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February 28, 2008

Dick Morris on the Clinton/Obama Race

Hannity & Colmes

COLMES: Welcome to HANNITY AND COLMES. We get right to our top story tonight. We are just five days away from the crucial primaries in Texas and Ohio. And today marks 250 days until the general election on November 4th. And, once again, today brought mixed news for the Clinton campaign. The campaign announced that in the month of February, Senator Clinton raised 35 million dollars. That's in comparison to just 14 raised in January.

The Obama campaign hasn't released its February figure yet, but they say it is, quote, considerably more. And that's the good news.

A new Rasmussen poll in Texas today shows Barack Obama opening up a four point lead. And, once upon a time, Senator Clinton led by double digits. Joining us now is former Clinton adviser Dick Morris. To keep up to date with the presidential race and get Dick's column and newsletters for free, log on to DickMorris.com.

Dick, welcome back. It's not shabby to say that she raised 35 million dollars. Although Obama is saying more. We don't know how much. But that's from 14 the month before. That's got to show some positive movement.

DICK MORRIS, DICKMORRIS.COM: Well, these folks are in very happy that it's a leap year, so they can get an extra day of fund raising in. I think Obama is going to beat that. He said he was going to beat it substantially. By the way, I think the Rasmussen data you are quoting is for Texas.

COLMES: Yes.

MORRIS: Nationally, I think Rasmussen has her eight points down, nationally, to Obama.

COLMES: Right, that's correct.

MORRIS: The average polling is eight points back. So the problem is, if you are losing in the national polls by eight points, you're not going to win Ohio and Texas. They are just not that different than the rest of the country. And I think that the problem Hillary has, in part, is her fund raising. That's what's getting her into trouble, the special interest money.

The main point of departure that Obama has from Hillary is the source of his campaign funding. Sixty percent of it -- he now has one million donors, largely small donors who are giving 50, 80 dollars. He doesn't even know their names, much less be beholden to them.

COLMES: It's not that people are voting based on where Hillary gets her money. Let me ask you this, what would you do, Dick Morris, if you were advising Hillary Clinton and it's a few days before a primary and this is the way the polls are going? What do you do?

MORRIS: At this point, I'm not sure there is anything she can do. You have got to remember these are all proportional representation primaries, which means you don't win or lose them by knock-out blow kinds of proportions. Obama's 100 delegate lead, counting super delegates, and 160 not counting them, is pretty substantial.

The problem that Hillary has got in Texas is that not only may Obama win the primary, which would give him 20 or 30 extra delegates, more than she gets, but there are 80 delegates, I think 68 delegates, selected by caucuses. And Obama all these kids who go to the caucuses, stay two and a half hours and vote, as well as, perhaps, some Republicans that want to defeat Hillary.

I think that he may open up a 50 or 60 delegate lead in Texas alone. And if Ohio is basically break even and Vermont and Rhode Island don't have much, he could come out of March 5th with a lead of about 150, 160 delegates, with only 600 more to be chosen. And about half of that 600 are in states where Obama carried the next door state, like North Carolina next to South Carolina, Mississippi next to Louisiana, Oregon next to Washington.

COLMES: At some point, do Michigan and Florida have to be addressed, or do we just make believe that that never happened, and not get any of those voters an opportunity to weigh in here?

MORRIS: I think as the process unfolds, the most likely outcome is that even if Hillary were to win three quarters of Michigan or Florida or the proportion that she won in the so-called primary, the unopposed primary in Michigan, and the neglected one in Florida, that would not be enough to make a difference. If it would be enough to make a difference, then I think what they have to do is have new primaries in Florida and Michigan. Obama will win those because his national lead is so large.

SEAN HANNITY, FOX NEWS ANCHOR: Dick, wait one second here. If Hillary Clinton tries to seat, as she is now saying she would do, the delegates in Florida and Michigan, or trying to make them count it, it is the antithesis -- it is the direct opposite of what she agreed to just back in September when the DNC said, if you change the date of your primaries, they will not count. There will be no seating of your delegates. She agreed to it then. Doesn't it sounds like she is trying to steal the election at that point?

MORRIS: Of course it does. Come on, add it to the list. She was one of the leading supporters of NAFTA, and now she says she always opposed NAFTA. Nothing to do with the Irish peace process and now she says she was instrumental in it. The truth is not of great consistency. Certainly, it's not a great problem for Hillary Clinton.

But I think that the ultimate -- if those delegates make a difference, there is going to be a new primary in those states.

HANNITY: I have got to tell you something, though, the fact that she agreed to it and now would change is nothing short of moving the goal post, changing the goal line, all of this stuff.

I want to ask you, if the polls hold right now, she will win Ohio. She will lose Texas. If she loses Texas, even Bill Clinton said himself that this is a must-win state. If she loses Texas, does somebody go to her and say, it's time for you for the betterment of the party to get out, and if they do say that -- by the way, if they need a volunteer, I will be happy to do it.

COLMES: Are you a member of the party? Did you just become Democrat?

HANNITY: If they do do that, what will she say? Will she get out if she loses Texas and wins Ohio?

MORRIS: No, I don't think so. I think if she loses both, which is what I expect to happen, then she might possibly at that point get out. She has appointed Harold Ickes, who is not noted for his charm, to smooth the relationships with the super delegates and seduce them into voting for Hillary. He is not exactly Jim Farley filled with Irish blarney. But I think that what is going to happen is, if she loses both of these major primaries, and I think she will -- that Ohio lead is so tenuous now -- then I think that there is going to be tremendous pressure. The super delegates are all going to jump ship and she'll have to get out.

HANNITY: We saw that certainly with a very, very prominent Congressman in John Lewis now switching his support to Barack Obama. It's interesting you mentioned Harold Ickes, and I will tell you why. The "New York Observer" has a piece, just out today, and he is going on record as saying -- that is Harold Ickes -- blaming Mark Penn. Quote, Mark Penn has run this campaign. When he was asked about this idea that it was officially they say that they are running the campaign by committee, Ickes was, quote, incredulous.

Ickes said, I have been at meetings where Mark Penn introduces himself as the chief strategist. I have heard it said many times. Why is he -- because you know the internal workings going on here.

MORRIS: Sure.

HANNITY: Why he is so adamant in throwing Mark Penn down the stairs on this and blaming him for this failure?

MORRIS: It goes back to my fight with Ickes when I had Penn's job. I was the one that hired Penn and Penn worked for me for two years. Penn is sort of the political consultant wing of it, and Harold is sort of the true believer, left wing of the process. Throwing Penn under the rails, that would have happened to me if we would have lost in 1996. Harold once got so mad at me that he slammed the door to his office so hard they had to replace the door in the White House.

HANNITY: You know, Dick, with all the stories between you and Bill Clinton and the rumors we hear about Hillary and Bill Clinton and now this one, there is not a lot of peace in that Democratic, Hillary land primary.

COLMES: The Republicans all love each other.

HANNITY: Dick, stay right there. We're going to take a break and come back with Dick Morris. Plus, critics of Barack Obama say that he has some explaining to do when it comes to his relationship with a hard left radical with terrorist connections. We'll debate that, give you the inside story. Plus, his recent denouncement of Louis Farrakhan's support; was it enough.

Do you want to be the first to know when Fox News declares the winners of the upcoming primaries and caucuses? Well, it's easy. Just text the word "election" to 36288. We will send you the realtime state by state updates, when Fox News declares the winners on Super Tuesday Two and beyond. Please note, standard text messaging rates may apply.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: At Beaumont, this is our moment and this is our time. And if you will vote for me, and stand with me, and march with me, and work with me, I guarantee you we will win Texas. We will win this nomination. We will win the general election.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

HANNITY: We continue now with Dick Morris. Dick, I want to ask you; I have read your recent columns, "the Clintons Just Won't Learn Here." One of the things you say in the column is about people being dumb-founded by the incompetence with which Hillary has run this campaign and their failed message. You raised the question why the Clintons persist in running a negative campaign when they can't find anything negative to talk about here.

"New York Times" talks about dumping the kitchen sink this week on Barack Obama. Why is it they have not changed strategy or tactics? What do you think it is?

MORRIS: I think we're looking at the Hillary Clinton of health care reform, the one in 1993 and 1994, who when her strategy and the guru fed advice didn't work out couldn't change direction. She kept moving in the - - you know Newton's law of motion. She kept moving in the same direction, at the same speed, and was never acted on by an outside force until she hit a wall. I think what is going on here is that she is incapable of changing.

HANNITY: Right.

MORRIS: Once Hillary gets her guns locked into something, she just goes for it. I think that it was the stupidest strategy in the world and they are still at it. It's a strategy where they talk about her experience and she doesn't have any.

HANNITY: This is what failed in South Carolina. This is what created all this controversy here. We were told that the Clintons were these, you know, the most brilliant political operatives in the world here. Now, there is an issue, and we're going to spend a lot of time tomorrow night on this, and we will touch on it later tonight, and we'll do more on Sunday night's "HANNITY's AMERICA."

There is the issue of this guy from the Weather Underground, this guy Bill Ayers. This is a guy that admits to being part of the bombing with the Weather Underground of the New York City police headquarters in 1970, our Capitol building in 1971, the Pentagon in 1972. And it was reported by Jonah Goldberg, who will be here tomorrow night, that as a right of passage, Barack Obama visited him when launching his political career in the 1990s.

When asked about it this week of whether or not they had a friendship, Barack Obama's spokesperson admitted that, in fact, they were -- that they did have a friendly relationship. This is a guy who is admitting to bombing our Pentagon, and was part of a group that declared war on the United States. I'm sitting here thinking as an outsider, if I'm Hillary Clinton, that's a big issue for the American people in a post-9/11 world.

MORRIS: Yes, Sean, what is she going to do? Her husband pardoned the FALN terrorist.

(CROSS TALK)

MORRIS: She -- wait a second. She was on the legal defense team for the Black Panthers, who tortured and killed a federal agent.

HANNITY: Good point.

COLMES: She worked as an intern at Yale, Dick. You are talking about when she was an intern at Yale for a lawyer who worked for the Black Panthers. Look, why haven't the Clintons, if they are going to throw the kitchen sink --

MORRIS: Alan, I'm not talking about that.

COLMES: Why haven't they done that?

MORRIS: Alan, I'm not talking about that. I'm talking about when Hillary was a law student at Yale, before she became an intern at the True Half Law Firm. Her job was to sit in the court room at the Black Panther trial and see if there was any grounds for appeal. It was a law school clinic that she headed that did that. After that, she did the internship. She was a member as a law student of the legal defense team for the Black Panthers.

COLMES: That was part of her educational process.

MORRIS: It's disgusting that Obama has been involved with them.

COLMES: If the Clintons are playing so dirty and you're accusing them of playing so dirty, and all this stuff is out there, and not put out by the Clintons, and you are alleging, as the "New York Times" did, that the kitchen sink would be thrown at Obama, why haven't the Clintons done that? They haven't thrown the kitchen sink at Obama.

MORRIS: Well, they don't have a sink. The Clintons don't have anything negative on him. What is amazing to me about the Clinton campaign is that they don't have any knockout punch. They are throwing these little bitty jabs which don't accomplish anything, the Muslim garb, his middle name.

COLMES: She didn't do that. First of all, that appeared on the Free Republican web site before it was on Drudge. There is no evidence the Clintons were behind that.

MORRIS: Whoever is doing any of it, there is all this little bitty stuff out there -- or it's plagiarizing the speech from Patrick. Whoever is doing that stuff, and a lot of it is Hillary, it's not effective. It's minor. It's tiny. It's penny ante stuff. For her to base her campaign on this stuff, all it does is alienate people. If you have negatives, wage a negative campaign. If you don't, don't wage a negative campaign. It's not like voters like negatives.

COLMES: Dick, the negative stuff against Obama is not coming from the Clintons. There is no evidence that it's coming from the Clintons. The people who want to smear Obama and the Clintons at the same time will say, look at all this negative stuff. And by the way, the Clintons are doing it, without any evidence the Clintons are behind it.

MORRIS: Alan, the charge of -- It's neither here nor there. The charge of plagiarism and other stuff clearly came out of Hillary's mouth. The charge of roll of the dice, the thing that this is a fantasy, that this is a magic wand, that's all from Clinton. The point about this to me is that she is waging campaign on experience and she doesn't have much, on opposing NAFTA, and she supported NAFTA, a negative campaign against Obama without any real negatives.

And nobody stood up there and said the Emperor has no clothes. This strategy won't work. It's entirely based on substance that isn't there.

COLMES: The negatives are coming from conservatives, but we'll get into that in a moment. Dick, we thank you for coming on.

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