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Nov. 6, 2009
Rabbi Berel Wein: Choosing to hear
JWisdom.com Zero to 1/60th: How to Empower An Hour with Gavriel Aryeh Sande (7 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick The mullahs' big week
Suzanne Fields A Fallen Wall for Fallen Man
Nov. 5, 2009
The Kosher Gourmet: Three scrumptious -- but simple -- butternut squash dishes
JWisdom.com Hidden Hints: Unlocking Faith & Prayer with Rabbi Jay Yaacov Schwartz (10 minutes)
Nov. 4, 2009
Tom Hamburger and Kim Geiger: Should prayers be covered?
JWisdom.com When God played peacemaker With Rabbi Sroy Levitansky (5 minutes)
Nov. 3, 2009
Martin Peretz: Beware, Barack. Beware, Rahm. Beware, Axelrod
JWisdom.com Are you are closet idolater? With Sara Yoheved Rigler (10 minutes)
Nov. 2, 2009
Paul Greenberg: The Holocaust is now on Facebook
JWisdom.com Abraham's Strange Change With Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer (5 minutes)
Oct. 30, 2009
Rabbi David Aaron: Secret to Immortality
Caroline B. Glick Silencing dissent in America
Oct. 29, 2009
Lini S. Kadaba: Do tactics avert flu or reduce humanity?
JWisdom.com We Must Revamp our Religious Vocabulary With Gavriel Aryeh Sanders ( 10 minutes)
Oct. 28, 2009
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: Atheists in Bubbleland
JWisdom.com Why what we wear impacts who we are With Rabbis Mordechai Becher, Menachem Golberger and Aliza Bulow ( 10 minutes)
Oct. 27, 2009
Paul Greenberg: The United Nations Is Outraged Again, Or: Department of Mideast Static
JWisdom.com The Science of Love With Rabbi Jonathan Rietti ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 26, 2009
The Jewish Ethicist by Rabbi Dr. Asher Meir: Damaging disclosures with a twist
JWisdom.com Wisdom and Wonks With Rabbi Eytan Feiner ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 23, 2009
Rabbi David Aaron: Are you ready for the ultimate pleasure?
JWisdom.com Watermark and oneness with Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 4 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick Stop using limited powers in a way that expands our enemies' advantages over us
Oct. 22, 2009
Steven Emerson: Terror Cases Share Desire to Kill Americans
JWisdom.com No More More Family Fights --- Really? By Sarah Chana Radcliffe ( 5 minutes)
Oct. 21, 2009
Tonya Alanez: Holocaust denier sues survivor, calling Auschwitz memoir 'vicious lies'
JWisdom.com Meditating Jewishly: A Panacea for Success by Sarah Yoheved Rigler ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 20, 2009
Dennis Prager: Obama and Dalai Lama: Why Israel Worries about U.S. President
JWisdom.com Abraham was not religious By Rabbi Yitzchok Fingerer ( 6 minutes)
Oct. 19, 2009
JWisdom.comWhy Good People Do Bad Things By Rabbi Eytan Feiner ( 7 minutes)
Oct. 16, 2009
Rabbi Yonason Goldson: The Perfect Number
JWisdom.com Hearing Voices By Rabbi Sroy Levitansky ( 5 minutes)
Caroline B. Glick How Turkey was lost
Oct. 15, 2009
Jeff Jacoby: Peace vs. the 'peace process'
JWisdom.com: Former MTV producer and stand-up comedian Rabbi Lawrence Hajioff: Taming a Control Freak (A VERY fast 15 minutes)
Oct. 29, 2003
Mortimer B. Zuckerman: Graffiti On History's Walls (MUST-READ!)

Jewish World Review June 16, 2008 / 13 Sivan 5768

Hillary circles slowly overhead

By Dick Morris & Eileen Mc Gann


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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | Hillary's suspension of her campaign, and her omission of any release of her delegates, makes her a factor for Obama to consider for the next three months until the Democratic nomination is officially and finally his. Absent an actual statement to her delegates urging them to vote for Obama on the first ballot, Hillary's candidacy cannot be said to have ended.


Rather, the former First Lady will be slowly circling overhead during June, July, and August waiting for Obama to make a mistake or stumble. Throughout the next three months, there will always be the possibility that he errs so badly that Hillary gets back into the race. Should another pastor rear his head or if one of the mythical tapes that are said to be about to emerge does, in fact, exist, Obama cannot rest secure in the nomination as long as Hillary is overhead, waiting.


Even if all of the super delegates desert Hillary, as most will now do, she still has 1,639.5 pledged or elected delegates to call her own. While these men and women can legally vote for either candidate, regardless of the slate on which they were elected, one must assume that they are true Hillary believers, who would not have been put on her slate to begin with. These pledged delegates mean that she is always just a step or two away from the nomination, should Obama commit a faux pas.


And there will be many opportunities for Obama to err over the next three months. With John McCain keeping up the pressure by suggesting ten town meetings between now and the conventions, at which the two putative candidates appear side by side, a weak debate performance or a decisive McCain win in any one of them could trigger a crisis for Obama which Hillary could move to exploit.


General election candidates usually try to move to the center after they have won their party nominations, but Obama may find his maneuvering room cut by Hillary's hovering overhead. Any move to suggest that he might re-engage in Iraq should things fall apart or that he may not raise taxes for ambitious health care plans during a recession — any departure from Democratic Party orthodoxy — could lead to grumbling by Hillary supporters and crimp Obama's flexibility.


Oddly, McCain finds himself in a parallel predicament. Republican leaders are worried that he is not a true Republican and concerned about his liberal positions on issues like climate change, alternative energy sources, torture of terror suspects, and corporate governance reform. His ability, too, to move to the center is handicapped while he awaits his coronation in Minneapolis-St. Paul.


But Obama's is the deeper predicament since, unlike McCain, he does not have a rival whose vote share begins to equal his at his party convention.


Is Hillary deliberately creating such an insecure position for Obama? Otherwise, why did she not direct her delegates to vote for Obama on the first ballot? She claims that she wanted to see her name introduced in nomination and demonstrate her large total vote for her daughter's sake? But wouldn't it be more accurate to say that while she has suspended her campaign, she has not left the scene?

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JWR contributor Dick Morris is author, most recently, of "Fleeced: How Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton, Media Mockery of Terrorist Threats, Liberals Who Want to Kill Talk Radio, the Do-Nothing Congress, Companies ... Are Scamming Us ... and What to Do About It". (Click HERE to purchase. Sales help fund JWR.) Comment by clicking here.



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