Family quarrels

Rob Price

America's true first family of politics - and it is not Bill and Hillary Clinton - spoke out last week, and their voices sent tremors through the Democratic Party.

The first wave broke Sunday morning, with Caroline Kennedy's endorsement of Barack Obama appearing on the editorial pages of the New York Times - the same New York Times that had endorsed Obama's opponent, Hillary Clinton, two days earlier.

Two days after Ms. Kennedy's endorsement appeared, the other shoe fell with Sen. Edward Kennedy throwing his own support behind Obama, reportedly after enduring a blistering telephone rant by former President Clinton.

And there you have it, folks: the Democratic Party dividing itself into two warring camps, one represented by the Times' eloquent endorsement of the seasoned Hillary Clinton; the other represented by the Kennedy family's multigenerational embrace of a young, firstterm senator.

But this is not some brawl over ideological differences. We all know there are few ideological conflicts between Hillary and Barack. This is a brawl about something else, and it continues to play itself out in weird ways.

The most recent wacky turn occurred immediately after the Kennedy endorsement, when the New York chapter of the National Organization for Women ripped into Ted Kennedy, accusing him of "the ultimate betrayal" in his endorsement of Obama. "He's joined the list of progressive white men who can't or won't handle the prospect of a woman who is Hillary Clinton." New York NOW fumed.

The national headquarters of NOW promptly issued its own disclaimer. "The National Organization of Women has enormous respect and admiration for Senator Edward Kennedy," NOW President Kim Gandy said in an official announcement that appeared a nanosecond after the New York NOW chapter's eruption.

Personally, I thought the New York Chapter of NOW got it just right. The chapter didn't say Kennedy was a white man who couldn't handle the idea of a woman as president; He simply balks at the prospect of a woman president "who is Hillary Clinton." Even The New York Times's own endorsement of Hillary characterized her as "the brilliant if at times harsh-sounding senator from New York."

A lively politics is usually "harsh." People disagree when they talk politics, and they are likely to disagree loudly, vehemently and even harshly. What's wrong with that when you're discussing the important political issues facing your country? In politics, there is no such thing as just getting along.

Clearly, there is something else going on, something we allude to through our use of the term "divisive" when talking about Hillary Clinton. Of course, there are plenty of journalists who put it more bluntly, as the Wall Street Journal did in a Jan. 23 editorial. Commenting on Obama's complaint that President Clinton was willfully distorting his record, the Journal noted: "(Obama) seems to be awakening slowly to what everyone else already knows about the Clintons, which is that they will say and do whatever they 'gotta' say or do to win."

But it's not just the conservative media that is reacting to the Clintons' double-teaming tactics against Obama. Writing in "The Nation" - arguably one of the great liberal newspapers in the country - William Greider had this to say about the Bill and Hill Show: "The recent roughing-up of Barack Obama was in the trademark style of the Clinton years in the White House. High-minded and self-important on the surface, smarmily duplicitous underneath, meanwhile jabbing hard to the groin area. They are a slippery pair and come as a package."

Meanwhile, the New York Times, in an endorsement I personally found balanced and persuasive, praised Hillary's "ideas, her comeback in New Hampshire,… her new openness to explaining herself and not just her programs, and her abiding, powerful intellect. … She is the best choice for the Democratic Party as it tries to regain the White House."

It would be pleasant to imagine there are two Hillary Clintons out there on the hustings: the good Hillary and her wicked twin sister, Hillary2. That at least would explain why one half of the Democratic Party cheers her candidacy while the other half talks nervously about the old circus returning to town.

But there's only one Hillary, and she comes with only one Bill, and the two of them are on the verge of making history. As they march toward that goal, they will present the Democratic Party and individual Democrats with some stark and difficult choices.

Being a Democrat can't be easy these days. Just ask Obama. He already has the bruises.