Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

I did not have this on my fuck 2022 bingo card.

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

You don’t get rid of your umbrella while it’s still raining.

We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation.

Usually wrong but never in doubt

Do not shrug your shoulders and accept the normalization of untruths.

Being the leader of the world means to be the leader of peace.

John Fetterman: Too Manly for Pennsylvania.  Paid for by the Oz for Senator campaign.

You can’t love your country only when you win.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

When I decide to be condescending, you won’t have to dream up a fantasy about it.

Americans barely caring about Afghanistan is so last month.

This fight is for everything.

When your entire life is steeped in white supremacy, equality feels like discrimination.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

Only Democrats have agency, apparently.

Nothing worth doing is easy.

Make the republican party small enough to drown in a bathtub.

This blog will pay for itself.

Balloon Juice has never been a refuge for the linguistically delicate.

No offense, but this thread hasn’t been about you for quite a while.

T R E 4 5 O N

Fuck these fucking interesting times.

if you can’t see it, then you are useless in the fight to stop it.

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New Rule

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Sully:

The best book on the Clintons remains “Primary Colors,” Joe Klein’s masterpiece. The movie wasn’t bad either. This clip shows the Clintons pondering whether to use some vile, underhand dirt on a political opponent. Except, of course, they don’t ponder. For them there is never any moral pondering. They do and say what is in their best interests, period – and they have no idea how to behave otherwise. It’s all excused by their unquestioned faith in their own benevolence. And the least ethical of the two – the most shameless, the least principled, the hollowest form of political life … is Hillary.

New rule: You aren’t allowed to use fiction to determine that Hillary is evil and should not be President. I really don’t think that is too out of line.

Reader Interactions

114Comments

  3. 3.

    sparky

    But it’s not fiction! I mean, it’s not as if Klein ever um got his facts wrong or doesn’t know what he’s talking about or can’t find his way out of a paper bag with a blowtorch….

    At least David Brooks is careful to not LOOK stupid.

  4. 4.

    Zifnab

    New rule: You aren’t allowed to use fiction to determine that Hillary is evil and should not be President. I really don’t think that is too out of line.

    *puts away lynching rope with Vince Foster’s name branded on it*

    Awwwwwwwwwww. Weak.

  5. 5.

    Jake

    New rule: You aren’t allowed to use fiction to determine that Hillary is evil and should not be President.

    There goes the GOP’s campaign strategy. They’d better hope Obama gets the nod.

  7. 7.

    myiq2xu

    This clip shows the Clintons pondering whether to use some vile, underhand dirt on a political opponent.

    As I recall, that dirt was information that the opponent was doing dope with a gay hooker.

    Like that would ever happen in real life.

  8. 8.

    Billy K

    B-but…I don’t care how we determine that monster is evil. We already KNOW it. Can’t we just cut a few corners? Come on – we’re all (but 2-1/2 of us) Hillary Haters here, right?

    I JUST HATE HER SO MUCH!!!!!!

  13. 13.

    Chuck Butcher

    Since Hillary is scarcely the most evil or opportunistic politician ever some of the heat around her is absolute BS. Hillary’s problem is that there is so damn much real stuff around her that makes her so banally opportunistic.

    In the case of Hillary, it isn’t a one time F-U, it is a repeated pattern of kicking ethics to the side for short term gain. Not criminal shit, just shitty behavior. She has proven to be worse than I thought and I didn’t have a high opinion. Spitzer is going to pay in spades for some sex, we’ll see what standard voters hole Hillary to.

    Most people supporting her would not tolerate the same behaviors in a friend, politics or no. Why she is somehow wonderful to them evades me. I can understand doing political calculation but this mindless enthusiasm in the face of a viable candidate astonishes me.

  15. 15.

    jenniebee

    But what does it say about Hillary that Sully would believe that this is a true depiction of her? Huh? Think about that.

    And what does it say about me that you would believe I’m a body double for the girls in the Emperor’s Club? Huh? What does that say about meeeeee?

  16. 16.

    myiq2xu

    Let’s stay with “real” offenses. From Molly Ivins:

    A well-informed woman, interested in politics, inquired a few days ago: “I keep trying to follow this, but I still don’t understand: Just what is it Hillary Clinton is accused of?”

    Beats me. I keep listening to Sen. Alfonse D’Amato, a punishing assignment in itself, and I don’t get it either. Of course, having D’Amato conduct an ethics investigation is like watching Mike Tyson run a sensitivity training seminar. As I understand it, D’Amato — by straining at gnats and putting on a display of prosecutorial innuendo unrivaled since the days of Joe McCarthy — hopes to make the case that the first lady personally ordered the firings of everyone who worked for the White House travel office when Clinton first came in, which, were it the case, would not be illegal, immoral or unethical.

    He has further sought, with great fervor, to prove that Hillary Clinton did some legal work for James McDougal’s long-since-failed savings and loan, which we know to be true because (A) she told us so years ago and (B) all the papers turned over to D’Amato’s committee bear her out. ????? That she did so is also not illegal, immoral or unethical.

    For some reason, all of this inspires D’Amato — who always has been easily excited — to wander around talking about “bombshells” and “smoking guns.” D’Amato claims that there are “tremendous discrepancies” in what the first lady has said. She said that the work she did for Madison Guaranty Savings & Loan was “minimal.” The billing records show that she did 60 hours of work for the S&L over 15 months — less than an hour a week. Quel tremendous discrepancy.

    Molly is a great source for all the terrible divisive things the Clintons did in the nineties.

  18. 18.

    myiq2xu

    And what does it say about me that you would believe I’m a body double for the girls in the Emperor’s Club? Huh? What does that say about meeeeee?

    Pictures?

  19. 19.

    HyperIon

    r€nato Says:

    Sully’s Obama-mancrush act is really, really tiresome.

    cole’s sully-mancrush is likewise.

  20. 20.

    ThymeZone

    from one of Clinton’s top surrogates, Geraldine Ferraro.

    If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position. And if he was a woman (of any color) he would not be in this position. He happens to be very lucky to be who he is. And the country is caught up in the concept.

    Stolen right off DKos front page.

    Every day, the Clinton train wreck gets worse and worse.

    Can you believe these people?

    Obama, who isn’t qualified to be president but would make a great VP, is … well, winning … because, you know, he’s a ….

    Is there really anyone with a brain who hasn’t seen enough of the Clanton Gang by now?

    Anyone?

  22. 22.

    4tehlulz

    myiq fails again:

    I’d like to make it clear to the people who run the Democratic Party that I will not support Hillary Clinton for president.

    Enough. Enough triangulation, calculation and equivocation. Enough clever straddling, enough not offending anyone This is not a Dick Morris election. Sen. Clinton is apparently incapable of taking a clear stand on the war in Iraq, and that alone is enough to disqualify her. Her failure to speak out on Terri Schiavo, not to mention that gross pandering on flag-burning, are just contemptible little dodges.

    –Molly Ivins

  23. 23.

    Zifnab

    And what does it say about me that you would believe I’m a body double for the girls in the Emperor’s Club? Huh? What does that say about meeeeee?

    That you’re not a cheap date?

  24. 24.

    myiq2xu

    myiq fails again:

    Please explain how your quote refutes my point about Molly being a good source for all the terrible divisive things the Clintons did in the nineties?

    Actually, it enhances my point by strengthening Molly’s credibility because she was obviously not a Hillary supporter.

  25. 25.

    DougJ

    At least David Brooks is careful to not LOOK stupid.


    Don’t be so sure    :

    “On my journeys to Franklin County, I set a goal: I was going to spend $20 on a restaurant meal. But although I ordered the most expensive thing on the menu — steak au jus, ‘slippery beef pot pie,’ or whatever — I always failed. I began asking people to direct me to the most-expensive places in town. They would send me to Red Lobster or Applebee’s,” he (Brooks) wrote. “I’d scan the menu and realize that I’d been beaten once again. I went through great vats of chipped beef and ‘seafood delight’ trying to drop $20. I waded through enough surf-and-turfs and enough creamed corn to last a lifetime. I could not do it.”

    Taking Brooks’s cue, I lunched at the Chambersburg Red Lobster and quickly realized that he could not have waded through much surf-and-turf at all. The “Steak and Lobster” combination with grilled center-cut New York strip is the most expensive thing on the menu. It costs $28.75. “Most of our checks are over $20,” said Becka, my waitress. “There are a lot of ways to spend over $20.”

  27. 27.

    Jake

    And what does it say about me that you would believe I’m a body double for the girls in the Emperor’s Club?

    All of them at once? It says the label in your dress reads “Circus Tent.”

  29. 29.

    The Moar You Know

    My line’s finally been crossed.

    I didn’t realize, as I don’t listen to The Great Anal Cyst, but Bill Clinton appeared on Rush Limbaugh’s show the day of the Texas primary.

    There really does not appear to be any ethical transgression that the Clintons won’t commit. I’m finally starting to understand why the right-wingers got so bent out of shape over these folks; and horribly embarassed at the amount of time and effort I put into defending them.

  31. 31.

    LaurainAustin

    Sully’s one of the very few conservative commentators whose opinions don’t make me want to vomit. Actually, I really like him–I like the way he shares his personal experience and the way his own life shapes his political views. He makes himself very accessible and genuine that way. I can disagree with his position on certain subjects and still respect his insights and like him very much.

    Keep in mind that Sully’s opinions are just opinions. It’s no secret his loathing for Hillary is visceral. He openly admits he can’t be anything close to rational about her.

    You have to learn to use a mental filter when Sully’s speaking of Hillary. He definitely goes over the top on a regular basis. I mean, Joe Klein’s Primary Colors? Come on. :-)

  32. 32.

    Buck

    New rule: You aren’t allowed to use fiction to determine that Hillary is evil and should not be President. I really don’t think that is too out of line.

    BAM! That’s what I call knocking it up a notch.

  34. 34.

    Delia

    My line’s finally been crossed.

    I didn’t realize, as I don’t listen to The Great Anal Cyst, but Bill Clinton appeared on Rush Limbaugh’s show the day of the Texas primary.

    There really does not appear to be any ethical transgression that the Clintons won’t commit. I’m finally starting to understand why the right-wingers got so bent out of shape over these folks; and horribly embarassed at the amount of time and effort I put into defending them.

    I realized what it was when I was walking my dog this morning. The Clintons have violated the old vaudeville dictum: “Leave ’em laughing when you go.” If Hillary hadn’t undertaken this presidential campaign, everyone would still be looking back fondly at the Clinton presidency, especially in comparison with the Bush disaster. Sure, there’s the Lewinsky thing, but most of us would really be blaming the VRWC more than Bill’s compulsions. Instead, we’ve got this incredible distasteful display of narcissistic acting out and vindictiveness by the pair of them and we’re beginning to look back on the nasty details of Bill’s presidency (like the enabling of the Rwanda genocide) that we’d somehow all missed. They’re not only blowing her reputation, they’re blowing his legacy. Good work, Clintonistas.

  35. 35.

    TheFountainHead

    Steve Grossman’s letter to Superdelegates makes me all warm and fuzzy inside. I love when former heads of the Democratic party stand up for Hillary and say, “Don’t listen to the people, you dolts!”

  36. 36.

    PK

    Much as I dislike Hillary, Sullivan’s Clinton hatred is nuts. He always needs to be in love, first it was Bush and when the blinkers came off, its Obama.

  37. 37.

    myiq2xu

    I realized what it was when I was walking my dog this morning.

    If you’re want credit for a full “Wolcott” you need to add at least 2-3 more paragraphs and conclude with a statement to the effect that you cannot in good conscience ever cast a vote for that evil, vile Hillary.

    The “walking my dog” thing was good though, I haven’t seen that one before.

  38. 38.

    TheFountainHead

    Andrew Sullivan: the gay Jonah Goldberg.

    That’s a little harsh. Sully may be a lot of things. Obsessive, outlandish, reactive, and occasionally blinded by partisanship, but he’s at least generally witty and entertaining at the same time. Jonah Goldberg is just a waste of flesh. Period.

    Besides, isn’t Jonah Goldberg the gay Jonah Goldberg?

  39. 39.

    Martin

    Actually, it enhances my point by strengthening Molly’s credibility because she was obviously not a Hillary supporter.

    Or it reinforces the increasingly accepted view today that most Democrats backed the Clintons out of party loyalty against unfair attacks rather than out of a measured respect for them and that a decade later, with those attacks behind us we see them for what they were all along and have changed our views along with Molly.

    But if ‘Molly always hated her’ helps you sleep at night…

    And in round 93 of ‘Democrats Who Have Disappointed Us’ we have Geraldine Ferraro trotting out the ‘affirmative action keeps the white man down’ conservative meme. Damn you uppety negroes getting in the way of our coronation!

  40. 40.

    Z

    The Moar…

    You know, it is weird, but I’ve been thinking a lot about this the last week or so. I had a lot of respect for the Clinton’s up until recently (as in the last few months). I never understood my Republican relatives absolute hatred of them. I get it now.

    Some of my Republican relatives thought, despite my being a somewhat fiscally conservative moderate, that I was some kind of deluded, Lie-bral, up until around 2006. Then their view of me started to change.

    It is so strange that the scorched-Earth, mercilessly divisive politics of Bush, Delay, and the Clinton’s might actually bring rank & file Repubs and Democrats together. Certainly, in my family, there is more respect between us.

    I am happy that many Republicans, like John Cole, woke up and realized that Bush, Limbaugh, and Co. were dead wrong, half this country isn’t the enemy. I think the Clinton’s antics are inspiring a bit of an awakening among Democrats, as well.

  41. 41.

    Dennis - SGMM

    Steve Grossman’s letter to Superdelegates makes me all warm and fuzzy inside.

    If you could spread that letter on the lawn your grass would grow twelve feet tall. The DNC, isn’t that the same bunch of sages who lost Congress for twelve years and the last two presidential elections?

  42. 42.

    myiq2xu

    Bill Moyers on the rehabilitation of Newt Gingrinch:

    MICKEY EDWARDS: …(W)hile I was in the House, Newt Gingrich sort of rose in power. And Newt decided that the purpose of the Republican in Congress was not to carry out the fundamental principles that they had originally believed in, but to defeat Democrats. That was all that mattered. And it became how do— it’s always war Democrats versus Republicans, all the time. And when you look at it from that mindset, you have a Republican president — you know, he is not any more the head of a different branch of government. He’s your team captain. He’s your quarterback.

    And so, Gingrich really created a system of nonstop warfare that went well beyond, you know, what the situation was with Nixon. And institutionalized it to an extent that today, when the Congress properly issues — tries to vote a contempt citation against two people on the White House staff, Harriet Myers and Josh Bolton, you know, who defy a Congressional subpoena, and Republicans in Congress walk out in protest, rather than engage in defending the branch of government that they’re a part of. So, I put a lot of the blame right on Newt Gingrich. I think he led to a lot of this.

    Then there is another view:

    At some point, even the most diehard Democrats are going to have to admit that the acrimony of the 90’s wasn’t just caused by the Republican party and Newt Gingrich.

  43. 43.

    Mike

    But how much of that was fiction and how much was it based on Klein’s reporting?

    I fail to grasp the distinction you seem to be trying to make.

  44. 44.

    myiq2xu

    Or it reinforces the increasingly accepted view today that most Democrats backed the Clintons out of party loyalty against unfair attacks rather than out of a measured respect for them and that a decade later, with those attacks behind us we see them for what they were all along and have changed our views along with Molly.

    “Increasingly accepted” by who? Do you have some evidence to back that up or did you just pull that out of . . . somewhere?

    As for those attacks being behind us, where have you been?

  46. 46.

    Martin

    The DNC, isn’t that the same bunch of sages who lost Congress for twelve years and the last two presidential elections?

    Pre-Dean, yes. Under Dean it’s the same bunch of sages that landed both houses of Congress in 2006.

  47. 47.

    myiq2xu

    You know, it is weird, but I’ve been thinking a lot about this the last week or so. I had a lot of respect for the Clinton’s up until recently (as in the last few months). I never understood my Republican relatives absolute hatred of them. I get it now.

    You do? From yesterday’s thread:

    Did you know that there were GOP members talking about impeachment before Bill even took the oath of office? The GOP and the VRWC accused Bill (and Hillary) of multiple murders, drug smuggling, rape, fathering a black child with a prostitute (recycled for McCain in 2000) along with a list of other lesser (but mostly sordid) crimes.

    From Molly Ivins’ Who Let the Dogs In:

    A Republican consultant told a network newscaster that his job was to make sure Hillary Clinton is discredited before the 1996 campaign. Each day, anti-Hillary talking points go out to talk-show hosts.(from a column originally published in May 1993)

    Since you get it, please explain why the GOP set out to discredit the First Lady from the time she arrived at the White House.

  48. 48.

    Zifnab

    Bill Moyers on the rehabilitation of Newt Gingrinch:
    ..quote..
    Then there is another view:
    ..quote..

    Right. This doesn’t make Gingrich a saint, again (not that he ever really was). But it does betray the idea that it was all Gingrich’s fault, all the time. Newt was a turd in a dish, but that didn’t preclude him from being the only turd in a dish.

    As we’ve seen from such stalwart asshats as Senator Rockefeller and Senator Reid and Senator Lieberman and Governor Spitzer, it still takes two to tango in politics. The Democrats have committed their fair share of travesties in defense of the Bush Doctrine. Whether you want to give Bill and/or Hillary a pass on this or that is a debate we can have. But Newt went to war in the House back in ’94. And the Clintons, along with their House and Senate backers, were the ones who lost that war – as often as not by their own personal follies.

    Obama looks, to me at least, like he’s a winner. He looks like the kind of politician who can sell an agenda I approve of to the rest of the American public. That’s why he gets my campaign dollars and my votes.

  49. 49.

    Goseph Gerbils

    Besides, isn’t Jonah Goldberg the gay Jonah Goldberg?

    Isn’t he married with a young family? I was under the impression that was the only reason he hadn’t signed up with the USMC to help bring freeance and peeance to Iraq.

    [snerk]

  50. 50.

    jnfr

    Ted quoted:

    Know Hope.

    Okay, now not only is my head exploded, I’m also puking. I did not know this was possible!

  51. 51.

    Dennis - SGMM

    Pre-Dean, yes. Under Dean it’s the same bunch of sages that landed both houses of Congress in 2006.

    You’re absolutely right. Dean has done wonders for the DNC and he’s had to fight many of them every step of the way. Remember the bitching as he began implementing his 50 state strategy? I’m just saying that Grossman’s letter imputing some kind of super human political insight to them is just so much crap.

  52. 52.

    Martin

    “Increasingly accepted” by who? Do you have some evidence to back that up or did you just pull that out of . . . somewhere?

    Gee, I don’t know. Just look around. hillaryis44 surely has links to the outside world. Just follow one. There aren’t many liberal pundits left in her camp. When Rachel Maddow is smacking Hillary around it’s a clue that maybe we’ve rounded the bend on that one.

    As for those attacks being behind us, where have you been?

    Since I seriously doubt you can differentiate between attacks against Hillary because she deserves it and those because she doesn’t, I’m going to ignore your assertion just as I would ignore praise for the color of my dining room from Stevie Wonder.

  53. 53.

    myiq2xu

    Gee, I don’t know. Just look around. hillaryis44 surely has links to the outside world. Just follow one. There aren’t many liberal pundits left in her camp.

    I’ve never been to hillaryis44. As for “liberal pundits left in her camp,” there never were many.

    More Molly:

    I have to add that Clinton has brought much of his trouble on himself, and the reason I have to add that is because a law was passed about four years ago; you may not know this, but the law forbids any journalist from ever saying anything either sympathetic to or admiring about Clinton without immediately adding, “But … ” and then sticking in at least a little knife. We all obey this law religiously because anyone who breaks it will have his press pass removed or, worse, lose his cynicism stripes and stand convicted of being a sucker for spin. (6/2/96)

  54. 54.

    myiq2xu

    Since I seriously doubt you can differentiate between attacks against Hillary because she deserves it and those because she doesn’t, I’m going to ignore your assertion just as I would ignore praise for the color of my dining room from Stevie Wonder.

    For the second day in a row I have asked you for evidence to support the lies and crap you are spewing and for the second day in a row you have failed to do so.

  56. 56.

    Martin

    And Hillary saves us from having to rely on Joe Klein:

    TAPPER: “Senator, how do you reconcile your suggestion that maybe Senator Obama would be appropriate to be on a Clinton-Obama ticket while at the same time you are suggesting that he isn’t prepared to be commander-in-chief?”

    CLINTON: “Well this thing has really been given a life of its own. You know, a lot of Democrats like us both and have been very hopeful that they wouldn’t have to make a choice, but obviously Democrats have to make a choice and I’m looking forward to getting the nomination. And it’s premature to talk about whoever might be on whose ticket, but I believe that I am ready to serve on day one.”

    What? We never said anything about Obama as VP?!

    Today, however, the President seemed especially tickled by the answer, and chose to share with his personal thoughts on picking Obama as a VP.

    “She said yesterday and she said the day after her big wins in Texas and Ohio and Rhode Island that she was very open to that and I think she answered explicitly yes yesterday,” Clinton began, referring to Hillary’s own answers on the topic in recent days.

    “I know that she has always been open to it, because she believes that if you can unite the energy and the new people that he’s brought in and the people in these vast swaths of small town and rural America that she’s carried overwhelmingly, if you had those two things together she thinks it’d be hard to beat. I mean you look at the, you look at the, you look at the map of Texas and the map in Ohio. And the map in Missouri or — well Arkansas’s not a good case because they know her and she won every place there. But you look at most of these places, he would win the urban areas and the upscale voters, and she wins the traditional rural areas that we lost when President Reagan was president. If you put those two things together, you’d have an almost unstoppable force,” Clinton went on to say.

    Yes, its a mystery how these ideas take on a life of their own.

  57. 57.

    The Moar You Know

    Delia: I loved the Clintons, I really did. Now I’m just really, really disappointed.

    Z: Look, a lot of what the VRWC got bent out of shape over (Vince Foster, travel office, etc) was manufactured bullshit. We all know it. The problem that the Clintons had/have is that they pull enough technically legal but ethically challenged crap as to make the manufactured rumors believable (and this is the important part) to those who wanted to believe the worst of them.

    Just like the Bush administration. The main difference is that the Bushies decided (once they realized no one would love them) was “fuck it, might as well be evil, then.”

    It’s a credibility issue, one that is killing the country by degrees. It’s hurting the Democratic Party right now. It’s going to hurt Dems even more in the general if she is the nominee. And it’s going to put the country into a world of hurt were she to be elected – we’ll have the same problem we have right now, where 50% +1 of the country is pissed off at the person in charge because they are provided a golden opportunity to believe what they want to believe; that the people in charge are the embodiment of pure evil.

    This is what the politics of divisiveness gets you; 50% of the electorate constantly pissed off. We’ve had 20+ years of this. I can’t take any more.

  58. 58.

    Martin

    For the second day in a row I have asked you for evidence to support the lies and crap you are spewing and for the second day in a row you have failed to do so.

    Is it an unfair attack on Hillary to assert that she has been more helpful of McCain than damaging of Obama with her ‘threshold’ talk? It is unfair to say that she has lied on a number of occasions about Obama’s statements and stances? It is an unfair attack to point out that she has gone from no to yes on seating MI/FL? Is it an unfair attack to note that she justifies FL/MI on ‘letting the voters be heard’ and then in the very same interview declare that pledged delegates are not binding and are up for grabs even on the first ballot (in spite of the fact that they are how the voters are heard).

    Are these unfair or fair attacks?

  59. 59.

    Ted

    Delia: I loved the Clintons, I really did. Now I’m just really, really disappointed.

    Careful there. Myiq2xu is a paid Hillary internet advocate, and you are definitely not going to get away with this!

  60. 60.

    myiq2xu

    Are these unfair or fair attacks?

    Now you’re trying to lie and change the issue. You said:

    Or it reinforces the increasingly accepted view today that most Democrats backed the Clintons out of party loyalty against unfair attacks rather than out of a measured respect for them

    Please provide evidence that there exists an “increasingly accepted view today that most Democrats backed the Clintons out of party loyalty against unfair attacks rather than out of a measured respect for them.”

    Your original statement said nothing about fair vs unfair.

    Bill had a high approval rating when he left office. That sounds like a “measured respect” to me.

    While you’re at it, show me where she “has gone from no to yes on seating MI/FL”

  61. 61.

    Linda

    I liked Hillary until her most recent misteps in her attempt to regain her momentum in this race. After some of the things she has said, I’m not sure I want her to win the nomination. Then Sully comes up with a quote like this and I realize if Hillary does win, at least I will get to see Sully’s head spin around 3 times. And for just a moment I think “It might be worth it”.

  62. 62.

    Xenos

    While you’re at it, show me where she “has gone from no to yes on seating MI/FL”

    Last week she went from no to yes, and back to no, in the course of 2 1/2 days. Each time the announcement captured a news cycle, which was the the point. Extremely tiresome display of bad faith.

    Now with the ‘I’m losing, but B.O. can be my flunky if he likes’ routine, it has gone beyond the realm of bad faith to shear pathos.

    Obama can put it away with a deft, well coordinated display of sad disgust. Won’t pull the trigger, though. Not yet, at least.

  63. 63.

    Ted

    Then Sully comes up with a quote like this and I realize if Hillary does win, at least I will get to see Sully’s head spin around 3 times. And for just a moment I think “It might be worth it”.

    If that happens, just wait to see what he does. He’ll spend months absolutely agonizing about whether to vote for her or McCain. It will be so melodramatic it will be Shakespearean.

    Then he’ll vote for McCain.

    Know Hope.

  64. 64.

    Martin

    http://www.nhpr.org/node/13858

    Oct 10 of last year.

    NHPR’s Laura Knoy: “So, if you value the DNC calendar, why not just pull out of Michigan? Why not just say, Hey Michigan, I’m off the ballot?”

    Hillary Clinton: “Well, you know, It’s clear, this election they’re having is not going to count for anything”

    Did 90% of the country have measured respect for Bush after 9/11 or were they rallying around their leader? Measured respect means that you’ve taken the time and had the opportunity to critically evaluate the individual. Admittedly, that was hard to do around all of crap being flung at the Clintons (which I’ll admit was crap). That doesn’t mean that they weren’t still divisive and only marginally honest.

  65. 65.

    Delia

    Then he’ll vote for McCain.

    Wait. You left out the fifteen debates he’ll have with Hitchens before he gets to that point.

  66. 66.

    Ted

    Wait. You left out the fifteen debates he’ll have with Hitchens before he gets to that point.

    Now that I think about it, though, I’m not sure Sully can vote. I know Hitch got himself fully naturalized in recent years, but not sure about Sully. Every election he talks about who he endorses, but I don’t recall ever hearing him say anything about who he’ll vote for.

  69. 69.

    MaryM

    Lord help me I will never get it. What is the deal with all the Hillary hate? What on earth has the woman done to deserve such _______ (substitute 5 dollar word of your choice-my spelling is not so good). She is ambitious, brilliant and wants to be President of the US. And she deserves to be hated for that? Is it because she is a woman? Because history would say the hatred is saved for the elected President, who ever he may be.

  70. 70.

    myiq2xu

    That doesn’t mean that they weren’t still divisive and only marginally honest.

    What did they do to divide people? (other than piss off Republicans by winning?

    Did they campaign using wedge issues?

    BTW – The NPR quote doesn’t show that Hillary was opposed to seating the MI delegates, and doesn’t mention Florida.

    Hillary has been consistent in wanting to either seat the original delegates or re-do the primaries.

  71. 71.

    John D.

    BTW – The NPR quote doesn’t show that Hillary was opposed to seating the MI delegates

    How do you get that from

    Hillary Clinton: “Well, you know, It’s clear, this election they’re having is not going to count for anything”

    ?

    “Oh, it’s not going to count for anything, BUT THEY SHOULD BE SEATED ANYWAY!”

    You’ve passed beyond spoof into outright idiocy.

  73. 73.

    tBone

    She is ambitious, brilliant and wants to be President of the US. And she deserves to be hated for that? Is it because she is a woman?

    Yes – everyone who doesn’t support Hillary is a raging gynophobe. There is simply no way anyone could oppose Hillary because they disagree with her voting record or her campaign tactics or the Star Wars cantina freakshow that constitutes her inner circle. No, it’s all because of misogyny.

    facepalm.gif>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

  74. 74.

    tBone

    Hillary has been consistent

    I stopped reading after this part. Didn’t seem worth the effort.

  75. 75.

    demimondian

    the Star Wars cantina freakshow that constitutes her inner circle

    Hey, watch it! Some of my best friends played the Star Wars cantina in Mos Eisley, and none of them could be confused with Wolfson or Penn.

  76. 76.

    myiq2xu

    Lord help me I will never get it. What is the deal with all the Hillary hate? What on earth has the woman done to deserve such ___ (substitute 5 dollar word of your choice-my spelling is not so good). She is ambitious, brilliant and wants to be President of the US. And she deserves to be hated for that? Is it because she is a woman?

    They hate Bill too, so gender doesn’t explain it. They hated both of them before Bill ever took office. He didn’t run a negative campaign in either 1992 or 1996, he didn’t lie us into a war or repeal the Bill of Rights, he didn’t have his dad’s cronies (and his brother) steal an election.

    I can understand someone “not liking” either or both or the Clintons. Disliking them based on their positions on issues or the Lewinsky affair, okay. They’ve both done some things I’m not too happy with myself.

    But they have been HATED by a significant group of people in this country since they first were campaigning for the White House. Foaming at the mouth, irrational hatred.

    I constantly see wide, sweeping smears made against them about sleaziness, dishonesty, divisiveness, and ruthlessness.

    But where is the specific evidence? Sixteen years in the public eye, and what have they done? He lied about a blow-job and she didn’t divorce him. Even the lastest stuff, even if it were all true (it isn’t) doesn’t merit HATRED!

  77. 77.

    myiq2xu

    “Oh, it’s not going to count for anything, BUT THEY SHOULD BE SEATED ANYWAY!”

    You’ve passed beyond spoof into outright idiocy.

    Jeebus, is English your native language? She did not say “I don’t think the MI delegates should be seated.”

  78. 78.

    tBone

    Even the lastest stuff, even if it were all true (it isn’t) doesn’t merit HATRED!

    This is true. The problem is, there’s a certain segment of the online Hillary fanclub that interprets any criticism of Hillary as hatred. The CDS stuff is just as stupid now as it was back when the Republicans called it BDS.

  79. 79.

    tBone

    Hey, watch it! Some of my best friends played the Star Wars cantina in Mos Eisley, and none of them could be confused with Wolfson or Penn.

    You’re right, that was a low blow. I apologize to any denizens of that wretched hive of scum and villiany who took offense.

  80. 80.

    Ted

    Parce-que tes parents s’est réuni seulement une fois à un bal masqué.

    Sweet! Was it like Eyes Wide Shut? Was the password ‘Fidelio’?

  81. 81.

    myiq2xu

    Was the password ‘Fidelio’?

    Is “Fidelio” when you get a blowjob from your dog?

  82. 82.

    Martin

    BTW – The NPR quote doesn’t show that Hillary was opposed to seating the MI delegates, and doesn’t mention Florida.

    Ok. You’re simply a troll. That’s the most dishonest thing I think I’ve read here. There is no way to not draw that conclusion, especially since you clearly have no idea why New Hampshire was asking about Michigan and why Florida wasn’t mentioned. Welcome to greasemonkey.

  83. 83.

    Asti

    She is ambitious, brilliant and wants to be President of the US

    If she were brilliant, she wouldn’t be acting so poorly regarding the negative ads, and hence alienating so many Dems from wanting to vote for her.

    If she were brilliant, she wouldn’t be calling a Republican who wants to take us to war with Iran more qualified than the other Dem candidate in this race.

    I’ll hand it to you thought, you got one thing right, she’s ambitious, she’s very ambitious.

  84. 84.

    Tax Analyst

    Obama looks, to me at least, like he’s a winner. He looks like the kind of politician who can sell an agenda I approve of to the rest of the American public. That’s why he gets my campaign dollars and my votes

    Agreed, Zif

  85. 85.

    MaryM

    Excuse me, but if you wanted to be the FIRST EVER elected WOMAN president of the US, you would have to be VERY AMBITIOUS, I think. After all, most of the elected presidents in the past 1/2 century were selected, not elected. Even JFK came along because his elder brother died and his father picked the next best thing. Well, ok Carter maybe was a real democratically elected candidate, Clinton 1 certainly was not due to Perot.

    At any rate, again I say what is it with the hatred? Really, what is it and I have been hearing this since 1990. Her very persona generates hatred, sorry about this, predominately from men. But why? I am really asking here. Why?

  86. 86.

    Asti

    They’re not only blowing her reputation, they’re blowing his legacy. Good work, Clintonistas.

    OMG you’re so right. I just hope they don’t realize it and fix the problem (they forgot to add “nice” into the mix) until AFTER the election.

  87. 87.

    borehole

    Demimondian, seriously? Tell the werewolf guy that a whole lot of us thought it was bullshit when he got airbrushed out of the re-release.

  88. 88.

    jcricket

    The CDS stuff is just as stupid now as it was back when the Republicans called it BDS.

    For the most part I agree. But can we all agree that Sully’s off the deep end, wrt to Clinton? If there was one verifiable case of CDS, it would be him. He’s all but unreadable unless you are an inveterate Clinton hater who likes bears (and not the Wild World of Nature kind).

  89. 89.

    borehole

    MaryM, this isn’t the place for earnest, profanity-free elucidation, but suffice to say she’s pulled some stuff in this campaign that was pretty loathesome. Just because it’s the freshest thing in my mind, I’ll go with the way she basically endorsed McCain over her Democratic opponent–that should do as an illustration.

    This is the wrong group for you to ask, anyway. There’s an element of misogyny to her negatives, to be sure, but the people here are more disappointed than hateful. I’ve been lurking here since just before the race started, and even with a cynical-as-hell voting record and overt neocon leanings, she was a perfectly acceptable candidate to the Juice crew until very recently.

  90. 90.

    jcricket

    You aren’t allowed to use fiction to determine that Hillary is evil and should not be President. I really don’t think that is too out of line.

    It’s like relying on Scaife, Rev. Moon or Drudge as your primary source.

  91. 91.

    MaryM

    I have spent more time than I care to admit on the “world of the blogs” and I have to say that for a political blog, you guys are the best and in my opinion, the brightest, and the least repressed by your own community.

    So I really just want an honest opinion about why Hillary turns you off and when did it start. I think it would be very informative to your daughters who may harbor AMBITIONS to run for higher office.

  92. 92.

    Asti

    So I really just want an honest opinion about why Hillary turns you off and when did it start. I think it would be very informative to your daughters who may harbor AMBITIONS to run for higher office.

    AUMF, for me. I’m sure several others started there too.

  94. 94.

    Martin

    At any rate, again I say what is it with the hatred?

    I was quite happy with Clinton as a candidate until mid-late January. That she has gone from someone I expected to do well in the White House to an individual that I now see as deeply dishonest is very disappointing. I had expected that with the albatross of the right-wing smear machine off of her at the level that she suffered though the 90s that we she’d be running a campaign closer to what we see Obama running. I gave her a pass on Kindergate as an aberration, but once she started turning on voters and lying about Obama’s statements then things changed. And it’s not so much about her statements about Obama that bothers me, but she insists on dismissing voters, which is direct offront to Democrats. Her statement from the debate:

    [He] has said in the last week that he really liked the ideas of the Republicans over the last 10 to 15 years, and we can give you the exact quote. … They were ideas like privatizing Social Security, like moving back from a balanced budget and a surplus to deficit and debt.

    Now, I expect this kind of stuff coming out of Bush or McCain. I have no respect for either of them. I did have some respect for Clinton even with AUMF. Maybe I shouldn’t have, but I did. I attributed Bill things to Bill and generally left Hillary as a clean slate other than the health care issue, but by her own insistence most of my objections to Bill outside of Monica I now need to apply to Hillary as well.

  95. 95.

    Martin

    Hiring Mark Penn as a campaign strategist and Terry McAuliffe as Chief of Staff of her campaign were my problems with her.

    Yeah, that sure as hell didn’t help. I kept giving her the benefit of a doubt and she kept making me feel like an idiot for doing that.

  96. 96.

    Stephen

    Up until the weekend before Rhode Island/Vermont/Ohio/Texas, I was OK with both of them – neither was my first choice, and I was hoping for Obama more than Ms. Clinton – but then she started in on ‘shame on you’ etc. and she’s done so much bad shit since then that I can’t even sort out what repels me about her the most.

    I’ve been saying that I’ll vote for her even if I hafta vomit after, but since I live in Massachusetts, I don’t think that will be necessary. I have voted for 3rd party candidates or left the Prez line blank most of my adult life. Main thing is to vote for all the downticket candidates.

  97. 97.

    Tax Analyst

    MaryM Says:

    I have spent more time than I care to admit on the “world of the blogs” and I have to say that for a political blog, you guys are the best and in my opinion, the brightest, and the least repressed by your own community.

    So I really just want an honest opinion about why Hillary turns you off and when did it start. I think it would be very informative to your daughters who may harbor AMBITIONS to run for higher office.

    March 10th, 2008 at 9:59 pm

    MaryM – I was initially fully in favor of HRC and did not initially take Obama all that seriously. As the campaign has progressed I have watched the Clinton campaign show a distinct and disappointing political tone-deafness that cost her a few primaries. I think it flowed from an entitlement mind-set – you know, being First Lady – even one was politically involved during Bill’s terms does not, repeat, does NOT form a valid foundation on which to base your candidacy on. It is “experience” but it is of an unaccountable type. But wherever it happened to come from her campaign seemed to start and stop with that sense of pre-ordained destiny. I suppose we would have all settled for that if a feasible alternative to her candidacy had not made an impression. Given the opening Obama displayed an ability to motivate people and generate enthusiasm…if Hillary had been able to do that earlier…or possibly even at that point this nomination would still be her’s and Obama would just be an “interesting future possibility”. But she hasn’t, and that has made me very concerned about how she would fare in the General Election.

    Long story short, I’m no misogynist. We have 2 women Senators in California and I’ve voted for them in every election. In fact, when Barbara Boxer first announced her candidacy for U.S. Senate back in the early 90’s I saw the tiny article in the back of the L.A. Times front section and told my brother, “That’s the next Senator from California” – he looked at me like I was nuts.

    This nomination was Hillary Clinton’s had she done almost anything except the things she has actually done. That doesn’t give me a lot of confidence, but I will vote for her anyway should she get the nomination.

    And, oh yeah, she shoulda hired Teller instead of Penn.

    Seriously, if hiring Mark Penn and having Terry McAuliffe as campaign COS are indicative of her “Executive Judgment” then I’ve got some issues with that. That guaranteed this would turn into a “50 + 1” campaign and a lot of folks, including me, are sick to death of the BS.

  98. 98.

    Martin

    BREAKING:

    McCain elected President by a whisker! Mystified Democrats investigate how Obama lost Massachusetts election. Blogger ‘Stephen’ suspected to be responsible.

  99. 99.

    Martin

    Oh, and the WaPo and NYTimes pieces on her campaign have been painful to read.

    The Clintons lent the campaign $5 million, and Solis Doyle and Henry focused resources on a dozen battleground states, mainly large ones such as California, New York, New Jersey and Massachusetts, as well as Arizona and New Mexico, with large Hispanic populations. But they essentially did not compete in smaller states holding caucuses. Clinton, feeling burned by Iowa, had become allergic to caucuses, deeming them unfair.

    Ickes and political director Guy Cecil argued that such states were important because even if she lost, she would pick up delegates with a strong showing. That would soon become clear. Clinton racked up big wins in California, New Jersey and even Kennedy’s Massachusetts. But she lost the caucus states, and because of the party’s proportional rules, it cost her.

    “That was one of the biggest blunders we had,” a senior official said.

    Obama invested in Idaho, for example, while Clinton did not, and as a result he won 15 delegates to her three. In New Jersey, on the other hand, Clinton won 59 delegates to 48 for Obama. So the net 12 delegates Obama picked up in Idaho offset the 11 net delegates she earned in the much bigger state of New Jersey.

    “You end up canceling out everything we had done in New Jersey,” said Hassan Nemazee, the campaign’s finance co-chairman. “All that work in New Jersey was essentially nullified.”

    First: “allergic to caucuses, deeming them unfair”. We don’t play unfair. We don’t stop campaigning in states because we don’t like the kind of voting machines they have, or because they have too many racists, or because their Governor said mean things about me.

    Second: “Ickes and political director Guy Cecil argued that such states were important because even if she lost, she would pick up delegates with a strong showing” Here these guys are giving good advise and it is going ignored. Either by Penn or Clinton. Now, in the general we have these situations with electoral votes. Nebraska and New Hampshire split EVs. Small EV states can make a big difference, but they have their big, blue state plan, which is exactly the same plan as 2000 and 2004 which were such winners for the Dems.

    Truly, this is a campaign that didn’t expect to have to work for their win. They didn’t prepare past 2/5, they didn’t pay attention to the proportional delegate math. The expected to walk in and be handed the candidacy. That’s offensive to me.

  100. 100.

    myiq2xu

    I find this thread so amusing. I’ve been “feeling the love” for Hillary since when I was still supporting Edwards and was just defending Hillary from unfair attacks.

    Several people here claim they were supporting, neutral or “giving her the benefit of the doubt” when this election started. Now they are “disappointed” because of some recent acts or statements by Hillary and/or Bill.

    she was a perfectly acceptable candidate to the Juice crew until very recently.

    You must be referring to the “silent majority.”

    Truly, this is a campaign that didn’t expect to have to work for their win. They didn’t prepare past 2/5, they didn’t pay attention to the proportional delegate math. The expected to walk in and be handed the candidacy. That’s offensive to me.

    IOW – I hate her because she didn’t try hard enough to win.

  101. 101.

    Asti

    Truly, this is a campaign that didn’t expect to have to work for their win. They didn’t prepare past 2/5, they didn’t pay attention to the proportional delegate math. The expected to walk in and be handed the candidacy. That’s offensive to me.

    After alienting so much of the Dem party, I don’t expect her to pull this off. The negative talk about mistakes made in the campaign sounds like retrospective afterthoughts and sounds like they don’t expect to win either. This sounds like a campaign that already has pretty much given up.

  102. 102.

    empty

    At any rate, again I say what is it with the hatred?

    Some of it might be and probably is misogyny (as some at least of anti-Obama crap is probably racist),but most is because her candidacy is competing with the chosen candidate of most of the people here. The ever insightful Jon Schwarz of A Tiny Revolution had a post about the Samantha Powers “monster” incident which might indirectly answer your question. I am probably violating some blogosphere rule by copying the entire post here but I don’t know how to link to his individual posts. Anyway, here it is:

    There are several interesting things about Obama advisor Samantha “Samwise” Power calling Hillary Clinton a monster:

    “She is a monster, too – that is off the record – she is stooping to anything,” Ms Power said, hastily trying to withdraw her remark.

    Ms Power said of the Clinton campaign: “Here, it looks like desperation. I hope it looks like desperation there, too.

    “You just look at her and think, ‘Ergh’. But if you are poor and she is telling you some story about how Obama is going to take your job away, maybe it will be more effective. The amount of deceit she has put forward is really unattractive.”

    #1
    Clinton, of course, is a monster. She’s a monster for supporting the invasion of Iraq. She’s a monster for being First Lady while we strangled Iraq during the nineties. She’s a monster for being First Lady while we supported Turkey’s massacres of Turkish Kurds. She’s a monster for dozens of other reasons, all involving mass death.

    Yet these actions did not arouse such anger in Power. Why?

    #2
    What Power is furious about is Clinton competing with her. This is a very, very basic part of human nature. When people are competing with you, all of a sudden what previously appeared to you as minor faults become monstrous. If Power weren’t part of the Obama campaign, Clinton’s tactics would have barely registered with Power at all.

    Similarly, Power got extremely angry about the actions of Serbia’s government during the Bosnian war in the mid-nineties. Meanwhile, as far as I know, she’s never said a single word about a similar situation during the same period: the Turkish government killing tens of thousands of Turkish Kurds (and Iraqi Kurds) to suppress a separatist movement.

    Why did Power get angry about one and not the other? Because the Serbian government was acting against the wishes of the US government, and thus (to Power) competing with her. And because the Turkish government was licking the boots of the US, and thus (to Power) not competing with her.

    Amusingly, Power’s counterparts on the Clinton campaign are exactly the same. They’re furious at Obama because he’s competing with them, not because of their stated reasons (he’s “presumptuous”). And Clintonites got angry at Saddam Hussein because he presented competition, not for the reasons they claimed (he’s a horrible dictator, etc.). (Background here.)

    #3
    No one with Samantha Power’s lack of self-knowledge should be allowed within a million miles of power. However, “should” and “is” are different things.

    #4

    Already the Ring tempted him, gnawing at his will and reason. Wild fantasies arouse in his mind; and he saw Samwise the Strong, Hero of the Age, striding with a flaming sword across the darkened land, and armies flocking to his call as he marched to the overthrow of Barad-dûr. And then all the clouds rolled away, and the white sun shone, and at his command the vale of Gorgoroth became a garden of flowers and trees and brought forth fruit. He had only to put on the Ring and claim it for his own, and all this could be.

    Imagine if Frodo had attempted to snatch back the ring from Samwise at this point. He would have been a MONSTER!!!

    #5
    The ring must be destroyed.

  103. 103.

    Martin

    The negative talk about mistakes made in the campaign sounds like retrospective afterthoughts and sounds like they don’t expect to win either. This sounds like a campaign that already has pretty much given up.

    Yeah, articles like that are the staffs way of ‘clarifying’ their role in the campaign so that when the resumes go out they can say “See, it was Solis Doyle, Penn, Bill and Hillary that fucked up!” They always leave out the fuckups by the lesser staff, but one thing you can count on – when they show up, the campaign is done, even if the candidate isn’t yet on board with the plan.

  104. 104.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    MaryM,

    I’m another long time Democratic party loyalist now lost to Hillary. It has nothing to do with her gender. I would be delighted to have a chance to vote for a women who I thought would make a good President. Unfortunately I don’t feel like I’m getting that option this year. Hopefully that will happen sometime very soon, but I don’t think this is the year, and here’s why:

    Some of it has been by way of contrast with Obama; by being a better candidate he has thrown some of the less appealing traits of Hillary’s campaign into high relief. For example I really do like the way he is working at trying to bring new voters, non-voters, and Indy / RINO voters out to vote for the Democrats, and talking about toning down the take-no-prisoners approach that has generated nothing but gridlock in DC for the better part of 4 administrations now.

    Despite this, and despite my policy preferences shading closer to Obama’s positions than to Hillary’s, as recently as the NH primary I still would have been content to see her as the nominee, and would have given my time and money as well as my vote to help her in November. Now in retrospect I feel terribly naive and realize that I just did not know her very well back then.

    My own trip down disillusionment lane since then has been painful, driven by a combination of things mentioned by the other commentators here:

    – policy issues: AUMF, Kyl-Lieberman, her failure to show up for the most recent vote on FISA.

    – bad judgment in choosing advisors (Mark Penn particularly). A very poorly run campaign which does not speak well for the ability of her staff to organize something as complex as the WH in an effective manner. Not having any backup plan for the Feb caucuses if the contest went past SuperTuesday was a big red flag.

    – cynical and slimy campaign tactics, starting with:

    Bill’s post-SC primary “Jesse Jackson” remarks

    the MI / FL revisionist positioning and the transparently phony “victory celebration” campaign rally in FL after the totals were announced.

    continuing with just blatantly dishonest goalpost shifting by her campaign during the primaries (spin is one thing, talking to me as if I’m an idiot or can’t remember what you said 2 weeks ago is different),

    Hillary’s seeming inability to give a gracious concession speech in the early rounds of the contest, when it would not have been that difficult to say something mildly complimentary about Obama’s performance. Even worse was the way she pretended that the WI primary was a non-event not even worth noticing, as a result of which she failed even to thank her own campaign workers and voters in that state.

    and now spiraling downhill to the kitchen-sink tactics in OH and TX and her “John McCain is more qualified than BHO” speech on display most recently, the last of which is just unforgivable in my opinion.

    – concern that she will have a more difficult time against McCain (than would Obama) with a fair chance of losing in Nov., and will have an even worse effect on Democratic down ticket races, especially in purple states where large gains are possible this year.

    Taken individually, none of these would have been a that big a deal. Together they just keep adding up, and it never seems to stop. Every week her campaign finds a new and more creative way to be offensive or look like a poor choice.

    But the real backbreaker for me has been the talk coming out of her campaign that some voters count more than others, and some should scarcely be counted at all (e.g., red state caucus voters). They’ve said this not just once, but so many times that it has become almost the unofficial theme for her campaign: Message to (the wrong kind of) voters: YOU DON’T COUNT

    This is a totally unacceptable message. It strikes (in a destructive way) right at the heart of what it is that makes a small-d democratically elected government legitimate. The whole point of being a democracy is the EVERYBODY COUNTS! If you don’t understand this, if it has to be explained to you, then you have no business in the Oval Office, much less do you have any business being the person to walk us back to normality from the Imperial Presidency that Bush/Cheney have constructed.

    Yes, I realize that at the end of the day, you have to total up the votes, and she or he with the most votes wins. But that is a different concept from the idea that some people don’t count ahead of time, because of what state they live in, or what demographic group they belong to, or how much money they earn, or whatever stupid reason the HRC campaign can think up next. The list just keeps getting longer and longer of people-who-don’t-count.

    Also, once the election is over, then the hard work of governing comes in. No matter who did or did not vote for them, the President of the United States should be President for all of us, not just the half (or less) who were lucky enough to be on the winning side. One of the most revolting things that George W. Bush and Karl Rove have done for the last 7 years is to govern this country on the principle of: “if you’re not on my side, then it sucks to be you”. Enough already! As Democrats we should be aiming at doing everything we possibly can to discredit and tear down Bush’s legacy, not endorsing it by trying to win the Democratic party nomination using the same divide-and-conquer Rovian principles.

    And that’s not even starting with the disturbing way that the Clinton campaign’s attitude towards inconvenient rules, both formal ( MI/FL ) and informal (don’t attack your rival in ways that flatter the Republican candidate by comparison – which is so obvious it should never have even come up as an issue) are reminding me way too much for my comfort of the Bush administration’s policy of:

    Doing-Whatever-The-F**k-We-Want-To-Whenever-We-Feel-Like-It-And-You-Cant-Stop-Us

    That would take a whole ‘nother comment to address.

  105. 105.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    Dang! – numerous typos, and the formating is lousy. Sorry about that. Maybe more tequila would help.

  106. 106.

    Beej

    Mary M,

    I am hoping Obama wins the Democratic nomination, but that wasn’t always the case. I am a feminist. I was ecstatic that Hillary Clinton was running for President and had an excellent chance of winning. I have absolutely no problem with ambition. In fact, for most of my life, I’ve been told that I have an extremely large dose of it myself. I would still be a Clinton supporter if two things hadn’t happened:

    1. Obama launched a campaign that seems to be genuinely trying to return us to some semblance of civility in politics and government. Believe it or not, politics was not always fought like it has been for the last 20 years. Once upon a time, most political candidates really did care more about the country than they did about their party, and if they somehow showed that they didn’t, they didn’t last long.

    2. Instead of jumping on the “civility in politics” bandwagon, as she easily could have done, and running a campaign that showed the voters how totally bankrupt of ideas the Repugs are, Clinton has decided to revert to the old “punch until you win” style of politics that the other party has become so good at employing. She’s even crossed the line to declare that McCain is more qualified to be President than Obama. That, in anyone’s book, is taboo.Furthermore these tactics threaten to take what should be an overwhelming victory for the Democrats in November and turn it into just the kind of take-no-prisoners fight that most everyone here hoped we were not going to see this year.

    Mathematically, there is virtually no way Clinton can win this nomination. Only by convincing super delegates to ignore the popular vote can she hope to prevail. That smacks of Bush-Gore in 2000. Most of us here don’t like that memory at all. People who start to look like they are running a Repug-style campaign don’t get a lot of respect here.

    And those are at least a few of the reasons Hillary Clinton has lost a good deal of her initial appeal here at BJ.

  107. 107.

    Beej

    Incidentally, I agree with you, Mary M, that there are some people who are “Hillary haters”. And I have as much trouble understanding them as you do. I will be voting in November for the Democratic candidate, no matter who that is.

  108. 108.

    myiq2xu

    1. Obama launched a campaign that seems to be genuinely trying to return us to some semblance of civility in politics and government. Believe it or not, politics was not always fought like it has been for the last 20 years. Once upon a time, most political candidates really did care more about the country than they did about their party, and if they somehow showed that they didn’t, they didn’t last long.

    Yeah, Obama never says anything negative, he is 100% positive all the time, while that vile monster is always negative:

    I. A few examples of attacks that John Aravosis claims the Obama campaign never indulged in
    “Past or Present Scandals”

    Summer 2007: Obama campaign urges press to look into Bill Clinton’s “post-presidential” sex life (a favorite topic of Republicans)
    August 2007: I’m not sure if Aravosis considers this a “present scandal” (I don’t), but the Obama campaign contacted the press to tie Norman Hsu to Sen. Clinton – even though Hsu was a donor and fundraiser to/for Sen. Obama as well
    December 2007: Obama surrogate once again raises Bill Clinton’s sex life and ties it to Sen. Clinton’s electability
    “Clinton’s negatives”

    December 2007: Sen. Obama explicitly questions Sen. Clinton’s electability using approval ratings and her negatives (he’s of course done this on many occasions)
    January 2008: Sen. Obama paints Sen. Clinton as divisive and questions whether people who vote for him will vote for her in the general election
    February 2008: Sen. Obama talks up Sen. Clinton’s negatives by falsely caricaturing her as a person whose “natural inclination is to draw a picture of Republicans as people who need to be crushed and defeated” and then adds about himself “I’m not a person who believes any one party has a monopoly on wisdom”.
    “What a Clinton run for the presidency will do to Democratic congressional races and governor races across the country”

    December 2007: Sen. Obama unfavorably compares Clinton and Bush eras
    February 2008: Obama campaign repeatedly attacks Clinton Presidency and paints Clintons as harbingers of Congressional losses in elections (The latter was a particularly deceptive and amusing attack – almost like they were asking for George Bush to remain in office since Bush was instrumental in Democrats taking over Congress in 2006).
    Needless to say, the above list is not comprehensive by any means.

    Eriposte lists a lot more stuff, like falsely accusing the Clintons of racism, spreading the false story that the Clintons were trying to profit from 9/11, and circulating the borderline racist “D-Punjab” attack.

  109. 109.

    myiq2xu

    At any rate, again I say what is it with the hatred? Really, what is it and I have been hearing this since 1990. Her very persona generates hatred, sorry about this, predominately from men. But why? I am really asking here. Why?

    Robert Parry:

    The political scorched-earth campaign against President Clinton may have started as a 1992 campaign “oppo,” but it raged on for nearly seven years, in part, because wealthy Clinton-haters got caught up in the propaganda, according to new evidence.

    Since 1992, Republican “opposition research” — known as “oppo” in Washington jargon — focused on Clinton’s philandering. That dirt-digging eventually linked up to the Paula Jones case, Kenneth Starr’s investigation and the GOP-led impeachment trial.

    But the endless “oppo” drew energy and determination from darker rumors tying Clinton to “mysterious deaths,” drug trafficking and government corruption.

    Some of these wilder stories popped up in major conservative outlets, such as The Washington Times and the Wall Street Journal editorial page. But mostly, the rumors built a constituency by appearing in Christian Right videos — such as “The Clinton Chronicles” — and circulating through Internet “conspiracy” sites.

    While lacking anything approaching evidence, the sinister allegations succeeded in coloring the attitudes of key Clinton enemies, including right-wing tycoon Richard Mellon Scaife and possibly House GOP leaders.

    snip

    Scaife’s money wound its way to a variety of anti-Clinton operatives in Arkansas. But an article in Salon by investigative reporter Murray Waas has added an important new piece to the mosaic. Waas reported that more than $14,000 was paid to a key “scandal” witness, former Arkansas trooper L.D. Brown.

    Waas cited confidential accounting records of the American Spectator Educational Foundation which showed payments to Brown of $6,200 in February 1994; $4,200 in March 1994; $737 in August 1994; and $3,500 in 1997. The American Spectator said the money was to compensate Brown for “investigative services” and to reimburse him for the cost of a chartered private jet.

    Yet, during those years, Brown was leveling some of the most sensational charges against the president. For one, Brown provided partial corroboration for the claim by convicted con man David Hale that he met with Gov. Clinton to discuss a fraudulent loan to Whitewater partner Susan McDougal.

    L.D. Brown also accused Clinton of collaborating with a cocaine-smuggling ring in Mena, Ark. Brown was the mainstay in several anti-Clinton books, including Roger Morris’s Partners in Power. American Spectator editor R. Emmett Tyrrell also published a series of articles about Mena based on Brown’s assertions.

    According to Brown’s testimony, he was recruited for a CIA-connected drug-smuggling operation in Mena with Clinton’s blessings in 1984. Brown claimed that he then accompanied notorious drug smuggler Barry Seal on an arms-for-drugs flight from Mena to Central America.

  110. 110.

    John D.

    Jeebus, is English your native language? She did not say “I don’t think the MI delegates should be seated.”

    The fuck?

    You really don’t have any ability to understand, do you?

    What, exactly, was the primary for, in MI? (Hint: It was intended to award delegates).

    If Hillary believed that the primary was not going to count for anything (which she is on record as saying), how, exactly, was she of a belief that there would be delegates awarded?

    She only decided that the election counted once she “won”. It’s plain to everyone with 2 functioning neurons to rub together. Admittedly, that appears to leave you out in the cold, but I’m tired of constantly having to deal with your pernicious bullshit and medacity. Welcome to the pie filter.

  111. 111.

    Original Lee

    What ThatLeftTurninABQ said.

    Honestly, I was ready to pull the lever for Clinton here in Maryland, and then I start hearing all of these comments from her, from Bill, from staffers, about how Maryland doesn’t really count, because we’re too blue, we’re too small, we’re too black, etc. etc. In 2004, I had to PAY for Kerry campaign materials because Maryland wasn’t a battleground state, and now I get to hear a major candidate telling me that my vote doesn’t even count! Grrrr.

    I think my main problem with her is her tone-deafness. She comes out with these statements and doesn’t seem to get why people like me find them offensive. Is it because I’m not in her target demographic or something? And then I start wondering about this in terms of foreign policy – all we need after the Bush administration is to have a Chief Executive who unintentionally offends other countries because she’s so focused on who she’s aiming her words at that she doesn’t realize she’s flipped several other somebodies off! Or how would this work when she’s trying to get her agenda through Congress? “Sorry, Madam President, you offended some of my deep-pocket constitutents last week, so I can’t vote with you on this.” The tone-deafness isn’t a recent tendency, either -even as First Lady, she would periodically say something that honked people off, but it didn’t get much national play because there was so much else going on.

    OK, so she’s tone-deaf, that sounds like such a small thing. But to me, it’s an indicator that she’s not thinking things through, or that she’s using a reasoning process when she does think things through that’s missing a piece. I’m not sure how to articulate it, but maybe something along the lines of, expediency often seems to trump ethics with her.

    My grandmother, who was a very wise woman, once told me that she always asked herself a couple of questions and tried to answer them as she thought the politician she was voting for would. One of them was:

    I want to do something very much, but I’m pretty sure there’s a rule that I shouldn’t. What now?
    a) Find a way to make it legal.
    b) Find a way to make it look as if I thought it was legal.
    c) Forget about it.
    d) Get someone else to do it for me.

    What do you think Clinton’s answer is likely to be?

  112. 112.

    Original Lee

    I should add to my grandmother’s question:
    e) Hope I don’t get caught.

    That wasn’t one of her choices, but she, bless her, always tried to give the politicians the benefit of the doubt.

  113. 113.

    Beej

    myiq,

    I don’t believe I ever said that Obama was 100% positive all the time or anything even close to it. Nor did I call anyone a “vile monster”. This kind of over-the-top attack is precisely what has made the Clinton campaign go off the rails.

  114. 114.

    Pelikan

    Thank you Miyq2xu! If you hadn’t piped up, we might have forgot to mention that on many boards, Hillary is at least winning the jackass vote.

    That’s what turned me from a farily objective Obama supporter to a “Hillary Hater,” I just don’t like her self-appointed mouthpieces.

    I do think we should be talking about Bush more, it seems like everyone’s so eager to get rid of him that we forget that, should the democrats sweep the elections, we really have him to thank.

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