Intolerable Vulnerability: Inside Hillary’s Tears

The mainstream press is aglow today in a gooey puddle of approval for the emotional response Hillary Clinton gave at a NH stop yesterday, and I think I may have watched something else than they did. From CBS News.com (“Clinton Finds Emotion on the Trail”) to the Boston Globe (“Clinton Shows Emotion in Final Hours”) and others, the reaction has for the most part been positive; demonstrating that the media (and voters) thirst for seeing any trace of a feeling human being underneath Clinton’s brushed-steel image — a thirst that overpowers the ability to spot acting even if when it’s quivering into a mic.

She answered a question about the brutal toll of campaigning with details of how hard it is, how she couldn’t do it if she didn’t believe it was the right thing to do (as opposed to the candidates running convinced it’s the wrong thing to do), and the personal nature of this campaign, considering “when we look at the array of problems we have, and the potential for it really spinning out of control, this is one of the most important elections America has ever faced”.

Fair enough. But what got her emotional, and where it happened, reeks of the sort of dark plottings advisors and managers are capable of in the twilight hours of a primary election, especially at a time when polls show poor standings, much of which stemming from voters unable to connect on a personal level with the candidate. She’s not the only one running who’s broken down of course. McCain and Romney have gone a soft one at a stop, both discussing returning soldiers dead or mangled (Romney also did it on Meet the Press regarding the day the Mormon Church would start allowing black priests). In the case of getting the weepies over the war, McCain’s are the most understandable given his military background, but that’s not to say marbleface Mitt wasn’t genuinely moved by mom and pop standing over their boy’s casket as it came off the tarmac wrapped in a flag. The problem with Hillary choosing the end to show some heart is that it can easily be seen as a calculated moment given her standings, being done so over life on the trail instead of loss of life. With that in mind, it’s easy to imagine Clinton campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle thumbing through the local yellow pages after Saturday’s debates, searching for an acting coach to teach Hillary how actors do it on cue.

And she did. There was a brief pause after the start of the answer, and her eyes trailed off into the distance for a moment before plopping her head down on her free hand as she opened up to the room, her voice breaking as the eyes welled: “You know, I have so many opportunities for this country. I just don’t want to see us fall backwards….yeah.” The meek “yeah” at the end was paired with a tender expression, a moment for connection. Gotcha.

The room reacted with applause, and now the stage was set. What followed was, on the surface a conversation between one woman speaking with close understanding friends, but using a wet-nap you could squeegee the away what was being said and hear the true message being sent.

“So this is very personal for me,” she continued, gaining composure “It’s not just political. It’s not just public. I see what’s happening…and we have to reverse it.” Here, the trembling in her voice was far more revealing, and far more real. Because she wasn’t talking about the direction the country has taken or where it’s headed, rather referring – if at a subconscious level – her own campaign in NH. What’s happening is Clinton is on the eve of destruction in NH, and this was a last ditch effort to sniffle herself some votes like a girl crying her way out of a speeding ticket. And it got worse:

“And some people think elections are a game, think it’s like ‘who’s up, who’s down’ (voice breaks, eyes raise)…it’s about our country. It’s about our kids futures, and it’s really about all of us, together.”

Actually, elections are handled and perceived exactly that way. A bloodsport. Survivable by deadly practitioners with the ability to wield Gracie Jiu-Jitsu moves (or perhaps Chuck Norris?) in the trenches when it really counts if you’re going to win. And if anything is known about Hillary, is that she’s a fighter. Enter the Dragon: “But some of us are right and some of us are wrong. Some of us are ready and some of are not. Some of us know what we’ll do on day one, and some of us haven’t thought that through enough.” Now who on Earth could she be referring to?...

There’s an expression in stage acting when a character deviates from the emotion being conveyed to the audience within a scene and directly addresses the crowd while, still in character, called “breaching the fourth wall”; referring to the three walls surrounding a performance stage, the fourth figurative for where the audience sits. It’s used in key points of monologue or even when an actor has ad-libbed and knows they’ve hit a home run the audience will talk about after the show. Turning on the solid voice and swallowing back the past minute of “vulnerability”, here’s Hillary’s swan song of the talk: “So, as tired as I am, and I am, and as difficult as it is to keep up what I try to do on the road like occasionally exercising, try to eat right, tough when the easiest food is pizza, I just believe so strongly in who we are as a nation, so I’m gonna do everything I can  to make my case and (shrugs) then let the voters get to decide. Thank you all.”

I’m surprised she didn’t finish with, “I’ll be here till Thursday, and be sure to tip your waitress.”

Vermin Blasting near McCain

Packed like sardines in a tin can outside City Hall in Manchester on Monday afternoon, the McCain platoon was flanked on all sides by sniper paparazzo, Tim Russert, and the righteous Mr. Vermin Supreme. For some inexplicable reason, Senator McCain passed on the opportunity to engage the only fringe candidate bold enough to challenge him to an on the spot debate. Vermin Supreme was wearing a rubber boot headdress and had an Incredible Hulk fist protruding from his pecker when he challenged the Senator.

Vermin spits venom from a shouldered bullhorn, waxing rhapsodic about how he’s the only candidate who is an organ donor, the only one who supports scientific inquiry into time-travel research, and the only one running for “Emperor of the New Millennium.”

Vermin, or the “Friendly Fascist” as he happily refers to himself, was dismissed as an annoying boot-pebble messing with the Straight-Talk Express as it goose stepped away to the next stop. Vermin did manage to give a series of filmed interviews with outlets unaware he himself is in on the joke.

Passing Gas with Joe Scarborough

I figured when I conned my way into the press bullpen at the Presidential Debates – an area that contains everyone from the ABC machine to obscure members of the Columbian press who moonlight as gunrunners on slow weeks - I’d be privy to all the perceived benefits of knuckling up with the mainstream elite. The reality was sobering. The pen, set up in St. Anselm’s gymnasium, was more ghetto than our hotel the Econo Lodge on Manchester’s west side.

The creaky folding table I worked from barely held up, while Rachel Sklar of the Huffington Post pissed and whined at the WiFi constantly crapping out while she liveblogged. The sound was a serious problem. With their antiquated audio system, it was hard to hear much of the debate, an issue made worse by fans bolted to the ceiling above. They squeaked and wrenched without a break. Before I fingered the source of this squealing I looked around half-expecting to catch Guiliani’s aides sacrificing a pig behind the sandwich table.

After the debates I hit up the Spin Room where representatives of the different candidates deal with all forms of damage control, official comment, how the candidate feels they did, so on. It’s a grim scene of flood lights, foundation and performance analysis.

I caught up with MSNBC host Joe Scarborough and pressed him on the few fireworks that crackled during the debates. The Republican debate could have been titled “Versus Romney,” given the comical beating inflicted on Mitt the Mormon from all quarters. Commenting on the McCain/Romney dustup, Scarborough noted:

“Everyone knows McCain and Romney hate each other. McCain’s reactions to Romney’s comments, his sour expressions while he spoke, and the direct attacks on him just demonstrated how personal this race is between the two of them. They have real contempt towards each other.”

This shouldn’t surprise anyone. McCain’s a grizzled ex-POW who was getting all his teeth ripped out while Romney was researching business schools. After Romney assured us that he could bring effective change to government, McCain smiled venomously and replied: “Gov. Romney and I disagree on many issues, but Governor, I can honestly say that we do agree on this one: You are certainly the candidate of change,” verbally bitch-slapping Romney on his flip-flopping record, and causing a strand of hair from that famous helmet to lose its place.

You could see it in Romney’s eyes: it was the hurt reaction of an otherwise powerful CEO up against a particularly eloquent flow of insubordination…McCain will take New Hampshire.

A Floating Orange Honeymoon

French-Canadian child laborers at the turn of the 20th Century comprised an early, hearty chunk of the blue-collar workforce Manchester, New Hampshire built its economic foundation upon. They toiled long hours at the employ of the Amoskeag Manufacturing Company, its multiple mill structures still lining Manchester’s Merrimack River, and this morning the Tower Mill on Bedford Street housed the John Edwards arrival rally, welcoming Number Two from his “thank-Christ-I-beat-Hillary” win in Iowa.

Ghosts of all those hardened tots from the mills were probably as pissed as us this morning, having to show to the 6:15am call time on the third floor only to learn the candidate was late, and a campaign DJ thought blaring Michael Jackson’s “Can’t Stop Till You Get Enough” on repeat under the hot lights would both sooth the mob while keep the room’s energy laced with ginger. Without it, the crowd serving as the expected backdrop for the mainstream media’s video clips would perhaps have been as dead as all the 9 year-old kiddies who once punched the clock for a fresh 18 hour shift, serving the Corporate Bosses employing them. The irony, given Edwards pitch, was palatable.

The view from the pipes was good though, and one couldn’t help feeling like Mick at the end of Crocodile Dundee, scaling the industrial plumbing bolted above while practically stepping on the heads in front of you. But there was nowhere to go even if you wanted to. The floor was packed solid; the part open for the crowd anyway: half of the entire available space was curtained off for press only, and more beyond that reserved for media equipment and tiered stands. Remaining space was limited and so tight I would’ve passed out butter at the door to squeeze in the Edwardites, had I discovered the breakfast table sooner. (Note: I don’t think it would’ve mattered, considering I later bumped into Maureen Dowd of the New York Times who seemed to be circling the bagels with a sense of malice in her eye…)

Picture a crude YMCA of yesteryear, a structure that in its day employed 17,000 people in an 8 million sq. ft. workspace. Only this youth club came with more pissed adults supervising, less basketball hoops, and so many bitchin’ ways for a 10 year old to lose a finger working the textile trade. This is the history of the setting John Edwards was 45 minutes late for, entering the crammed rally with a trademark grin and bags the size of golf balls under his eyes as he launched into familiar grey rhetoric: fighting for the working class, taking on Washington greed, and change for America. Presumably a breed of change his rival Barak Obama isn’t going to bring.

I won’t bore you with the content of his greeting speech to the crowd. If you saw his speech after the Iowa caucus last night, you’ve heard it essentially word for word. This morning basically found him higher pitched, with his voice cracking a few times underscoring the physical strain of the trail. Last week’s efforts in Iowa are creeping up on him causing his normal orange-marmalade smoothness to snap like Bobby Brady’s voice, and furthermore casting a slightly dazed hue over his expression. I wonder what he’ll sound like later tonight, at oh, 7pm, at the Nashua rally? At this rate I’d wager he’ll closely resemble someone who’s just deep-throated a Rhino, but the day isn’t over yet. Not for us, anyway. The specter of 18-hour workdays haunts Manchester even now, 4 days from the primary: if not for the candidates, then definitely for your correspondent.