HIllary’s Coup de Grace?

03 May, 2008 by Gina Cobb

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A colleague emails:

Don’t know if you watched the Derby, but the horse Hillary wanted came in second, collapsed and was killed on the spot.

It’s true. Hillary was rooting for the filly, no doubt on grounds of gender:

LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Big Brown backed up his trainer’s boasts with an explosive finishing kick and won the Kentucky Derby on Saturday, a commanding victory turned somber by the fatal breakdown of the filly Eight Belles on horse racing’s biggest day.

The cheers for the winner’s 4 3/4-length victory were cut short when Eight Belles, the runner-up, collapsed while galloping out near the second turn. She broke her two front ankles and was euthanized on the track minutes later.

"When we passed the wire I stood up. She started galloping funny. I tried to pull her up. That’s when she went down," said her distraught jockey, Gabriel Saez.

Eight Belles was attempting to become the fourth filly to win the Derby.

The backstory:

INDIANAPOLIS — Hillary Clinton’s pick to win the Kentucky Derby this year came in second, but was later euthanized on the track. The tragic moment at Churchill Downs cast an eerie spell over the campaign and the candidate who recently compared herself and her candidacy to the only female horse running in the race, Eight Belles.

At a campaign in event recently in Jeffersonville, just north of Louisville, Kentucky, Clinton encouraged her supporters to put their money on the 20-1 long shot. “I hope that everybody will go to the derby on Saturday and place just a little money on the filly for me,” she said. “I won’t be able to be there this year, my daughter is going to be there and so she has strict instructions to bet on Eight Belles.”

Earlier that day Clinton visited her Kentucky headquarters where a sign on the wall said “Bet on the filly.” A filly is a young female horse, and no doubt Clinton saw a comparison to the horses’ race and her own political race.

OK, Hillary, you’ve got your comparison.