NBC’s Chuck Todd appears to be concerned that 2016 will be a repeat of 2008 when the media helped take the Democratic nomination away from Hillary Clinton.
Tuesday morning Todd tweeted, "Judging by new NBC poll, there may be more members of the press searching for a Dem foe for Hillary than actual Dems":
Judging by new NBC poll, there may be more members of the press searching for a Dem foe for Hillary than actual Dems. http://t.co/xz1M6jgYEr
— Chuck Todd (@chucktodd) November 12, 2013
The poll in question is one finding Clinton with a ten point lead over Republican New Jersey governor Chris Christie.
Along with the tweet was a link to a Politico article entitled "Wall Street's Nightmare: President Elizabeth Warren":
There are three words that strike terror in the hearts of Wall Street bankers and corporate executives across the land: President Elizabeth Warren.
The anxiety over Warren grew Monday after a magazine report suggested the bank-bashing Democratic senator from Massachusetts could mount a presidential bid in 2016 and would not necessarily defer to Hillary Clinton — who is viewed as far more business-friendly — for the party’s nomination.
And the fear is not only that Warren, who channels an increasingly popular strain of Occupy Wall Street-style anti-corporatism, might win.
The "magazine report" Politico referred to was the following from The New Republic:
In addition to being strongly identified with the party’s populist wing, any candidate who challenged Clinton would need several key assets. The candidate would almost certainly have to be a woman, given Democrats’ desire to make history again. She would have to amass huge piles of money with relatively little effort. Above all, she would have to awaken in Democratic voters an almost evangelical passion. As it happens, there is precisely such a person. Her name is Elizabeth Warren.
A Harvard law professor and best-selling author who led the congressional task force overseeing the bank bailout, Warren was already a liberal icon before she set foot in the Senate last January. Her public floggings of Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner helped make her a fixture on MSNBC, “The Daily Show,” and The Huffington Post.
As Mediaite reports, this led Todd to comment on MSNBC's Daily Rundown Tuesday, "The Elizabeth Warren boomlet of yesterday was just sort of a reminder of how I feel like there is a press corps, a media, whatever, among Democratic elites that are more interested in a Democratic primary than Democrats."
That "boomlet" of course was the Politico and TNR pieces.
So is Todd saying that he doesn't want a repeat of 2008 when Clinton seemed to be cruising toward coronation until a relatively unknown junior senator from Illinois threw his name into the ring and got enough media attention to not only make it a horse race but also to ride that wave right into the White House?
Let's be clear: the media were just as much on Clinton's bandwagon in 2005 as they are today. However, two years later they clearly wanted a horse race more than a coronation because that increases ad revenues.
Is there any reason to think that won't be the case this cycle?
Consider who's currently featured at the top of the perilously liberal Huffington Post:
Possibly much to Todd's chagrin, the "Warren boomlet" continues.
Readers unfamiliar with her should be advised that she truly is a darling of the far-left, much more so than Clinton who devout liberals consider to be too moderate like her husband on certain issues such as foreign policy and the economy.
Such people might therefore champion Warren over Clinton giving the media the horse race they love.
With this in mind, we could be setting up for not only several political campaigns in the coming months and years, but also a struggle between the "Hillary Deserves To Be Coronated" media and the "A Horse Race Is More Fun and Better for Business" media.
We know what side Todd's currently on. Where will the rest of the press fall?
Stay tuned.
