The Nancy Pelosi Superdelegate Hop-Step
There are days when I almost feel sorry for Nancy Pelosi. Not only has she turned out to be a miserable failure as a Speaker of the House and has helped to drive Congressional approval ratings to the point where more people approve of smallpox and lemon juice on papercuts than Congress, but she’s also stuck right in the middle of the Democratic Primary process. I can’t feel too sorry, though, because she got herself into the trouble she’s in right now.
A smart person in her position would have ducked every election question. The Speaker of the House doesn’t ahve a lot to do with the election and you could forgive Pelosi for wanting to stay out of the steel cage match that the primary has become. Besides, she has plenty of other stuff to do, like seeing if she can hit single digits before November. Instead, she decided, what the heck, why not just see if both of her feet could fit into her mouth in the same week.
Just a few days ago her position was that the superdelegates shouldn’t vote against the will of the people in the coming convention. Bad answer. The Clinton people got mad, the Obama people got glad, and the historians got to wondering what in the heck she was talking about. Since then, someone must have reminded her that the superdelegates were created to vote against the will of the people, so now her new line is that the superdelegates should vote for whomever they wish. That ought to completely flip the Obama and Clinton campaigns, since it’s exactly the opposite position from the one she took about a week ago.
I’m honestly not sure where Pelosi thinks she’s earning points. Neither campaign’s going to like her very much since she waffled worse than the morning rush cook at IHOP. Her Helpy McHelperson act can’t be ingratiating her any with the superdelegates either.
Yeah, I almost feel sorry for her. Then I remember what a self-aggrandizing weasel she’s been and I think that she’s not been embarassed quite enough.
(Cross-posted to The Sundries Shack)
But why should she worry? She’s got the job of Speaker essentially for life. Unless the Democrats contrive to lose control of the House (not likely any time soon), or she gets defeated in a primary (she does have an opponent this year; claims she is insufficiently liberal), the only way political correctness will let the Democrats replace a woman Speaker is if they can come up with another woman. The fact that her incompetence at her job rivals Bush’s at his is irrelevant.
wj - My bet is that she loses the house in 2010.
And as regards relative incompetence, you should probabloy note that Congress’ approval rating is right about half the President’s.