I was sad to learn today that Samantha Power, who has been called "one of the most creative and dynamic thinkers on the political horizon," resigned from the Obama campaign due to her extremely unfortunate comment about Hillary Clinton.
Ms. Power is the author of the Pulitzer Prize winning book "A Problem from Hell: America and the Age of Genocide," and a former professor at the Kennedy School.
The comment she made (to The Scotsmen) was:
"We f***** up in Ohio," she admitted. "In Ohio, they are obsessed and Hillary is going to town on it, because she knows Ohio's the only place they can win.
"She is a monster, too - that is off the record - she is stooping to anything," Ms Power said, hastily trying to withdraw her remark.
But it was too late. The Clinton campaign leapt upon the remark and pointed out how inconsistent it was with the broader Obama message, and Ms. Power realized she had little choice but to resign.
How can someone so circumspect and thoughtful make such a mistake? It's not surprising, actually, considering how intense this campaign has become. It's easy for anyone within one camp or the other to be seduced into demonizing the other side in just this manner. As Stu Rothenberg, editor of The Rothenberg Political Report, puts it:
"The whole Democratic race has ratcheted up in intensity. It is just incredibly meaningful right now. And so there is a tendency for people to kind of snap or say things that are more caustic and negative than they would. There is also a fatigue factor; this has been a long race. Staff has as much invested, maybe more, than the candidate, it sometimes seems... This is not breaking the law to call your opponent a monster. That's just politics."