Clinton technique -- the distraction

With the nomination contest between Hillary Clinton and Barak Obama heating up, the Clintons are starting to resort to some of the classic techniques they have used in the past. I'm sure they had not planned on using these until the general election campaign.

Yesterday, a commentator at MSNBC noted that Chelsea Clinton has now been taksed for a more active role in the campaign. He described this as "pimping-out" Chelsea; probably not the most elegant language but certainly the gist of the facts. While the most important trend in the nomination is the erosion of Clinton's support, Hillary got the classic distraction going by whining about the language used about Chelsea. And thus, the media was distracted from the real story.

A Clinton distraction like this, one involving an attack on the media, serves dual purposes. Not only is the public distracted from what is really going on but members of the media are discouraged from sharp coverage of Clinton in the future. In fact, Hillary's complaints about unfair media coverage disguise the reality that she has been treated very gingerly -- not only in comparison to republicans who are attacked on a regular basis, but also in comparison to other democrats. Who else, for example, could claim eight years of experience as "co-president" while keeping all of the documents secret that might shed light on this claim.