Maybe this is just Hillary Clinton's debt retirement plan

If Hillary Clinton can't win...why is she spreading so much toxic waste? (It's really true that she can't win, by the way, not even if Michigan and Florida are seated at full strength. See Al Giordano for the details.)

The usual suspects: she's delusional (thinks she can win), she's negotiating (wants VP), she's spiteful (angry that she lost, or as ctk points out in the comments, angry that Obama has said "no" to her VP aspirations), and that she's undermining Obama (for 2012).

There's some truth to all of those, but here's a different idea: this could mostly be a cynical attempt to retire her mountain of debt.

The HillaryClinton.com homepage yesterday

Remember, she's stuck with something on the order of $21 million in debt. That's probably one quarter or or one fifth of her net worth, and she's going to be on the hook for it if she doesn't get it paid off soon.

Even if she can get around the rules which say that she must retire the debt by late August, as soon as her supporters think the nomination contest is over, the flow of money will stop.

She has to make the campaign seem real, otherwise nobody will donate to it...and she'll be stuck with the debt.

Clinton's message these days is "show me the money" as much as anything else. If you watch her on the trail, everywhere she goes, she is pushing people to go to HillaryClinton.com to make a contribution. Her last two "victory" speeches were more like infomercials. Yesterday, I checked out her site and it had been completely taken over by a fundraising pitch.

If this is what Clinton is up to, even in part, I do find her actions heartbreakingly cynical. It's not just that she's encouraging 11 year-old kids to sell their bikes to raise money for her campaign -- it's also that she's putting the entire 2008 campaign at risk and further dividing the Democratic party for selfish financial reasons.