Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

This has so much WTF written all over it that it is hard to comprehend.

If you still can’t see these things even now, maybe politics isn’t your forte and you should stop writing about it.

Giving up is unforgivable. ~Joe Biden

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

Can we lighten up on the doomsday scenarios?

You cannot love your country only when you win.

Baby steps, because the Republican Party is full of angry babies.

“Just close your eyes and kiss the girl and go where the tilt-a-whirl takes you.” ~OzarkHillbilly

These days, even the boring Republicans are nuts.

It may be funny to you motherfucker, but it’s not funny to me.

This blog will pay for itself.

We know you aren’t a Democrat but since you seem confused let me help you.

Putin dreamed of ending NATO, and now it’s Finnish-ed.

They traffic in fear. it is their only currency. if we are fearful, they are winning.

People identifying as christian while ignoring christ and his teachings is a strange thing indeed.

The low info voters probably won’t even notice or remember by their next lap around the goldfish bowl.

… riddled with inexplicable and elementary errors of law and fact

The Supreme Court cannot be allowed to become the ultimate, unaccountable arbiter of everything.

Today’s gop: why go just far enough when too far is right there?

Speaking of republicans, is there a way for a political party to declare intellectual bankruptcy?

Fear or fury? The choice is ours.

“Loving your country does not mean lying about it’s history.”

Republicans got rid of McCarthy. Democrats chose not to save him.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

You are here: Home / Clinton Rules

Clinton Rules

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The GOS notes:

In one of the threads last night, commenter theran made a good observation:

At some point the concept of “Republicans will do X” has turned into a license for Hillary to do all the same things. It’s bizarre, but I don’t really consider her a Dem any more.

Actually, in fairness, Josh Marshall pointed this out several days ago:

With the Wright business and now with this, the more nuanced version of the Clinton line has been that what ‘we’ think is not really the point. It’s what Republicans will do with it in the fall. And that’s a real concern that I definitely have. I won’t deny it. I’ve never thought Obama was a perfect candidate. But as we get deeper into the primary calendar, increasingly so, this ‘what the Republicans will do’ line has become more of a simulacrum, or a license, if you will, to do what Republicans actually do do. That is to say, to grab for political advantage by peddling stereotypes about Democrats and liberals that are really no less offensive than the ones we’re talking about about Americans from small town and rural America.

And seeing Hillary go on about how Obama has contempt for folks in small town America, how he’s elitist, well … no, it’s not because I think she’s either. I never have. But after seeing her hit unfairly with just the same stuff for years, it just encapsulates the last three-plus months of her campaign which I can only describe as a furious descent into nonsense and self-parody. Part of it makes me want to cry. But at this point all I can really do is laugh.

Credit where credit is due.

Reader Interactions

27Comments

  1. 1.

    Jen

    Slate’s John Dickerson tweets: (I think it should be twitters, but the Powers What Be say tweets)

    Clinton totally trying to stick Obama with the liability of the “people you might know” on his Facebook page.

    (773,000+ friends, in case you’re curious)

  2. 2.

    cleek

    it would be interesting to see her reaction if Obama started attacking her the way the Republicans would presumably treat her.

  3. 3.

    ThymeZone

    As soon as I figure out how to get “Remember Vince Foster” and “Release The Rose Law Firm Billing Records” onto one lapel pin, I will be taking orders for the pin here.

    { pre order add to cart }

  4. 4.

    Hillary

    I think it is interesting that Obama brought up the relatively innocuous “bake cookies” line instead of the “screw em!” line from HRC that’s getting some play in the blogosphere.

    Is there any doubt she learned the wrong lesson from that?

  5. 5.

    Hillary

    The Obama campaign should start printing bumper stickers that read “We Didn’t Kill Vince Foster!”

  6. 6.

    cmorenc

    The other thing deeply bothersome about Clinton’s sleazy attack campaign over the three months is that in the debates, when she moves away from that tack and into substance, you can see how much genuine potential positive ability and intelligence she has as a candidate. Think HOW MANY of us three months ago were thinking WOW! We have two really great candidates, either of whom I could support wholeheartedly. We were worried about all the unfair crap the GOP would be attacking Hillary with if she was the candidate, and some of us were somewhat preferring Obama because he didn’t carry that baggage. And then unfortunately, Hillary managed to make us (now) former Hillary-admirers understand for our selves just why so many Republicans hate Hillary and Bill’s guts to the core – cause we’re starting to feel that way too, for many of the same reasons (no, not the Vince Foster thing).

  10. 10.

    Danton

    The last time the traditional media was rough on a candidate was right before the New Hampshire primary. The decidedly sexist coverage of HRC aroused the ire of New Hampshire voters, and they responded accordingly. Just maybe something like this sort of backlash might happen in Pennsylvania. I suppose it’s one way of telling the traditional media to do a better job with political coverage. Then again, the traditional media’s memory can’t seem to reach back a few months to what happened in New Hampshire.

  11. 11.

    Wilfred

    Part of it makes me want to cry. But at this point all I can really do is laugh.

    Wanking. I’ll certainly be laughing at Marshall et al. if Clinton actually does get the nomination as they’ll be doing what the conservatives are doing with McCain – forgetting all they don’t like about her because, you know, McCain is worse. Or are they the same now? Who knows, who cares?

  13. 13.

    ntr Fausto Carmona

    I’ll certainly be laughing at Marshall et al. if Clinton actually does get the nomination

    Any chance she had, she blew it last night. You don’t join in on slagging the other guy when you’re going to get the same exact treatment when it comes to the general.

  14. 14.

    Ivan Ivanovich Renko

    I don’t get it—why should Obama be asked to distance himself from the guy who helped save LBJ’s life?

    You mean the LBJ who helped shove the Voting Rights Act of 1964 through over the strenuous objections of the (now)Republicans?

    You actually have to ask?

    /snark

  15. 15.

    Billy K

    “We are all Vince Foster now.”

    I don’t know what that means, but it just popped into my head.

  16. 16.

    David

    I like how Josh Marshall managed to write “do do” and “about about” in the same post and they even made sense.

    Apropos of nothing….

  18. 18.

    ding7777

    Since Kos thinks Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was looking like a Democrat, its no surprise that Kos thinks Hillary is not a Dem.

    I’ll take the old style Dems if the New Dems are represented by Obama, Arnold and all the rest of the Reagan loving clones.

  19. 19.

    Phoenix Woman

    Ivan Ivanovich Renko: True dat.

    Imagine if Nixon hadn’t sent Anna Chan Chennault to Paris in 1968 to make sure the peace talks fell through. (And imagine if RFK had been warned about Sirhan Sirhan.)

  20. 20.

    PaulB

    I’ll certainly be laughing at Marshall et al. if Clinton actually does get the nomination as they’ll be doing what the conservatives are doing with McCain – forgetting all they don’t like about her because, you know, McCain is worse.

    Why would you be laughing? Josh has made no secret of his intention to vote for the Democratic candidate in the fall, regardless of who it is. I support Obama but will cheerfully vote for Clinton in the fall, since Clinton at her worst is ten times better than McCain.

    I don’t like her campaign tactics but her policies are, for the most part, decent. I sure can’t say the same thing about McCain.

  24. 24.

    cleek

    Simple questions….

    Do you think if Barack Obama had left his seriously ill wife after having had multiple affairs, had been a member of the “Keating Five,” had had a relationship with a much younger lobbyist that his staff felt the need to try and block, had intervened on behalf of the client of said young lobbyist with a federal agency,…

    and it gets better!

    (h/t Hilzoy)

  26. 26.

    Rick Taylor

    Hillary ain’t running for the Dem nomination (she knows “the math” is prohibitive)—she’s running to be (perhaps already as) McCain’s #2.

    That is ridiculous on so many levels. . .

  27. 27.

    RC

    Unfortunately though sometimes you have to fight fire with fire. The Clintons are still the only ones who survived swiftboating, though Bill nearly got impeached in the process. They did that by playing rough at times, and sometimes the only thing the Republicans respect is strength. This idea that Obama can tame these rabid wolves by smilling and being nice is getting a bit old. Try that tactic the next time you are confronted by a vicious dog.
    I hope the Obama supporters will apologise for their false certainty if Obama ends up folding like a cheap tent under the swiftboating to come. Right wingers already seem pretty confident they have the ammunition to bring him down already, and they weren’t this sure until well into the election with Kerry and Gore.
    I know it seems so right to go with the flow with Obama but could this just be a herd of lemmings heading over the cliff like in the last two presidential elections? Don’t forget half the Democratic party still prefer Hillary and this feeling of Obama inevitability isn’t shared by them at all. It just seems like a percentage of voters are enraptured by something they see in Obama and seem to demand that Hillary stand aside in shame for having the temerity to even run against him. Maybe they can see the emperor had no clothes with Bush but can’t see the Empty Suit this time.
    Perhaps they see a certain genius in Obama and perhaps there is, and perhaps some fragility and weakness as well. There is nothing unusual about Democrats needing to toughen up and become like Republicans to win, though the tone of this post and Josh marshall’s implies otherwise. In fact the Democrats have largely come back from oblivion by using the Republican tactics against them.
    So I hear a lot of nice rhetoric about how easy it will all be for Obama, but one cannot practise a new form of politics as long as the Republicans practise the old dirty kind. There is the politics of the lion and the politics of the lamb and if you reach across that aisle you get your arm bitten off.

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