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Part of Obama’s persona is self-reliance. He’s calm he’s cool he’s self-possessed. In many ways, he has tried to define himself in opposition to Clinton’s sometimes needy, often undisciplined, emotionalism.
Obama has made America cool again – and more than that, he’s made his own brand arguably the most powerful the world has ever known.
The fight is always the same within the Democratic Party, isn’t it? The more things change, the more they stay the same.
Washington is still very much a male-oriented culture. Being from Los Angeles, I think it is less so there – there is less attachment to tradition, perhaps, there is more flexibility, more acceptance of change generally. That is partly because of Hollywood.
When I joined Bill Clinton’s start-up presidential campaign in 1991, I was confident that women would play an ever more important role, but I never gave a minute’s thought to what would happen if we won. When we did – and I became the first woman to serve as White House press secretary – it changed my life. But it didn’t change the world.
There are people in the public sector with a range of experiences that have no equivalent in business, but are essential to governing, like keeping a kid in school or helping someone get and hold a job. The value of those skills can’t easily be measured against a bottom line.
Palin was a political Hail Mary, a long bomb in the closing minutes of a game that John McCain and Co. were certain to lose. They didn’t care if she had the policy or political or emotional capacity to serve as vice president, let alone president. They were willing to drive the country off a cliff, if that’s what it took to win.