Hillary Clinton pays visit to Palazzo Feinstein Part 3: And so does Barbara Lee

Hillary Clinton pays visit to Palazzo Feinstein Part 3
And so does Barbara Lee
San Francisco
October 1, 2007

This is the last part of my reports titled "Hillary Clinton pays visit to Palazzo Feinstein". ("Palazzo Feinstein" refers, of course, to Senator Dianne Feinstein's 16.5 million dollar mansion which commands a spectacular view above one of San Francisco's toniest neighborhoods.)

I contemplated a 4th part to be titled "The Swells of War" to describe the arrival and departure of wealthy Hillary Clinton supporters-- but am not knowledgeable enough about the individuals to judge them.

They definitely appear to live in a world far apart from any I have yet scarcely had a glimpse of or desire to know. None fully understands, I guess, to what extent even they, with all their wealth, are bought and sold-- just as so many politicians are bought and sold, just as most all of us are bought and sold in this society we live in.

I was flummoxed by the exaggerated propriety and polite deferment paid by some protesters to individual passing guests when only moments before they had been singing songs set to ridicule them. "Please tell Hillary..." "Please tell Dianne..." "Please do something..."

At the same time I liked to imagine many of the guests inside-- with their drinks in hand and napkins full of delicacies-- telling the political bosses in private audience to "impeach Bush"... "to bring our troops home now." "To do what is right for the people."

Of course. That was what many of them must have been doing. That must be why they could later walk by we protesters, divulging nothing, and without flinching in shame.

And what were the bosses telling them? To "hold steady." "Help us win the next election... don't be naive.. you will see...."

But who are the bosses? Clinton and Feinstein? The ones who came to write the checks. Both?

I thought to myself, "God forbid if they are inside that house seconding each other to strike innocents somewhere without mercy." (Some people, I think, do indeed think like that. Remember one of the most recent examples, in Lebanon?)

So much for my darkest thoughts.

Barbara Lee arrived later than Mrs. Clinton who was inside. As the security detail had become thicker such that I could see her only from a distance, I wondered if someone in the garage had signaled that she must wait awhile before going upstairs to join the other guests. After a short pause, before entering-- she suddenly turned around and ventured alone across the street to greet several protesters. She talked with them a few minutes. All smiles and solidarity-- and then she returned to the garage where it appeared she was really to be held up. Had she missed an elevator? Were they waiting on a floor to dry, or for someone to come pick up some shards of broken glass?

For several minutes I could see her standing inside the garage. She anxiously peered back at us across the street from time to time with a somewhat embarrassed-looking smile-- the type you make to a friend when you can no longer remember their name. Finally she disappeared, as if her flight had arrived.

I later asked one of the women protesters what it was that Barbara Lee had said when she had spoken with them. The woman explained that Barbara Lee had thanked them for being there, and to "keep it up." She had said that with us doing our job "outside," she could do her job better "inside." Supposedly that meant that she had come to change some minds.

The woman who reported this remarked that she had been refused a meeting with Barbara Lee for months.

For the next hour, the protesters and I milled about outside occasionally spying someone with a wine glass looking out from an upper window-- not at us-- but at some distant cloud perhaps-- all the while yakking on a cellphone. We nervously eyed the small army of security who were silently monitoring us. Occasionally, a police officer would assert themselves by informing us to toe a line.

Once a neighbor with her nose buried in a book and obliviously walking her dog on a leash zigzagged through the midst of them, putting the closest police officers on alert. In another moment a bumping sound was heard coming from down the street; the driver of a giant red Hummer looked as if he were fleeing. "He just hit somebody!" someone called out-- and everyone loudly laughed-- to the chagrin of the police wedded to their spots.

Finally the guests began to depart-- looking about as inscrutable as when they had arrived, except for having a slight expression of undefinable disappointment. A few tarried to bandy a few words with the protesters who appealed to them to get Clinton to be more responsible. One man, obviously impressed by all the Green Party banners, railed against the evil Ralph Nader.

Barbara Lee left, this time waving aloha to the protesters across the street before disappearing into the chauffered vehicle that had been waiting for her. She was smiling at them as if to sing "We will meet again... don't know where... don't know when...."

Then-- to universal cries from the protesters to "Stop the war!" Hillary Clinton also departed. Same beatific smile, same refusal to look at anyone, including the people whose many hands helped guide her out of the garage and into her getaway vehicle.

Mike Allen and John F. Harris writing for Politico yesterday reported that the Clinton campaign has recently become bumpy.

They wrote:

"Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) last week flew into a sudden burst of media wind shear. After months of mostly rosy portrayals of her campaign’s political skill, discipline and inevitability, the storyline shifted abruptly to evasive answers, shady connections and a laugh that sounded like it was programmed by computer." (http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0907/6088.html)

But if her campaign is faltering, what are the states of her opponent's? Just as the San Francisco Chronicle is learning from San Francisco's non-existent mayoral race-- the corporate media may be beginning to worry about how it will "clean-up" financially without a real presidential "horse race".

Meanwhile, the world looks less and less safe from the growing potential of a broadening war in the Middle East. With impeachment "off the table", a skittering economy, and neocons possibly restrained only by growing resentments and disloyalties within the U.S. military-- the 2008 election still looks eons away.