In what is deemed to be a last bid attempt at grabbing the attention of the masses, US Senator Hillary Clinton began running an advert on television.
It is very short advert that ends in barely 10 seconds and shows America at 3am when babies and adults alike are cosy and snug in their beds. The voiceover says who do you think would be awake and the camera zeroes in on the White House and focuses on a serious and wide awake Madame Clinton, answering a telephone call at that unearthly hour.
The advert is said to focus on the fact that here is a woman who takes her job seriously, knows her way in and out of the White House, has been there, done that, hobnobbed with dignitaries of the world, and by virtue of that familiarity better qualifies for the post of the President of the United States of America than her adversary.
Well, I only hope the American public is not as gullible as Madame Clinton makes them out to be. If Barack Obama is a greenhorn and that is what this advertisement says, then Clinton is no old hand at the game either. And we cannot forget the fact that most of her illustrious predecessors including her own husband William Jefferson Clinton had never really lived at the White House to have made a success of their tenures.
Weren't George Washington or Theodore Roosevelt as new to their respective posts as Obama may be, if he wins? Then how and why should the logic being purported on that propaganda message be justified?
Tough fight
The former first lady and current candidate in the race to the White House had once said in her book: "It takes a village to raise a child." I would like to modify it and say, 'It takes an entire nation, for that matter, the entire world to groom a US president.'
Personally I quite like the energy and charisma of Clinton and admire the tough fight she is giving to her adversary. The Democrats have so dominated the political centre stage this summer that poor John McCain despite his public ranking, is yet to find a spotlight that could exclusively shine on him.
The newspapers are only full of the eloquent speeches of Obama and the much thought out retorts of Hillary. While Obama is being hailed as the man who might sweep America with gusts of change, Hillary would be the first woman to get into the highest office in the US and she is trying her best to do that by marketing her image of being the seasoned politician in the reckoning for years.
Who knows which way the election might swing, but it definitely is one of the most riveting, adrenalin-pumping dramas of our times that we can beam into each day in our living rooms.
College drama
It reminds me of another similar drama that happened during a prestigious student council election in college years ago. Here was A - confident, experienced and smart after having won the elections for four years in a row. Nobody could really shake her. She was followed by B a rival candidate who besides being pretty was unsure of herself and very appealingly raw in her experience. She didn't stand a chance.
However on election eve, B had an accident and yet she came to college, with her glamorous bandages and arm in a sling, standing outside the polling booth, saying nothing yet her injuries speaking volumes for her. The sympathy wave drowned all voice of reason. Needless to say, B won by a landslide margin.
Sentiments can swing anyway in an election. We saw how Hillary's earlier tears helped her sponge up support for herself in the earlier caucuses.
One really doesn't know what else could possibly prove to be the ultimate tear-jerker in the Obama-Clinton standoff. We have to wait and watch how Obama reacts to that 3 am advert.
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