Left Behinds: Hillary's Field of Meaning

Thursday, September 28, 2006

Hillary's Field of Meaning

First, I'm taking the LSAT Saturday, hence the very sporadic blogging this week.

Second, I just took a break and posted a few comments on Ben Smith's blog. I was happiest with the following, LSAT-influenced, observation.

BEN WROTE:
the center of the piece is an argument that she's been a capable but undistinguished senator without clear beliefs, and that that's a problem for the presidency.

Today Clinton offers no big ideas, no crusading causes—by her own tacit admission, no evidence of bravery in the service of a larger ideal. Instead, her Senate record is an assemblage of many, many small gains. Her real accomplishment in the Senate has been to rehabilitate the image and political career of Hillary Rodham Clinton. Impressive though that has been in its particulars, it makes for a rather thin claim on the presidency. Senator Clinton has plenty to talk about, but she doesn’t have much to say.

To which I replied

Hm those kinds of considerations (how remarkable are her legislative accomplishments?) might be relevant for a Senator who's merely a Senator and pondering a prez run, but Hillary operates under completely different semiotic rules. She's iconic, for better and for worse.

Posted by: solomongrundy at September 28, 2006 11:52 AM

Brilliant comment. Somebody should get that Solomon Grundy guy a blog. And admit him to the law school of his choice.

1 Comments:

At 12:38 PM, Antid Oto said…

I'd be willing to bet a fair amount that Hillary won't be the Democratic nominee. Remember that at this point in the last presidential cycle Joe Lieberman was crushing in all the primary polls and everyone just knew he was going to be the nominee. If I had to pick a likely winner it would be John Edwards, since two of his strongest states--Iowa and New Hampshire--are the first two caucuses of the primary season. He should win both, giving him The Big Mo heading into New Hampshire.

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Thursday, September 28, 2006

Hillary's Field of Meaning

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