Taylor Marsh – TaylorMarsh.com – News, Opinion and Weblog on Progressive Politics

BY TAYLOR MARSH

Donna, you have a problem. I’ve not weighed in on Ms. Brazile’s… um… performances on CNN. But she’s got real credibility issues that have shown up via many emails. Hold on to your chairs, folks. This one is a doozy.

From: xxxxx@yahoo.com Sent: Thursday, May 08, 2008 2:17 AM To: donna@brazileassociates.com Subject: This Race Hi Donna!!!! I am emailing you on behalf of many people. I am, as you may know, a Hillary Clinton Supporter. You have probably gotten a lot of emails from her supporters, and I understand from the blogs I often frequent that you have responded to many of them. I want you to know that I read bits and pieces of your autobiography, Cooking With Grease, and thought it was wonderful and well written. I came to understand from your book and from a lot of what I have witnessed in this election cycle that to simply put groups of people in Demographics and Exit polls is a misunderstanding of both America and the Democratic Party. What I have learned is that people often vote based on their experiences. You, as an Undeclared Obama supporter, probably identify strongly with his candidacy because of the struggles you went through during a time when race relations in this country were in turmoil. I voted for Hillary Clinton, not only because I relate to her strongly as both a person and a woman who is very spiritual and devoted to her family and to helping others, but also because she is the greatest candidate to lead this country out of the mess we’re in, and because her policy proposals have been phenominal and close to my heart, because it proves to me that she is not simply talking and promising change, she is telling me how she is going to make it happen. It proves to me that she actually cares. As a young person, I have a big future ahead of me, and I also have dreams and ambitions, and strong opinions and many other things. CNN tells me every day that I should be supporting Barack Obama, because his freshness and newness should appeal to my fickle nature. But I support Hillary, and like many of her supporters, I feel sad and dissappointed and hurt and many other things by what I see, based on rationality and facts, as the poor and undeserved treatment she and her husband have received by the DNC party elite and the Chicago Style Campaign tactics of Senator Obama’s Campaign that I have witnessed with my own eyes and heard a number of stories about. I understand that many of the emails you have received by Clinton Supporters urging you to do the right and ethical thing by seating Michigan and Florida delegates have been angry and often probably obnoxious. But you cannot possibly understand how frustrated they are. And while you may say that they are “the reason” Hillary is losing, whatever her supporters have done or said pale in comparison to the abuse and mistreatment we have suffered from some supporters of Senator Obama. You may use Roe V Wade as a trump card for accusing them of being petty in their vows to not support Senator Obama, should he be the nominee, but I assure you that using something like that as a threat will not work, because there are few (actually, no) politicians I have seen that are as devoted to a woman’s right to choose than Hillary Clinton, and you know that as well as I. Ms. Brazille, I urge you not to disclude and disenfranchise millions of voters from every walk of life from this nominating process simply for the sake of one candidate, because doing so would be an awful mistake. I have respect for you as a person, Ms. Brazille, but I would implore you to make the right decision and seat Florida and Michigan . I would also implore you to stop encouraging super delegates to force Senator Clinton out of the race, because the more they do this, the stronger she gets. Ms. Brazille, I cannot pretend to understand what you have gone through in your life, nor what you are going through now. It would be ignorant of me to try. But many people feel angry when they are stereotyped or put in a box because if what candidate they support. I support Hillary Clinton, and I love all of my friends. Including the great African American friends I have that I adore. and all of the African American women at my mother’s church who embrace me and always tell me how “pretty” I look every time I see them. I also love my Latino friends, my Italian friends, my Jewish friends, my Catholic friends. As I said, I cannot pretend to understand your experiences, but nor can you understand mine. Just because a person’s skin may be paler that yours, does not mean their lives are without suffering. I, for one, cry at night wondering what my republican mother will do if anything happens to her, because she doesn’t have Health Insurance. And because of this, my mother may just support Hillary Clinton over John McCain come this fall. She is a Republican who supports Hillary Clinton not because Rush Limbaugh told her to, but because she believes that Hillary Clinton is a Candidate that may actually care about her. So Ms. Brazille, I would yet again urge you to do everything you can to seat Michigan and Florida properly, and also, I would ask that you stop saying you are “undeclared” on CNN’s panels when clearly you know which candidate you support. Thank you very much for reading this email. Like you, I am very emotionally invested in this Campaign, (as is Stephanie Tubbs Jones, a Congresswoman from the district next to mine who also supports Hillary ) and wish you all the luck in the world. respectfully, A young female voter from Ohio I thought it was a very nice letter. I was so proud of it I even went back and read it over a few times. It was a nice letter, and I posted it on the Comments section in Taylor Marsh, and was told “If this doesn’t reach her then nothing can.” Well, that is a bit of a problem because this was her reply: From: “Donna Brazile” Add Mobile Alert To: xxxxxxxxx Subject: RE: This Race Date: Thu, 8 May 2008 07:58:35 -0400 Thanks Natalie, As of today, I am not going to respond to any more anti American, Anti Democratic emails. Have a nice day. I am sorry because you are sincere, but the Hillary forces are uncivil, repugnant and vile. When you come up for air and would like to email a person who cares about America and not just a personality, I will respond. (emphasis added by TM) Thanks for your time and your interest. Donna I kid you not. That was her reply. This is DNC leadership. A Superdelegate and a person responsible for seating Florida and Michigan. Is this normal behavior for party leadership? I must say that I’m somewhat confused. And if anyone can tell me how my letter to her was “Anti-American” and “Anti-Democratic” and how I supposedly “don’t care about America” because I urged her to count the votes in two swing states, please let me know. I’m dying to figure out how counting votes is “Anti-American” and “Anti-Democratic”.

Clinton’s forces are “uncivil, repugnant and vile”? Brazile has a lot of nerve talking to Hillary’s supporters about a “personality.” You just cannot make this stuff up.