'Meet the Press' transcript for May 25, 2008

MR. RUSSERT:  In The Wall Street Journal, a Professor Donald Boudreaux from George Mason University, said he's not a Democrat or Republican, but he's just watching and listening, and that this is a Democratic primary that we're talking about where Hillary Clinton carried white men, and if she thought she encountered sexism in a Democratic primary, then how can she say she's a stronger candidate in the general election, where she's going to deal with independents and Republicans, which might have even a more pronounced attitude towards Hillary Clinton?

MR. MEACHAM:  No, absolutely.  Senator Clinton and Senator Obama and Senator McCain, I think, are--to use business speak--stand-alone brands, in many ways. It's why I don't think the "this is the third Bush term" argument ultimately will work, because McCain seems like a public figure in his own right.  The other important--two quick things.  One is, Senator Clinton can run until Labor Day if she wants, you know?  No, no one's--she keeps talking about people forcing her out.  It's a democracy.  She's running, she's winning the popular vote, God go with her.  So that's, that's that.  The other thing that's important, I think, for all of us, and the press in particular, to remember is you can be for a female president or for an African-American president or for a Latino president and be against Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama or Bill Richardson or whomever.  One of the great things, I think, about this election is, while these issues are live, important and real, the issues of identity, you can, I think, oppose these folks on meritorious grounds and not be somehow consigned to a hopeless retrograde category.

MR. RUSSERT:  Just to put facts in their perspective.  David Brody, on Tuesday you wrote about what actually launched Barack Obama, and it was Iowa--when you saw him back in Iowa giving his victory speech the other night, you went back to January 3rd and you wrote this:  "As I watched Obama's speech [Tuesday in Iowa], I couldn't help but think ...  if and when Obama goes on to win the nomination, he can look back to his victory in Iowa as the turning point.  It was that victory, in snowy white Iowa where a black man won.  At that point, African-Americans across the country started to really believe what--that Obama could win.  What happened?  South Carolina became a, became a blowout."

Just go back and look at these numbers.  This is December, the Democratic primary race:  Clinton, 45; Obama, 27; Edwards, 15.  Cash on hand:  Clinton, nearly 38 million; Obama, 18.6.  That's the end of 2007.  Here's South Carolina in July of '07:  Clinton, 43; Obama, 27; Edwards, 17.  Amongst African-Americans:  Clinton, 52; Obama, 33; Edwards, 5.  After Iowa, Obama won north--South Carolina 55-to-27, he carried blacks 17--78-to-19, which changed the whole dynamic of the campaign.  It was Hillary Clinton who had said this back in December:  "I have a campaign that is poised and ready for the long term.  We are competing everywhere through February 5th.  ...  So I'm in it for the long run.  It's not a very long run.  It'll be over by February 5th."

MS. MARCUS:  Oops.

MR. RUSSERT:  That was the strategy.  That was the strategy, Maureen Dowd.

MR. BRODY:  Oh, well, I was, I was, I was just going to say quickly on Iowa, I mean, it goes back to Iowa and that the Clinton campaign readily admits that they, they blew it when it came to the caucus strategy.  I mean, they just did.  And from Iowa what happened was is look what happened in South Carolina, where we saw so many African-Americans say, "You know what?  He won in Iowa. Well, wait a minute here." And it changed the whole complexion of the race. So it was the caucus strategy that really was a problem for the Clintons since day one.  They recognize it internally, and now they're having to deal with the fallout from it.

MR. RUSSERT:  And at a time when sexism and misogyny and gender was not being talked about as a detriment to the campaign.

MS. DOWD:  Yeah.  It's inexplicable, because Harold Ickes, who works for Hillary, helped write these rules, right, about the caucuses.  So I, you know, the--there's--Michelle Cottle has a piece in The New Republic quoting different people anonymously inside the Clinton campaign about saying what went wrong, and one of them said that the mismanagement of money borders on fraud, because this was someone who had raised a quarter of a billion dollars and still now has had to give 20 million of her own money because of mismanagement and still didn't have a campaign in half the states she needed.

MS. MARCUS:  And the...

MS. IFILL:  And the other thing those numbers kind of explode is the notion that black voters were always on board for the black candidate out of race pride.  Black voters got on board for Barack Obama after it looked like he could win.  It was really very simple, and it was pretty much the same.  Maybe there was some race pride that kicked in later, but in all of the analysis, we, we tend to say, "Oh, well, we know black voters were always going to vote for Barack Obama," and that's not--just not true.

MR. RUSSERT:  Did some of the comments of Bill Clinton add fuel to that?

MS. IFILL:  Oh, yes.  I think we can, I think we can safely assert that they didn't help, yes.

MR. RUSSERT:  We're going to take a quick break and come back and talk about the role of race in this campaign, the role of faith.  The cover of Newsweek magazine, Jon Meacham, as you know, is race.  And John McCain, his VP visits out in Arizona.  A lot more coming up in a special edition of MEET THE PRESS, right after this.

(Announcements)

MR. RUSSERT:  An incredibly busy week, the race for the White House.  Much, much more from our roundtable after this.

(Announcements)

MORE FROM MEET THE PRESS

Meet the Press Section Front

Sunday's Meet the Press guest list July 12: McCain, Schumer, roundtable June 28: Axelrod, Romney, Graham, roundtable June 21: Netanyahu, Nunn, Thompson, Easton, Todd June 14: Biden, Murphy, Scarborough May 31: Leahy, Sessions, Owens, Schmidt, Mulcahy, roundtable May 24: Durbin, Gingrich, political roundtable May 17: Kaine, Steele, Haass, Noonan, Brownstein   Slideshow: A look back at 60 years of 'Meet the Press' Find ‘Meet the Press’ in your area Meet the Press Section Front   Add Meet the Press headlines to your news reader: