Why Hillary Should Stay In the Race

Everywhere on the radio, TV and internet people are saying that it is time for Hillary to step aside. For once I am in agreement with Hillary and feel she should stay in the race until the convention. I don’t say this because I think she can win, she can’t. Not unless something so outside of the pale is found out about Obama that it forces him to stand aside and I definitely don’t see that happening. I also don’t think Clinton is staying in the hopes that Obama will pick her as his VP. That isn’t going to happen either.

So why should she continue to stay in the Presidential Race? If she should get out now it would look like she is admitting failure. That Obama is the winner and has beaten her. Admitting defeat or even admit the softer sounding idea of being pushed out is not something either of the Clintons can easily say. Not when she can walk out of this looking like a winner, even though Obama becomes the Democratic candidate for president.

Imagine this…. It is the convention and Clinton stands before all of the delegates, party big wigs and the whole nation via the TV coverage she would be sure to capture. Then Hillary delivers the speech of her life in which she graciously “gives” Obama all of her committed delegates. She then asks all who voted for her to help out Obama for the sake of party unity. Now instead of looking like a loser as she would if she dropped out before the convention she instead appears to be a “kingmaker”. She turns defeat into victory by giving the nation the illusion that Obama becomes the nominee only because of Hillary and her delegates.

If she did this it would totally belittle Obama’s wins. She would effectively have him cornered where he would have to now thank Hillary even though he and most of the world knows that he would have been the candidate even without her help. And if he tries to say as much or complain he would now be the one accused of tearing the party apart and even of being rude to Clinton. Plus if Hillary’s supporters who are angry at Obama end up voting for McCain this would not be Hillary’s fault for she could point to this speech and say she told them to go with Obama. It would then be Obama’s problem for not being able to keep them….

I have no idea if Hillary has envisioned this kind of end but I wouldn’t be surprised if the thought has crossed her mind. But I just don’t know if she can withstand the growing pressure from all sides to step down now. I am not fond of any of the Clintons but a part of me is rooting for her to hang in there and then go out like a winner at the convention.