Organizing for America | Maxim Thorne's Blog: Hillary's Endorsement by Independence Party

Hillary's Endorsement by Independence Party

By Maxim - Feb 27th, 2008 at 11:22 pm EST

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Tags: barack, Clinton, debate, farrakhan, Maxim Thorne, Obama

Kenrick Ross wrote that Senator Clinton thought she could score a cheap shot last night with her addendum to the Farrakhan segue of the debate, but her little anecdote about her clear 'rejection' of the Independence Party is not as cute, or accurate, as it seemed.

First, she made a parallel between Farrakhan's endorsement of Senator Obama and an Independence Party endorsement, but the two aren't comparable. The former is one man's public endorsement, while the latter is associating one's name with a political party- and its platform- on a written ballot. The Independence Party would have literally put Clinton's name as its standard-bearer on the 2000 NY ballot. I've not heard of Farrakhan trying to register the Nation of Islam as a political party and putting it on November ballots with Obama as its candidate.

Second, she made the Independence Party seemed like a racist, fringe hate group that was trying to strong-arm her into accepting their endorsement. Yet, in 1999 USA Today (as far as I know, not part of the vast anti-Clinton media conspiracy Paul Begala railed against last night on CNN), said this of then First Lady Clinton and President Clinton, and the Independence Party: "And if the Independence Party endorses Clinton as its Senate nominee -- an endorsement she and President Clinton are aggressively pursuing,". Rather than the Independence folks stalking Clinton around New York trying to rope her in with a hateful lasso, it seemed the other way around. And for good reason, the Independence Party is the third largest political party in New York state and routinely draws more than 300,000 voters. New York allows for third parties to split tickets, allowing them to 'endorse' whoever they like and put them as choices on the ballot, so often a Republican also runs on the Conservative line, etc. What made USA Today take notice in 1999? The Independence Party had hitched up to Ross Perot's reform movement and that year, their presidential candidate was Pat Buchanan. The idea of a Buchanan-Clinton ticket was too enticing to ignore. And not only for the media, when asked about that probability, Clinton adviser Howard Wolfson did not reject it, saying "We've had no thoughts about that. We would cross that bridge when we got there." Clinton did reject the Independence Party's nomination because among its leaders was Lenora Fulani, who had refused to renounce anti-Jewish statements from 1989.

Third, guess who was the Independence Party nominee for Senate in 2006- Hillary Clinton.

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