Hillary Clinton is receiving criticism today for this statement, in which she mentioned the assassination of Robert Kennedy while explaining why she remains in the race:
My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.
It seems quite obvious that Clinton was simply establishing that nomination contests sometimes continue into the month of June. Her first example, her husband in 1992, stands for that precedent. The reference to Kennedy is her second example.
Certainly, it would have been better for Clinton to have said something like “Robert Kennedy and Eugene McCarthy were still campaigning in June 1968,” and left it at that. But for those of us who remember RFK’s assassination, it’s easy to understand why, speaking off-the-cuff, Clinton would refer to the event that made the 1968 California primary memorable.
In short, there’s nothing here, and the New York Post’s headline that “Clinton Raises Assassination Issue” is grossly misleading.
UPDATE: I fail to see how one can construe Clinton’s remark as a statement that she’s remaining in the race just in case Obama is assassinated. In that horrible event, the party would almost surely turn to Clinton whether she were still in the race or had withdrawn.
To comment on this post go here.
Notice: All comments are subject to moderation. Our comments are intended to be a forum for civil discourse bearing on the subject under discussion. Commenters who stray beyond the bounds of civility or employ what we deem gratuitous vulgarity in a comment — including, but not limited to, “s***,” “f***,” “a*******,” or one of their many variants — will be banned without further notice in the sole discretion of the site moderator.