I have nothing to say, but instead will let Gary Hart and Jonathon Chait speak for me.
Of course, I am sure they are just misogynists.
PS- Fratricidal maniac sounds about right, and the best way to avoid being called a monster is to stop acting like one.
Sojourner
For Christ’s sake, John.
Nobody is arguing that holding Clinton accountable for her bad behavior is misogynist. But when I read this kind of shit:
You clearly have your head up your ass when you claim that misogyny is not occurring.
I would think that a college professor would be capable of making those distinctions.
Apparently not.
k
I thought that was a Reagan rule.
Punchy
I would like to see McCane completely overread the polly landscape, pick a crazee-ass wingah for a runnin mate–like Coburn or Brownback–to grab some Evangellys, then watch him lose 61-38 to a Obama/Clinton tix that completely cleans up with the jungle fever voting bloc.
John Cole
Sojourner,
I have stated repeatedly that there have been misogynistic remarks throughout directed at Hillary. Not sure how that makes her crazed behavior the past few weeks somehow acceptable.
And if you are going to start holding me accountable for what other people say, it might be time to close down the comments here.
chopper
what i love the most are the comments in gary hart’s piece at huffpo – clinton supporters are brushing it aside because he cheated on his wife.
clinton supporters. i mean, the hell?
“i’m not going to listen to what you say because you cheated on your wife. now, bill clinton, on the other hand, that’s totally different. he’s alright.”
chopper
sorry, not most. some.
Jorge
You know, if this turns out to be Obama’s worst two weeks in this elecion cycle, he is going to coast to the White House.
I mean, his worst two weeks will have consisted of losing the state with the highest KKK membership in the nation (Ohio), tying in a state that has the second most Mexicans (who don’t seem to like him), losing the smallest state in the nation, winning a small North Eastern state, winning a mid-size southern state, and winning a mid-size western state, raising 55 million dollars and then heading into a 5 week dead period that will completely most of Clinton’s momentum.
Plus, the two most damaging narratives about him – experience and Islam, will be out in the open. I see Obama making alot of speeches over the next few months about how his WWII veteran granpa taught him what true patriotism means and how important his Christianity is in his life.
He’ll cap it off with an convention speech that will completely tailored to inspire people to make America better while showing off how smart and wise he really is.
myiq2xu
IOW – Hillary should behave like a good girl.
chopper
where did hart or chait say that? i don’t see it.
JWeidner
First sensible thing you’ve said in weeks…
chopper
yeah, that’s exactly what he said. jesus, put the bundle of straw down and back away.
rilkefan
because he’s saying Mondale was a monster for doing the same thing to him. Yep, Clinton’s being (almost) as vicious as Mondale, that fratricidal maniac.
This site’s back to being as funny as it was when John was defending Bush.
chopper
i didn’t know mondale endorsed reagan over the democrat. that’s really interesting. no wonder he lost.
myiq2xu
Mondale called Hart “All sizzle – no steak,” and (more famously) asked “Where’s the beef?”
History repeats.
chopper
so the people on huffpo chiding hart for cheating on his wife are actually brushing it aside because of mondale? are you daft?
chopper
and got utterly destroyed by the republican in the general.
if that’s what you want. hello president mccain, i guess.
Andrew
fixed
ThymeZone
No, I have to go with them on this one. Hillary created the complete absurd, dishonest “commander in chief threshold” thing, and people are going to run with it because …. she deserves it. She totally deserves it.
The goddam woman has never crossed any kind of CIC threshold. Any way that idea can be turned on her, any way at all, is fair game. Because it’s a frigging lie. She has no more preparation for the job than her husband had when he ran against a guy who had it in spades (Bush the Elder).
Anyone who claims that she is CIC material based on Hillary Clinton’s “experience” is just asking for the most agressive kind of retort. Good for whoever wrote that lipstick thing. It is just about perfect.
HyperIon
this site (considering JC’s and MD’s posts) is beginning to resemble sullivan’s with its all-hillary-bashing, all-the-time.
myiq2xu
Hart was the first “Madison Avenue” candidate for President.
Take a young, telegenic politician with basically a blank record, give him some stirring speeches full of ambiguity, package him as all things to all people, add some glamor and glitz, and sell him to the American people. They even compared him to Kennedy.
It worked, for a little while, then reality set in. Packaging will only take you so far. You can’t sell chicken shit as chicken soup.
Sojourner
John, you trot out the “misogynist” word just about every time you vent your ire over Clinton’s actions. By doing so, you belittle those of us who have observed exactly that going on. One can reasonably conclude that you are saying that we are incapable of distinguishing between real reasons to be pissed off and those which are attacks on Clinton as a woman.
You undercut your own arguments by attacking people like me who would otherwise agree with you. I’m not sure why you would want to do that.
It is quite possible to hold two ideas at the same time. Clinton can be challenged on her voting record (including votes she didn’t bother to make) and the antics of her campaign. This is why I voted for Obama. But I continue to be angry at what are real misogynist attacks that occur occasionally on this blog and with some regularity on shows like Tweety’s.
I continue to hope (with diminishing confidence) that I will see a woman president in my lifetime. And so I will continue to challenge those who feel that it is acceptable to attack a woman for reasons other than policy or ethics.
I am not saying that you are a source of those attacks. But statements like the ones you made above, belittle those of us who find such attacks unacceptable.
Helena Montana
Hillary is running for the vice presidential position on the GOP ticket–THAT’s why she keeps kissing McSame’s ass.
Sojourner
Oh, okay. She does some shitty things and therefore all attacks are equally okay.
TZ: you’re starting to sound like the authoritarian Repubs I work with.
Dennis - SGMM
Hi Sojourner. As you know, I posted the lipstick comment. It was a surreal response to Clinton’s surreal “commander-in-chief threshold” speech. Said speech doing more for McCain than it did for her or for Obama. My post was unfair, repulsive, beyond the bounds of propriety – and mildly funny (Why do Republicans and Clinton supporters seem to have no sense of humor?). Consider it my contribution to preparing Clinton for what might come at her in the general election. That is the rationale for those apologists of Clinton’s race-to-the-bottom campaigning, isn’t it?
myiq2xu
The Democrats were gonna get killed no matter who they ran. Reagan was very popular, the economy was on the upswing, the US hosted the Olympics (Reagan took advantage of the flag-waving and all those “USA, USA” chants) and the Iran-contra scandals hadn’t started.
Marvel
Well, when Hillary stops doing bashable things all the time I’m guessing the tenor on this site will change also.
Honestly, she’s way, way, way over the line. The only interesting question right now is whether the voters will punish her for it or not. If not, then we get what we deserve. Peggy Noonan’s article today was great on exactly what that will be.
kmeyer
Just heard that the “Obama is a Manchurian Candidate for radical islam who won’t put his hand on his heart for the national anthem and oh yeah his middle name is Hussein” email that apparently went very viral (I must be the only person who never got one) a few months back came from a Clinton rep, an Iowa county co-chair. Don’t know how valid this is; I’ve not found solid corroboration yet, but I kind of suck at research. I think that would have to be, if true, the coup de grace for her awful campaign.
chopper
so i guess history isn’t repeating. either that or you get to cherrypick history.
face it, hart aint obama and mondale aint clinton and reagan aint mccain. 2008 aint 1984.
but hart does have a good point. and the clinton supporters who are raggin on him for having cheated on his wife are being disingenuous as shit.
chopper
wha?
well, you know that ‘rodham’ rhymes with a certain pronunciation of ‘saddam’. my god, they’re both in it to destroy america!
dslak
I thought I made Sojourner leave. That she’s back makes me feel like I’ve failed.
Sojourner
So you’re arguing that all’s fair, right?
Sounds to me like you’re racing her to the bottom.
myiq2xu
Please keep repeating slanderous rumors without any proof. The GOP has been trying to smear Obama and blame Hillary for it for months. That’s a Rovian two-fer.
dslak
As for Cole’s misogynist line on Clinton detractors, he also used to make snide comments about how Obama critics could be dismissed for being racist. Where was Sojourner then?
Sojourner
Joke’s on you. You guys invited me back by providing evidence for exactly the argument I was making.
Better luck next time.
Brachiator
Apparently, some newspapers are starting to explore Senator Clinton’s dubious claims to great experience (Clinton’s experience claim under scrutiny).
A quote from someone who was there:
I also liked this piece:
Again, Senator Clinton tries to have it both ways. She wants to claim that her private, personal, undocumented “counsel” to her husband is the equivalent of a public, documented, verifiable record of advise, counsel and assistance in decision making. She has, ironically, created her own version of the Bush/Cheney style of “trust us” non-closure decision making.
dslak
Well, you do have a history of reading more into people’s comments then is there. As I recall, getting hammered on that what was made you pick up your ball and go home before.
myiq2xu
I’m not one of the ones “raggin” (interesting term) on Hart for monkey business, but Hillary Clinton supporters could do so without being disingenuous. She didn’t cheat on her spouse (Vince Foster conspiracy theories don’t count.)
Zifnab
Obama has been taking about as high a road as one can ask for through the better part of this campaign. Show me, fucking show me, where he ever once suggested “A Republican would do a better job than Hillary Clinton” in any respect, even once. After over a decade of this absolute wanktastic bullshit, Hillary Fucking Clinton – of all people – has the nerve to go to bat for John Waterboard Me In The Ass McCain – over Barack Obama.
Is this how she’s going to win the general? Maybe if she fluffs McCain a little harder the old guy will just have a heart attack and she can walk in unopposed.
chopper
yeah, like ‘obama called lorne michaels to whine about SNL’. how stupid is that?
Tsulagi
Did Hillary piss in your crockpot? j/k
dbrown
Let me get this right: Billary “oddly qualified response as to whether Obama is a Muslim (“not as far as I know”),”
Then I could say, as far as I know Hillary does not generally rape and murder young children, rape dogs, or on most days help terroist murder American soldiers, that is, to the best of my knowledge but I might very well be wrong.
As an (now very ex) Hillary supporter, she will never get my vote now that I understand what powere for the sake of power means to her.
dslak
Everyone who disagrees with me sounds like evil, authoritarian Republicans, even the people who agreed with me just five minutes ago. Some people say I have a problem with taking criticism, but that’s just something Republican authoritarians say.
dslak
There’s nothing in the “not as far as I know” comment by Hillary. She was being repeatedly badgered on the matter, even after denying that she believed him to be a Muslim.
John Cole
You guys keep rolling with that Clinton as Mondale comparison, because it is full of win.
How many states did Mondale lose- 48? 49?
chopper
yeah, cause hillary supporters tell bill to fuck off every time he opens his mouth because he cheated on his wife, right?
myiq2xu
I’m sorry, I believed Obama when he said he did. It turned out he was
lyingjoking. I’ve been sick and I missed his retraction.ThymeZone
Cut the crap. I have been asking, daily, sometimes hourly, on these pages: What experience does this woman have that justifies her absurd claim to CIC readiness, “Day One” readiness, or 3 am preparedness …. all of which are her bogus and completely unsubstantiated claims.
There are a bunch of Hillarites on this blog. Why hasn’t one of them stepped forward and put forth a substantive and convincing answer to this question? For that matter, any answer whatever to this question?
Because it’s a lie, there is no answer. So to hell with her. She deserves every bit of rebuke she can get for this bullshit.
Please, prove me wrong. The floor is yours.
chopper
what retraction?
Dennis - SGMM
You are, while deflecting criticism with the all-powerful “You’re picking on her because she’s a girl.”
Clearly you didn’t understand my previous post. Did you actually read it all the way through and give it some thought?
If Clinton was a sixty-year-old male senior Senator from New York with the same record I would be opposed to him as the nominee. It has nothing to do with her gender.
When you supporters of The First Woman President stop playing the gender card at every criticism then I’ll listen to you. If you give up excusing her scorched earth tactics then you’ll get a hearing. Otherwise, I will continue to scorch.
As we used to say in my hippy days, “”What comes around, goes around.”
myiq2xu
This is what she said:
From the March 2 edition of CBS’ 60 Minutes:
Quit peddling lies.
Sojourner
No, I left before because of the unwillingness on the part of some Obama supporters to understand that their words support the position that Clinton is fair game for all attacks. Other posters have agreed with this concern and gotten equally hammered for it.
It’s rather ironic that a candidate who wants to stand above race and gender has some supporters who don’t share that position.
Martin
The email had been out for months before that. The co-chair received it at one point and forwarded it out with a comment about how absurd it was. It was poor judgement in a ‘she’s a monster, he’s Ken Starr’ kinda way, but nothing more. TPM covered it back in December or something.
Sojourner
I disagree. Her claims for having the right experience can be challenged. That does not mean that all kinds of attacks are valid.
Bruce Moomaw
“No, there is nothing to base that on, AS FAR AS I KNOW.”
So where’s the lie about what she said, Myiq? She said, explicitly, that there was a genuine chance he’s a Moslem. When even “The Economist” calls that statement “Nixonian”, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that it is.
Buck
A-men!
dbrown
To think that I was making fun of Obama supporters because I considered them spoiled little children for saying that if Hillary won the dem nomination, they would not vote for her in the general election… damn, what an ass I am! Hillary scares me and I supported her! What a dumb ass I was!
ThymeZone
Compare Clinton’s verbose answers to Obama’s answer to a question about whether he’d advance some smear against Clinton, also on 60 Minutes, the week earlier:
“No. We don’t play that.”
Whose answer do you like?
I like the man’s answer: Short, no wasted words, complete.
Sojourner
Your first sentence is completely wrong. I don’t play the gender card at every criticism. Remember, I didn’t vote for her and I had good reasons. But comments about her finding lipstick on her husband’s penis are completely and totally inappropriate. If that’s your idea of “scorch,” then so be it. But don’t be surprised if people find your arguments less than persuasive.
Zifnab
It would be nice if she actually supported said claims, rather than repeating them ad nauseaum. And as far as I can tell, Hillary has been on the offensive for the last month or more. How many times can she stab at Obama for being a skilled public speaker before the Hillbots start calling her on her bullshit?
dslak
No, you left because you were ruthlessly mocked of accusing everyone who was critical of Clinton of being a misogynist. For anyone who cares, it’s plain as day here.
Buck
*snort!*
*laugh!*
dslak
You’re not quite ready to try your hand at concern trolling, it seems.
chopper
yeah, he lost with a focus and intensity normally seen only in successes.
dslak
Just because you’re only criticizing Clinton for lacking the experience she claims to have doesn’t mean that Sojourner can’t accuse you of misogyny. That’s just how identity politics works.
jj
This statement is
1. Inappropriate
2. Sexist
3. A hilarious riposte to Mrs. Clinton’s absurd assertion that she has crossed some nebulous ‘Commander In Chief’ rubicon that Mr. Obama has not.
4. Has no place in the formal language of a political campaign. On an online blog however, all bets are off.
To me, it could be considered “misogynist” only in the vaguest sense.
Sojourner
Ah yes, the black and white world of Balloon Juice.
Of course I didn’t accuse EVERYONE who was critical of Clinton of being a misogynist. I don’t consider myself a misogynist even though I’m a critic of Clinton.
I know these distinctions are difficult in a world where Obama = everything good and Clinton = everything evil.
My apologies for introducing such complexities.
Dennis - SGMM
Sojourner, if your screen name was inspired by the incomparable Sojourner Truth then don’t bother seeking medical help for that whirring sound you constantly hear. It’s just the original spinning in her grave.
demimondian
No, John, the way to avoid being called a monster is to run away when the MUPpets say “Boohoo, you’re hurting our feelings!” Don’t fight back, just die quietly. Don’t you dare actually try to win.
After all, that’s…that’s…monstrous.
Don’t look for weaknesses in your opponent! That’s…-unwomanly-…err, I mean monstrous!
For God’s sake, don’t fight on when a MAN has stated his claim to His Office. Unless you’re -a lesbian like Eleanor Roosevelt- a -nutcracker- monster.
And don’t you dare -whine about- point out that many of the smears used against you are sexual “another woman’s lipstick on your husband’s dick” “There have been many interesting lesbians” “A Hillary nutcracker — just like the real one, but useful.” That’s NOT FAIR.
Sojourner
Rule #2 at Balloon Juice: Anyone who disagrees with Obama = everything good and Clinton = everything evil is a troll.
Example of the profound thinking being displayed by SOME Balloon Juicers:
Breathtakingly brilliant.
ThymeZone
Tick, tick, tick goes the clock, and still we have no idea what it is that has prepared or qualified Hillary to make CIC, Day One or 3 AM claims of readiness.
Nothing, nada, zip, zilch. Just proof by assertion, proof my photo-op.
I think what she is doing is called browbeating. Isn’t it?
Zifnab
I see you’ve noticed the color scheme.
The curtains do, in fact, match the drapes.
Sojourner
Oh I see. Being sexist has nothing to do with disrespecting women. Interesting.
ThymeZone
“proof by photo op”
Sorry, the cries of “misogyny” are wearing a little thin.
It’s time for the Brunhildabots to put up or shut up.
Where is the preparation, the qualification, the experience?
Anyone?
dslak
How is the “black or white” distinction even relevant here? You continually toss around these phrases without seeming to have any sense of their meaning.
My statement there was an exaggeration, but I won’t hold it against you if you thought it was in good faith. That hardly excuses your continually sloppy reasoning, which persists even now:
And now you’re back to the strawman that led to you being jumped before you promised never to darken our doorstep again. I know it’s difficult for you to comprehend the possibility that somebody might prefer Obama to Clinton without considering the latter to be the Anti-Christ.
My apologies for introducing such complexities.
Sojourner
Not fair? Wow. Interesting. So you’re arguing that women should just take whatever disgusting comments a man chooses to make. Huh.
Martin
Fair enough, but I think if we roll back the time machine, we’d find that most Obama supporters were actually okay with Hillary for quite some time. He was accused of lying about wanting to be president with this gem:
And we had this one, which was the one that caused me to break for him over her, but I was still willing to be supportive of her:
Which was a flat out distortion of what he said. And things more or less have devolved from there since Super Tuesday with ‘plagiarism’ charges over something that had been openly known and accepted as SOP for almost a year.
And so on. Yes, Obama wants to stay above the fray and Clinton could have joined him there but she didn’t. Calling out voters as being second-rate and whatnot aren’t insults to Obama, but insults to me, and that’s when she lost any hope of support and earned my scorn. I can say that this was the point that DKos turned hard against her as well. So, I think I can tell her to go fuck herself for saying that my voice in an election somehow doesn’t matter. That’s not me defending Obama, that’s me defending me, and I don’t need to play by Obama’s rules. I can play by mine.
chopper
you know, i too would like to see the reams of evidence that hillary has to demonstrate that she’s ready for the 3am phone call.
dslak
Rule #3 of balloon juice: Sojourner can only think in simplistic dichotomies, and assumes that the same is true of everyone else.
Buck
Balloon-Juice: Hot Air and Ill-Informed Banter
And here I thought that was in reference to the posts.
myiq2xu
How about 8 years as a US Senator on the day she would take the oath of office?
Why don’t you lay out the objective criteria for being qualified to be the CinC? Then we can see how the three candidates measure up.
demimondian
You betcha. I struck out all of those slurs (and even called them smears and slurs) because they’re entirely fair. After all, if they weren’t, they would never have occurred, now would they?
jj
You really cannot be this obtuse.
Read vewy closely, this might be a little complex for you…
Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton are competitors for the same job, this does not make them enemies, even if Clinton wants to play it that way.
There are a million and one ways that this election could turn out in which both Clinton and Obama could benefit from being allied with one another, so why do you and Hillary think it prudent to torpedo not only Obama’s chances, but to plant the seeds of internicene party conflict?
It’s stupid, shortsighted, shitty and…….stupid.
A year ago, I was pretty much resigned to a Clinton presidency and a month ago, I would have voted for her over any Republican in a New York minute.
Flash forward…while there still is no chance in hell McCain will get my vote, between her and Billy’s SC shenanigans and her subsequent attack dog tactics, I will probably not vote for her in the general.
And listen to this, it wont’ be because she won. It’ll be because she won by slinging shit and acting like a fucking Republican-lite.
demimondian
Hey, TZ, show me any evidence that someone who had to take lessons on international relations from someone who can’t keep her freeking mouth shut about a sensitive intra-campaign matter has any hope of being able to handle international relations?
Sojourner
Nope. I’m arguing that it is quite possible to attack Clinton on her policies and her ethics without calling her a bitch or referring to her husband’s penis.
Since Obama is such a strong candidate, that shouldn’t be too tough.
It’s also possible to argue that there have been some comments on this list that can be reasonably challenged as atacking her in ways that most people understand are attacks on her gender.
I know that’s a difficult concept for you but it is the case.
demimondian
Hmm. And kewt little jj calls me “obtuse”.
Hey, MUPpet moppet — go read what I wrote. Carefully. Actually, just start by reading what I wrote, OK?
bootlegger
That comment was indeed vulgar. “Inappropriate”? In a polite debate yes. On a message board? Really? And I too am sick of everyone crying misogyny whenever someone says something mean about Hilary. What if we reverse gendered that statement and said: “sucking another man’s cum out of his wife’s vagina doesn’t qualify him to be CIC.” Bad taste? Vulgar? You bet. But is it patrigyny? Really?
Sojourner
Call me when it happens. Then we’ll talk.
myiq2xu
Where’s the lie?
There’s the lie. She said explicitly that she believed that he wasn’t. She never even hinted that there was any chance, genuine or not, that he was a Moslem. She said it over and over and over.
The only way to make her statement “Nixonian” is to take one small part of it out of context. That’s Rovian.
chopper
wow, 8 years as senator. (whistles). don’t tell me, the threshold falls just above the amount of time obama has spent in the senate, right? ‘the time obama’s been in the senate + 1’? like the 50%+1 strategy?
demimondian
By the way, the word you want is “misandry” (a hatred of men).
Rick Taylor
I pretty much agree with Gary Hart’s take. I’m not so sure about Jonathan Chait’s, as Hillary Clinton could still win the popular vote, even if she looses the delegate count, and then it’s not so clear how the uncommitted super delegates should vote. So I think it’s fair enough she stay in the campaign and attempt to win given the rather bizarre rules of the democratic primaries (which need to be reformed). But there’s a line you don’t cross; you don’t win at the expense of your own party, and as Gary Hart argues, I think her recent comments crossed that line, which I honestly hadn’t expected from her.
I’m also finding my stomach turned at the brouhaha regarding Samantha Powers. True, she screwed up, she said something she shouldn’t have said, tried to retract it, and when it got out apologized. Matt writes
Unfortunately, Matt doesn’t say exactly how the Clinton campaign is continuing to bash Power, so I’m reserving judgement, but it doesn’t sound good.
bootlegger
Sorry, the correct word is “misandry” not “patrigyny” (which I totally made up).
Dennis - SGMM
I was born and grew up a Navy dependent. My mom raised us and fed us us – despite the long times between money in the Fifties Navy. Ever had Cheerios for dinner by candle light because the power company turned of your electric? My mom made it seem like an occasion. I was so much raised by a wonderful woman that I had to break myself of covering my mouth with my hand when I snickered.
I don’t disrespect women, I revere them as people, and friends, and mothers and spouses.
So, at long last, fuck off.
Martin
Hmm. I think this is equally valid:
Which is to say that it’s not valid at all.
Rick Taylor
I also agree with everything Hilzoy has written about the Power issue:
jj
I thought misogyny = the hatred of women.
Disrespect is one thing, hatred is another.
Words are important.
Moving on to the larger point:
Any person who makes tenuous claims to on-the-job experience due to proximity to their spouse, going even further to conflate it to meretricious executive experience, deserves derision, mockery and yes, a loss of respect.
dslak
You’re admitting the possibility, yes. But you have yet to acknowledge that such a thing has ever actually happened, which leads to suspicion that you’re being disingenuous here.
This is awfully weasely. Why not just come out and say there have been examples of misogyny against Clinton on this blog, then cite an example or two. I won’t bother denying this claim, anyway, because it’s irrelevant to your overall point, which is to tie any misogynist criticisms together with legitimate ones, so they can all be dismissed without scrutiny.
Your problem on this count is that you confuse a snide comment such as “This person’s criticism of Clinton can probalby just be chalked up to misogyny” with the claim “There have been no misogynist attacks on Clinton.
It’s obvious that this is a difficult distinction for you to make, but admitting that you have a problem is the first step on the road to recovery.
Sojourner
Uh, that would be me.
ThymeZone
Well then, Harry Byrd is your ideal candidate, then?
How about Mitch McConnell?
Or at least, John McCain? Who by the way also has no experience whatever that qualifies him, but more than Hillary.
WTF are you talking about, man? Can you ever provide a serious answer to this question?
The woman is lying, she has no experience that prepares her for CIC duties, or 3 am phone calls, or Day One presidentin’
And you know it and you and your HRC spambots know it.
ThymeZone
Misogyny is hatred of women in general, not hatred of “a” woman.
Any suggestion to the contrary, like everything else peddled here by the HRC crowd, is a damned lie.
Disrespect of HRC and her bullshit is not misogyny any more than rebuke of John McCain is “man hating.”
Sojourner
I think they’re on the same scale, with disrespect at one end and hatred at the other.
myiq2xu
What about falsely accusing Hillary of racism? Don’t you think that could “plant the seeds of internicene party conflict?”
What if Hillary wins the nomination but black voters stay home in November because they think she is a racist? What would her chances of beating McCain be then?
demimondian
Here’s something you boys need to get your minds around — right now, one of the two candidates had much, much more experience in difficult elections than the other. One of the two candidates clearly understands that the game is dirty and that your opponents don’t play fair, and that you need to be ready to get out there and play every bit as dirty as they will be, because otherwise they — who are often quite evil — will win.
It doesn’t look like Obama is ready to do whatever it takes to win. If so, then he doesn’t understand how important this election actually is — and, if he doesn’t understand that, then, you know what? He isn’t the right choice for the nominee. He has to show me he can handle being manhandled, because he is *going* to be manhandled. And right now, he isn’t handling that at all well.
dslak
You would consider yourself to be the lone exception, of course. I took that for granted, given your “I’m not really a Hillary supporter, but all criticisms of her are probably misogynist” schtick.
Sojourner
Funny. I give an example just from today.
Martin
That only means she’s qualified to legislate on day one. Senators don’t have life-and-death issues presented to them, unless we want to revisit Schiavo and pretend it’s relevant.
The objective criteria for being qualified to be the CinC is having been the CinC or having held high military rank. Everyone else is a rookie – including McCain. Sorry, but some jobs are sufficiently unique that you need to need a net when you start. That’s why Presidents have Cabinets and enough advisors to fill Madison Square Garden.
Besides, CinC is a fairly small part of the job unless you are planning to do a lot of invading or get invaded. I agree it’s an important part, but every President walks in with their weaknesses. I thought Rice did a nice job laying out an honest case on this matter.
demimondian
Martin — if someone is your adviser, and spouts off like that, then that can cause an international incident. He has such bad personnel sense that he didn’t realize that? Then he’s shown he isn’t ready.
I realize that you can’t help but think of Hillary Clinton as just as extension of Bill Clinton, MUPpet, but that’s your problem, not mine. Bill Clinton isn’t being elected here — so answer the question about Obama.
myiq2xu
I was answering TZ’s question, not setting a threshold.
Sojourner
Nope. I think most of the people on this blog fall into this category.
Where did I say that all criticisms of her are probably misogynist?
Callisto
Wait just a minute here. So if i said something along the lines of “Maybe John McCain absorbed some real capitol hill experience, through his shriveled old vienna sausage of a penis, from the lobbyist tart he’s been doing on the side”, then that makes me a man-hater? Or do i just hate osmosis?
dslak
You didn’t give an example of it happening, you gave an example of what kind of criticism you would consider to be acceptable. Do you accept that some people here, other than the proprietor of this blog, have made legitimate criticisms of Hillary that have no basis whatsoever in misogynist sentiments? That’s the point I’m driving at.
Sojourner
Who is arguing this?
ThymeZone
Why do you keep avoiding the central question here?
While you folks whine and bitch about “disgusting” remarks, your candidate is making a disgusting assertion: That she is qualified to be president because she was married to one.
That suggestion doesn’t disgust you? It does me.
And what doubly disgusts me is the suggestion that attacking that bullshit assertion is being done because “she’s a woman.”
She’s a woman who wants to puff herself up to be qualified for a job that her husband held because she was his wife.
This bullshit is so thick, I can’t find the knife sharp enough to cut it.
ThymeZone
Who is making the horse manure “misogyny” argument here?
PeterJ
In my book, doing anything to win in a primary stops short of putting any candidate from the other party above any other candidate from my party.
But obviously I don’t want to win enough…
jj
”
Is that something the Obama campaign has done? If so, it’s not a meme that has stuck at least not with this African-American.
OTOH, inferring that SC didn’t “count” because the state is too black didn’t exactly win her any love in the black electorate.
From where I sit, if black voters stay home, it wouldn’t be because of any percieved “racism”.
Running a half-assed, negative, shitty campaign is more than reason enough.
tBone
Ah, we’re judging on bad personnel sense? Well then, I’ll see your Powers and raise you a
PennMcAuliffeHillary’s entire frickin’ campaign staff.Dennis - SGMM
Amen.
chopper
but hillary sez that she has the experience and obama doesn’t. so how long do you have to be in the senate to have “the experience”?
besides, hell having been in the senate 8 years by the time inauguration day rolls around ain’t what she’s arguing. she’s saying she has the experience now.
so, myiq, what experience does she have now that makes her ready for the magical 3 am phone call?
jj
Ah, the rationale, of gangsters, drug dealers and lowlifes everywhere.
See if YOU can understand THIS:
America call ill-afford another 4 years of shortsighted, realpolitik.
ThymeZone
Uh, you want to love him but in a manly way?
I hear ya, demi. Right there with ya.
Martin
False conclusion. Since he’s winning, nobody can say how far he’s willing to go. The only way to know how far someone is willing to go is to push them to that point. Right now, Obama needs to convince 789 Democratic superdelegates to support him, and I think a reasonable strategy to doing that is to not do harm to the Democratic party and image on the way to the nomination. There are downticket races to consider and he’s still taking time to support them (see Hasterts seat).
So you are basing your preference solely on the known quantity. Unfortunately, it would appear that while she is willing to play rough, she also seems willing to take out some of her support to do it. Remember, playing rough only counts if you win. And she’s not, and she’s making no headway toward winning either.
dslak
It certainly doesn’t seem that way a lot of the time. Now you just need to refrain from continually strawmanning people who disagree with you, and our quarrel will be over.
I was using that particular strawman as a synecdoche for your typical reaction to criticism. I’m just saying that you should try addressing someone’s point sometime without accusing them of thinking that Obama is the Messiah and Hillary the Anti-Christ or other such nonsense.
Sojourner
I’m sorry TZ that you don’t understand why some of us might find arguments involving sucking husband’s penises as a way of disqualifying a candidate to be an issue.
myiq2xu
Tell me, Master Yoda, what is the threshold?
is it this?:
Very few of our Presidents would have met this threshold, including all of our “war” Presidents (Madison, Polk, Lincoln, Wilson, FDR, Truman, JFK, Johnson, Nixon, Bush I)
jj
Exactly.
Her doing so is profoundly disrespectful of the intelligence of the entire electorate.
ThymeZone
No offense, to you personally, but you don’t understand.
You don’t understand that a woman who makes an absurd claim to being qualified to be president because she slept with one leaves herself open to penis jokes, and deserves them, and will get them, not because she is woman ….
Because she is a damned fool, and a liar.
You don’t get that. I’m sorry, that’s the way it is.
Sojourner
I don’t know how many times I have to say this. I VOTED FOR OBAMA. I agree that her arguments about experience are questionable at best.
But I do have a problem with some of the language in some of the posts that have been made about her.
I’m sorry that I don’t fall into the Hillbot category.
dslak
Is there reason to think that either Hillary or Obama is lacking in qualifications to be president (use of ‘CinC’ seems to cop to the notion that we live in some kind of military protectorate)?
Keep in mind that the fact that one may be more qualified than the other in some area does not make the other completely unqualified.
myiq2xu
7 years as a US Senator
Sojourner
Ah, so you are admitting that this is going on. You just don’t have a problem with it.
Well, that’s a start.
ThymeZone
No. No, you tell us. It’s your side that is making the threshold assertion, you show us where it is and why she reaches it.
Start soon, because are digging yourself a hole so deep that you are never going to climb out of it. I’m going to be right here until you answer the question.
tBone
We Had to Destroy the Village in Order to Save ItIt Takes a Village
In bookstores now.
dslak
I don’t care. If you would notice, I never made who you preferred for president an issue, because it’s irrelevant to the claims you’ve made here.
As well you should. It’s how you are ready and willing to tar numerous innocents in the process that’s problematic.
And I’m sorry that you’re unable to appreciate the fact that someone might criticism your arguments without assuming that you are completely irrational.
chopper
is that why she’s losing, and has been losing since day one?
obama seems to have figured out the path to the nomination a long time ago.
clinton, on the other hand, despite having already been around this block before several times, was complaining about how incomprehensible the texas system was before the primary there. the clintons already ran under those rules before. twice .
if completely forgetting how a state’s primary works when you’ve been through it twice is “having much more experience campaigning” than i definitely have to take her “i’m experienced” line with a huge fucken grain of salt.
myiq2xu
7 years as a US Senator.
ThymeZone
I hope you know me well enough by now to know that I am quite sincere when I say ….
You of all people, then, should get this! the woman is making a LUDICROUS argument based on being married to a CIC, that she is ready to be CIC. By what rule is she now immune to penis jokes?
I beseech you, look at this objectively. myiq is hopeless, he wouldn’t admit that the sun is coming up tomorrow if Obama said it. But you are reasonable.
jj
So why does she claiming “I am offering 35 years of experience making change”?
Also,
7 years as a (carpetbagging) US senator means she has LESS experience as a legislator than Obama.
Could it be, Hillary is full of shit?
PeterJ
Difficult elections? None of the three left standing has had anything like a difficult election…
Martin
Please. Clinton is hardly a model of good staffing. Just assembling a team that can win an election would be my first qualification. No plan after 2/5? How shortsighted is that when you have 100M in the bank? And I’ll grant you that Powers probably would have been a bad pick to be available to speak on behalf of the administration, but that doesn’t mean that she would have been put in such a role. It’s also anecdotal. Nobody can predict when a single individual will have a moment like that. But so far it’s an isolated incident. If there was a pattern to people going off like that, I might agree with you.
But if we want to compare apples-to-apples, what is your take onthis as it relates to Hillary’s staffing?
I never suggested that. I was just drawing out the logical extension of Hillary’s claimed experience and how completely unrelated events to that experience are meaningless. But if you want me to continue the parallel, what kind of international incident would it create if the Monica incident were to repeat with someone attached to a foreign government instead? If we are going to assume past behavior is predictive of future behavior, let’s apply the standard equally to both candidates.
Sojourner
Um, you claimed that I disagree with the views of most of the people here. I’m simply pointing out that you’re incorrect.
How have I tarred the innocents? You don’t think the posters here are smart enough to know the difference between arguments on policy/ethics and those which involve belittling someone on gender?
Ask TZ. He acknowledges it’s going on but he’s fine with it.
myiq2xu
Since TZ won’t answer (because he knows it will ruin a good kerfluffle) then you answer:
What is the objective threshold for CinC?
demimondian
Ummm…he has more pledged delegates, yes, but, um, no, he is not “winning”.
NEITHER CANDIDATE CAN WIN THE NOMINATION ON THE CAMPAIGN TRAIL NOW. Either one of them will need superdelegate votes to win the nom — at least, on the first ballot.
If Clinton keeps beating him around the ring like she has been, those superdelegates won’t break for Obama. They’ll think back to 2004, and say, “Sorry, Barack, you had the chance to make the sale, and you didn’t close it.” and vote for her.
chopper
you tell me, you’re the one saying that she has the experience and obama doesn’t.
of course. we’re saying the ‘i’m experienced enough to be CiC’ line she’s peddling is complete bullshit. no civilian is really ready for the job.
saying that being in the senate makes you ready to run the largest, most powerful military in the history of the universe by fiat whereas somebody else being in the same senate does not make him ready is completely idiotic.
dbrown
When Hillary said that to the best of her knowledge that Obama is not a Muslim, if that isn’t Rovian gamesmenship, then what is?
What I said about Hillary was outrageous lying and even above the fold of Rove but it was exactly the same logic Hillary used in answering the question about Obama’s religious alignment – she knows full well that Obama is no more a Muslim than McCain or even bush yet she added that ridiculous qualifier?!
The woman would sacrifice any moral to win the office and that is Rovian and Nixon-like. She is a politician who will screw all of us for power – don’t trust her; the war in Iraq needs to end and I don’t now believe she will really try and stop it but Obama will; or at least I believe he has the honor to follow through on his word even if the repubic’s attack him for being weak; Hillary would cave.
dslak
When did I claim this, and what specific views was I referring to, if I did?
You seem to think we’re not smart enough to know the difference between mockery of quick appeals to “misogyny” and actual misogyny. What you just mentioned is so obvious that it’s not a contentious issue to anyone except you.
What do TZ’s feelings on the appropriateness of misogynist attacks have to do with your inability to appreciate that it’s possible for people to disagree without considering each other to be irrational?
Sojourner
Sorry TZ but no, I don’t agree that she has opened herself up to whatever attacks anyone wants to make.
You make arguments on the basis of qualifications. If your arguments are strong (which I think they are), then belittling her because her husband cheated on her (therefore, by implication, she is less of a woman because otherwise her husband wouldn’t have cheated on her) is not an appropriate argument. I’m not saying YOU made that argument but you do appear to be accepting it as a valid argument.
I am absolutely of the wrong generation to accept that kind of an argument. I dealt with that crap in the early years of my career. It was wrong then and it’s still wrong.
tBone
There isn’t one. Which is why it’s ludicrous for Hillary to suggest that she’s somehow more prepared than Obama.
/SATSQ
ThymeZone
No. You are going to answer that, or you are done, compadre.
Your butthead candidate claims to have reached that threshold. We don’t have to explain to you where it is, you have to explain it to us.
And you need to stop flailing your arms and get serious about this, because you are going down like a building implosion at the moment.
demimondian
No, Martin. Lose your idiotic attitude. You’re moving the goalposts. You need to answer the core question now, since you’ve chosen to make it yours, instead of TZ’s. Why is there any reason to believe the Obama is capable of handling international relations? That’s the question I’ve asked, and just because you’d like to change the subject doesn’t mean that it’s not a good question.
chopper
so exactly 7 years in the us senate is the magical threshold? how utterly convenient. what logic did you use to come up with that specific number, myiq?
ThymeZone
Soj, my argument has nothing to do with his behavior, good or bad. It is entirely about hers, and hers now, not then.
She, now, is claiming qualification based on being married to a president. It’s an absurd, insulting claim.
I assert that she is therefore open to any and all criticism for it, including rude and crude remarks.
Yes, they’re rude. But they’re deserved.
jj
Go here
And while Article Two of the U.S. Constitution lays some decent ground rules for who can hold the job ‘o the presidency, I’d like to add a few more to thing that DON’T count towards crossing the threshold
1. Vote to authorize shitty, wasteful wars and pretend otherwise when the polls change
2. Doesn’t tout expereince as first lady as preparation for becoming CinC, especially when you fucked up your main initiative – healthcare.
Back to you.
tBone
Two victories in the last, what, 14 contests is “beating him around the ring”?
By that standard, Walter Mondale was the greatest President we never had.
kwAwk
I have to tell you folks something.
You guys make Obama sound like the biggest Pussy to ever set foot in the world of politics. Do we really want somebody as our President who’s who staff goes into bizerk fits of whining and crying because somebody said something mean about him?
Do you really think that Obama was going to get all of the way to Novermber without somebody asking how being a state senator and a community activist prepared him to be President? Seriously, in spite of Obama’s stance on the Iraq War, Hillary is considered to be the stronger candidate on issues of Foreign Policy and National Security. Obama just as easily as Hillary could be on every debate stage explaining how he got the war in Iraq wrong if only the Bushies had done a better job of securing the country and rebuilding after the invasion.
And really, there have been no worse cheap shots in the campaign than the Obama supporters trying to convince people that Bill Clinton was a racist because he called Obama’a Iraq stance a ‘fairy tale’.
After that whole incident I don’t blame the Clintons for taking the gloves off.
Martin
Indeed. There isn’t much in the way of prep-school for running the most powerful military the world has ever seen except for running some subset of it. There are lots of other Presidential responsibilities that are equally hard to have experience in like dealing with the UN, handling an economy, dealing with national disasters, and so on.
So, we can either continue to argue that our candidate should have a combination of experiences that is, frankly, impossible to achieve, or we can argue that demanding it in the first place is intellectually dishonest, especially if the person demanding it doesn’t possess it in the first place. We may not like that we need to elect a President that has no track record at doing some aspects of the job of President, but it’s true that it happens that way and we’re lying to ourselves if we think we can shoehorn some *other* thing into that spot and say that the standard has been met.
Now, Obama isn’t claiming he has that experience. He’s claiming he has good judgement that will stand in for that experience, and from what I’ve seen, I agree that he has good judgement, and that’ll have to suffice. But he’s not pretending that getting women to talk to each other in Ireland means that he’s ready to order a quarter million troops into battle. Hillary is. That’s dishonest to equate with experience to be CinC. It just is. And frankly, coming from a military family, it’s insulting as well.
ThymeZone
Gee, I can think of at least two.
One, he and she had the same chance to judge a critical foreign policy situation, the runup to war. He opposed it, she voted for it. If that were all I knew about them, he’d get my vote.
Two, he talks about the subject in an intelligent, informed, reasonable fasion, describing an approach to the problem set that sounds a lot like what mine would be, based loosely on a high regard for diplomacy, and a low regard for bellicose chest-beating.
Again, he gets my vote on that basis.
It ain’t rocket science.
myiq2xu
.
I already did. Twice.
demimondian
Actually, TZ, there’s no evidence that he opposed it.
Dennis - SGMM
You’re of the absolutely wrong
generationmentality to accept any kind of argument.Still waiting for a reasoned responses to my past couple of posts.
dbrown
One more point – relative to the CinC thing; as an ex-military officer who flew jets, I will add my two cents (please don’t give me any change back); to be a good CinC of the US you need honor above all other qualities (bush-the-stupid nor cheney-the-coward had this quality nor Nixon, nor ray-gun the simple. I hope Obama does but Hillary doesn’t.
jj
Do we really want somebody as our President who
’s who staff goes into bizerk fits of whining and crying because somebody said something mean about him?cries when the going gets tough?Fixored.
Sojourner
You’re right. I think I misread you. My apologies.
Actually, TZ agrees that it has occurred. But he thinks Clinton deserves it.
I never used the word irrational. I believe that was you.
demimondian
Hey, Steak, I thought I was a pie vendor to you?
If she KEEPS beating him around the ring like she has in the last couple of weeks — and you can pretend, but she’s been him up seriously — then the supers will reject him.
Sojourner
You told me to fuck off.
Martin
Since the winner will be who crosses 2200 delegates first, I think having more delegates is precisely winning.
And you argue that the supers won’t go for him, but he’s gained 53 supers in the last few weeks. Hillary has lost 1. You can argue that position all you want, but Obama is not only adding to his pledged delegate lead, but he’s closing the superdelegate lead rather quickly. In fact, there is no evidence that the trend is going in the other direction at all.
dslak
Obama would seem more manly if his supporters would stop trying to defend him, or be critical of his opponent.
If my grandma had balls, she’d be my grandpa!
Shorter kwAwk: You can judge a candidate by the actions of some of his supporters unassociated with the campaign, but you can’t judge a candidate on her campaign’s strategy.
ThymeZone
Great, we have myiq being a horse’s ass, and demi doing his concern spooftroll routine.
Ignore these idiots, and keep your eyes on the ball.
Clinton’s experience claims are baloney. Taken literally, they are campaign material for John McCain, as well as being completely bogus.
Barack Obama is exactly right when he says that the way to judge this contest is to look at the judgement they’ve displayed. Clinton voted to authorize the stupidest war since Remember the Maine, and later claimed that the dog ate her homework. That’s all we need to know. She blew it.
End of story.
chopper
so what’s the reasoning behind the utterly convenient “7 years” threshold?
i’ll note how interesting it is that you first said ‘being in the senate 8 years on inauguration day’, and then changed it after i pointed out that she’s arguing that she has the experience today. changed it, in fact, to exactly the number of years she has under her belt right now.
i’m sure if we found a statement by her from 2005 saying ‘i have the experience to be CiC’ you’d conveniently change the requisite number to ‘4 and a half years’, eh?
dslak
No problem. At least we’ve moved past mere animosity.
More than once, you’ve claimed that those who disagree with you on something assume either that people who hold your position or else support Hillary are stupid. In other words, that they consider them to be irrational.
Sojourner
And then failed to show up for one of the most critical votes of the year: the FISA bill.
Yep, she blew it.
Sojourner
Huh? I have no idea what this means.
tBone
On the other hand, there’s voluminous evidence that you do, in fact, like pie. To what might be considered an unhealthy degree.
ThymeZone
Soj, I truly believe that if Hillary had been president, and Bill were now running and claiming “experience” as First Manlady …. you’d be seeing a heck of a lot more penis jokes than you are now.
This isn’t misogyny. It’s good old fashioned snarkitude.
Honest.
kwAwk
dslak – lol And this isn’t Obama’s campaign strategy? Encouraging his supporters to whine Hillary out of the race does seem to be his campaign strategy.
If Obama had acuatlly cast a vote against the Iraq War, you know what you could make a pretty good distinction of their records. The problem is that Obama didn’t vote against the Iraq War. He didn’t look at the intelligence offered that Hillary did, and he had no moral dilemma on whether to give a speech.
You can judge a candidate on his supporters and on her campaign strategy. But don’t set a double standard. If you are going to condemn dirty politics do it for both sides.
Martin
I wonder if she had 4 years and he had 2 if our CinC job would suddenly be 42.9% easier to do.
Or put another way, McCain is 3 times more experienced than Hillary – or does experience after year 7 not count?
Sorry, but there is no honesty in your assertions.
Sojourner
Thanks, TZ. You got me all fired up now.
My biggest beef with Clinton (policy wise) is her attempts to triangulate. She makes “political” decisions. She seems almost allergic when it comes to saying “By G-d, this is what I believe, I stand behind it, and I dare you to take me on.”
I want someone to take a stand (obviously the one I agree with!) and have some guts.
ThymeZone
On another topic, seeing Keith ream McCain tonight?
Lovely. Funny.
chopper
hillary read the NIE?
Sojourner
Call me when it happens.
myiq2xu
Actually, that’s a jackalope.
The President is the “Commander in Chief” of the military, but he isn’t part of it. The President is saluted out of respect, but he is a civilian and does not properly return the salutes.
Generals and Admirals “run” the military, but they take their orders from civilian authority.
In theory, the President (with Congressional authorization) decides policy (go to war) the generals and admirals decide strategy (bomb here, invade there) and mid-level officers decide tactics (units “A & B” provide covering fire while unit “C” advances, unit “D” in reserve to protect the flanks and rear.)
TZ is offering a different jackalope. He asserts Hillary is unqualified because he experience as First Lady counts for nothing (in his regard) while he ignores her Senate experience completely.
He demands answers, but it is clear no answer will satisfy him. OTOH, he refuses to explain his own criteria to qualify as the CinC.
Dennis - SGMM
Just guessing, I don’t think that you have any coherent response. If you did, then you would have responded with a tightly reasoned, erudite riposte.
You didn’t respond to my post about being raised by a wonderful woman because it didn’t fit in with your world view.
That’s okay, Rage on. Rage on against your perceived absence of the light.
Godspeed.
dslak
Sojourner, you’ve adopted a defensive posture of “You can’t handle my argument, because you think Obama is Jesus and Hillary is Lucifer!” The way that is cashed out is that you assume at the outset that your opponent considers you incapable of being rational, and so his arguments can be dismissed. It’s a rather convoluted and dishonest debate trick, and I don’t like it.
By pointing it out, I’m hoping that you’ll refrain from doing it.
jj
Disrespect does not equal misogyny.
No one deserves misogyny, or any kind of hatred for that matter. At least not if you are trying to have a civilization.
Respect however, is something else altogether and Hillary Clinton seems to be working very hard to lose the respect of a lot of voters. Period.
“I was married to a President once, that makes me more qualified than everybody else who wasn’t so lucky”
“Your states don’t count”
“Thanks for being the footsoldiers in the civil rights movement, but you ungrateful darkies need to thank LBJ for your rights. Vote for me BTW, as I intent to carry on in the same patrician manner”
And so on…….
Hillary Clinton once had my respect and has actively worked to lose it, step by agonizing step.
I’m sure my experience is reflective of the way a lot of Democratic voters, especially younger voters and voters of color, are starting to view her.
Sure Dennis’ remarks were ribald and off color, not to mention disrespectful, but if that statement (and others like it) are all you’ve got to hang your hat on, you are fighting a losing battle with me.
A year ago, I may have been similarly outraged by hostility towards Hillary.
Today, I don’t care.
Know what changed?
Respect.
w vincentz
I just read the Samantha Power’s interview over at Salon.
She made many points with which I agree. Barack should have defended her.
Now, about Hillary…I agree with Hart. I think she should withdraw from the presidential race and remove herself from the Democratic party. She’ll never get my vote due to her low blow tactics. Seems that the only woman with whom she shares “low blows” is someone named Monica (not Monster).
West Coast libertarian
I just got here, so if this has been answered up thread, I apologize. Here’s my problem. I do not understand the logic behind what I understand to be the Clinton argument re the SDs. As I understand it she is saying that Obama is only winning in the states that aren’t going to vote Dem in the GE anyway so that her wins in for ex NY and CA are more important in determining which candidate stands the best chance in the GE.
If I have that right, to me it argues in favour (that’s for Krista) of Obama. My thought is that NY, CA and the other HRC states aren’t going to vote for McCain even if Obama is the nominee, so it makes sense to put the red and purple states into play by nominating the MUP.
If my reasoning is wrong, can someone (p luk?) explain.
ThymeZone
Well my hpyothetical of course can’t happen, but anyone who hangs here at BJ knows that the penis jokes will fly here at the drop of a hat. A tapped foot. Crude jokes are, um, let’s say, not exactly hated here.
Okay, we love crude jokes. Alright? And we love BJ because here’s place where you can have a good crude joke and you won’t get slammed or have your post taken down.
So, allowing for the fact that the remark was rude, do you really think it was out of line in this context?
Well, I don’t think we’ll agree, something tells me, but my instinct is that there is less to it than meets the eye.
ThymeZone
jj makes one of the best posts I have seen on these pages, on this subject. Bravo.
dslak
Is this assumption based on anything other than your dislike of Obama? I didn’t think so. When my guy does it, it’s just good campaigning. When yours does it, it’s whining. That’s pretty much how this argument goes.
That Obama wasn’t in the same position as Clinton doesn’t entail that he didn’t face any dilemma on the matter, nor that he would have come to the same conclusion as she did.
Unless you can show a direct connection between the actions of some supporters of a campaign and the people running that campaign, it’s not a basis for criticism. Hillary is not exonorated from criticisms that her campaign strategy is fratricidal by pointing out that some independent Obama supporters engage in fratricidal tactics, too.
Sojourner
Sorry. I’m snowbound in Ohio, and consuming a lot more wine (i.e., more than a glass – I’m a wimp) than I really should.
Okay, you’re not a misogynist. But can you understand why some women like me get seriously offended when a presidential candidate (arguably not a great one but a candidate nonetheless) is belittled because her husband cheated on her?
Can you understand that women should not be judged badly because their husbands are assholes?
Should she be criticized because she didn’t divorce him? How the hell would I know? I think an argument could be made either way. I don’t think that affects her status as a candidate either way.
Criticize her on her credentials, criticize her on the Canada/NAFTA thing (which I haven’t seen much of in the press and I’m not sure why), criticize her voting record, criticize her lack of political courage.
All of that is fair game.
ThymeZone
That is correct, that is what I assert. And, it does count for nothing.
Tell it to Hillary, she is the one who doesn’t get it. Well, besides you, I mean.
demimondian
Yup — and that person can not win by campaigning.
Got it, Martin? You can duck and weave as long as you like, but the fact reamins that Obama is not “winning”. What’s he’s doing right now is exactly what she is — trying to convince enough of the supers to carry him over 2200. That’s called “trying not to lose”.
I realize you don’t want to accept that there’s a difference, but there is. Until Tuesday, he could reasonably say he was “winning”. No more.
mapaghimagsik
I do believe Senator Clinton has been attacked with sexist attacks. I think those attacks were inappropriate, lame, and even worse — attack women who do not deserve to be attacked that way.
I am frustrated that the candidate that serve as inspiration for women who have struggled against the glass ceiling is using a scorched earth policy to the nomination. If a man were doing the same tactics, I would be just as angry, if not angrier.
I think there are genuine questions to be asked about Clinton’s policies and her current behavior that needs to be asked. I would *love* to see Obama adopt Clinton’s policy on Health Care. I would be pleased with an Obama/Clinton ticket.
I think what’s frustrating to many is that when Senator Clinton loses the nomination, the mysoginists will cheer right along with people who felt (Knew?) she wasn’t the right candidate. It hurts to give those assholes fodder. I think those assholes need to be ignored, and women can rejoice in that a woman was a serious contender for the presidency. And she was a serious contender not because she was a woman, but because she was qualified.
Other women will be qualified too, and will be taken seriously as candidates. However, this candidate has lost her parties nomination not because she’s a woman, but because there was a better candidate.
Sojourner
I sort of agree with this, because that’s what I’m hearing from some of the folks on this list. It’s okay to make penis jokes or call her a bitch or (my favorite) talk about bitch slapping her because her campaign has done some really crappy things.
I disagree with this argument.
I have no idea whether people here think I’m rational or not. So I really still don’t understand what you’re arguing.
It could be the wine.
Martin
I don’t see where he needs to. Nobody is arguing (including Obama) that he is more qualified or meets some standard of qualification. In fact, his staffer argues the opposite:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385×101660
Clinton and her supporters are arguing that not only is she more qualified but that there is some invisible line in the sand that she has crossed that he hasn’t. We’re calling on someone to identify that line. In addition, we’re calling on someone to identify the spectrum of experience so that we can gauge whether Obama is just shy of the line or Hillary well over the line.
The burden is entirely on Clinton to defend that since it’s her claim, not his. And a Nobel Laureate thinks she’s full of shit;
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2008/03/08/wuspols108.xml
Laertes
There is no way to cross the goddamn threshold. There are exactly four people on this Earth who know what it is to bear the awesome responsibility of the Presidency, and none of them are running. Get over it.
myiq2xu
Welcome to Balloon Juice!
demimondian
You conveniently ignore the fact that Brokaw’s mythical 50 supers evaporated…or don’t you follow inconvenient news?
Sojourner
I’m not sure what battle you are referring to.
dslak
The misogynist attacks on Clinton are going to play a role in the general election. They shouldn’t, but they will. If you take a line like demi’s, such that anything thrown at Obama is fair because it makes him prove himself, that also means you’re committed to the acceptability of misogynist attacks on Hillary. One way to avoid this problem is to accept that there are at least moral limits to how one should campaign against an opponent who is also a member of one’s own party.
I think TZ may have meant something like that, although I won’t presume to speak for him directly.
Xenos
184 posts in 2 1/2 hours? I’ll just skip to the end.
Null set. What preparation did Lincoln, Wilson, or FDR have? None, but they did passable, at times brilliant jobs.
How about Washington? He managed to lose us into independance, and the righties wanted to make him king, so he makes a useful counter-example.
Eisenhower is also a good counter-example. He was very well prepared, and saw through a lot of the crap coming out of the Pentagon.
Hoover had excellent preparation in managing an army at war, but that was not the skill set needed, so a fail on that one.
LBJ? Had a largely political but useful role in WWII, and managed to get a phony silver star. Certainly would have met Hillary’s standards, but what a clusterfuck…
There must be many here who can give a better analysis than this. Still, the record appears to indicate that there really is not a clear pattern of efficacy as CiC for military or diplomatic experience.
myiq2xu
The paduan obeys
Martin
What happened on Tuesday that didn’t happen on every previous day? Obama lost about 12 pledged delegates, picked up 8 from California, picked up a few supers, and with the TX caucus results so far, appears as though he’ll come out even with her or a delegate ahead.
tBone
No, you’re absolutely right. And in fairness, p.luk said earlier today that, were the election being held today, Obama would be the better candidate – based on recent SUSA numbers that match up with your reasoning.
Sojourner
mapaghimagsik:
BRAVO!!!!
Standing ovation.
myiq2xu
Fixt (unless you are counting Cheney) because Chimpy still doesn’t have a clue.
Sojourner
So we’re not allowed to criticize Clinton on her policies and her ethics?
You’ve got to be kidding.
ThymeZone
Face, desk.
dslak
Some of this is problematic, and some of it is things that would also be used on a male candidate (i.e., the bitch slapping). Some of it is reprehensible, some merely in bad taste.
Maybe not, but it has come out in some of your arguments that you assume all of your opponents are assuming you to be irrational.
Sojourner
I’ll believe this when the racist comments start flying. And when pigs fly.
demimondian
What happened on Tuesday was that he failed to win a majority in Texas or Ohio. Prior to that, he had won majorities in many states, and she hadn’t managed to lay a glove on him.
Suddenly, in the last week of February , she started finding ways to hit him. And *she kept hitting him*.
And he had no effective defense. None. He stumbled. He walked out of press conferences. He lost control of the narrative, just as she had previously.
OK, that’s a part of a campaign. You can’t always control the narrative; events happen, and you don’t stop the news. But the key thing is that you must regain control of it, or you will lose. Obama is now trying to avoid losing. She’s shown that she can take the agenda back in a tough fight, and that’s the skill we know we need to have.
Now Obama needs to show he can do it, too. The general election doesn’t allow you to bank delegates, and the campaign has to show it can win.
Sojourner
Serious question for myiq2xu:
Are you bothered by the fact that Clinton failed to show up for the FISA bill vote, even though she was in town and even though Obama and McCain both voted?
Martin
I wasn’t referring to those. Obama’s campaign said that rumor was untrue as soon as it was floated. He’s been picking up superdelegates every day and almost one every day or two days either flips from Clinton to Obama or switches from Clinton to uncommitted.
Some of us have, you know, facts and stuff. Latest count I see shows her with 240 supers and him with 200. He’s up 112 total, including supers, and excluding MI and FL which is the largest lead he’s held. That includes the recent CA delegate movement, recent supers that have pledged, and excludes some of the TX caucus delegates that have yet to be counted.
Jack Roy
So, if I’ve got this right, the new rules are:
1) Referring to Hillary Clinton in any way that identifies her as a woman, or as having a husband, is sexist, misogynistic, or worse;
2) Arguing that a particular number (1) argument is not, in fact, sexist, does no more than “support the position that Clinton is fair game for all attacks” and makes you sound like the “authoritarian Repubs I work with”;
3) Anyone who points out that (1) and (2) together leave little room left for open debate is merely an Obama cultist; and
4) You just don’t get it.
And to think I was just wondering why I stopped slumming in the comment threads…. oh well, I’m out of patience. Have a good weekend, everybody!
dslak
Why should only racist or misogynist attacks be off-limits? I would expect any principles one would appeal to against the allowance of either to encompass other things, as well.
Callisto
I’ll say it again: So if I said something along the lines of “Maybe John McCain absorbed some real capitol hill experience, through his shriveled old vienna sausage of a penis, from the lobbyist tart he’s been doing on the side”, then that makes me a man-hater?
I don’t understand. Is it only offensive if you’re making fun of a woman or an african-american?
Sojourner
Nope. Frankly, I don’t care what my opponents think of me.
Martin
Majorities aren’t what wins elections. See Gore, Al.
What he did do on Tuesday was win 2 states and lose 2 states on delegates. All it took from Hillary was to effectively concede 13 states in order to rack up those two wins. How many states will she need to concede in order to try and hit 270 in November? Obama is campaigning in every state, winning delegates in exactly the same focused manner that you need to win electorates in the general, and coming out ahead. He’s raising the money to get it done, he’s getting the volunteers needed to get it done, and he’s lifting up other candidates along the way.
zsa
Does Clinton have a legitimate shot at winning the nomination? If not, then what the hell is she doing?
She picked up what? 9 delegates on Obama in Ohio? Lost ground in Texas? For all the media buzz, she was up 20 points in both states just a month before and just narrowly held on to avoid losing altogether. She needed to win by large margins in order to gain significantly on Obama, and she didn’t do it. Obama got what he needed out of March 4, if not quite what he wanted.
The Florida and Michigan delegations are simply not going to be seated if the nomination is even close. Na Ga Ha Pa.
What are the HRC supporters going to say when Obama goes to the convention with a clear lead in pledged delegates? Ignore them? Twist the arms of the superdelegates to eke out a narrow Pyhrric victory? Insist on seating MI and FL? Insist that California should count for double? Take their ball and go home?
Can anyone manufacture a plausible scenario for HRC to win the nomination? Keep in mind that superdelegates are going to want the candidate with the longest coattails. They’re not just voting for the candidate most likely to prevail in November, but for the candidate most likely to help them get re-elected themselves. HRC has huge negatives and 49% of the general electorate would rather be butt-fucked by spider monkeys than vote for Hillary. I don’t think that’s fair, but it’s definitely true … her negatives are way higher and way more entrenched than Obama’s. Her coattails are way shorter. The supers are going to balk.
The other thing is that she is not just tearing down Obama. Democrats tear each other down all the time. He’s a big boy and he’ll either bounce back from it or not. But she shouldn’t build up John McCain. That’s criminally stupid. Particularly when Obama is the prohibitive favorite to win the nomination.
Note that I’m not suggesting that she drop out, or even that she stop attacking Obama … bring it on … but it’s absolutely beyond the pale … totally mutherfucking unacceptable … for her to build up McCain.
We’re running against McCain, you might recall. He’s not a capable CiC. He’s a crankly old serial adulterer with a history of unstable behavior, prone to violent rages, mentally still back in some North Vietnamese hellhole where they brainwashed him to go back to the US and run for President. He’s a dishonest, corrupt political hack. He’s George Bush. All over again. Four More Years! Four More Years!
For Clinton to say anything that diminishes the chances of a Democrat (any Democrat) in the general election is just fucking stupid.
Sojourner
But I do think I’m smarter than my opponents.
Callisto
Actually, it looks like Obama won Texas, demimondian. So Clinton won two states, while Obama won two. Yes, Clinton managed to end Obama’s long winning streak – but nobody expected it to go on forever.
Sojourner
Such as?
dslak
Caring and assuming aren’t the same thing. I can assume that tomorrow is Saturday without caring.
Laertes
Fuckin’ A.
Would you hillbots please please please stop polishing McCain’s knob as a way of tearing Obama down? It’s bad for the party.
Xenos
While Hillary and her people have suggested some useful experience from her first lady days, the CiC argument is more based on her experience in the Senate Armed Services Committee. Instead of five years’ experience on that committee, Obama has just three years’ experience on the Foreign Relations committee.
It is an honest argument, if not a terribly persuasive one.
dslak
Well, what principles are in play on your view that only leave racist or misogynist attacks beyond the pale?
myiq2xu
There is no objective criteria, and even if there were, meeting that threashold is still no guarantee that the candidate will do a good job.
But knock off the hyperventilating. This is politics. Every candidate claims to be qualified, that’s implicit in being a candidate. Every candidate claims to be more qualified (in one way or the other) than the other candidates.
And most candidates claim that their opponents are unqualified in some way. Hillary says Obama is inexperienced. Obama says Hillary has bad judgment, as exemplified by her vote on the AUMF. Which ever one wins the nomination will be claiming McCain is unqualified because he’s nuts.
Can we fight about something else for a while?
mapaghimagsik
Callisto:
In a way it does, but at the same time, you don’t have a whole set of sexist baggage that it gets put on top of. Besides, McCain doing a tart isn’t sexist against McCain. Its a virility thing. Now Iseman being a tart, is kind of sexist, even though she probably does “know how Washington works” if you know what I mean.
I think its difficult because lets face it, the Vienna sausage comment is a funny image! At the same time, I don’t think its effective because of what I said above.
Being funny and salient is not an easy process. At the same time, when you are, its darned effective.
Something else to consider: When you use an attack against Clinton that is sexist (I know its in the eye of the beholder, but “wash my shirt” — not used by anyone here, clearly was) you actually are *helping her*
I really really really don’t want Clinton to win. The only person I want to win less than Clinton is McCain. So, I tend to craft my attacks very carefully. I don’t think making fun of her being a cuckhold is necessarily sexist, but it is juvanile, and without that right punch behind it, ineffective.
chopper
that is so awesome.
ThymeZone
All true. But the real story here is that it’s not HER argument. Her argument is that she has this vague “35 years of experience WHITE HOUSE doing rather a lot of things OVAL OFFICE mostly involving earning a living WHITE HOUSE and helping her husband run for office OVAL OFFICE that really doesn’t mean much PRESIDENT of anything.”
And asking us to buy that this vaguely celebrity past makes her qualified to be president.
No sale here.
myiq2xu
Nope. Only on her gender, choice of spouse, hair styles, wardrobe, laugh, voice, and secret sexual orientation.
If you want to discuss substantive issues you need to go to one of those political blogs.
BTW – Did you know Obama fathered two black babies?
ThymeZone
Like what?
Callisto
But stating that he got valuable experience through cock-osmosis is not any different than stating that Hillary got hers through reverse-cock-osmosis, right?
Is it just a matter of her being a woman and McCain being a man, or is it just that imagining McCain’s shrively doodle is just funnier?
Callisto
Wait, I thought you were going on about “7 years in the US Senate” being the magical threshold. You’re really all over the map here, myiq2xu.
tBone
What most candidates don’t do is claim that the opponent from their party is less qualified than the opponent from the opposing party. That’s the issue that’s got people fired up, no matter how much you want to avoid it.
chopper
apparently she didn’t pick up any pointers from back then. sheesh, they dealt with the texas primary twice in the 90’s, and yet she bitched and moaned this year about how confusing and unfair it is.
myiq2xu
Yes, but only a lttle, because it was obvious the fix was in. If she had missed the vote and her vote would have made a difference, I would be bothered a lot.
Are you bothered that one of Obama’s advisors on intelligence and foreign policy is John Brennan, who supports telecom immunity?
PeterJ
So lets say Clinton would win the primary, how highly unlikely that is.
Then suddenly McCain no longer would be qualified as CiC?
And for some reason McCain wouldn’t point out the fact that she has said that he is numerous times.
Good luck with that.
mapaghimagsik
Callisto:
For you and me, its probably not any different. But that’s because I can give a little on it. If we lived in a world where there was no misogyny, there would be absolutely no difference, except for the fact that McCain getting any experince into his withered walnut is ludicrous, no matter what the route.
But, we live in a world of context, whether we like it or not. I don’t get to say “niggah” please, because there’s a whole lot of history there just just doesn’t make it right. Its one thing to see it as unfair, its another to accept historical context for what it is.
Racists and Sexists ruin the fun for us all.
myiq2xu
Isn’t that a gay porn flick?
myiq2xu
It’s my 50 state strategy.
chopper
you’re asking if we’re bothered that obama disagrees with one of his advisors? what, are they all supposed to agree with him on every issue?
zsa
That may well be, but what she actually said just the other day is that McCain is more qualified to be CiC than the likely Democratic nominee. Totally different than simply claiming that she has more experience than Obama.
It’s plainly and simply over the line. Unacceptable. It’s bad for the party, bad for the nation, but marginally beneficial in the short term for Clinton. So apparently that makes it okay.
Is she a Democrat committed to defeating the GOP in November? Or is she only out for herself and if she can’t have her way she’s going to trash the place? Jeez, I’m half expecting her to mount a 3rd party campaign if she doesn’t finagle her way to the Democratic nomination.
mapaghimagsik
Its an important issue for me. I would like to hear someone explain what value he sees in the advisor when said advisor is so dead wrong on such an important issue.
Not every question is demonizing, and I think we all know that.
myiq2xu
Does he also disagree with the statement by Samantha Powers (before she resigned) that Obama’s “plan” to withdraw two battalions a month from Iraq is not firm and will depend on what the situation on the ground is in January of 2009?
Sojourner
Good point.
I don’t know what the people here think about me.
I do think that some people do not understand the difference between criticisms of policy/ethics and criticisms that target gender.
Sojourner
I don’t believe that race or sex influence one’s ability to be an effective leader. I would also add sexual orientation to the list. Attacking someone on any of these plays into stereotypes that have plagued this country for centuries.
I would hope that you already know this.
Sojourner
Sojourner
Not as long as Obama votes against it.
Sojourner
And yes, Clinton had an obligation to show up and take a public stand. She didn’t.
chopper
not that i know of. shit, what she said makes perfect sense to me.
i do, however, know that he is against telecom immunity. just because one of his advisors isn’t is no reason to hyperventilate.
this isn’t that hard, people.
Bruce Moomaw
If Obama does get nominated, it will be fascinating to watch Hillary explain why she’s endorsing him despite the fact that he’s far more of a danger to the survival of the Republic than McCain. (Of course, I still have fond memories of the very end of the 1972 Democratic Convention, where Scoop Jackson endorsed McGovern while looking as though he would prefer to be cleaning toilets with his tongue.)
myiq2xu
I was clearly using snark font, couldn’t you tell?
mapaghimagsik
Agreed. And what kind of advistor is this guy of? Intelligence and National Security? You know, the kind of advisor who should be advising in that area?
No hyperventilation here. but I want to know the answer to what value Senator Obama sees in him.
Sojourner
Sorry, I missed it. Must be the wine.
chopper
is telecom immunity the only deal in the great pantheon of intelligence and national security issues? if so, then yes, i’d wonder why he has the guy on his roster.
Civilized Crank
Obama would argue that his judgment on military intervention, particularly about the wisdom of the Iraq war, makes him qualified. You are free to argue that his military philosophy is off base or makes him unqualified, but that is his position (and one that Hillary repeatedly fails to combat, except by arguing that they have voted the same since he joined the Senate).
Hillary’s argument is that her experience as a public interest lawyer, first lady of Arkansas and the US, and her time in the Senate makes her qualified. Obama has argued that nothing in that experience makes her uniquely prepared for the job.
And this idea that you have to do anything to win reminds me of this line: “What shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?”
myiq2xu
I do know that Hillary is against it too, and just because she missed a meaningless vote (for her, not the country) is no reason to hyperventilate either.
She spoke out against it. She missed the vote, which looks bad (and will be used against her) but her vote wouldn’t have made any difference.
I’m pissed at all the sell-out Democrats who voted for it, like my home state Senator Di-Fi.
Bruce Moomaw
Well, quite a few people think it profits them a lot. Losing your soul while looking like a fool, however, has nothing whatsoever to recommend it.
mapaghimagsik
You know as well as I do its not. Considering how important telecom immunity is, dont you think the question is worth asking?
Sojourner
The other way of looking at it is Clinton wants to be the leader of the Democratic party. It is difficult for me to think of another issue (except perhaps torture) that is as important as this vote.
How can you be an effective leader if you don’t show up?
chopper
i’ve never hyperventilated over her ditching the FISA vote. i do, however, think it makes her look bad, especially as she was in town at the time.
The Grand Panjandrum
Ah, yes, that was a memorable moment.
Clinton’s look will be fun, but the First Black President leering at Obama? Jesus! I think I’m getting aroused.
Callisto
As long as Obama has a reasoned, principled stand against “telecom immunity”, why should we worry?
It used to be we celebrated the idea of a President who included in his cabinet advisors who didn’t agree with him on certain issues.
chopper
i don’t expect obama to agree on everything with his advisors. if obama didn’t have his mind made up over immunity, then i’d have more of a problem with it.
demimondian
No, Callisto, Obama did not win Texas. Sorry, but the only vote which has any predictive value for how Texas will go in November happened during the day — and Clinton won that.
Martin
Interesting segue:
Here I thought we finally got onto a substantive issue without the attacks and whatnot and now it gets called off.
See, but people can’t seem to see the distinction in the two above sentences. Is Obama inexperienced? Yep. I don’t see him arguing that. He’s arguing that experience isn’t all that, and that Clinton is arguing experience that she doesn’t have. It’s not that one is more or less experienced, it’s that one is more or less *honest* about that experience.
But on the judgement side, he’s giving concrete examples of that judgement and being (as far as I can see) honest about that as well. She hasn’t been terribly honest about her attacks on his judgement either, by example of her misrepresentation of his Reagan statement.
Look, she can beat the hell out of him all she wants, she just needs to be fair and honest about it. I’d much rather have an honest than dishonest president. I’ve had my fair share of dishonest presidents, and you can argue that dishonesty is what you need to win, but I don’t see that it necessarily is and I see it as a false bet – actually demanding in the candidate the very quality you would decry once they got to office. And I have no problem with the substantive reasons why people support their candidate – Hillary has a huge number of positive qualities and assets, but be honest both with yourself and the rest of us about them.
Clinton says that she crossed the CinC threshold and when pressed on it you dismiss the statement as ‘that’s just politics’. You don’t realize that ANYTHING can be dismissed that way, so it’s a dishonestly evasive way of jumping out of a debate. In the same breath, you accuse me of being intellectually weak on my position by accusing me of ‘hyperventilating’. I have some issues and concerns about Obama, but I’m honest about them. So if you are going to argue Hillary’s position and want to be taken in any way credibly, you need to knock off the bullshit of defending against my facts like delegate counts with your opinions of stumbling and momentum and shit. Momentum can be measured – so measure it. Add up the delegate gains that she earned and show me that the delegates are going in her direction. I don’t care what kind of delegates they are – pledged, supers, even florida and michigan if we get some official indication that they’ll be counted.
myiq2xu
Oops:
Where are all those people from yesterday who were insisting I denounce/renounce Hillary for breaking the hypocritic oath?
John S.
What an absurd thread – as usual.
This whole experience thing is really quite easy to figure out. If I were looking to hire someone for the job of President of the United States, then I’d want to see their resumé. So let’s all have a look, shall we?
Barack Obama
That looks like a pretty solid background to me. Hillary Clinton doesn’t seem to have a CV listed on LinkedIn, so this was the best I could find…
Hillary Clinton
They both certainly have excellent resumés, but frankly I think Obama has more experience in government than Clinton does. Clinton has a longer work history, but the majority of it is in an affiliated field (law). I also find it curious that her role as official US hostess is listed but not her job as official Arkansas hostess.
Even if that were included, I would still hire Obama for the job.
Callisto
Last I checked, this contest is for the Democratic nomination. And in the Democratic nomination, the winner in a particular state is the person who walks away with the most delegates, not the one who wins “the vote which demimondian thinks has the most predictive value”.
Obama has the majority of delegates from Texas, ergo he won Texas. If you want to redefine ‘win’ to something else that’s fine, but I’m going to go with the way the DNC defines it if you don’t mind.
The Grand Panjandrum
Obama will end up with more Pledged Delegates from Texas. It is the ONLY thing that counts in the Democratic nomination process. Its a full reset after the nomination. Arguing that a primary election between two Democrats has any predictive value for what will happen between a Republican and a Democrat defies all logic and reason.
John S.
No, demispoof, a Democratic primary in Texas has little predictive value for what may happen in a general election. The only relevant result from the March 4th vote in Texas pertains to the delegate distribution, and it looks like Obama won that.
myiq2xu
He gave one speech, while in the Illinois Legislature, opposing the war. He represented one of the most liberal districts in the state at the time.
When he decided to run for the US Senate, he tried to scrub the speech from his website, claimed there was no difference between his position and Bush’s and said he didn’t know what he would have done if he had been in the Senate when the vote was held.
Since then his record on Iraq has been identical to Hillary’s.
Martin
I think he has indicated that all he can do is lay out a plan based on how things look now. It would be irresponsible to implement a plan with willful disregard to new information or conditions, no? And the point is, as has been made repeatedly by the campaign, is that Obama, Clinton, and McCain by the fact of them being in the Senate and not the White House have a limited amount of information to work from which cannot be avoided. Once they get more information – and you must admit that this administration is FAR from transparent and accommodating – they may revise the plan. We don’t have to like that answer, but its an honest answer.
Andrew
With all due respect, demi, that is as stupid as fucking retarded horseshit, and you know it.
Obama won Texas. The end.
I’m not surprised that Hillary supporters are in denial of this fact, given that they cannot accept that it is basically impossible for her to win a majority of pledged delegates, but I am a little worried that so many Democrats can’t do math above a 2nd grade level.
AkaDad
Let’s be clear. Hillary is not a monster, as far as I know.
John S.
Demi is not a Hillary supporter, but he plays one on this blog.
Callisto
Hillary introduced a bill in 2007 intending to redeploy troops out of Iraq within a year? Hillary opposed removing an end date from Feingold-Reid?
I had no idea.
The Grand Panjandrum
Bullshit, myiq. Watch Lessig’s video on Obama. He addresses this very issue and refutes it in no uncertain terms.
chopper
…and obama called lorne michaels to complain about how he scrubbed his speech from his website!
The Grand Panjandrum
You’ll have to explain this to me.
ThymeZone
A Crank For All Seasons.
Krista
John, if ever we needed a return to cat blogging, it’s now. I’m begging you, man. I think we’re all getting an acute case of Primary Fatigue Syndrome.
Oh, and hi Sojourner! Long time no see! I’m actually in agreement with you, by the way. The Obama campaign (and Obama supporters) should be uber-careful to try to avoid anything that can be construed as sexist — all it does is create sympathy for Hillary. Mind you, this is probably easier said than done, when we have people who think that the word “periodically” is sexist when one is using it in the context of a female. I mean…really? Soj, you’ve got a pretty good radar for misogyny, but you’re reasonable about it. What did you think of that whole “periodically” kerfuffle?
chopper
you know, after all the dust settles from 3/4, the total delegate count for the whole day is going to be very close. there’s even a chance that obama will walk away with a very, very slim lead or tie hillary.
in which case he still would not have lost a single day in the entire campaign, delegate-wise.
Conservatively Liberal
I ran across a Ben Smith/Politico article that identifies the person who runs Hillaryis44.org. His name is Alex Rodriguez, and he was a Perot supporter in ’92. The site is run by someone who did not even support Bill in ’92. Oh the Hillaryity! There is no known link between Rodriguez and the Clinton campaign, but Smith pulled a fast one and dug up one interesting tidbit; he is known by name to at least one Clinton campaign member.
I like how Ben Smith tripped up a Clinton campaign consultant (Tracy Sefl, Clinton campaign ‘liaison to Drudge‘) by only providing the first name of the guy to her, and she made a crack about a baseball player with the same name. That Smith did not give her the last name is a good catch by him. He pointed this out to the Clinton contact, and she responded that she just heard his name ‘somewhere’.
This shit is funny on so many levels, you just can’t make this up. She must have the IQ of a potato.
chopper
it’s a joke, myiq1/10u was pushing the false ‘can you believe obama called lorne michaels to complain about SNL?’ shtick for a while.
AkaDad
With the way Hillary is running her campaign, I don’t understand how she could have a 47% disapproval rating.
Martin
Read the speech. Was that the right judgment on the situation or not?
‘Tried to scrub’? He’s not in control of his website? How long was the speech missing from the site, BTW? What was the explanation for it not being there? If you are going to attack – have some facts on your side.
And the Bush reference has repeatedly been taken out of context. (Original article seems to be gone from ChiTrib)
Jen
Very O/T, just got here and have to go again, but y’all might appreciate the Montana governor giving the middle finger to the feds…
and this plea for us all to get out of the race.
TZ should appreciate the knitting suggestion. It is relaxing.
myiq2xu
My cat is an Obama supporter. But what does he know, he’s a pussy.
myiq2xu
How many times are you going to blogwhore that site?
Sojourner
I banged my head against a wall until I couldn’t remember anything about it.
Seriously, Krista, you remain a voice of reason on this site.
Count me as one of your many fans.
chopper
lessee here…
sounds spot-on to me.
Sojourner
The straight answer is I thought it was stupid.
chopper
when are you going to stop getting every goddamn thing wrong?
the answer, my friends, is blowing in the wind.
TenguPhule
Hillary is an asshole.
But she is our asshole.
Right now there are ugly noises and she is making a big stink.
She must clean up or she will be purged.
Either way, the shit will be flushed from the system.
myiq2xu
Back at ya:
From Hillary’s AUMF sppech on 10/10/02
chopper
“straight”? that’s a very heteronormative thing to say.
Krista
Don’t do that. Wine will give you the same effect, but without those unsightly bruises.
I’m here solely for the adulation, really. That, and the pie.
tBone
You’re only saying that because you’re a girl.
Go Obama!
John S.
Uh, oh.
Bill Maher is making Terry McAuliffe look stupid as fuck. Not that Terry needs help with that.
Martin
Actually, Lessig isn’t entirely correct. The speech was missing for a few weeks when one of his staff took it off the site after Mission Accomplished day when he/she figured it was no longer relevant. When it was pointed out to him that it was missing, he had it put back on. It was gone less than a month and there was some site redesign in there as well, which may have been part of why it was taken off. But Clinton wasn’t honest in her statements there because she implied that the speech was taken off and not returned. And her statement on ‘didn’t really disagree with Bush’ is dishonest as well because there was a clear context to that statement.
The Grand Panjandrum
I think I recall it vaguely. Probably had a few shots of tequila at the time so my sieve like memory was even more impaired than usual.
Sojourner
Good way to belittle an issue that some of us live with on a daily basis.
AkaDad
Oh give me a break. You should rethink this when you’re ironing my shirt.
John S.
Sounds like she left a big gaping hole for George Bush to drive a Mack truck into Iraq through.
Sojourner
The voice of reason as usual.
:-)
myiq2xu
Most sensible thing you’ve ever said.
The Grand Panjandrum
10-4. Thanks for the info. Do you remember where you read or heard it?
cbear
Speaking of blogwhoring myiq, it’s funny how you seem to mimic the bloggers and commenters from over at No Quarter so well.
TenguPhule
No, she isn’t.
She’s making the same fucking mistake that fucked her on Iraq and on the Iran vote. She keeps putting short-term gains over long term consequences. It’s the CEO Candidate II, Revenge of the Dumbass. Everything she thinks helps her in the primary is just a running fuse to piles of shit waiting to explode in the general election.
If she really wanted to win, she’d take a page from Obama’s book and start praising Obama and using the time to stick a fork in McCain at the same time. Honey or Vinger, do the fucking math. If she works towards the shared goal of destroying Republicans in November, she could pull the votes to her. If she doesn’t, the Long Knives are going to come out and start stabbing.
Personally, unless Hillary Clinton rips out Al Gonzo’s still beating heart and eats it on Live TV, I’m not going to carry any water for her. She’s violated the 11th Democratic Commandent: Thou shalt not make the fucking Republican’s job easier.
Krista
And you’re only saying that, because you delight in being a royal pain in the arse.
tBone
You forgot the coda to that speech:
Please stop trying to justify that vote. Everyone with two neurons to rub together knew what it would lead to, and pretending otherwise is insulting.
myiq2xu
As I stated earlier, I made the mistake of believing Obama’s statement that he called Michaels.
tBone
I do. I really do.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have a hankering for some pie.
Martin
What’s your point? She’s saying not to attack Iraq while she is giving a President that every Democrat knew not to trust the full authority to attack. That’s like me giving my 7 year old daughter a loaded gun and telling her to not shoot herself – and then when she blows her brains out claiming I wasn’t responsible.
AUMF was an authorization with few limits and no means to retract. Once it was handed to Bush, he could do whatever the fuck he wanted – and everyone knew exactly what he wanted to do with it, and had known for a year.
See, that’s that judgement thing again.
myiq2xu
GMTA
Callisto
Well that sure was a stern warning she gave George Bush about unilaterally invading Iraq right before she gave him the power to unilaterally invade Iraq. And then stood by as he unilaterally invaded Iraq.
An invasion that she still hasn’t admitted was a stupid idea, even though we all know it was built on a flimsy house of cards.
I guess you learn the hard way when you give a case of whiskey and the keys to your Porsche to your irresponsible teenager saying “Now, don’t do something stupid” that placing trust in the untrustworthy without doing any thinking about the situation at all can have major consequences.
cbear
Sorry, I don’t know what that means. Is it some secret code you and SusanUPC (or whatever the fuck her name is) have worked out?
Martin
Nah, some random link I found a few days after I first saw the Lessig video. I think Lessig’s point stands in spite of the small error. While Hillary’s claim of removal of the speech isn’t an outright fabrication, is certainly isn’t an honest claim.
Krista
As long as you’re cleaning the toilet, big boy.
TenguPhule
During which she’s been part of the worst fucking Congress in memory. And so has Obama, though he got stained with less due to not being there as long.
So I don’t see any benefit to either of them to hawk those credentials.
C&C qualifications are shit. When the fuck did those matter? We’re having a Limbaugh Ass size meltdown in the economy, our foreign credit is worth less then spit on the street, the entire world now fucking hates us for being hypocritical facist assholes and we’re pissing away money and lives in the Mideast on missions that have not only failed, but gone so FUBAR that China and Russia are considered better company then we are. And that doesn’t even address the purge of the government needed to get rid of the Republican Fifth Cols. that are planted in position and waiting to attack from within.
AkaDad
Since Krista apologized for Canada earlier, I think we can hold off on the invasion.
myiq2xu
I disagree. I was opposed to Bush for a lot of reasons way before he was even the GOP nominee but I never suspected how bad he really was.
Hindsight makes your statement obvious but at the time it wasn’t that easy. Actually, in hindsight it is obvious that Bush & Cheney intended to invade Iraq no matter what Congress did.
cbear
Teng,
You forgot to mention a DOJ that prosecutes and/or imprisons political opponets.
Conservatively Liberal
chopper, I just ignore the bleating of myiqisnegative and p.luk. It is a waste of time and they have nothing of value or substance in what they say, it is all Hillary, full throttle with them. You can’t have a substantiative discussion with a zealot.
Like they say, don’t wrestle with pigs. You get filthy, and only the pigs like it.
I found the story on the hillaryis44.org site to be interesting because this Alex Rodriguez is known to one Clinton campaign member. That was a stupid slip up on their part. IMO, there is something ‘there’, but what it is remains to be seen. I hope people keep picking away at it. If they are able to hang that albatross of a web site around the Clinton campaigns neck, that would really hurt.
cbear
I’m beginning to understand why you don’t fare so well in some of the arguments here at BJ.
myiq2xu
It means ignorance is bliss and you’re a happy camper.
Goodnight everybody!
Callisto
“Statement”? Don’t you mean “joke”? Come on, myiq2xu, don’t make stupid excuses. Your utter disdain for the guy as a person caused you to read something totally different out of a lighthearted self-depricating joke.
The fact that you apparently kept going with it, taking it seriously enough to try to use it as evidence to shore up your own internal anti-Obama dialogue leads me to believe that it might be a nice idea for you to take a break from the entire world of American politics for a while.
John S.
It’s quite simple, really.
myiq2xu reads this:
And thinks that Hillary Clinton is an excellent stateswoman. I read that and I see a load of bullshit.
She found the notion of unilaterally invading Iraq appealing, thought that it would be acceptable to do so, but only when she was fed more bullshit facts by Bush to the point where she could say that it was a good option.
If you are OK with that, then Hillary is definitely your woman.
TenguPhule
See purge.
Every Bush appointee is going to have to be fired. Just on the safe side I’d imprison them all until trials could be scheduled too. After all, we don’t have a fourth amendment any more.
tBone
Bullllllllshit. It was crystal-clear at the time to anyone who cared to look.
The Other Steve
I’m no longer wasting time on Hillary. She either drops out, or I am flat out voting for McCain.
AkaDad
That is clearly sexist.
cbear
I say throw ’em all in those KBR rape trailers and let nature take its course.
Bob In Pacifica
myiq2xu, not a good “girl.” A good Democrat. It’s a concept that seems to have left her.
mark
That’s why we need to double Gitmo.
Martin
Actually, fair enough. Every Democrat *in Congress*. I don’t expect most people to keep up with what is admittedly pretty boring crap, but I do expect senators to. Bush was pushing shit from start to finish and that was 2 years in. Everyone in Congress should have known what this guy was.
TenguPhule
No, I don’t believe in torture.
Fair trials, sentences and executions.
Xenos
I am trying to work out the angles on going for McCain.
He would have a ghll of a time trying to run the decrepit machinery of the the Bush/Cheney administration. While he is plenty craven, he lacks the sheer criminal shamelessness needed to operate an organized crime syndicate. Congress could run 90 different investigations at once, and without the right crooks in the DOJ the administrations would grind to a halt, unable to do anything.
With a reinvigorated Congress jamming legislation down his throat, we could kick his ass around for an amusing four years, like a mirror image of the last two.
Naaahhhh. Too much trouble that way, too many potential points of failure.
Xenos
… hell of a time….
eyes getting bleary.
zsa
Whoa there, Charley. Take it easy with the economics jargon.
…
I supported the war because I actually believed all that stuff about WMDs and how we would pull out before we ejaculated. So yeah, I’m a fuckwit and a turd wrangler … I actually believed the President and gave his administration the benefit of the doubt. Once.
But what was crystal clear at that time was that Bush was so going to attack Iraq. Anyone who didn’t realize that at the time just simply wasn’t paying attention. It was totally fucking obvious.
cbear
Nah, a couple of cases of 7.62mm should do the trick.
Unless they took the sanctions for treason out of the Constitution with all the other stuff, that is.
TenguPhule
You haven’t seen anything yet. This is going to make 70s stagflation look like a weak cough.
We’ve got $300+ Billion of Big Shitpile Confessions to go.
Gods know how much more in Little Soon to be Big Shit Pile II: Credit Cards and Car Loans.
Dollar is going to toilet paper at the exact same time India and China are discovering the joys of having money to burn. Which means no matter how much American demand goes down, foreign demand is going to keep prices rising and rising.
And that doesn’t factor in any of the wild cards in play.
Honestly, I don’t envy whoever gets stuck with trying to fix this turd.
cbear
-or 5.56mm…depending on the choice of weapons for the squad.
Conservatively Liberal
Regarding the ‘Hillary is a monster’ flap, I find the Clintonian reasoning about their use of the ‘Ken Starr’ label against Obama is very telling. She views the ‘monster’ slam against her as something to be fired for, but she says the Ken Starr reference to Obama is fair as it is a ‘historical’ reference or comparison.
?!
She has to be pulling this shit out of her ass. Clinton Rules indeed. She is framing everything negative about herself as positive and shifting the accountability for it over to Obama. Nothing applies to her or her campaign because she says so. Never mind that she is losing, and has been losing for two months now. She defines what a win is.
I like the constantly moving Clinton goal posts; they put the goalposts on wheels so every time they bump up against it, it rolls further away. Ingenious!
This primary can’t get over soon enough, and I hope it spells the end of the Clinton/DLC era forever. IMO, Hillary is a monster, one that is singlehandedly shredding the party with wanton disregard for the consequences in the general election.
Bob In Pacifica
Look, bottom line, Clinton can’t win the nomination without a fight at the convention and the Party won’t let that fight happen. Between the pledged delegates that Obama accumulates over the rest of the primary season, the many super delegates who plan to still be in the Democratic Party after the Clinton supernova burns out, and bigwigs who are now behind the scenes trying to turn off the money spigots, Hillary will only go as far as her allies at FOX and the likes of Rush can take her.
Every day I hear another party official saying that the race has to end before the convention. Hillary can only win at a brokered convention. That means, “Hillary, you can’t win. Quit.” I heard Art Torres, head of the Cali Demo Party, same the exact same thing. A day before that Cal Demo moneyman Walter Shorenstein said the same thing. Yesterday Robert Wexler said the same thing. Torres represents the biggest state that Clinton won. He tells her to quit (well, says the race must end soon). Shorenstein, one of those spigots, says it must end. Wexler, from Clinton’s sunny state of Florida, is telling her to quit. Obama got endorsements (and superdelegate votes) from someone from West Virginia (where Clinton will probably win) and from Nevada (where she lost).
She may be disconnected from the political reality of her loss, but someone over there has noticed. It’ll eventually get through.
What does Clinton have left? The racist governor of Pennsylvania, Rush Limbaugh and FOX News (at least for states with open primaries). Not much else.
cbear
Yeah, but I would still vote for her rather than another crazier-than-a-shithouse-rat gooper.
Bob In Pacifica
But you won’t have to. Eventually she will be gone.
Martin
Something to keep in mind regarding Power. This comment is not local to the election. She has had a low opinion of the Clintons since her work on Rwanda.
http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/NSAEBB/NSAEBB117/index.htm
I’m not excusing her statement, just pointing out that it wasn’t solely driven by this campaign but also by something very personal to her, and I do think it’s unfortunate that she was driven to resign as she is unquestionably someone on the right side of problems in the world. Hopefully she will still get a voice in the future.
Cain
You sure are easy to please.
cain
Martin
Two more things to read about Power, for those that don’t know who she is:
http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200109/power-genocide
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/ghosts/interviews/power.html
I think ‘monster’ probably was a restrained comment from her regarding the Clintons.
DougJ
If Obama can’t deal with a few mean words from Hillary then how will respond then the mullahs march into the White House to behead him? And don’t think for a minute that the fact he’s a practicing Muslim means they won’t do it.
Chuck Butcher
myiq2xu – must refer to a box of rocks
Obama cannot play Hillary’s dirty politics, it won’t fit the narrative. To try to carry that dilemma over to the general, though, misses just how vulnerable the R’s are on completely valid issues. It is extremely problematic at any time to make the kind of Republican attacks Hillary is making and responding to them with gloves off is worse. Obama is just going to have to ride it out. He can win with it in Nov and he can actually govern if he has enough of the populace behind him. It’s a very narrow calculus he’s playing with.
As for bad jokes, I’ve heard quite a few about both, quite bad. Sojourner, you seem to forget with this feministic BS that Hillary is not a girl, not a woman, not a lady, she’s a goddam Presidential candidate whose been treated with kid gloves by her opponent and his surrogates (one screwed that up and got fired) because he cannot afford to play it any other way. Or maybe the deals for her brothers, or how about her autocratic handling of health care that tubed it before it had a chance. I have an idea, lets talk pardons. Maybe her chumminess with Lieberman rings some bells.
I won’t belabor the Iraq war vote, that’s been hit on enough, maybe you’d like to explaing the flag desecration crap she voted for. Maybe you’d like to explain why the mega corps that’re bailing from the Republicans love her with money?
Since nobody cares to explain why Republican talking points are her mantra right now somebody would like to explain why that ought to garner Democratic votes. Maybe somebody would explain why her trouble making over FL/MI isn’t real bad for the DNC who is blameless. Tearing apart the Party mechanism makes some kind of long term sense? Her Terry McAuliff already wrecked it once. You want to tout her health care, etc I’d stand still for it, but her junk stinks and not calling her on it is not only silly, it’s destructive of the Democratic Party. I’ve invested a mountain of time, energy, and money that I really don’t have in Democratic politics and watching that two bit corporate whore kick my Party apart for her personal gain pisses me off beyond words. I won’t stand for that from a “Democrat,” she’s stepped beyond the pale with this now.
TenguPhule
The MUP will take to the skies on wings of dreams and bury the mullah horde under a rain of fragrant Pony Surprise.
myiq2xu
This is too good:
snip
snip
Oh, Butch?
That’s a sack, not a box, there is only two of them, and they’re made of brass, not rock.
AnneLaurie
So if i said something along the lines of “Maybe John McCain absorbed some real capitol hill experience, through his shriveled old vienna sausage of a penis, from the lobbyist tart he’s been doing on the side”, then that makes me a man-hater? Or do i just hate osmosis?
Why bring a semi-innocent lobbyist into this slanging match? I’d go with the classic “Does ‘Mad John’ McCain get Oval Office Credit for all the times he’s let Dubya buttfvck him there? Does his proven ability to let Commander Codpiece frotteur him on-camera speak to his gift for standing up to America’s *foreign* enemies?”
I will vote for Obama, if he is the Democratic nominee, even though Obama’s voice grates on my nerves second only to Dubya’s. I will vote for a farm animal or a piece of furniture if it is the Democratic nominee, because what’s most important this election is getting the Republican Party the hell out of the White House, the Department of Justice, the Supreme Court, and Cheney’s Undisclosed Location Safe.
However, after thirty years of living with Tech Boyz, I think you White men ought to be clear about one important fact: Even if Obama becomes President, it will NOT be okay for you to start using the N-word. Not even ironically, in the comments section.
You don’t have to understand why this will be true; just take my word for it, and you’ll avoid a whole lot of ugliness, okay?
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
Does anyone have any evidence, either in polls or anecdotal, that Hillary’s “John McCain in my new BFF” speeches are helping her?
I haven’t seen any polls, and all of the water-cooler talk I’ve heard is that this has instantly made her radio-freaking-active. I can’t find a single person who face-to-face will publicly admit they are still willing to vote for her, and I know several folks who were previously neutral to slightly pro-MUP but basically not particularly anti-Hillary, now all you have to do is say her name and they look like they’re about to have a stroke.
I think Hillary took aim at the MUP and gutshot herself with this one.
Martin
Whoops. The girl in the 3AM ad is an Obama supporter.
http://www.king5.com/video/featured-index.html?nvid=225413&shu=1
Conservatively Liberal
The Hillbots are pimping this CBS poll, so I will too:
Who has the momentum (scroll down the page a bit for the poll)? Hillary was behind when it was posted to a Hillary site, now she is ahead.
myiq2xu
Yes, and we are having a pimping good time.
Dennis - SGMM
I hope Hillary gets the nom. That way I’ll get to watch an old white woman and an old white man try to pick a fight when they’re essentially in agreement about everything. It’ll be like like reliving the latter part of my youth.
PaulB
Hell, yes, it was. There were too many of us out here crying in the wilderness for you to be able to make that claim with a straight face. It was fucking obvious what Bush would do and he did precisely what most of in the progressive blogosphere predicted he would. No special insight, hindight, or foresight needed — just common sense.
myiq2xu
Oh fuckski! Who won Texass?:
I’m going to bed.
myiq2xu
I’m tired and drunk. So I’ll keep it simple – fuck you!
I was here arguing against the war back in 2002-2003. It was pretty fucking lonely. Where the fuck were you “too many of the rest of us?”
Kiss my ass.
Chuck Butcher
hey, box o’ rocks
You sayin’ it ain’t exactly what you’d call real damn convincing. You see, that is my name and my bio is public and fairly extensive and not one that would indicate someone easily impressed by…assertion rather than, oh say, facts and actions. Your abject Hillarism isn’t impressive, lacking as it does in arguments of any substantive matter. As for your real life outside that “persona” I have no idea, but if you’re thinking comparisons you better bring some pretty cool stuff to the table, I’ve been around the block a few times and, yup, I been to the rodeo.
Johnny Pez
You’re assuming that she will endorse Obama.
Dennis - SGMM
If Obama is the candidate then Clinton will pull a Lieberman and stump for McCain.
Conservatively Liberal
I think it is great that Obama has won Texas, and they are still counting the caucus results. That puts him and Hill at 2 and 2 for last Tuesday. I remember Bill saying that Hillary needed to win Texas and Ohio to continue. What? Oh, right. The goalposts on wheels, forgot about that!
The Obama pickup of 4 votes in California, which means a shift of 8 delegates, is a nice last minute gift for him too. You know that is going to irk her and her supporters even more.
Listening to the Hillbots, you would think that delegates don’t matter. I hate to crush their dreams but the only metric in this primary that counts is the delegate totals, everything else is just a statistic. And unless the superdelegates can come up with a good reason to override the pledged delegate counts, Obama has as good as won it (barring a live boy or dead girl moment).
The math is not on Hillary’s side, unless she blows out Obama by 65% or more in the remaining races, he stays in the lead with pledged delegates. And at the rate that he is attracting superdelegates, he may pass her in that final statistic very soon. Once he does that, Hillary is dead last, no matter how she or her supporters slice it.
If Hillary does not win this, the Clinton legacy is as good as over. They have burned too many bridges in the progressive community. The only thing that might save Hillary is a very graceful exit, and very soon. That will salve some of the people who are pissed. But if she stays in it until the convention, she will never be forgiven by most of the people who her supporters, her husband and herself have offended.
Chuck Butcher
What I’d like to know is how this comment site can eat most of a paragraph between reading the damn preview and appearing on line.
has most of a paragraph gone missing and is in the preceding paragraph.
Ahead of that were references to regardless whether the Republican attack had validity there was behavior of poor judgement and lacking ethics regarding Whitewater, Travelgate, etc that opened the door for Ken Starr and the Repubs since she saw fit to bring it up. She brought it up, not her opponent. You whiners want to go there? You really want to endorse a scorched earth policy?
Hey yeah I want a CiC with such a great grasp of detail and subtleties that she didn’t know who was getting what blown by whom and then fell into gasping fits over it. That kind of rules out, didn’t give a shit about it. I give a rat’s ass about her personal life, but she wants to make it a qualification that she was married to Bill.
Ah well, people like box o nuts aren’t open to persuasion or criticism, they have a thing and they’ll hang on to it whether it makes any sense or not. Kind of like a meth addict, teeth falling out and seeing football sized spiders on the walls that would discourage most, just really aren’t an issue, because, well, because.
I don’t do saints and saviours in politics (or much of anywhere) because I recognize they’re fallible people with a tough game that has harsh rules that tend to shift. There is exactly nothing new in Hillary’s behavior this past week – and, it is one of the reasons she was at the exact bottom of my list, yes, behind every Democrat. You do not shit on your own Party. You might disagree and you might work to change it, but you do not shit on it. If that’s the case, then get the fuck out of it.
Here’s something to think about, Ike may have been a fine administrator, but he let Joe McCarthy flourish and kick shit out of his State & Defense Depts. Oh yeah, Ike could have put a stop to it, he had the populariity, he didn’t have the political skills or nuts to do it. Oh yeah, another Republican domestic success, Ike was. You go clear the hell back to TR and find a Republican Congress of plutocratic tools engaging in fear mongering and enemies lists, what the fuck is the matter with that bunch? They’re consistent, anyhow.
hey John Cole, you ever look at the continuing behavior of that bunch when you were involved with them? Or was history one of those inconveniences masked by Reagan and his Commie scare? At least sufficient that his nutless response to the Marine barracks didn’t set off alarm bells?
oh that was mean, you’ve ditched them, given the ring back and all…
TenguPhule
myiq, some free advice.
Stop campaigning like you want to lose the general election if you ever hope to salvage anything in the primary.
The lily livered ‘swing vote’ is not firmly in the Democratic camp. We’re going to have enough trouble as it is holding them in the big tent without people already inside the tent punching holes in the canvas holding it together.
Obama’s reconciliation policies suck. I admit that, the only decent candidate the D’s had was Dodd and he’s not in it anymore.
Thing is, Hillary’s policies at the moment suck much worse.
So *fix* them. Otherwise, your bitching only looks like blind assgrafting symbiosis.
Martin
Burning bridges has nothing to do with it. Obama would mean the end of the top-down money Democratic party which the Clintons are the center of. Clinton is at war with Dean as much as with Obama because if the Democratic party fully embraces a grass-roots approach then the Clintons have absolutely nothing to offer. Even if Clinton could mend those bridges, they’d be political outcasts by 2016. That’s part of why she fights so hard. They’re out of any kind of power if Obama wins, likely even her Senate seat, so she has no choice but to go all-in.
Ted
And childishly named “myiq2xu” will happily follow.
Conservatively Liberal
The Bill Maher’s show (Real Time) had Terry McAuliffe on a live video feed, and it is frickin’ hilarious. At one point Bill referred to what Terry responded to as ‘bullshit’ part of the response, and the interview went downhill from there. Someone at the Clinton end pulled the plug on the interview and they left Bill hanging. He wrapped it up nicely. ;)
Priceless, absolutely priceless. If they can’t control the message, pull the plug. That interview did not help one bit…lol
Conservatively Liberal
Oh, the link to the Real Time clip I reference above might be helpful!
Here ya go…
TenguPhule
Never forget what we’re all fighting against.
Fuckstain McCain and his merry band of Spanish Inquisitors need to be kept away from power at all costs.
Asti
::thumps head::
Oh, I think I finally get it. Since Hillary was with him in the White House for at least six years, they had a common law presidency.
Xenos
Does this explain why Obama has gone all silent-like for the last three days? Is he giving her enough rope to hang herself?
Obama needs to go in for the killing blow already. The most deadly thing for Clinton would be to be ruled ‘pathetic’ by the superdelegates – Obama sure as hell had better be busy getting this done behind the scenes. If he does not know that, I am sure Michelle does, so there is hope.
Xenos
I was here arguing against the war back in 2002-2003. It was pretty fucking lonely. Where the fuck were you “too many of the rest of us?”
Ah, memories:
dslak
Okay, so let’s say that the principle is “it is immoral to make things that aren’t relevant to a person’s ability to be a leader issues in a political campaign.”
The problem with this is that a lot of campaigning is throwing dirt at the opposition and seeing what sticks. A lot of that dirt may have nothing to do with whether someone can be an effective leader (e.g., Obama has a funny middle name, or one of his advisors said something mean about Hillary; on the Clinton side, some people at low levels of her campaign circulated ‘Obama is a Muslim’ rumors, Hillary has failed to disclose her tax returns).
On the other hand, some of these things may be relevant, and that’s only going to be established by the opposition nailing the other campaign. Since some of those things will be irrelevant, this means that someone who holds this principle would be committed to the view that presidential campaigns are fundamentally immoral.
Since we at least think our guy’s campaign is the best of all available, this is a problem. It can’t simply be that race and gender are irrelevant which makes it wrong to make them issues in a a campaign, while still excusing everything else.
dslak
I haven’t seen demi say anything to indicate that he favors Hillary over Obama. You can recognize some shortcomings of your own guy’s campaign and favorable circumstances for the other without any inconsistency. Demi is certainly correct that, if Obama can’t take back the narrative from Hillary in this campaign, he’s not going to win the nomination.
That being said, I think some of the positions demi has taken in this and various other threads are wrong, but that doesn’t make he’s either a mindless Hillary booster or playing one on this blog.
Rarely Posts
What crazed behavior? The articles you linked to make Obama sound like a weakling. Someone on her campaign calls her a monster and it’s her fault?
Over the edge, you are.
dslak
I liked Rarely Posts more back when he resembled his name.
AkaDad
That girl in Hillary’s 3 AM ad is an Obama girl.
AkaDad
Oops. Forgot the Link.
Dennis - SGMM
That’s why Clinton is ready for that 3AM phone call: she already knows where the phone is.
Johnny Pez
Btw, since this is, in theory, an open thread, I’ll throw this question open to the group: if Ron Paul is dropping out of the GOP race, and if Ron Paul isn’t going to run as an independent, then when is he going to spend all that money he raised online?
I mean, he couldn’t have spent it all on the blimp, could he?
Dennis - SGMM
Actually, Paul is asking for more money to finance his re-election to Congress (ronpaulwarroom.com). He’s been busy fending off a challenger, Chris Peden, from his own party. According to opensecrets.org, Paul spent a bit more than twenty million on his campaign, leaving some eight million in his war chest. Paul can’t spend any of that money on his congressional campaign until he formally drops out of the presidential race.
Dennis - SGMM
More open thread goodness: McCain’s recent remarks from Reuters.
Because the tax cuts are working out so well and over regulation caused the sub-prime mess. I guess that crossing the commander in chief threshold doesn’t require that you know how to raise money for your forces.
Sojourner
Of course that’s why it’s done. But what it does is it diminishes those who belong to the group being attacked. It discourages people from participating in the process because they don’t want to deal with the crap, and we end up with even more incompetent representatives.
Just because it’s done doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t try to make it stop.
Sojourner
Ah, it’s so refreshing to see the Maverick in action. The base tells him to sit up and beg, and he’s quite happy to oblige.
Good dog.
Callisto
Uh, Obama? You do realize that this race is about delegates, right?
garyb50
100% in agreement.
Svensker
From an article in the UK Telegraph:
Hillary on her role in making peace in Northern Ireland:
David Trimble, Nobel peace prize winner for his role in getting the peace agreement:
Hillary on her role with Irish women:
What the Telegraph reported:
Andrew
Breaking news: Wyoming doesn’t count.
tBone
I imagine it was. Too bad Hillary couldn’t have been here to keep you company, but she was busy voting to give Bush the power to invade.
From the linked article:
It sounds like Hillary has suddenly realized that unimportant states holding unrepresentative caucuses might be important, after all. This is a big improvement over Jabba the Penn’s usual rhetoric.
Xenos
There is a village in New York that is missing it’s middle- aged- lady- with- inflated- sense- of- self- worth- and- an- embarrassingly- tenuous- grip- on- reality.
In the rest of the country we call the Realtors(c).
Dennis - SGMM
Campaign for every vote, even in “unimportant” states? What a concept! I’ll bet Penn grants himself a big bonus for coming up with that one.
myiq2xu
(yawn)
That meme is pretty stale. Got anything fresh?
Andrew
Well, tbone, says one thing:
And does another…
Andrew
Tell that to the parents, spouses, and children of the 4000 dead Americans. And 1 million Iraqis.
Bob In Pacifica
People should try to find Samantha Power’s BBC interview on their website. I heard the last part, maybe twenty minutes, and I was impressed with her. It was clear that the interviewer was trying to trip her up, but at least during the part I heard she seemed to be quite intelligent and forthright.
In other words, I would like to know on what she bases her characterization of Clinton.
The Other Steve
It must be very strange to be Hillary Clinton. A woman of extraordinary vision and brilliance approaching to genius, she can’t get anyone to notice. She is like a great painter or musician who is ahead of her time, and who unveils one masterpiece after another to a reception that, when not bored, is hostile.
dslak
Sojourner, I agree that there are problems with the process. But those kinds of attacks work, so voters are responsible, too. Even so, certainly you must agree that not all baseless attacks are equivalent to such attacks based on misogyny or racism. So this still doesn’t get at why only those kinds of attacks should be considered beyond the pale.
There was something beyond-the-pale wrong with the mockery of John Kerry and Max Cleland’s service records, and it had nothing to do with racism or misogyny.
dslak
Powers is impressive. Even the reporter who printed her “monster” remark said so. It’s just the reporter at The Scotsman is a reporter first.
Check out Glennzilla’s post on what this says about the subservience of our press.
Andrew
I saw Carlson’s interview last night. He is a pompous, condescending asshole of the highest degree. And a coward.
myiq2xu
Oh my, Hillary (and Hillary alone) is personally responsible for each and every one of those dead people because if hadn’t been for her yes vote on the AUMF we would be . . . where?
Exactly where we are today.
John D.
By this logic, any majority decision decided by more than 1 vote can be brushed aside.
That’s utter bullshit, and you know it.
Judgement matters. Decision-making matters. How do we evaluate a politicians judgement? Me, personally — I look at their voting record first, and their statements second. Hillary’s stance on the AUMF allows me to make an evaluation that her judgement is lacking in that regard.
I’m sorry if that bruises your tender sensibilities, but so be it.
The AUMF vote has directly led to a massive fucking catastrophe for America’s perception abroad. It led to a million dead Iraqis. It led to 4000 dead Americans. That vote was one she participated in, one that she voted for, and one that she now owns. I’m not looking for her to backpedal, or “explain”, or even apologize for. It’s far too late for that.
She does have the blood of those soldiers and those Iraqis on her hands. She is by no means alone, she by no mears shoulders that burden alone, but I will be DAMNED if I let you sit there and absolve her like you are trying to do. She bears some of this responsibility, and your refusal to see that makes your opinion worthless in my eyes.
Andrew
Shorter myiq:
tBone
I’m just impressed she bothered to show up at all. It’s more than she did in a lot of other states that don’t count.
Shorter myiq: there is no principle I won’t disregard to defend Hillary.
dslak
Obama hasn’t shown up to some votes. Lots of politicians don’t. What’s the principle for determining when their presence matters?
I’m not simply dismissing the criticism, but just wondering whether it can ever be applied consistently.
tBone
Huh? We’re not talking about someone not showing up for a vote here.
John S.
Like I said earlier, if a person read this:
And think that Hillary Clinton is an excellent stateswoman, then there is no reasoning with them.
She found the notion of unilaterally invading Iraq appealing, thought that it would be acceptable to do so, but only when she was fed more bullshit facts by Bush to the point where she could say that it was a good option.
If you are OK with that, then you are totally in the tank for Hillary.
dslak
It’s at least one of the things being discussed. I didn’t mean to imply that it was the only thing.
Sojourner
Absolutely. It is increasingly difficult to be sympathetic with people who are struggling these days given their voting records.
It also explains why I (and others) feel the need to call people on their comments at BJ. Because just about everyone here is a (U.S.) voter. We should take responsibility for our own culpability.
I believe the issue was lies about their service. Which is beyond the pale by definition.
TenguPhule
Okay MYIQ, I’ve had it.
Fuck you. Hillary bought a piece of the Iraq Clusterfuck when she voted for AUMF. She refused to say she was wrong about it afterwards when it was clear to everyone that it was a big fucking mistake. Now she’s trying to run on this as being ‘experienced’ for ‘security’.
Three strikes. You’re out.
Go the fuck away.
Chris Johnson
The Glenzilla post on journalistic deference is quite gratifying (here)
Okay, first we import Paxman…
Then, Gordon Ramsey is forced to be the chef at the White House on the condition that he has to sit in on all policy meetings and start screaming at people when they are hopelessly stupid and self-deluding…
:D
SocialScientist
Long thread. Let me see if I’ve got this right.
If we assume Clinton is correct in that there *is* some objective threshold one must cross to be Commander in Chief and that both she and McCain have crossed it (while Obama has not), then the threshold could be some criteria common to both her and McCain.
This rules out being married to a former President, regardless of how many discussions of “3am” phone calls she might have participated in with her husband. I’m not too sure, anyway, how much she’d like to admit engaging in discussions of national security issues with a security clearance.
It also seems to rule out criteria such as graduating from Yale or being an associate and then a partner at a law firm. First, they are not shared criteria. Second, while they are impressive, it seems a stretch to suggest they prepare one for being the CinC.
So we are left with the conclusion that she might be referring to her seven years in the US Senate and her service on the Senate Armed Services Committee and (possibly) her multiple trips to both Afghanistan and Iraq.
Under those terms, it would seem that McCain is more qualified than she to serve as CinC since he’s been to both countries multiple times and has a longer tenure on the Senate Armed Services Committee – twenty-one years to her seven.
I suppose it is also possible that the threshold might be an either/or one. For example, either twenty-one years in the US Senate and on the Senate Armed Services Committee *or* being married to a former President. Under those criteria both her and McCain are qualified, but so are Laura Bush, Barbara Bush, and Nancy Reagan. Would she seriously try advancing that claim?
No. I’m going to assume she’s referring to the Senate service specifically.
So let’s have a look at some of the people who have served – arguably – as notable Commanders in Chief who were not in the US Senate for seven plus years and who did not serve on the Senate Armed Services Committee. Lincoln served briefly in the US Congress, but never in the Senate. Wilson served only as Governor of New Jersey for two years before running for President in 1912. And Roosevelt served in the New York state senate from 1911 to 1913 before leaving to serve as Wilson’s Assistant Secretary to the Navy and was Governor of New York for four years before running for and winning the Presidency. Never even elected to the Senate. Using her criteria, these candidates never crossed the “Commander in Chief threshold” whatever that means.
I agree with her on one, and only one, point. There is an “objective” standard for Commander in Chief; a threshold, if you will, that one must cross before serving. It is this: winning the Presidency. To be *eligible* to do that, according to the US Constitution, one must be a natural born citizen (or a citizen at the time of the Constitution’s adoption, be at least thirty-five years old, and be an inhabitant for at least fourteen years of the United States. It’s becoming increasingly obvious that she’s not going to win, regardless of her eligibility such as it is.
Look, it’s clear that McCain, Clinton, or Obama, if elected, would all meet the Commander in Chief threshold. So this whole thing is just bullshit posturing and gamesmanship. If she wants to talk about experience, that’s fair game. Just let her do so without creating nonsensical criteria out of whole cloth.
SocialScientist
should read *without* a security clearance
damn hangover
Mike
Kerry also voted for the authorization and I fail to recall any Democrat foaming at the mouth about it when they voted for him on 2004. Obama is far from pure on this issue since he voted for funding the war, but, hey, when you’re Obama, your unassailable.
I note that Clinton called for withdrawal in ’05 while Obama was hedging as late as 2006
….Would Obama have acted differently had he been in Washington or had he had the benefit of the arguments and the intelligence that the administration was offering to the Congress debating that resolution? During the 2002-2003 timeframe, he was a minor local official uninvolved in the national debate on the war so we can only judge from his own statements prior to the 2008 campaign. Obama repeated these points in a whole host of interviews prior to announcing his candidacy. On July 27, 2004, he told the Chicago Tribune on Iraq: “There’s not much of a difference between my position and George Bush’s position at this stage.” In his book, The Audacity of Hope, published in 2006, he wrote, “…on the merits I didn’t consider the case against war to be cut-and- dried.” And, in 2006, he clearly said, “I’m always careful to say that I was not in the Senate, so perhaps the reason I thought it was such a bad idea was that I didn’t have the benefit of US intelligence. And for those who did, it might have led to a different set of choices.”….
PaulB
Love you too, sweetums.
So let’s see: your failure to link up with the rest of the progressive community or to see what was going on around you in plain sight is my fault? Yeah, that makes sense. Moron, there were national protests, progressive blogs and websites, anti-war blogs and websites, and on and on. I repeat: it was fucking obvious what Bush was going to do and to pretend that it was not is both silly and foolish. Too many people knew otherwise, and were proved right.
That so many in Congress voted as they did is a testament to their stupidity, their political calculation, and their cowardice.
Whatever you say, dear.
PaulB
Mike, before you go spouting lame talking points about how similar Obama’s position and Clinton’s position is, perhaps you should do some homework?
PaulB
Over 420 posts and not one Clinton supporter has been able to come up with a single reason why Clinton is more “ready” to become President than is Obama? I’m excluding the idiotic “7 years in the Senate” stupidity for obvious reasons.
Anyone? Anyone?
Chris Johnson
The thing that gets me is, I want the President to be a CIVILIAN leader. Not another general, not primarily a military dictat-oops-I-mean-leader.
All these guys- by which I mean ‘including a woman, but actually not Obama’, so the term is pretty ridiculous- are posing like they have to be the biggest, baddest military guy. REGULAR soldiers sleep, but by God the COMMANDER IN CHIEF, he doesn’t even sleep! He WAITS, by the phone, like Chuck Norris, to spring into action ordering military strikes!
Spare me.
No, spare the rest of the world AND me, since they’re not actually striking me with military action yet, but we are talking about people who reacted to a fairly dramatic terrorist attack (and not at 3 AM either! The only instant reaction was to squirrel away Cheney in a bunker!) by bombing the crap out of a totally unrelated country’s innocent people MUCH LATER.
Can we STOP this CinC bullshit plz?
I would rather die than watch that obscene bullshit go down again.
I would rather be bombed MYSELF than be complicit in another situation where my country explained how ‘shock and awe’ means we’re leveling the civilian city, including the poor fuckers who just live there, because ‘they are responsible for not rising up and smiting the terrorists out of their land’ and have to be punished for their failure to stop their leaders from developing weapons of mass destruction.
OH, and Saddam tests those WMDs on his own people, did you hear? So we have to bomb the shit out of those same people to punish them for allowing Saddam to also kill them with WMDs that turn out not to exist.
STOP THE CINC NONSENSE. The President’s responsibility is to be the civilian sanity-check to the existing military chain of command.
Chris Johnson
Way too many caps. Sorry. I’ll try to chill out a little.
I am really, really angry with the way this is playing out. I thought we were working a sort of referendum on the whole psychotic mess, not electing a new top general of it.
kmeyer
The email had been out for months before that. The co-chair received it at one point and forwarded it out with a comment about how absurd it was. It was poor judgement in a ‘she’s a monster, he’s Ken Starr’ kinda way, but nothing more. TPM covered it back in December or something.
Thanks for the clarification.
Krista
That would be AWESOME!
Chris Johnson
It would make you feel even sorrier for Ramsey than usual.
We’re talking Bonaparte’s level sorry. I would fear for Gordon’s health and put him on suicide watch :)
TenguPhule
Fuck you. Kerry apologized and admitted he fucked up. It didn’t make it right, but he had the maturity to admit his mistake. He was also the only game in town to stop Bush.
Hillary didn’t and isn’t the nominee. Big difference.
Fuck you again. Funding for troops already stuck in the shit because Commander Codpiece was quite killing to kill them to make a point that Democrats are ‘weak’. The whole party buckled under on that one.
Clinton called for withdrawal. Wonderful, except that she STILL refuses to admit Iraq was a mistake from the get-go, insisting it is only a management problem.
Go away.
Redhand
Ah, it was the Bush-Cheney-Neocon cabal who used 9/11 as a pretext for the Iraq war. Shinseki called it straight on what would be required to occupy Iraq (reserving judgment on whether the whole exercse was necessary) and that was the end of his career.
jcricket
Because we’re so far past the point of diminishing returns that we’re now moving backwards regarding Clinton v. Obama, I post this gem from Washington Monthly/Kevin Drum
Want to increase turnout? Send out mailers that show the voting records of your neighbors. Social shame works!
jcricket
I’ve heard this about 5 times now, and y’all seem to think you’re being serious, but the animosity (“rational” or otherwise) regarding Clinton here is to the level where it wouldn’t matter what any of us said – it would be shredded. Sure, everyone would claim it’s a fact-based shredding, but I feel strongly that level of “personal opinion presented as fact”, confirmation bias and subjective validation is to the point where it’s impossible for most of the Obama supporters on this blog to recognize the difference between their personal feelings for Clinton and the way others/general public see the same situation. Of course, they all disagree.
But seriously, is anyone here who believes the worst about Hillary going to be convinced by anything that Hillary isn’t the anti-christ? Worse than all the Republicans? Purposefully trying to ruin the party? Aiming for 2012 after she gets McCain elected? No one’s gonna be convinced, that ship has sailed. I’m sorry to see them react this way, and I don’t think it’s warranted, but it is what it is.
As a Hillary supporter I’m just going to let the rest of the campaign play out in the public and then vote for whomever is the nominee and whomever is their VP choice. And I’ll give my money to them then.
I’ll end by pointing you to the post at TPMCafe which sums up my feelings right now.
TenguPhule
You won’t know until someone tries advancing an honest argument instead of the MyPonyIQ doubletalking claptrap.
I would forgive Hillary if that stupid idiot would only apologize, without condition or reservations for fucking up Iraq, Iran and buttering up Fuckstain McCain and Lierman.
But instead, she simply insists on digging the hole deeper.
That is why so many people here are so pissed at her.
Andrew
And the fact that the only way she can win the primary is to destroy the electability and legitimacy of the likely winner.