined to get this nomination, any way, any how. If they have to do it by falsely claiming to have won states like Florida and Michigan -- where Obama's name wasn't even on the ballot, because there was an agreement by all the candidates to punish the states for holding early primaries -- then they will. If they have to do it by overturning the will of the Democratic electorate by appealing to the unelected super-delegates -- a group of party functionaries who seem likely to hold the balance -- they will. If they have to do it by pandering to racist sentiments -- dismissing Obama as akin to the black firebrand Jesse Jackson, or by leaking images of Obama in African tribal dress -- they will do it.

Some American liberals have been suddenly, violently disillusioned by the Clintons' tactics over the past few months. But in reality, for people who could see beyond political tribalism, the nature of the Clintons has been plain for a long time.

The idea that Clinton was "the first black president" was always implicitly racist: so screwing around, riffing well in speeches and liking fried chicken makes you black now? In fact, Bill Clinton was prepared to lash black people whenever it was politically convenient, with the quiescence of Hillary. Just after receiving the Democratic nomination for president, Governor Clinton returned to Arkansas to authorize the execution of a black man, Ricky Ray Rector, who was so profoundly mentally disabled that he told the guards to keep his last meal so he could have it tomorrow.

Attacking blacks when an election neared became a habit: in 1996, Clinton signed a package of welfare reform that effectively abolished benefits for poor women after a two-year time limit. They are disproportionately black -- and as a recession hits now, they will suffer severely.

Of course you have to make compromises to achieve power. But at some point, on some issues, you have to say no, I can't. I can't execute this mentally disabled black guy. I can't plunge millions of kids into poverty.

I can't still insist I was right to back the war in Iraq, when it has killed more than 650,000 Iraqis. The Clintons don't have that gagging reflex.

Instead, they chose to turn themselves into weathervanes, pointing whichever way the winds of mega-power blow them. This meant that on all the great issues of their time -- global warming, spiraling inequality, the foolish "war on drugs" -- the Clintons fed and fuelled the right. Hillary is following this approach to the letter. While promising in public to "take on the oil companies, the pharmaceutical companies," she is in fact shoveling more of their cash into her campaign than any other candidate, Democrat or Republican. Fortune magazine recently ran an adoring cover story calling her "the candidate of business."

Why did it take us so long to see them for what they are? Partly, it is because the Clintons were blessed with a parade of even greater grotesques as enemies. The right couldn't attack the Clintons on their genuine scandalous behavior, because they supported it all: the executions, the abolition of benefits, the crackdowns. So they contrived nonsense scandals, like Whitewater and Monicagate. Today, many of them are serving up stale sexism against Hillary: right-wing host Tucker Carlson has announced, "There's something about her that feels castrating, overbearing and scary."

And partly, it is because the nightmare of the Bush years has made even the Clinton years seem like a halcyon heyday.

Think about the symbolism for the watching world if the Clintons manage to snatch this nomination. The people in a majority of states in America will have shown they are ready to embrace a black man as president -- only for some white guys in suits to hand it to the wife of the ex-president. Their arguments in their own defense will seem feeble. The idea that Hillary is more "experienced" seems to me both anti-feminist and untrue. How does being married to a man make you "experienced" in his job? As the stand-up comedian Chris Rock said in a recent gig, "I don't get it. I've been married for 10 years -- but if my wife came out here on stage now, you wouldn't laugh."

Bill Clinton increased jail terms for drug possession, creating a situation where one in nine black men between the age of 20 and 35 is now in prison at any given time. Obama, by contrast, was arguing for the full decriminalization of marijuana as recently as 2004, and has refused to indulge in this deranged tough-on-crime escalation.

If the Clintons prevail, there will be a worse effect still: the US will be much more likely to have another Republican president. Most major polls show Obama is more likely to beat John McCain. The Republicans are desperate for a Hillary candidacy, knowing it is the one thing that can unite their base behind McCain. The far-right radio hosts Rush Limbaugh and Laura Ingraham have begged their listeners to go out and vote for her in the Democratic primaries; the National Review ran a front-page pleading, "Please vote for this woman."

Hillary would be unable to make an election issue out of McCain's greatest weakness n his support for the invasion of Iraq -- because she made the same dumb mistake. She would have to fall back on reinforcing right-wing ideas by bragging about her "toughness." The enthusiasm Obama has stirred among first-time voters would leech away.
With their latest lunge at power, the Clintons have shown us how they should be remembered when the end credits roll -- as a greasy stain on the blue dress of America

[What's his face]

Hi Teri B !
You are right about Howard Dean....he should be tarred
and feathered. On the other hand, what's the urge to vote
for the monster or for Ken Star's alter ego ? Cant you
be content with McCain's fatherly tone and demeanor....
what's the matter with you ?Stop beeing as naive as to
think that either Carter or Tipper's husband could solve
this screw-up....as a last resort you might want to consider Ralph Nader.
Hope I have set you straight ! Whatever you decide..make
sure you vote for a man.

[Mrs. Tiggywinkle]

The Clintons are both very driven and will conspire to do anything possible to win this race. I don't trust Hillary at all. I honestly believe that the negative tactics being used against Obama will come back to bite Hillary on the butt.

Bill really needs to stay home and play with the dog... His attitude and offensive comments are not helping Hillary or the democrats in general.

[Gertrude & Slobodan]

Matha Davidson,
What a mouthfull of indigestible marxist and trotskyist
baloney.What nostalgia ! Forget it Matha.....the days of
the goulag and Stalinist Blood baths will NOT be coming
to a theater near you.....unless you moove to North Korea.
Bon voyage Matha !
G & S

[Ellie]

Matha, thank you for that fantastic comment.

[Nelson Peebles]

Bill Clinton should stay at home
No, actually Bill Clinton should go to jail

Hillary Clinton would have been a lot better of had she done the right thing in the Monica Lewinsky scandal
Hillary knew of Bill's past infidelities

He lied to her. Took her on national TV and disgraced her. Yet she 'stood by her man' or so it would seem
The reality is, she chose to stay with him to further her own political career
Dhe did not have the confidence that she could make it on her own
She also was not sensitive enough to women's issues
Otherwise, she would have recognized how Bill had used his position of power to take advantage of a 21 year old inter/employee
Shame on you Hillary

[SimpleRep]

"Maybe Bill Clinton should stay home?" YOU THINK? Governer Spitzer's resignation only reminded, indirectly, the publc if only symbolically, of who the Clinton's really are...I agree with a previous blogger, they BOTH should stay home.