Isn’t terrorism, despite all the hand-wringing from the serious people and their bedwetting allies in the blogosphere. This is the real GOP nightmare:
Hillary Clinton apparently thought that she had a killer sound bite during Thursday’s debate when she ripped Barack Obama as a promoter of “change your can Xerox.”
Instead, the audience booed, critics winced and once again the New York senator’s attempt to demonize her rival fell flat, another illustration of how 2008, at least so far, is the year that negative campaigning just doesn’t work as it once did.
“It looks like people are just burned out on that stuff,” said Peter W. Schramm, the executive director of the Ashbrook Center for Public Affairs in Ohio.
In state after state, voters said they moved from Clinton to Obama — or, on the Republican side, from Mitt Romney to John McCain or Mike Huckabee — partly because they were tired of what seemed like politics as usual.
Without negative campaigning, the GOP has- well, nothing, really. They have no new ideas. They have unattractive candidates. Their standard-bearer is someone who can easily be tied to many (if not most) of the disastrous policies of the Bush administration, someone who has gone out of his way to seek part ownership of the extremely unpopular war in Iraq, and someone who gets less attractive by day as reporters suddenly begin to examine his record. No amount of straight talk can insulate McCain from the party of Bush, Cheney, and DeLay, and now negative campaigning, dragging down the Democratic candidate, may not work.
And that has got to scare the shit out of them.
rilkefan
Apparently the Obama campaign didn’t get the news.
calipygian
McCain is the GOP’s bottom. Next step is to work hard against the interests of the country to paint Obama as the 21st Century Jimmy Carter (Malaise Forever!). Given that we stand at the precipice of stagflation, that may be easier than I think. After four years and everyone has forgotten about DeLay, Abramoff, et al. and we have pushed the last helocopter off the last aircraft carrier recieving evacuees from the embassy in Baghdad, the GOP runs Bobby Jindal in 2012.
1) Fuck up and sabotage
2) ??????????
3) Profit!
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
I think that’s only a subset of their nightmare
I think they, along with Hillary, are absolutely frightened that the machine of cause-and-effect, empirically tested, mathematically discrete politics is no longer profitable.
Sure, you can use it, maybe on small races and such. But politics have become so illiquid that it’s highly profitable for someone like Obama to take a risky stand on something.
So Obama is “being reckless” (in their eyes) and winning by gobs and gobs. And now the mathematical candidates like Hillary have to go find the storage locker they left their spinal columns in. It’s just been _so long_ since they had to push for something, they’ve forgotten how to do it.
Shabbazz
You mean “Hating Libruls” isn’t a viable campaign platform?
I’m very much looking forward to the day when I can remind the wingnutted “treason-mongers” that we are at war and any criticism of the sitting president emboldens the enemy and borders on treason.
I’m betting they won’t take doses of their own medicine very graciously.
John Cole
AT least around here, Rilkefan, we kinda laugh at TalkLeft posts. And will continue to do so until there is a Democratic nominee. TalkLeft is Hillaryis44.org with a more readable font.
demkat620
But Pat Buchanan assured me they only have to call Obama a liberal several hundred times and John McCain can move in to the White House.
If they can’t call people names, they might as well get off every ballot now, cause they don’t know how to do anything else.
Mary
Meanwhile, all hell breaks loose in Vegas as the Democratic delegates meet.
TR
Agreed. Next time, try to cite someone a little more objective, like Mark Penn.
F. Frederson
Kudos to that audience. Next up: permanently derailing the Straight
LieTalk Express.TR
*objectivity
Although Mark Penn clearly has an objective, and that is to suck at everything he does.
wasabi gasp
Its awful how that Hillary lady has to muss herself up and “react strongly” after being “attacked” by that Obama guy.
myiq2xu
Carville and Begala talked to the Kerry campaign people after he tanked against George the Lesser in 2004 and asked them why they didn’t run negative ads against Monkeyboy.
The Kerry crew said that polls showed that people said they didn’t like negative ads.
“And you believed them?” was Carville’s response.
Negative campaigning works. If anyone thinks that the GOP Slime Machine has been rendered impotent, you’re in for a rude awakening. The Turdblossom Special will be running at full speed by September. Those boys ain’t shit for governing but they’ve made defamation of character an art form.
Of course, tearing down your opponent only helps if you have something to offer in their place.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
More weak sauce from Talk Left.
They have a point about the Obama campaign being dumb enough to trust a Newsday article. Newsday has already been caught fabricating complete stories before. It’s going to require a retraction.
But then they finish off with the second point by accusing Obama of _disagreeing_ with Hillary’s health care item making everyone buy in, and doing so using the old _mom and pop paying bills_ scare. When will Senator Obama learn that married couples don’t worry about bills anymore?? Everyone knows they just take out another subprime loan when the red numbers get a lot of digits.
Also, Senator Obama failed to note in his flyer that every single fact about Hillary’s plan is better, and Barack is a wee wee face.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
I’m sorry, we can’t give you full credit for that answer.
The answer is “suck at everything he does, while getting paid 7 digits for it“
John
I agree with myiq2xu. The republicans are just much, much better at throwing slime than the Democrats.
McCain will not make any negative ads. Neither will the RNC. You’ll get shadowy swift boaters whispering to Sean Hannity and that world-rockin’ Matt Drudge.
That’s the kind of slime that gets people worked up, not Bill calling Barack Jesse.
myiq2xu
Laughing is so much easier than addressing the merits of the post.
“It’s from TalkLeft? Ha ha ha ha ha!”
See?
J. Michael Neal
The other problem with Clinton’s whining in this case, is that she did support NAFTA. Yes, she can claim that she no longer does, but she did.
I think it’s a shame, since I think NAFTA has been a good thing, but whadda you do.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
/sigh/
Take a message to your sweetie for me, k? TORTURE IS ALWAYS WRONG.
TORTURE IS ALWAYS WRONG.
RAPE IS ALWAYS WRONG.
TORTURE IS ALWAYS WRONG.
see how easy it is to have a spine?
ThymeZone
That rilkefan link is one of the oddest things I have ever seen. Can anyone figure out what the point is that they are trying to make?
I don’t think it’s all about resistance to negatives, although I agree that this is part of the Obama phenomenon.
It has much more to do with Obama himself. Those who don’t get this just hate the idea, but the guy attracts voters to his style, his frame of mind, his personality, and his conversational tone. The halting stuttering Not Martin Luther King style of speaking, the non lecturing approach.
When Clinton speaks I feel that she is telling me that there is a test on Monday and it is going to be a ballbuster. When Obama speaks I feel like he is telling me that he knows what to do, trust him, trust in the future.
The style of the message is different, and right now, people are just damned hungry for something that looks and sounds like it isn’t, as they say, politics as usual. That may include negative campaigning, but that is only a small part of it.
I just like the guy. He doesn’t pander to 6000-year-old-earthers, he doesn’t sell fear of terrorists, he is against the war, he is not a Republican. He doesn’t lecture me. He is calm and resolute in the face of whatever they throw at him.
Ka-ching. I send money, and I vote for him. Simple.
superdestroyer
Take your thesis to its natural conclusion. What will the U.S. be like as a one party state? Will the former Republicans start voting in the Democratic primaries. What will politics be like when the general election is a moot exercise because the real election was in the Democratic primary. Will more than half of the Congress be able to run for reelection without a real opponent?
SmilingPolitely
Why does Hillary’s campaign keep insisting on shooting itself in the face?
From today(Youtube Link):
Hillary is unhinged
D-Chance.
Lee Smith, subbing for Michael Totten: We shouldn’t elect Obama because the Arabs may not like him.
And if we elect him, we’re exporting the idea that skin color and religious affiliation matter? So we should stay safe and go with the old white Christian guy, I assume. I dunno, the article meanders all over the place… if anyone can translate and put it in layman’s terms, please do. Smith seems to change subjects and points of view about a half-dozen times through that piece. Very weird, yet a disturbing tone to the whole thing.
dslak
One of Michael Totten’s claims is that Arabs will be upset that Obama isn’t a Muslim, because his father was one. He doesn’t ask anyone if they really hold such a view, however.
Don’t want to challenge the narrative that all Muslims are intolerant!
myiq2xu
I thought you were my sweetie?
p.lukasiak
I hate to break it to you, but Hillary’s line wasn’t the problem, it was the delivery. It actually a very good line, but it skilled timing and delivery. Hillary never should have used it before “auditioning” it before a groups of supporters, just as a comedian will try out new jokes in small, friendly venues before going on the road with them.
Negative campaigning has to be done “right” — its always gotten a bad reaction if its done badly. (e.g. Barack Obama got away with his “Walmart” comment despite it being a low-blow because it was well-timed, and Hillary got away with her Rezko line because it was a response to Obama’s low-blow.)
**********
as for Hillary taking on Obama’s attack mailings on health care and NAFTA, good for her. She’s setting the agenda for the debate on the 26th … and my guess is that her internal polling showed that she scored big on the “health care” portion of the debate a couple of days for her.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
I did (above), but the point is “HEY NOT FAIR MEANIE YOU SAID NO ATTACKS AND THEN YOU CRITICIZED HILLARY AND CRITICISM IS AN ATTACK SORTA RIGHT??”
[/cruise control]
Don’t you worry about explaining yourself TZ. This is turning out to be one of those subcultural things. Some people vote for the person, their mascot (and expect others to do similar); and some people vote for the message, at least because of concern for the issue addressed.
I bet if any one of the other candidates even dropped their schtick and started playing Obama’s game, Obama would be immediately in trouble. Obama is a naive junior senator with some serious ambition, and he would get pwned.
But instead all the others cling to what they have tighter. Just be content in knowing what you know, and sit back and enjoy the ride. It’s the best show in town.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
I love you, but you seem to love Hillary more than you love me, and that makes me sad. You have to choose myiq. I can’t take your tomcatting around.
I hate to break it to you, but you’re still fucking oblivious.
The majority of Hillary’s peripheral support is comprised of people that can still appreciate Obama’s attempt at a purely non-cynical campaign. They just trust Clinton’s history over Obama’s. It’s not complicated, dude. Wise up.
She got booed because rational people would hate the idea of gouging a superstar Democrat unnecessarily.
PROTIP: You can be a Hillary supporter and still find Obama a good guy.
Asti
Me too! ;)
Mary
Given her display of fury today, now I’m wondering if the weakass plagiarism charge last week was scheduled to ding Obama’s image as an honourable guy so that this attack would have a better chance of sticking. And her “moment” at the end of this week’s debate — you know, the one made into an ad that she and Bill are asking donors to send them $1.3 million so they can broadcast it — was meant to again highlight the contrast between the sweet and honourable Hillary and the nefarious Obama revealed today.
I’m sorry. I’m done giving this woman any slack at all.
myiq2xu
Is it just me, or does CfC border on incoherence a lot of the time?
I feel like I’m at some “New Age” poetry reading when I see his comments.
Asti
Not really. It only shows the kind of lameness you are attracted to. The line sucked, and her delivery only accentuated that fact.
t jasper parnell
WaPo
No if that isn’t straight talk, I’ll eat my hat, assuming I have one.
Asti
Mary’s not so quite contrary. ;)
calipygian
I read the essay and, in between 10 century Arab poet quotes, what he has in mind is that he seems to think that Muslims will consider Obama an apostate because Obama-daddy was Muslim and Obama isn’t.
Expect more idiocy like that the closer we get to the election. Is Obama a Black Nationalist? Is Obama an apostate Muslim? Is Obama a crypto-Muslim? Is Obama the unholy alliance of a Black Nationalist Muslim Marxist and Jewish Mother? I wish the wing nuts would get their story straight. I’m starting to get really confused.
Asti
What I want to know is why more GOP bible-scripture yelling jerks don’t realize that McCain means “Son of Cain”? You would think that those who believe in prophecy and the end-times would realize they are trying to put an evil man into the White House.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
I can’t tell, my thoughts are in a jumble. What did you say?
Hey, I’ll admit that was a broad brush in my statement, but it sticks. Us Pony Molesters aren’t so concerned about Obama, but what he’s going for. We like the new tactic. We’d prefer it be deployed by someone more senior. But nobody is stepping up to do it, so fuck it; We’ll take the lanky pony.
I see a whole bunch of HRC supporters complaining that Obama is attacking Hillary, or Obama is playing unfairly, or Obama this, or poor Hillary that.
I also see a whole bunch of Obama supporters saying “Man, did you see all those people at the rally”, and “Did you hear what Obama said?”, “Did you see the amount of support Obama got?”
To me, that dissolves down to HRC supporters support because they like the lady, and Obama supporters support because they like the message and the change of pace.
Disagree? Say something about it. Yes I’m incoherent. Trying to be honest, but I’m doing other things like programming. You’re lucky I don’t respond in Java.
abstract public class Supporter {
abstract public Object cause();
}
public class HillarySupporter extends Supporter {
static Person HILLARY; // initialize in factory
public Object cause() { return HILLARY; }
}
}
public class HillarySupporter extends Supporter {
static Issues[] DILEMMAS; // initialize in factory
public Object cause() { return DILEMMAS; }
}
}
See? I’m frikkin nuts.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
And a horrible programmer, apparently.
myiq2xu
It’s simple: Obama is a Black Judeo-Moslemcommiefascistlibrul plagiarist/misogynist wannabe messiah.
Got it? Now say it 5 times as fast as you can.
wasabi gasp
When I laugh at the laptop, babycakes looks at me like I’m up to no good.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
ok, those [code] tags are complete shit. it’s what I get for being me.
The Grand Panjandrum
Because Obama has been so successful Clinton is now forced to run against NAFTA, and in effect, Bill Clinton. She is also running against 8 years of her own 35 years of experience. The Clinton campaign has been out thought and out maneuvered. Again. One can fault the Obama mailer for the manner in which a third party quote appears to be from Clinton. I would prefer that minor error not be present, but it is meager when compared to how Clinton has campaigned. Here’s a little treat from Jane Hamsher:
Ouch!
For anyone still concerned about Rovean campaigning I recommend Larry Lessig’s very fine video supporting Barack Obama. So, yes, Clinton is fighting back, shadow boxing, as it were.
myiq2xu
Shaddup and bite your pillow, sweetie.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Were the hickeys I left on you last night too noticeable?
Did Hillary say something about it?
Does she know about me?? HUH?? WHY WON’T YOU TELL OTHERS ABOUT OUR LOVE?? DON’T YOU LOVE ME??
The Grand Panjandrum
Here’s the Jane Hamsher link.
myiq2xu
Here’s the vid from C&L
My other sweetie* lets her inner bitch out
*just until she wins and give me a paying job
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
OMG, this has gunpowder to it.
Obama actually blew something, so he has to address this…
Hillary is looking a little PTA-mom-like by saying what Obama has the right to do
She’s even making gestures that the wingnuts will happily take as nazi salutes lol.
Wingnut post with screenshot and horizontal flip of HRC _obviously_ honoring Nazis in 3… 2… 1…
oh wow.
“aid and comfort” hahahaha
“shame on you… so lets have a debate”
This will be interesting.
crw
I have to say, myiq is right. People always tell pollsters they hate negative campaigning, and perhaps they do, but that dislike doesn’t make it ineffective.
It should go without saying, but the point of negative campaigning isn’t to build support on your side, or even to take away support on the other side. The point is to introduce noise in the process, throw your candidate off message, and manipulate the media.
It works because:
A) In group/out group bias means people will believe outrageous claims about someone if they aren’t part of their in group
B) On top of that, humans are prejudicial little shits
C) The media loves nothing more than to report a controversy. And because modern media thinks objectivity = neutrality, they repeat the bullshit claims without fact checking, commentary or criticism. Even in the rare cases the media does do fact checking, the attacks are still effective because they become the story, sucking away oxygen from the candidate.
So, don’t expect attacks to go away or stop working any time soon. Human nature and the current operation of the media dictates against it. The Republican slime machine will spin into overdrive on Obama if for no other reason than to deprive him of valuable media coverage. And no, the Internet does not magically change the game. If anything, it makes it worse because attacks get the blogosphere in a frenzy and become the center of discussion. Flame wars over an attack prevent people from offering up intelligent arguments for their candidate. We’re all suckers, and we fall for it every single time.
UnkyT
Aren’t you late for a WOW quest?
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
oh shit! I forgot.
/climbs back on/
~leeeeeeeroy jenkinnnnnnns~
p.lukasiak
Your just figuring this out? After years of Hillary smears about her being a lesbian and having an affair with Vince Foster?
Mike S
What is the over/under on terror alerts? Not that it will work again but the GOP is nothing if not consistant.
myiq2xu
That was “investigative journalism”
p.lukasiak
Okay. Think of Conan O’Brien delivering the line. Or Chris Rock. Or any professional comedian…
The thing that worries me most is that Obama and his campaign are beginning to believe their own myth in the same way his supporters do.
I can watch a four minute video of an Obama speech and say “hey, that was really good.” I can watch a debate and say “Obama won the second segment” not because I bought his argument, but because I haven’t lost my perspective.
But most Obama supporters (at least those around here) can’t tell the difference between a good moment for Clinton, and a bad one. That four minutes of Hillary taking Obama to the woodshed for his campaign tactics was extremely effective, whether you like it or not. At the last debate, Hillary won the health care discussion, and Obama was much better on Iraq, and the only people who don’t understand this are “true believers”.
montysano
I saw McCain on Countdown last night, and something in his body language seemed to say “The NYT story is true”. Time will tell, eh? Whatever the case, I’m sure there are more skeletons waiting in the closet. If I were the Dem nominee, I might be tempted to just print huge posters of the famous “Bush hug” and let that speak for itself.
Plus….. McCain’s wife is just plain scary looking. That can’t help.
Califlander
Hillary Clinton apparently thought that she had a killer sound bite during Thursday’s debate when she ripped Barack Obama as a promoter of “change you[] can Xerox.”
Instead, the audience booed, critics winced and once again the New York senator’s attempt to demonize her rival fell flat, another illustration of how 2008, at least so far, is the year that negative campaigning just doesn’t work as it once did.
“Change you can Xerox” is an “attempt to demonize?”
You’re joking, right? Please tell me that’s a joke. Cause if you think “change you can Xerox” is demonizing, you are in no way, shape, or form ready for a general election race against the GOP.
montysano
@ p.lukasiak:
Oh, I disagree. She seemed shrill, and a bit desperate. Her response was substance-free, just a lot of carping.
The MSM Kewl Kidz and the parties tried to handpick nominees and cram it down the voters’ throats. Trouble is, the voters have other ideas this time around, thank heavens.
The Other Andrew
Obama and company need to be more careful about what they say. McCain could put on a full-length musical about bombing Iran, and the media wouldn’t bat an eyelash, but if Obama misphrases a sentence or two, it could be over.
I’m not usually a bible guy, but in our current dynamic, it’s good to be as shrewd as snakes and as innocent as doves…maybe the Magical Unity Pony will become some sort of hybrid griffin?
p.lukasiak
okay, I was willing to think that we had a legitimate disagreement over the effectiveness of that Hillary moment.
But do you really expect me to take you seriously — as if the media hasn’t been giving both Obama and McCain much more positive coverage than their rivals? I mean, did you watch the post-Iowa coverage? McCain comes in 4th, with 12%, and he’s the guy with momentum going into New Hampshire? Obama wins in Iowa, and suddenly the Clinton campaign is on its deathbed?
montysano
Dead right. Remember Howard Dean: he whooped, They destroyed him. Simple as that. The media’s creation of and participation in news is, in a way, our worst problem because They prevent or impede any real discussion of the true issues.
zzyzx
I’m neutral on this attack – didn’t think it was horrid, didn’t think it was uber helpful, but the one thing that confuses me is the timing. Why go on the offensive on a Saturday when no one is watching the news? By Monday, Obama’s team will have a chance of spinning this.
montysano
In the last few weeks, once it was apparent that the story had changed, yes. But for months leading up to Super Tuesday, it was Clinton, the Mittster, and Ghouliani.
myiq2xu
It begs the question, have they lost perspective or are they lying?
I don’t think I’ve ever seen an Obama supporter admit that he was wrong about anything or less than perfect.
borehole
p.lukasiak, I can’t imagine either of the comics you named delivering that line, because they’re funny. Leno, maybe.
It was a terrible, terrible joke. It would’ve been a terrible joke even if it made sense, which it did not, as the subject of “Xerox” in its verb form would appear to be Obama’s notion of change. By the joke’s logic, the problem with Obama is that others will rip him off.
Regardless of who we’re supporting, we must–MUST–do all we can to stop Democratic consultants from attempting to craft laugh lines. Finding crap funny aids and abets crap.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Jesus. Whether or not you have kept your perspective, you certainly have some stupid expectations.
People laugh at comedians because they go to their shows to laugh.
Do you think people go to see political figures because they want to poke fun at things aimlessly, or because they’re looking for a project and they’re trying to pick which leader would lead the project best?
This is why people are laughing at you p luk, you’re acting like this is some retarded TV show.
People find this stuff sacred. When lines are thrown about like “Change you can Xerox”, they get booed down because they’re disrespectful to the atmosphere of two people seeking to do good for the country.
“professional comedian”. Are you fucking kidding me?
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Obama has been wrong many times.
There. Feel better?
/he just does a good job of keeping an even keel, so we tend to give him the benefit of the doubt
//he’s still a novice, though
demimondian
I’d say so. You should guarantee that the derived classes are final, since otherwise a Roving adversarial coder could override the original supporters and define their issues himself.
calipygian
Obama playing into the Gooper frame that “Social Security is broken! Lets get Merril Lynch to take care of your retirement funds” frame? That was dumb. Especially when all that is needed to make Social Security solvent forever and ever is a quarter percent raise in the Social Security withholding and raising the retirement age to 70.
zzyzx
“I don’t think I’ve ever seen an Obama supporter admit that he was wrong about anything or less than perfect.”
I’ve done it tons. I think he occasionally stumbles in his speeches (especially lately when he’s getting a bit tired) and doesn’t change them up enough in an era of 24/7 news coverage and the Internet.
borehole
Y’know, every Obama supporter I know has some pretty serious misgivings about the guy.
His online fan club’s a little wacky, no argument there, but I think myiq2xu is mistaking “wow, he didn’t collapse like a house of cards under the national spotlight” for “he’s like Christ but hotter.”
Not that illumination knocks card-houses over.
p.s. 70? Fuck that.
demimondian
Yeah, myiq, I’m an Obama fan, but I agree with calipygian that buying into the “ZOMG Social Security is Brokeden!” meme was stupid. I also think that his refusal to accept that mandates are necessary to make any universal insurance plan work is just..boneheaded and stupid.
rilkefan
One reason to read TalkLeft – BTD is willing to criticize his preferred candidate.
ThymeZone
Okay, let’s run with that. What, in the context of this time in the campaign, do you think he has been wrong about?
rilkefan
I hasten to add that one should read demimondian too.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
oh, damn, you’re right!
ssh [email protected]
MOTD: "aww shucks. Anyone wanna sing cumbaya?"
Password:
Welcome, krove
/home/nobody $ find / -name ObamaSupporter.java
/home/bobama/src/java/org/obama2008/ObamaSupporter.java
/home/nobody $ chmod 777 /home/bobama/src/java/org/obama2008/ObamaSupporter.java
Permission denied
/home/nobody $ chown krove !$
chown krove /home/bobama/src/java/org/obama2008/ObamaSupporter.java
Permission denied
/home/nobody $ cat ~bobama/password
loveandpeace
su bobama
Password:
/home/bobama $ vi /home/bobama/src/java/org/obama2008/ObamaSupporter.java
ThymeZone
Demi, on the SS issue I don’t know what your point is (not saying I don’t agree, but that I don’t know exactly what you are arguing).
On healthcare, I consider this issue to be HRC’s second most vulnerable point of attack, for two reasons:
One, as I said yesterday, the President By Injection claim and the I Am the Healthcare Guru claim are both just pure bullshit. She has no actual track record of success in this field. Her husband’s failure to lead effectively on this issue, allowing the moneyed interests to solidify against reform and making the issue the third rail of politics for years, did nothing but set the interests of the people back at least a decade, maybe more. They blew the thing worse than Bush blew his so-called Social Security “reform” campaign. She has no right, AFAIC, to stand there and act as if she is above reproach on the issue. Total bullshit.
Two, the right thing for a president to do, and therefore for a candidate to do, is to lay the groundwork for a process to solve the problem, not to lay out a flawed “solution” and pimp it to a gullible populace. All the proposed solutions are flawed. The question is, how will the new president lead on this issue? See my One, above for how the last Clinton administration totally failed on this score. Totally, completely, blew it.
Chris Johnson
You really KNOW you’re on the internet when people start making code jokes… o_O
demimondian
Regrettably, here, TZ, I don’t think that it’s a matter of a plan, but Obama’s own comments. He started out saying that coverage purchase wouldn’t be mandated. Then, he was forced to suggest that people would be penalized for needing care if they hadn’t bought coverage. He’s on reconrd for both of these — and they’re both disastrous policies.
Clinton’s success or failure on that score is irrelevant to me. I do prefer her plan, for the reasons outlined, but the fact that it’s hers, not his, has nothing to do with whether or not Obama is always right.
demimondian
Not to mention using Japanese-style (eye-shape based) emoticons. :P
ThymeZone
Her plan means nothing. What matters is the plan for steering the issue through the iceberg fields of legislation, and managing a good outcome.
She’s a policy wonk of great capacity. So is her husband. Together, given a great opportunity, and the presidency, they produced nothing, and in fact set the thing back for years.
She says it’s solutions and results that count, not speeches. Oh yeah? Show me the solutions and the results in this field that she can take credit for, that would make me choose her if this issue is key to me. Because I have been watching those two for sixteen years now and I don’t see it. What did I miss?
demimondian
TZ, what Clinton does or not do here is not at issue. We’re talking about Obama’s plan, which is critically wrong on at least two points.
p.lukasiak
In the last few weeks, once it was apparent that the story had changed, yes. But for months leading up to Super Tuesday, it was Clinton, the Mittster, and Ghouliani.
puhleez. The media has never pushed Clinton. I refer you to the Shorenstein Center study of media coverage of the first five months of the campaign in 2007. Obama coverage was overwhelming positive. Clinton coverage was predominately negative — but not to the extent that Obama’s was positive. The media did, in fact, limit our choices to Clinton and Obama — treating Edwards as an afterthought, and just about ignoring everyone else. But to the extent that they ‘picked’ the Democratic nominee, they’ve picked Obama.
On the GOP side, the Shorenstein study showed that Rudy actually got significantly more negative than positive coverage during the first five months. Romney’s coverage was mixed — equally positive, negative, and neutral. The guy the media tried to shove down our throats was Fred Thompson — he got overwhelming positive coverage — until he actually entered the race, and proved to be a dud.
Ironically, the person with the most negative coverage was McCain — overwhelmingly negative. The media pretty much wrote him off, based on the fact that he was spending far more than he was raising — to little effect because Rudy was still 20% ahead of McCain (who was 2nd) in national polls.
http://www.journalism.org/node/8196
After those first five months, my impression is that the media really didn’t seem to be pushing any candidate on us in the GOP, as much as find a challenger to Rudy who would appeal to the “christian right” base. Thompson proved to be a dud, Romney had that “mormon” problem — and the press ignored the most obvious choice (Huckabee). Meanwhile, bad press plagued Rudy, then the focus on Iowa and New Hampshire resulted in Rudy being pretty much ignored (except to criticize him about his late state strategy, and note his deterioration in the polls).
So, along comes Iowa, and Huckabee wins, and McCain comes in 4th — and Huckabee still gets ignored, and the media starts drooling over McCain.
ThymeZone
Nope, you are talking about his plan. Nobody else really cares about the details of his plan. He isn’t going to go to capitol hill with that plan. He is going to have to manage a very difficult process of executive-legistlative interaction. That’s what counts. He knows that producing another version of the plan that Clinton came up with and gave us 15 years of nowheresville in healthcare is a waste of time. And he says so, and watch her blow up over it … because she knows damn well, he has her beaten on this issue. She can do or say NOTHING that will win her one more vote in one primary, on healthcare. She has a lot of words, but no track record, no results, no cred other than lip service.
All he has to do is show up and acknowledge that the issue is important, and he beats her. You think this is about policy details, it isn’t. It’s about who can make something happen. I asked you, why should I trust her to make something happen? Give me a reason please.
ThymeZone
Are you guys even on the same planet with reality? We have demi who argues policy wonk stuff, and lukasiak who seems convinced that the media is holding back his favorite candidate.
Fellas? Trust me: You don’t get what is happening here, at all. Not even close. It aint the media and it aint the policy. It’s about who makes people reach for the DONATE button and the ballot mark. It’s a gut thing. My gut says two things:
Clinton is the poster girl for failed healthcare reform, and the poster girl for “we believed the intelligence” on the Iraq war.
Honestly guys, try to pay attention.
Martin
I do all the time elsewhere. I hate the fact that he voted for mandatory pledge of allegiance in school, for instance. I think the Harry and Louise visuals on his flyer was a cheap shot. I think he misses on some of his speeches and policies. I think he should have taken a stronger line against the media in some instances.
However, as CfC above notes, context matters.
How we expect two candidates in the same party to behave toward each other is different than how we expect two candidates in different parties to behave. When speaking to Democrats in a campaign only against Democrats, he’s been pretty damn good. If we took the last two months and pretended they were the general election, I’d be pretty disappointed – but the context is different.
You don’t expect hockey players to throw elbows in pre-season, but you sure as hell expect them to do it in a real game. Some people don’t see a difference, others do. I don’t think Clinton sees a difference or she wouldn’t be lining herself up to be the starring figure in Octobers GOP 527 ad campaign discrediting Obamas inexperience and ability to lead us through the valley of death. It’s stunning that she can’t see that the GOP will use her in the general to provide iron clad evidence that McCains position is right.
demimondian
No, TZ, I am not. If you think I am, you need to go back and reread the original statement.
You, on the other hand, *are* jackaloping.
ThymeZone
Hell no, it is THE money shot. It is the complete and abject failure of the Clintons to lead effectively and let the Harry and Louise campaign define their crusade that let to the massive failure of reform, a failure we still suffer from 15 years later. Harry and Louise should be on the mind of every voter right now. Had Clinton led on the issue and gotten out in front of the objections and the freight train of opposition, we might have accomplished something. When you are taking on something that big and that important, you can’t just make a high-sounding speech and think that the thing is going to happen.
It’s exactly the kind of failure that Clinton wails about now, speeches and no solutions. One of the biggest such examples in our history. Why should I trust her to get it done? I still haven’t seen anyone give me a reason, I see blog horseshit … demi calling my argument jackalope.
The fucking collossal Clinton healthcare failure is a goddam jackalope? Fuck you demi, if you are going to play that asshole word game of yours then get the fuck away from me. Speak to my question. Why should I trust her to get this thing done?
demimondian
To clarify, I am saying that putting out a plan so terribly flawed was a mistake on the part of the Obama campaign, *whether or not it will survive on the Hill*. Sticking to it after the problems were pointed out was an even greater error; it’s easy enough to say “This is just a plan, and of course will change on the Hill. We can work the details out next year; we all agree that the goal is to get all Americans adequate access to health care.” Obama’s campaign would have looked serious and he’d have looked statesmanlike if he’d done that, and he didn’t.
Those were mistakes.
demimondian
Why don’t you try speaking to the actual topic of conversation, asshole? We were talking about whether Obama’s campaign had made mistakes; you raised Clinton, not me, and insist that I said things I did not say.
That’s a jackalope worthy of Darrell, you self-indulgent asshole.
Asti
Well, please forgive me if I interject here, but, might I say that Clinton has years of “this is what I’m going to do and how I’m going to do it” to live up to, while Obama has months of planning to get it right without that “I’ve been here before” monkey on his back. What we need is a loud voice of opposition to those parts of what he says he wants to do, letters, phone calls, and reasons why it won’t work.
He is allowed to make mistakes and own up to them and change them. Hillary on the other hand is so entrenched in her own plan from her hubby’s Oval Office days that she can’t really do that.
p.lukasiak
well, this is encouraging. When forced to, Obots can actually find something bad to say about the MUP.
Now lets see if they can find one example of Obama actually making things work the way he claims he will. I’m not talking about stuff like a typical politician does, making deals with special interests and “stakeholders” and everyone getting half a loaf.
No, I want some example of Obama using his power to inspire and motivate the people of Illinois, or the American people, to effect truly positive change. I mean, he’s had more than ample opportunity, right? Its not like he didn’t have thousands and thousands of people at his rallies that he could say “call your congressperson, and tell them to vote this on SCHIP, and get everyone you know to do the same” — and tons of free airtime during victory (and the occasional concession) speeches, where he brought a crucial issue telecom immunity to a national audience, and told them to call their Senators….
I mean, I’m not saying that Obama never accomplished anything… considering his relative lack of seniority in the Illinois senate, and complete lack of seniority in the US Senator, he was pretty effective — acting as a typical politician does.
I mean, call me skeptical, but showing all the hearings on health care reform on C-Span 3 isn’t exactly my idea of something truly transformative. I mean, do you really think that people will watch that? (let alone the fact that the real deals will be made behind closed doors…. or that drug, insurance and hospital corporations aren’t going to be willing to discuss everything that needs to be discussed in a public forum.)
But, skeptical or not, I’m open to persuasion. so give me an example of where Obama has already done what he says he can do.
ThymeZone
Yes you are, and I am saying, it doesnt matter. The plan will not go to the hill. Another version of another plan will go to the hill. What matters is what the hill looks and acts like when the plan gets there, and how the people on Pennsylvania Avenue manage that process. That’s what failed 15 years ago, failed miserably. And I have no reason AT ALL to think that putting the same team in the White House wouldn’t produce the same failure.
Clinton wants to have her cake and eat it too. She wants to pimp “35 years of experience,” which means nothing, but hope that we won’t notice some of the gigantic failures in that 35 years’ experience. The biggest? The total cratering of healthcare reform in their first term. The wreckage is still smoldering down there.
And talk about tone deaf. Does she really think that Texas voters are going to the polls to mull over policy differences in healthcare plans? That’s the big mistake in this campaign, the foolish and arrogant assumption that having a nicely drafted plan is going to get her nominated.
She needs a plan to run her campaign, that’s what she needs, and it’s about two months too late to start drafting it. Great healthcare booklet, Hillary. Really. Impressive.
Martin
I didn’t say it wasn’t effective, just that it was cheap. Part of staying above the fray for Obama is that voters will buy into the idea and to some degree punish those who don’t. That may not amount to very much, but then it probably doesn’t need to. If another 5% of voters feel that Obama is deserving and got a raw deal and vote for him over McCain, he probably wins based on the last few elections.
If he breaks that image of being above the fray, then all bets are off and they’ll eat the guy alive.
I agree that it serves as a good reminder that the Clintons fucked up healthcare by being pigheaded back in 93, but I doubt that many others will. Hell, most of them probably missed the Harry and Louise tie anyway… so nevermind. I forgot most of these people are retarded and was trying to make sense there.
But yeah, Clinton won’t get shit done. What remains of the GOP will filibuster anything that she likes for the sheer fact that she likes it, and she’ll alienate every progressive Dem by excluding them from the process as she has done with everything over the last 16 years. She won’t have control of anything.
ThymeZone
Your problem, Paul, is that the guy is immensely likeable, and is running against Hillary Clinton.
If he were running against Frankin Roosevelt, you might have an argument. But he is running against Hillary, and she has demonstrated how quickly she can steer her campaign into the same kind of deep crater into which she steered our hopes for healthcare reform 15 years ago.
Fausto Carmona
Someone tell me when the last time “Trust Us, We’re Right On The Policy Details!” ever worked for a Democratic candidate.
I keep watching these threads and get the impression of Clinton supporters hating on Obama because he got the round peg through the round hole. “How dare you! We only deal with square pegs in our party! We can still get it through, we just have to hit it hard enough this time!”
Martin
Well, most of us saw that she was fucked when she hired Mark Penn. It really came down to whether everyone else would be more-or-less fucked than her.
And I have to say, Obama’s ground game is unbelievable. If he can keep that running through the general and get what is a fucking army of volunteers to cover downticket candidates as well, the GOP will be in ruins.
ThymeZone
Erm, yeah, in other words, you got nothing.
Obama’s healthcare plan won’t work.
Well, neither will hers. And because she doesn’t have the chops or the cred to sell her position, and because he is crushing her under a steamroller of popular enthusiasm, she is going to lose and he is going to win.
But, you sit there and insist he’s made a big mistake. Really, it’s …. entertaining.
John S.
Which is a lot more than can be said of you, Paul, in regards to your candidate du jour.
zzyzx
I won’t and you won’t, but the people who really care will, and they’ll report back to us with the important quotes. There will be video snippets and commentary on blogs all over the place.
ThymeZone
Well said. I may have to steal this ……
demimondian
No, asshat, I have exactly what I say I have.
Do you deny that he made a mistake in putting forward a plan that won’t work and then refusing to admit that? That’s the point I made, and nothing else.
Asti
Every candidate has been wrong on something at some point in their candidacy. This is the time to listen to the people and develop a plan. The problem is that Clinton thinks she already listened to the people and developed a plan fifteen years ago and she is sticking to it. She is not running for president with fresh ideas in 2008, she is running for president with old ideas from 1992 and 1996.
demimondian
I don’t recall being forced to do anything, Paul. I was asked to give an example of an imperfection, and I did so. Perhaps you can tell me what exact force you applied?
ThymeZone
Do I deny it? I have been arguing against it here for an hour.
It’s not a mistake. If I were him I think I would do exactly the same thing. Put a flawed plan out there, and let her do the harumph! thing all over it. Don’t you get it? This outburst today isn’t going to win her a damned vote she doesn’t already have.
The only way he could put a plan out there that she’d approve is to put her plan out there. Why do that, when he can just say, hey, do you really want to put these people, who failed you healthcare last time, back in there to fail again? Same old, same old?
Call me crazy, but his strategy has worked pretty well so far. I haven’t ever seen a better primary campaign at this level. Thing of beauty. Your rant about his spelling errors is just sort of …. weird. While you circle his spelling errors, thousand line up to hear him speak.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
Well, that’s not exactly true. He recognizes that his candidate has some negatives.
You see, he’s found through personal research that HRC has a 48% negative rating in purple states, such as Ohio, Texas, and Florida, and some blue states like Michigan. But because Texas only has 400 million delegates, and Ohio has 20 billion delegates, and they’re both dubiously assigned though a mechanism termed the reverse Hoffman-Symposium rule (discovered in Jan. 2007), these delegates are going to have their votes discounted in the general election. Therefore, because the general election seeks to disenfranchise these noble voters’ negative feelings about Hillary, we have no choice but to move on to reinstate Michigan and Florida’s positive feelings about Hillary into the democratic process.
/ 77% 85.4% 33.41%
// Rhomboid dodecahedron.
/// Inverse normal stochatic process compounded against Hillary’s New York-New Jersey wins
//// It’s all so simple!!
Fausto Carmona
Be my guest. I put my snark and pith on the Creative Commons license.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
He systematically manipulated us all into simultaneously divulging embarrassing opinions on Obama by a 6-dimensional matrix of voter opinions, emotional reactions, and complex polling equations that only his genius can contain.
he used butterflies, too
p.lukasiak
Your problem, Paul, is that the guy is immensely likeable, and is running against Hillary Clinton.
that’n not my problem. Its the country’s problem. Or to coin a phrase…. its not about me, its about all of America.
************
Which is a lot more than can be said of you, Paul, in regards to your candidate du jour.
Okay, how about this…
From the moment that Hillary Clinton was sworn into the Senate, she has been running for president, and deliberately positioning herself as a “moderate” who was strong on national defense. Call it cynical or pragmatic, the end result is a series of really bad votes on a host of issues — issues that as a New York Senator she could have voted differently, but made the wrong choice for the sake of her national ambitions. And I don’t fault her for AUMF, but I do fault her for not speaking out strongly against Bush’s decision to invade unilaterally, and her consistent votes to fund the war.
In terms of her policy proposals, I think the idea of a five year freeze on interest rates is so insane that the suggestion that its feasible is pure demagoguery of a crucial issue.
I don’t believe that she will put any effort or political capital at all in order to keep her promise on an issue of personal importance to me — ending discrimiation against gays and lesbians in the military.
And from the day she gets sworn in as President, she’ll be running for re-election, and will do what is politically expedient rather than what is right as long as the consequences of that expediency are not unforgiveably high.
Do you need more?
I’m not the least bit happy with my decision to support Hillary Clinton — merely less unhappy than I’d be with a decision to support Barack Obama.
Caidence (fmr. Chris)
god damn.
Could someone quickly get this self-important dick into an A.A. meeting before he DWIs and runs over some 10 year old Barack fangirl?
John S.
Except that when you qualify a negative by saying something like:
It really undermines most of the acknowledgement, doesn’t it? I mean, if someone cticizes Clinton’s ‘Xerox’ line, saying that it wasn’t the line, just a bad delivery and she just needed to practice it better and it really was good because in theory a comedian would have aced it…
There’s no such thing as everyone else except mea culpa.
ThymeZone
Alright, well, given what we have been through the last seven years, I think a term or two of the Obama administration will be something we can endure.
tBone
And Obama supporters are the ones who have lost all touch with reality? Yeah, good luck with that.
That video plays into every negative stereotype that’s been built up around Hillary over the last 15 years. Providing some extra height to BTD’s tent isn’t the kind of “extremely effective” that her campaign needs at this point.
ThymeZone
I agree with the steak. Her campaign advisors put her up to that and honestly I think they have really let her down.
Asti
Well, I can’t find it now in the gazillion Hillary campaign sites out there, but, I saw not so long ago a soundbite from Clinton during her senate run that said she had no intention of running for president at all. Apologies that I cannot find the link now. If anyone else can find it, please supply it.
I agree. Her idea that freezing the interest rate to fix ARMs is ludicrous.
I would expect Obama to address this before Clinton would.
See above.
What do you have against Obama that tops the things you just reported about Hillary?
John S.
Seriously.
At this point, I am utterly baffled by Paul.
p.lukasiak
That video plays into every negative stereotype that’s been built up around Hillary over the last 15 years.
Just curious, but is there anything that you think that Hillary Clinton could do that wouldn’t fit into one or another negative stereotype of her?
personally, I don’t think there is. Even if she does something that “good”, is always because she’s “calculating”, never because she’s capable of doing good for goods sake.
I guess its ultimately a question of whether or not you’ve ever bothered to seriously question the accuracy of those stereotypes.
I mean, personally, I do think that Clinton is calculating…or, as a Clinton supporter should put it “pragmatic and deliberate.” But that’s based on her actual record, not the media’s presentation of that record.
demimondian
Once again, Clinton’s approval or disapproval of the plan has nothing to do with whether or not the plan itself is out of touch with reality. The plan was stupid, and then his defense of it was foolish. If he had simply wanted to put something out there, then he should have backed away from it, and he did not do so.
If he’s planning on repudiating his plan, great. Let’s hear him say that. Otherwise, he’s going forward towards the election with several financial plans that are worse than nothing.
ThymeZone
I think McCain is your man. I fully support your voting for him.
But seriously dude, I think Obama is smart enough to realize that being president is about leading people to do things, not about having all the right plans and policies figured out. I am sick to death of policy wonks who can’t win and can’t get anything done.
p.lukasiak
What do you have against Obama that tops the things you just reported about Hillary?
actually, I have nothing much against Obama — he’s just a typical political with no relevant experience who a great speaker. I’m in general agreement with most of the criticisms of Obama that were cited above, and I think some of his campaign tactics have been sleazy — but no more sleazy than your average politician.
In fact, back in 2000, I would have been happy to support Obama, and I’ll probably be happy to support him in the future.
But its 2008. The country is broken. It doesn’t need to be changed. It needs to be fixed. And I don’t think that Obama has the first clue how to be an effective President at a time like this. I mean, the guys been in DC for all of three years, the last of which he’s been running around trying to become President. And he’s never run anything in his life.
And while Hillary Clinton may not have “running things” experience, she knows more about what it means, and what it takes, to be President than anyone other than those who have held the office itself. She has a deep and profound knowledge of the complex issues facing this country, and an understanding of how to deal with those issues. Moreover, she’s learned from her mistakes, and those of her husband.
She’s just the better choice for President. (and for different reasons, I think she’s a better candidate to face off against McCain.)
jcricket
I’m a Hillary supporter, but I’ll gladly vote for Obama if/when he’s the nominee. Would have rather voted for Edwards, but that didn’t go anywhere.
That said, I think Obama supporters are in for a world of hurt. hey keep believing that his ability to attract independents is going to make him immune from attack (he’ll just rise above it). They think his rhetorical style will win over Republicans who would filibuster any other Dem.
I’ve got news for you – he’s gonna get trashed as bad as Hillary, if not worse (whee – a whole new generation of Dems to trash), and lots of the trashing will “work”. Some Independents who support Obama will buy the fear/hype and revert back to voting Republican. Some evangelicals will come out and vote Republican out of fear of the secret-black-muslim (or whatever).
Doesn’t make Hillary a better candidate, but some percentage of Obama’s imagined positives are just that (imagined).
None of this makes me less likely to vote for him – but I think there’s serious confirmation bias and subjective validation going on WRT Obama from his supporters. He has very real weaknesses, and the fact that Hillary gets lots and lots of votes means lots of people like her to. It’s not 90/10 blowouts, so get a fucking grip.
Brachiator
Nah. This is just the cynic’s fallacy at work. Campaign adviser slime insist that negative campaigning works because it’s all they’ve got in their toolboxes. The fantasy that Senator Clinton might not have lost 10 primaries in a row if only she had gone negative earlier, ignoring all the other noted deficiencies in her campaign, is the impotent whine of hucksters trying to line up their next campaign job.
This suggests that at best negative campaigning fires up those who are already in the opponent camp, but its impact on people who already like a candidate is much less clear.
The media are often just as craven as anyone else. I watched and listened to a lot of media insider carping that the latest debates weren’t slugfests, because it meant that the post-debate analysis didn’t have anything juicy to hang onto. And fact checking requires that you pay reasonably intelligent people reasonable sums of money to support real journalism. It is much easier, and better for ratings, to just point a camera at some telegenic goon whose name you plucked from the lazy journalist’s rolodex.
Even in the rare cases the media does do fact checking, the attacks are still effective because they become the story, sucking away oxygen from the candidate.
The media has always been lazy and slimy, with rare moments of reflection.
Actually, what has been happening is that parts of the internet become ideological echo chambers where people desperately flee to in order to have their deepest fears and prejudices re-inforced (while braying like asses that they are objective or just telling the truth). People looking to engage ideas without fear have little trouble finding places to hang out.
Speak for yourself.
Actually, it was just BS chum for the conservative lunatic fringe to feed on. None of this prevented Clinton from being elected senator, and it was, and is, meaningless to those who respect her.
They never would have used the line in the first place. Their instincts would have told them that it was lame.
You don’t have to be an Obama supporter to understand that getting booed was a bad moment for Senator Clinton.
Which four minutes was this?
Not even. Neither candidate did well here, and neither was hurt, because the whole idea of a health care plan is theoretical until someone actually puts a plan, and its costs, on the table.
Actually, I thought that Obama was better on Cuba, but I take your point here. And the recent news that Australia plans to pull out of Iraq, but not Afghanistan, may help Obama more than it does Clinton. And it helps both against McCain.
ThymeZone
I dont know how we figure out who will vote for whom in the general election at this point.
ThymeZone
Totally disagree, pretty much with everything you said.
But, it’s what makes this a great country, eh?
demimondian
You lie, you distort, you misdirect — you never actually answer a direct challenge. TZ, are you capable of holding a discussion while actually holding to the topic at hand?
Never mind, I know the answer to that — I’ve been reading your work for years, and the answer is “no”.
I am not talking about voting patterns, or anything like that. I am saying that Obama made mistakes, and that some of them (in the financial and economic spheres) are quite serious, and that some of his proposals will do more harm than good.
I expect him to take responsibility for his position papers, TZ, just as I expect him to take responsibility for his campaign workers. That’s his job.
tBone
Actually, I never bought into the stereotypes. I think the abuse she’s suffered over the years has been disgusting.
Still, however unfair those stereotypes may be, they exist. Do you think a good way to get people to reevaluate them is by putting out a scolding, school-marmish video? Terrible decision, IMO.
ThymeZone
Well, that’s my point. We are talking about two different things. You are insisting there’s a mistake in his plan, and I am saying, even if there is, it doesn’t matter.
What’s going on right now isn’t about the plan details.
To you it apparently is. I don’t happen to agree.
demimondian
Which is to say, you don’t bother to deal with what people say to you.
Whether it makes a difference is *irrelevant*. Is it true, or is it not, that there’s a mistake in the plan? Will you please grapple with the one thing I actually asserted? Will you, for once, not run away from the issue being discussed?
ThymeZone
Uh, I said about two hours ago that his plan was flawed, did I not? All the plans are flawed.
Your assumptions about the relevance of that and mine obvously don’t coincide. I happen to think I am right and you are wrong.
p.lukasiak
The fantasy that Senator Clinton might not have lost 10 primaries in a row if only she had gone negative earlier, ignoring all the other noted deficiencies in her campaign
Have you really heard anyone say that Clinton should have “gone negative” earlier (I’ve seen one person–an Obama supporter.)
I personally think that the Clinton strategy was good — she concentrated on the states that would be (or might have been, had Romney been the nominee) crucial in November. This was a chance for her to define herself to the voters on her own terms in those states — something that she really needed to do, considering her high negatives.
But the Obama strategy was much better — it was basically an insurgent campaign, designed to exploit weaknesses in Clinton’s strategy — and the media’s hostility toward Clinton. (great primary strategy, but not terribly effective for an “unknown” candidate in the general election facing a known candidate with good approval ratings like McCain. Not only does Obama have to redefine McCain for voters, he has yet to define himself and what he stands for besides ‘change’ and ‘hope’, and there are hundreds of millions of dollars going into the right wing smear machine that will be used in battleground states to define what it is that Obama hopes to do, and what changes to expect.)
As a result, while Clinton achieved her goals of winning key states on Super Tuesday, she got no momentum from ST. And the Obama campaign had been working in the post ST states, and instead of getting at least one or two wins and and some credible losses, she got blown away everywhere.
I mean seriously… you don’t go from a 10 point win in NJ to a 23 point loss in Maryland because there is something intrisically wrong with the candidate. We’re talking about two states with similar demographics that are very close to each other geographically — and there’s a 33 point swing in a week? That doesn’t happen…absent finding a candidate with a dead girl or a live boy — or a really bad strategic decision.
But the Clinton campaign has had time to recover, and I think she’ll do well a week from Tuesday (and I hope they learned their lesson, and aren’t ignoring RI at VT).
****************
try this experiment. Go to http://www.mockelection.org/electionmap/ and fill in the states that Clinton won with Blue and Obama won with red, up until super-tuesday… then fill in all the states McCain one until ST in blue, and the states everyone else won in red.
demimondian
No, I don’t see where you said his plan was flawed. For once and for all, I don’t care if it’s relevant that his plan is flawed, I merely want you to acknowledge what I said — and that I said nothing else.
wasabi gasp
At this point in the race, the inability to quickly and easily find a suicide hotline number on Hillary’s website begins to undermine her dedication to issues of health care.
ThymeZone
10:32 timestamp. And I am pretty sure I have referred to his plan as flawed on at least one other thread.
All the “plans” are flawed. And I don’t think it matters at this point.
John S.
Where do you come up with this stuff? The most recent favorability poll I found was from Pew two weeks ago which showed:
Looks like the “unknown” candidate is more favorable than either of the “known” candidates. And when you break it up by voter registration, the numbers are even more telling:
With more favorability amongst Independents than McCain and a favorability with Republicans almost on par with McCain’s favorability with Democrats, how is Obama not effective in the general election?
p.lukasiak
Do you think a good way to get people to reevaluate them is by putting out a scolding, school-marmish video? Terrible decision, IMO.
actually, she didn’t put out the video. Its CNN’s.
But I do think its a good idea, because it goes after Obama where he is most vulnerable — the idea that he’s not just another typical politician, but rises above all the slime that is politics today. But Hillary is showing that while Obama may talk the talk, he doesn’t walk the walk.
And I don’t think that its bad for Clinton in the short term. The people who have their negative stereotypes reinforced weren’t voting for her anyway. And her supporters loved it… media Hillary-haters have been saying that her great moment at the end of the last debate was a pre-concession speech. I think this will shut down that speculation (of course, the same people will call it an act of desperation… )
John S.
Obama is just as slimy as I am!
That’s a brilliant campaign strategy, Paul. Did you and Mark Penn come up with that one all by yourselves or did Wolfson pitch in, too?
Brachiator
p.lukasiak
Here are your own words:
When, exactly, would negative campaigning have worked for Senator Clinton? Should she keep it up? Should she go more negative? Is she really able to do it right?
I think that your comments here may actually reflect the Team Clinton strategy. The only problem is that painting Obama as another typical politician does not necessarily make Senator Clinton into a palatable alternative. I still haven’t figured out whether Clinton’s advisers really want to chase away moderates, Independents and pro-Obama Republicans.
In modern American political history, I don’t know of any Democrat who has run a presidential campaign promising “status quo, with a few fixes.” This goes against the grain of everything that the modern Democratic Party has ever aspired to. Hell, even Andrew Jackson, founder of the Democratic Party, ran as a fresh alternative to the sticks-in-the-mud.
Senator Clinton is, so far, doing a pretty good job at playing Henry Clay to Obama’s Andrew Jackson. It didn’t work the first time, and I don’t think it will work this time either.
So far, Senator Clinton is demonstrating that she cannot run a credible political campaign. How can she claim that she can run a country?
So, being able to run things is very important. Except when it’s not.
I don’t know what Senator Clinton knows, or how deep and profound it might be. But being largely an observer for 35 years does not automatically confer the ability to be a great leader.
In fact, I would suggest that a great leader is not the one who promises to sit in a room and work hard to fix things, but the one who promises to listen, and to get others to do, together, more than they ever believed that they could do alone.
myiq2xu
From Left Coaster:
Damn John, even the bleeding-heart California liberals are praising you. When you betray your roots, you don’t mess around. Those Red Staters ever get their Cheeto-stained paws on you and they’ll burn you at the stake.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
This exchange reads to me like two people with completely different conceptual models of how to create and implement policy, who are talking past each other because neither one understands or accepts basic assumptions that are central to the other side, and instead misinterpret them using a frame of reference which does not apply.
I’m not trying to put words into somebody else’s mouth, so it is possible that none of this applies to either one of you, but give it a try and let me know if any of it fits:
The HRC model is to craft the best policy in two steps: in step 1 you gather and analyze all the relevant data, working with experts in the subject, and construct a best fit plan to address the problem (e.g., Healthcare).
After the best possible policy has been identified, then you proceed to step 2, in which you have to go around and sell it – rounding up votes, twisting arms, calling in favors, doing whatever it takes to get the best possible policy passed. If you can round up at least 50% + 1, then mission accomplished! If you can’t sell people on the best possible policy during step 2, then that reflects badly on them and/or is a failure of political willpower, and you just have to try harder next time.
In this model, you really have to make sure that you haven’t messed up in step 1 (crafting the policy), because the design is basically frozen at that point – step 2 is about passing the policy, not changing it. If you start step 2 with a deeply flawed policy, then we’re screwed. In this model, the role of the leader (HRC) is to direct and supervise the policy wonks in step 1 to make sure they come up with the best policy possible, and then to twist arms in step 2 to close the deal.
This model is basically technocratic in nature, and works well when your advisors are really good, the problem domain is not too difficult, and you already have a working majority you can depend on in step 2.
The BHO model is totally the opposite – it assumes that we can’t design a best fit policy on paper, because a really key component to a good policy is that it must have as high degree of acceptance across as broad a base of support as possible, thus maximizing the chances of passing it now and minimizing the temptation to sabotage it later. It assumes that good policies can’t be designed, they have to be negotiated.
The BHO model also has two steps: in step 1 you call in all the key interested groups and get them to commit themselves to a something very much like a binding arbitration process for crafting the policy, where an upfront acceptance of the result is the price you pay for a seat at the table. In step 2, all the parties who were willing to opt-in in step 1 put their cards on the table, and you negotiate priorities. The desired policy result is a min-max solution such that to the greatest degree possible all the parties involved feel that while they have had to give ground on their lowest priorities, they at least got something they can live with on their highest priorities. The resulting policy may not be ideal, but it is seen as a least-bad solution by a large enough block of interests that passing it is fairly easy (and reversing it later will be fairly difficult).
In this model it really does not matter as much if the starting point is seriously flawed, because the design hasn’t been frozen yet – in fact it is expected to change significantly as the negotiation process proceeds. The role of the leader (BHO) is to bring everybody important to the table, to act as an acceptably neutral referee while they hash it out, and to then to apply maximum pressure to ensure that everybody involved lives up to their promise to support the final result.
This model is political rather than technocratic in nature, and is preferable to a technocratic approach if the problems being addressed are really hard to understand and construct correct solutions to, or working majorities are hard to come by and having some kind of solution is preferable to gridlock. Policies produced in this manner are also less likely to be held hostage to changes in the winds of political fortune, than are policies which were crammed down the throat of an unwilling minority (which may grow into tomorrow’s majority – c.f. the Bush tax cuts).
If you think about these two models, it becomes clear that supporters of one model will look at supporters of the other model and conclude that they are insane.
A HRC style policy wonk will look at a flawed BHO plan (mistaking it for the final policy blueprint rather than the starting point for negotiations it really is) and think “this is going to be a disaster.”
A BHO style consensus building advocate will look at a very detailed HRC plan (mistaking it for the starting point for negotiations rather than the final policy blueprint it really is) and think “this will never get off the ground because it is polarizing and will make it very difficult to sit down the key players and get them to negotiate in good faith.”
In terms of political philosophy the 1st model is classically liberal in its assumptions, and the 2nd model is classically conservative. In that sense HRC and BHO are running a classic liberal vs. conservative contest, not so much in terms of the policies they advocate, but in terms of the type of process they advocate using to get those policies passed.
One of the reasons why I support Obama is that I think his model for constructing policy by building consensus is a much better fit for our current political climate than HRC’s. While I prefer some of HRC’s policy positions, I see the chances of them making it through a Senate where the GOP will still control more than 40 seats (and is willing to filibuster until Hades freezes over) as exactly zero. Obama may get some things passed that are less than optimal, but I’m willing to take that in preference to having nothing but gridlock for the next 4 years and then watching the GOP campaign in 2012 against what they will call “a Do-Nothing Congress and a Failed Presidency.”
Jimmy Jazz
Listening to the sputtering, uncomprehending Hillary supporters, I am reminded of nothing so much as Al Capone being dragged away at the end of “The Untouchables”: You’re nothing but a lot of hot air and a badge!
Hehehe, you can guess who plays Eliot Ness.
Hil? About that Iraq vote? Suck. It. Down.
Splitting Image
“She’s just the better choice for President. (and for different reasons, I think she’s a better candidate to face off against McCain.)”
Actually, I would probably have preferred her if she were running against Romney.
If the last week or so of McCain coverage has done anything, it’s that the Democrats have everything to gain – with Obama – by dredging up the 90s. McCain’s supporters are currently in damage-control mode and trying to argue that everything before 2004 is ancient history.
If Clinton were the nominee (or if she makes a comeback and ends up being the nominee), the Republicans would be more than eager to put the Clintons’ entire resume back on the table and draw attention away from the Keating Five scandal. They can’t do that particularly well with Obama, who can argue that McCain’s sins and Clinton’s are both good reasons for reforming the system.
At this point, I think Obama’s upside against McCain significantly outweighs Clinton’s, although either ought to come away with a convincing win.
Chris Johnson
I keep seeing people saying all Obama does is talk, and I think that if you were able to enact policy on the campaign trail this would be another and much scarier world. All either of them can do is talk at this point, is it so bad that I like Obama’s way of connecting better?
I keep seeing people saying Obama is doomed because the right wing will go negative on the poor naif and he’ll go ‘whoof’ like a feather in a blowtorch, and all I see in response is ‘I don’t care if you say it’s moot, I still like him and thanks to your comment I’m giving him another $10’. What more can people do beyond rejecting negative spin and giving him more money to campaign with?
Americans can be stubborn. I hope so, because more than a reasoned selection of a prime policy wonk to fix particular ills with the country, this is a thundering gut-level referendum against how politics is even done anymore- and I’d hate to see that message blunted. But how can it when it’s even blowing away the best laid plans of mice and Republicans? If we get Obama/McCain as a race it’s a double-barrelled referendum, except that on the Repub side it’s more a rejection of the mechanisms of the party than any rejection of what the modern republican ‘stands for’.
With Obama it’s both a rejection of the same old mechanisms and a rejection of what post 9/11 America has come to stand for, and it’s about time. Long overdue, actually, thanks to those old mechanisms.
p.lukasiak
When, exactly, would negative campaigning have worked for Senator Clinton? Should she keep it up? Should she go more negative? Is she really able to do it right?
I don’t think there was a time that she has gone really negative — which I define as focussing on another candidate’s deficiencies, rather than your own positives, in your presentation to the general public. There was one radio ad (IIRC) that was quickly withdrawn that focussed on Obama. (Obama put up a negative radio ad in response — which I don’t fault him for.) “Going negative” isn’t always wrong, and this is especially true when the other campaign has provoked it by “going negative” first.
Then there is “negative – by -proxy” campaign that both (if not all) campaigns engage in. This consists of leaks of negative information to individual reporter, and the “email wars” — emails not disseminated to the general public directly, put to the media and/or supporters.
The ‘negative’ ones fall into two general categories
1) “Look what someone else said about the other candidate” emails, that highlight negative press coverage toward the other candidate. (this is how the whole ‘plagarism’ thing got traction — when a campaign sends out one of these emails, they are essentially legitimizing a story/opinion indirectly.) There is a variation on this — “I wonder want the GOP will do with this information”, which is designed to say “we’re not going to make this an issue, but we think the GOP will if the other candidate is the nominee” (recently used by the Clinton campaign to bring attention to Obama’s Ayres/Dohrn connection.)
2) “S/he says this now, but look what s/he said before” emails — usually designed to highlight the oppositions (alleged) hypocrisy or change in position. The Obama campaign’s “look at all the other people who have said ‘its not about me'” email is a variant on this.
Most of this stuff is completely ‘legitimate’. But some of it is dumb (‘plagarism’) and some of it is incredibly sleazy (the way the obama campaign played up the race issue in SC.)
The Obama campaign’s mailings aren’t just “going negative”, they are attack ads — and attack ads of the worst kind. Attack ads are bad enough when they represent something that is true — but when you get into the realm of deliberately distorting/misrepresenting another candidates position/history, you’re in “Swift Boat” territory.
The Clinton campaign responded to these mailings the last time, but didn’t make an issue of them. Now that the Obama campaign has sent out the exact same mailings in Ohio, the candidate herself is making an issue of it. But its crucial to keep in mind that she was provoked — the first time the Obama campaign sent these out, they got a warning. now, they’re getting what they deserve.
I think that the Obama campaign’s provocation was deliberate, and was a big mistake. While Clinton hasn’t yet learn the fine art of initiating an attack without appearing to be attacking (see ‘plagarism’), one thing she has learned to do in the last 15 years is how to respond to attacks. (see the walmart/rezko exchange).
Kathy Cole
That was a great summary — need it reposted a little earlier in the next open thread so it doesn’t get lost.
John S.
Excellent analysis. Please post more often.
p.lukasiak
I keep seeing people saying all Obama does is talk, and I think that if you were able to enact policy on the campaign trail this would be another and much scarier world. All either of them can do is talk at this point, is it so bad that I like Obama’s way of connecting better?
While candidates can’t “enact” change, what they can do is have a major influence on what happens in Congress if they choose to do so.
I mean, all the candidates “agreed” on telecom immunity, but only Chris Dodd made it a campaign issue, and Dodd was getting no mainstream coverage of his efforts. Now just imagine what could have happened if all the Democratic candidates stood behind Russ Feingold as he gave a speech/press conference about telecom immunity — and then every candidate spent a couple of minutes in their stump speeches and town hall meetings to urge their supporter to call their Senators on the issue, and to get their friends to do that too.
Now, I think it would have had a major impact — and that Obama would have been especially effective at it. And if Obama had done that, and had gotten results, I’d be much more likely to support his candidacy, because he would have proven that he wasn’t just good at talking about how he would accomplish things as president, he would have shown that he can get that job done.
p.lukasiak
translation:
You think just like me. I want to read more people who think just like me.
Sorry dude, but anyone who thinks that every word of the Clinton health care plan is written it stone — or that it represents the final version — isn’t doing analysis, but propaganda. There are a few things written in stone — the plan has to cover everyone, and it has to provide sufficient subsidies so that its affordable to everyone. But the idea that Clinton will be completely inflexible on every aspect of her program is sheer nonsense
p.lukasiak
And you feel certain that in the current political climate, that the Obama model will achieve the desired results?
John S.
Unlike your formulaic posts that always sum up with “this will be good for Hillary”, ThatLeftTurnInABQ made an excellent post. He built a good case that makes sense, and it doen’t matter if I agree with him or not. That would explain why you have only the lamest of retorts in response to it. Because you got nothing.
You’re a cheap shill and it shows.
John S.
Oh, and here’s a tip, Paul.
If you wrote posts that were actually thought-provoking rather than mindless propaganda, you might actually have a chance of getting through to somebody. All you’ve proven over the last few weeks is that you are very good at filling in Hillary Mad-Libs. Get some new material.
John S.
The press gives Obama a pass and is mean to Hillary!
See, Paul? The media hates Obama, too. How a ridiculous piece that re-frames the wingnutosphere’s howlings over bullshit easily debunked ends up on the front page is beyond me.
But don’t let that stop you from whining.
p.lukasiak
He built a good case that makes sense, and it doen’t matter if I agree with him or not.
the problem with his analysis is that he doesn’t credit Clinton for learning from her mistakes — and making sure that she has enough votes in Congress to pass her plan before trying to get it passed (one huge mistake that was made by the Clintons is that they pretty much shut out the relevant congressional committees that the plan had to get through during the creation of the plan process. Especially after having served in the Senate, I seriously doubt she’ll make the same mistake — yet his analysis is premised on this mistake being made.
John S.
Because anybody who isn’t a complete and total Hillary shill sees that she doesn’t learn from her mistakes. She can’t even admit that she makes them. Or does the fact that she voted for the AUMF and then went ahead and voted for Kyl-Lieberman somehow not register in your brain?
p.lukasiak
See, Paul? The media hates Obama, too. How a ridiculous piece that re-frames the wingnutosphere’s howlings over bullshit easily debunked ends up on the front page is beyond me.
I hate to break it to you, but that was not Obama-bashing. It was an article about the kind of treatment that Obama can expect to get from the right-wing smear machine. Will it give some people pause when they consider who to vote for in the primary? Sure…. but primary voters should consider the candidates’ potential weaknesses in the general election campaign.
ThymeZone
Kept trying to tell demi that, but he had another agenda. Maybe your explanation will work better than mine did.
The “two models of how to implement policy” theme has been on the conveyor belt here before, BTW, and wasn’t original as it came from somewhere out there in MSM. The idea was that Clinton’s style is to insist on everything and then hope to settle for most. Barack’s style is to propose less and then negotiate up. His style, presumably, doesn’t trigger the massive opposition effect.
If you want an example of how her style works, please examine the Clinton administration’s attempt to get healthcare reform 15 years ago. They designed the mother of all plans. The failed to lead properly, used the bully pulpit approach, and lost to Harry and Louise, a campaign that talked directly to the people. Clinton had nothing to counter Harry and Louise. Harry and Louise are still running our healthcare system.
I for one don’t want a repeat of that disaster.
Brachiator
No. Primary voters should consider a candidate’s strengths, and not obsess over the over-rated GOP smear machine. Let me re-iterate a response to you on this issue from another thread that is germane to this topic.
Here is the rub. You speak more of Hillary being a better candidate, but not a better president.
To use a metaphor from military history, to allow the GOP to have any influence in determining the Democratic Party nominee would be like allowing an enemy general to select the officer corps of his opponents. It is absolutely wrong for Democrats to allow the GOP to select the field of battle, to frame the debate, in any way, shape or form.
Democrats need to stop cowering in anticipative fear about what the dreaded GOP MIGHT do. This also applies to the Democrats in Congress who roll over because they fear losing votes or outraged constituents. This is a waste of time. We need to come at these goons with a stake, silver bullets and garlic.
Obama’s advantage now is that he has large numbers of people behind them. Bill Clinton had this advantage also, especially when the GOP goons were bewildered as to why Bill’s approval ratings continued to soar despite the impeachment ordeal.
By contrast, Hillary Clinton’s support has eroded, and she, sadly, not only has failed to demonstrate the political instincts to draw people to her, but also insists on selling herself as a super-intelligent super-serious drudge, who will work hard, and who positions herself as a president for the difficult times ahead. Here, she demonstrates that she doesn’t understand the history of her own party. What was FDR’s theme song, during the depths of the Depression? “Happy Days Are Hear Again.”
Senator Clinton’s greatest weakness is that, unlike the party, and unlike her husband, she does not come from a place called Hope. That she might lose the support of voters turned off by her relentless dreariness makes her far more vulnerable than Obama.
Yeah, we kinda do. They are already trying out the commie, radical, secret-Muslim thing. They are rehearsing the “once a drug user, always a criminal” thing, and I have a pretty good idea of what else they may try, thanks to a recent John Cole posting from the NRO about the good old days of segregation.
The funny thing is that the GOP, like right-wing talk radio, is finding that their relentless wingnut cheerleading and propaganda appeals only to a small, if vocal fringe.
On the other hand, the people who deride Obama as “a poet, not a fighter,” have forgotten the example of Muhammad Ali. I look forward to watching Obama float like a butterfly and sting like a bee as he demolishes the ugly old GOP.
I also think that one of the reasons that GOP zealots fear John McCain is that they are not sure that he will go along with the nastiest anti-Obama smears that they are working on. For example, if McCain were inclined to seriously draft Colin Powell as VP (or even, if he were stupid, Condi Rice), the GOP and their 527 swift boat wing, would find it almost impossible to come out with race-based anti-Obama attacks.
But even apart from this, McCain no doubt has a long memory of how the GOP attempted to attack him and to humiliate his family, by suggesting that he had fathered a black baby. Unless he decides to sell his soul to fuel his ambition, I don’t see McCain going as far as the GOP might like in attacking Obama (or even Senator Clinton). The GOP had a free ride with ethics-free morons like Dubya, Cheney and Rove and the gang. Now, they don’t quite know what to do.
The GOP’s worst nightmare is Obama vs McCain.
Asti
This was an excellent post Chris Johnson and sums up my thoughts better than I ever could. Thanks.
demimondian
SO, let me get this straight, TZ. In your eyes, Obamania is just a left-wing Stray Cock Express? I hope you’re wrong, but you may be right.
If so, however, then Obama’s position paper is still a mistake. You see, I’m going to vote in November on the basis of Obama’s handling of health care. I am an economically driven voter. If Obama’s plan has not changed by November, then I will vote Republican, and I will work to convince others to do the same thing.
Yes, TZ, I will vote for McCain in that case — I’d rather have a thug that is known to be a thug and will get nothing done than someone whose key policies are worse than nothing.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
in reply to comments above –
To Kathy Cole and John S: Thanks for the kind words. I don’t feel comfortable with blogwhoring my own comments on another thread, but please feel free to take what I said and run with it yourself. I don’t claim copyright, as ThymeZone rightly points out, these aren’t exactly original ideas.
To p.ulukasiak: You have some valid points, so let me address some of them.
The two models I was describing are Platonic abstractions occuping endpoints on a spectrum of possible approaches to making policy – I expect that Hillary and Obama themselves are somewhere in between these endpoints.
My point was that Hillary appears to me to be closer to the technocratic end of this spectrum than Obama, and the distance between them is noticeable, not that she has no negotiating capacity at all (and the same goes for Obama – there is a bit of the technocrat in him too, but it is a minor key compared with Hillary).
Also, I was trying to address the attitudes of very vocal HRC and BHO supporters as much as the candidates themselves. It looks to me like the increasing polarization between the two camps that is noticeable on this and other blog sites has a Mars-Venus quality to it. They aren’t speaking the same language, and I was trying to explain that I think this is rooted in different conceptual models, so when we are trying to analyze one approach using the assumptions built into its opposite, the result is “they be crazy people.” I was hoping that a discussion of this might help the two sides to understand each other a little bit better and calm things down a bit.
I really would like to give Hillary the benefit of the doubt here, but she hasn’t done a very good job of building this meme during her campaign. Why so much emphasis on 35 years of experience, and much less mention of what lessons she has learned from her failures during those 35 years? I keep hearing that what she has learned from that experience is how to fight the Right Wing Noise Machine. OK, very good, but that doesn’t really address the negotiation issue. It sounds to me more like “next time, bring a gun to the knife fight.”
Her stubborn refusual to admit that she made a serious error on the Iraq AUMF (c.f. John Edwards) worries me – admitting past mistakes does not seem to be her strongest suit, nor does the group of advisors she has chosen to run her campaign suggest a great deal of pragmatic and flexible thinking about how to recognize past errors or how to make anything more than tactical adjustments in response to them.
In other words – you are right that Hillary may have learned a lot from her mistakes, but why isn’t she doing a better job of telling me that story – I shouldn’t have to take it on faith, or pick it up in blog comments – it should be a clear message coming from her campaign. I haven’t seen much evidence of that yet.
This may be an area where their campaign strategy of running as the inevitable frontrunner was a really bad idea. Not just tactically, but also because it has forced Hillary to remain silent about her past mistakes when it would have been better to air them out and talk about what she has learned from them.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
Oops, I forgot to include this:
No, I don’t feel certain of this. I do feel certain that if Hillary is elected the GOP will stall, obfusticate, and block everything she tries to get passed, and then run against the Dems in 2010 and 2012 as the Do-Nothing party.
Why do I think this? Because they are already doing this in the Senate this year, and because it is very similar to what they did to Bill from 1992-1994. The blueprint is already there – block out and grab the rebound.
I don’t know that Obama will be able to overcome this resistance, but at least he is addressing the reality of it by saying that we do need to have a cross-party dialog in order to get things done. And if the GOP still blocks everything under Obama, then the Democrats will be much better positioned to campaign against their stalling tactics in 2010. Under Obama the Dems can go to the electorate and say “look, we tried our best to work with these chumps, and they won’t listen to reason. You have to throw them out if we are going to get anything done”, and have a chance of making it stick.
I don’t see how Hillary will be able to make that pitch in the 2010 midterm elections, because the “Clintons are polarizing” meme is already deeply embedded in the minds of low information voters.
It may not be fair to Hillary that she has to carry that baggage and Obama does not, but I’m beyond worrying about that . There are bigger problems for us to deal with than that.
demimondian
Why on Earth does anybody believe that the REepublicans won’t do the same thing to Obama? The Republican minority is a very deft opposition party, and an absolutely inept governing party. They’ll do the same thing with an Obama House and Senate as they did with Clinton I.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
Demi, please go back and re-read the section in my post starting with “I don’t know that Obama will be able to overcome this resistance, but at least he is addressing the reality of it”. I agree with you on this. I do not expect the GOP to play nice just because Obama is elected.
What I do expect is that the Dems need to think about how to anticipate this resistance and postition themselves to crush it in the 2010 midterms. The GOP will play nice when they get their heads handed to them on a platter for obstructing anything and everything proposed by a Dem.
Given the themes on display from both of the Dem campaigns this year (and the “polarizing” label that, fairly or not, Hillary drags along with her), which candidate do you think will be better positioned to go to the electorate in 2010 and tell them “We tried to work with the Rep.’s, and it just didn’t work. The ball is in your court now – you have to throw them out!”
If that is going to be the theme in 2010, who do you want on the pitching mound?
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
… or to put it in more colorful terms:
I think some of Hillary’s supporters are missing an important aspect of Obama’s approach to bipartisanship. It isn’t just about being nice, holding hands and singing Kumbaya. He’s baiting a trap for the more pigheaded and obstructionist elements in the GOP, which will be sprung in the 2010 midterms.
If the GOP choses to work with the Dems and solve some of our problems, then everybody will get credit for the win, but the Dems will get more credit because it happend under their leadership. If the GOP rejects the overture that Obama is offering, then they will have turned themselves into the IED in the road of American politics, and it will be out in plain sight for everybody to see.
MNPundit
Heh, the thing that Obama’s increased number of younger voters has brought is the ‘youth’ attitude of snarky humor combined with a cynicism that comes from being marketed to for the first 25 years of their lives and being aware of it.
Far more likely to shout “lame!” at an attack just because it’s so damn hokey (as Clinton’s line was) no matter it’s salience.
Not that older generations don’t do this too, but the internets have made it the standard position for younger folks.
ThymeZone
I have no idea what that means, but I am glad that you do!
I think we are about out of material on this thread, amigo.
John S.
How hacktacular.
I guess it’s only media bashing when Hillary is the recipient. Running a front-page story on Obama that is entirely fact-free and full of reconstituted right-wing smears doesn’t count.
And in this regard, Paul, if this, Rezko and the madrassa bullshit is all they can gin up on Obama, it’s still a lot weaker than the mountain of bullshit they will hurl at Hillary.
p.lukasiak
what Hillary has acknowledged is that had she known then what she knows now, she never would have voted for it.
I personally was against the AUMF… but then again, I was against the Afghan War because I knew that it was going to be too easy — and that Bush would pursue further wars. I “knew” that George Bush would invade Iraq without any justification, and that going to the UN was just a fig leaf. But back then, you were considered a “kook” for suggesting such a thing about “our heroic president.”
Clinton (and the country) was betrayed by Bush. The expectation was that Iraq had weapons, and would not permit the unrestricted access demanded by the UN. Hans Blix himself was telling Congress that it was important to pass the AUMF.
The fear was that despite overwhelming international support to depose Saddam in the face of his intrasigence, that we’d be faced with a situation like the UN’s handling of Kosovo. A veto was exercised by Russia, which denied UN authorization to intervene — an Bill Clinton went ahead with NATO allies and intervened anyway. Those were the circumstances and assumptions that Congress was dealing with.
It is not a bad idea to give a president that kind of authority under those circumstances — it was a bad idea to give George W. Bush that authority. But at the time, only us “kooks” were saying that.
What I’d like Clinton to ask Obama is whether he would have supported a UN authorized invasion by multinational forces (including Arab forces) in the face of Saddam’s refusal to co-operate with inspections, and clear evidence that he was working on a nuclear bomb?
Because that is what people like Hillary Clinton thought they were authorizing when they voted for the AUMF.
p.lukasiak
And in this regard, Paul, if this, Rezko and the madrassa bullshit is all they can gin up on Obama, it’s still a lot weaker than the mountain of bullshit they will hurl at Hillary.
Do you really think this is all they have?
I mean, Obama is on record as wanting to make it illegal for Americans to own handguns. And on the record for absolutely unrestricted access to abortions. And on the record as letting women on welfare have as many babies as they feel like on the taxpayers dime. And that’s all from one questionnaire — god knows what he was actually saying back in 1996….
The right wing smear machine doesn’t even have to distort this stuff…. all they have to do is present it.
ThymeZone
I knew it, why didn’t she? Why didn’t she ask the tough questions that I would have asked that would have revealed basically what we know now, which is that there was no real WMD threat at all? Why didn’t she ask how CNN could report the movements of individual truckloads of oil that Saddam was selling over his borders, but we couldn’t track and point to the actual stores and movements of WMDs? These facts were evident before the invasion. What the hell was she focussed on?
Asti
How about which corporations were going to profit from the oil theft and how much those corporations were going to give to her campaign?
Asti
Cite please?
Asti
From a USA article regarding Obama’s stances:
Granted, p lukasiak, I never read the info that you elude to before, and I did go looking for it, but, I feel much better with a candidate who changes his views on issues after rethinking the idea rather than someone who doesn’t.
Obama is running for President in 2008, why not use his stances from 2008 to support what you are saying?
Here’s Barack Obama on the issues
Asti
Does this sound like a man who wants to totally take away all guns from everyone? A limit of one gun a month? I’ve never purchased a gun ever. If I ever do, you can be sure it will be the only one I purchase.
John S.
Yeah, and they don’t even have to do that – Hillary has already done them the favor.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
and then later in the same comment:
I notice that you skip the issue of her team, not just the candidate, showing sign of problematic thinking, but let’s concentrate on just Hillary.
Fine – she has learned that Bush is not to be trusted. It sounds as much like an excuse as it does like an admission of error, but something is better than nothing. Shoving the blame off on Bush is not an especially helpful insight starting on 1-21-2009, since it does not even begin to address how other people who ought not to be trusted can be identified ahead of time.
Again, John Edwards has done a much better job of covering this ground that Hillary has. But what on earth was she thinking when she voted for Kyl-Lieberman? It was hardly a deep dark secret that the Cheney wing of the administration was lusting for an excuse to go to war with Iran. How many times do we need to get burned before this lesson really sinks in with her? Or as W put it:
“fool me once, shame on — shame on you. Fool me — you can’t get fooled again.”
It is one thing to make a mistake – it is another thing to have to have admission of that mistake dragged out of you, and then turn around and do the same thing all over again. For me personally, Kyl-Lieberman was the breaking point, beyond which I simply do not trust her judgment, and find it very hard to take the justifications she has given for her AUMF vote at face value.
p.lukasiak
Fine – she has learned that Bush is not to be trusted. It sounds as much like an excuse as it does like an admission of error, but something is better than nothing.
see, its neither. She didn’t write the AUMF, and she had two choices — voter for it or against it with the language that it contained. At the time, there were a host of excellent reasons for voting for it, and one really good reason for voting against it — the understanding that George Bush was a narcissistic sociopath. But anyone who recognized that, and said it, was labelled a kook at best, and usually a terrorist sympathizer.
But what on earth was she thinking when she voted for Kyl-Lieberman?
The very substantial Jewish vote in the swing state of Florida, would be my guess.
p.lukasiak
Obama is running for President in 2008, why not use his stances from 2008 to support what you are saying?
Hey, I’d be happy to restrict the argument to where the candidates stand on the issues today…
But the fact is that the Obama campaign is using stuff that Hillary Clinton said in her capacity as First Lady in 1996 to argue that in 2006 she thought NAFTA was “a boon to the economy”. And if what Hillary Clinton said as part of her job in 1996 is relevant, then don’t blame me for bringing up Obama’s positions in 1996 when he was running for office.
p.lukasiak
2000: Was running for US Congress
but also voted in2004 to let retired police officers carry concealed handguns.
while running for the US Senate.
p.lukasiak
Why didn’t she ask the tough questions that I would have asked that would have revealed basically what we know now, which is that there was no real WMD threat at all?
uh, there was no way to “reveal” what we know now through questions. That required inspections. And Hans Blix was saying that the only way to get those inspection done was to make sure that the international community was serious about invading if Saddam didn’t co-operate, and wanted the AUMF passed as part of sending that message.
And you seem to forget that at the time, Clinton was a freshman senator with less than two years under her belt.
p.lukasiak
Aides say Obama did not fill out the questionnaire and instead it was handled by a staffer who misrepresented his views on gun control, the death penalty and more.
Nice try. I mean, this might be believable, if Obama hadn’t attended an interview with the group whose endorsement he wanted, and everyone there was given a copy of the questionnaire — and the board member at whose home the interview took place wasn’t saying that the campaign’s explanation is “ridiculous” and she didn’t have notes to back up her memories.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
p.lukasiak – I don’t disagree with your hypothesis explaining Hillary’s K-L vote, although I’d prefer to chalk it up to her positioning herself for the 2008 election more generally rather than blame one specific group.
But this raises the question – if Bush made her do it once (AUMF), and certain 2008 voting blocks made her do it again (K-L), then how many more bad actors are out there waiting, who are able to force her to make bad judgments on some other occasion in the future? Is there a list of them or something? Have we now exhausted the supply of People who can force Hillary to make bad decisions, or is it a long line that winds around the block, like the yellow-coated housing authority bureaucrats in the Monty Python Gas Cooker sketch?
p.lukasiak
But this raises the question – if Bush made her do it once (AUMF), and certain 2008 voting blocks made her do it again (K-L), then how many more bad actors are out there waiting, who are able to force her to make bad judgments on some other occasion in the future? Is there a list of them or something?
As President, Clinton would be, to a very large extent, setting the agenda…. and implementing things like the AUMF and Kyl-Lieberman. In other words, I don’t think Clinton would have invaded Iraq had she been president at the time, and as President I don’t think she’ll use Kyl-Lieberman as a pretext for confrontation with Iraq.
I mean, the US had an “official policy” of regime change in Iraq under Bill Clinton. He didn’t use that power to invade Iraq. (and btw, my grand theory of Iraq is that under Clinton, the US wanted Saddam in power, and not co-operating with inspections. Absent Saddam and the threat of WMDs, there was no rationale to maintain a troop presence in Saudi Arabia — and the ultimate policy was maintaining a troop presence in the region to secure the oil fields. As a result, intelligence about Saddam’s WMD’s was viewed far less skeptically that it should have been under Clinton, leading to the “everyone thought Saddam had WMDs” thing that was in place when Bush came to power.)
Asti
It’s not my try. You’ll have to take it up with the Obama campaign. I merely copied and pasted part of an article from a major media source and linked the article.
Asti
Really? The problem is Hillary is still saying the same shit now that she did back then. Her stance never changes, even over time and through demographic shifts and national crises that change the way her plans would affect others. Back then what she said didn’t bother me because her job was to pick out white house china and perform “first lady” duties. Now she wants to sit in the oval office, now those things mean something.
p.lukasiak
Really? The problem is Hillary is still saying the same shit now that she did back then.
no she’s not. As first lady, she pretty much said that nafta was the greatest thing since sliced bread. Now she’s saying it needs to be fixed — and has been saying it for quite some time. Her position is the same as Obama’s now.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
p.lukasiak:
I think we’ve reached the point where reasonable people can agree to disagree. Thank you for taking the time to engage me in a polite and substantive exchange. I’m still not sold on Hillary, but I’ve come away with more respect for some of her more vocal supporters (than I was before) by virtue of your efforts in this thread.
John S.
Without acknowledging her support for NAFTA, and admitting any error in judgment. Just attack the invisible enemy that foisted NAFTA on us and pretend you had nothing to do with it.
Thet’s her MO.
Randolph Fritz
But so is Obama, except that his version is a little bit to the right. It doesn’t seem to matter; Obama is showing people that endlessly fascinating subject, their own dreams. But dreams cannot govern.