Emmett Tyrrell has some thoughts:
The reason for the dramatic decline in Hillary’s front-runner status is that Democratic voters increasingly are alarmed about a large hairy monster that has been roaming through their consciences for years, probably since they first heard of Gennifer Flowers and of Bill Clinton’s diplomatic negotiations with his draft board. The monster is the Clintons’ record of lawlessness and scandal. Already in this campaign cycle, Democratic voters have reminders of the Clintons’ unsavory practices, felons among their contributors, even shadowy Asians bundling checks, as in 1996, and, of course, the politics of personal destruction practiced against their opponents.
My guess is that a sizable number of Democrats have had enough of it. Obama represents a clean break with a troubled and mediocre past. As Hillary leaves New Hampshire, she challenges Obama on the question of experience. The junior senator from Illinois should take up her challenge. Hillary can chide him for his lack of experience, and he can remind us all of Hillary’s unique experiences, beginning with the Clintons’ “holiday from history,” and Travelgate, Filegate, missing billing records, lying under oath, her cattle-futures bonanza, the Riady family, Johnny Chung, John Huang, Charlie Trie — and suddenly, you see it, too, the large hairy monster that is the Clinton legacy.
Also, long-time cartoonist nemesis of Bill and Hill, Sean Delonas, is in high form in the wake of New Hampshire. (Note to visitors from the future, not a permalink. Select January 10th, 2008 in the pulldown boxes).
[Update a couple minutes later]
Dr. Sanity has some additional thoughts on the Democrats denial and anger:
Just as Hillary had a neurotic and “forgetful” moment regarding the antics of her husband; what we are witnessing is a supremely neurotic moment on the part of the left, who willy-nilly have jumped the Clinton ship and climbed aboard the Obama “vessel of hope”. They are astounded that the antics of the Clintons (which for years they have rationalized and excused) are being used against them. Their idealization of the Clintons had worn thin and, just in the nick of time, along comes a younger, prettier face that can help them shore up those tired, old “progressive” ideas, and delude them into believing they actually are supporting something fresh and innovative.
I hate to tell them, but Obama is just another socialist hack. For sure, he’s fresh and young and articulate. But his ideas are no fresher than Hillary’s and quite a bit more rigid and uncompromising. Hillary and Bill never believed in anything but themselves. Obama comes across as selfless as Mother Theresa, promising to lead us to his utopian wonderland.
What we are witnessing is the neurosis and fickleness of the political left, who just a short time ago adored the Clintons and could bear nothing bad be said about their legacy in the White House.
I still see a lot of potential for a very ugly August in Denver.
[Update a couple minutes later]
Oh, man. I didn’t pop the corn soon enough. I didn’t expect this until March, at least. They’re eating their own:
Obama’s national campaign co-chairman, Jesse Jackson Jr., slammed Clinton’s now-famous misty-eyed moment by wondering aloud why she didn’t shed public tears for victims of Hurricane Katrina, for example.
“They have to be looked at very, very carefully in light of Katrina, in light of other things that Mrs. Clinton did not cry for,” Jackson told MSNBC.
And they think that Huckabee is going to split the Republicans? This could be the crackup that finally drives the blacks off the Democrats’ liberal plantation. The slave revolt may be finally beginning. The big tent may be falling down around their ears. And the destruction of that coalition that the Clintons started back in the nineties may be finally coming to completion. If so, let’s just hope that some new, and better parties arise from the ashes.
[Update a while later]
Dennis Wingo in comments links to Camille psychoanalyzing Hillary today. This may not be just a night, but a year of the long knives.