I have to confess- I am celebrating Hillary’s implosion today. I went out earlier and had two glasses of wine, a spectacular grilled romaine salad with avocado and a raspberry vinagrette, and then a splendidly rare filet mignon in an oyster demi-glaze on a bed of asparagus. Because, you know, I am an elitist. And then I had a fat cigar.
A few months back I was defending her, and was ready to vote for her, even after years as a Republican. And then I watched her campaign and I realized once again how repellent she is.
Yeah, I really wish I could be more graceful about this, but since dinner, I have had a couple more drinks and I keep getting more ecstatic. In my defense, you know what you get when you come here, so deal with it. All praise the Giant Spaghetti Monster, please give us another pervert Republican this weekend and the week will be complete.
Again, I wish I could be more tactful, but after watching her lackeys and her supporters spend the last three months with no real route to the nomination sniping from the sidelines hoping for an Obama disaster to propel OUR LADY OF INEVITABILITY to the nomination, you can consider this a pretty damned good day for me.
But John, you say- she was just talking about the timeline. Whatever. Bye, Hillary.
As a personal aside, I found that the self-immolation of the most narcissistic campaign ever washes down really fucking well with a Pinot Noir. Fuck off and good riddance.
John +5 (for those of you who are new here and have no idea what it means, click the link)
PS- In pure Clintonian fashion, expect her to play the victim tomorrow. Why, she just made an innocuous statement about the election timeline and all these Obama supporters are trying to push the little woman out.
Fuck that nonsense. Buy some garlic and a wooden stake and tell her and her supporters to piss right off.
trevalyan
Two glasses of win? That a fact?
I know you meant wine, but I like your original phrasing better. More appropriate, and I can’t blame you one bit, given that +5 = awesome.
null pointer exception
Dude, I don’t think she’s dropping out until after the convention.
myiq2xu
What self-implosion?
You and the rest of the OFB had a major wankfest over nothing.
Even RFK Jr. defended Hillary.
Lay off the booze John, it kills brain cells.
John Cole
She is done. What she said tonight is worse for her campaign than Dukakis’s death penalty response. In twenty years, people will point to it as the actual end of her campaign.
Trust me on this. Done. After her “white people won’t vote for him’ bullshit, she needs to worry about challenges to her seat in 2012. Roll the credits, put a fork in her.
It is over. Trust me. This was so fucking beyond the pale, it is just over.
Jon H
I wonder how many supers Obama will pick up this weekend. Or, if he keeps the announcements on ice, on Tuesday.
It’s like waiting for the MacWorld new product announcements. ;^)
Thoreau at Unq. Offerings made a good point: whatever she meant, if anything *does* happen to Obama, her public statements have made her essentially a prime suspect. Which would make it difficult for her to jump into his place.
It’s pretty creepy that this was their justification at least as far back as early March. And who knows how long they’d been saying it to supers and donors.
Incertus
Taken on its own, myiq, you might have a point (other than the one atop your noggin), but this is the latest in a recent stretch of regoddamndiculous comparisons. If nothing else, it shows that she’s not thinking her statements through anymore, and that’s a bad habit to be in.
Conservatively Liberal
Glad you got a night out John. The wife and I went to Smuggler’s Cove down at the harbor tonight. It was our ‘once every third blue moon’ night out. She had the grilled salmon and a strawberry mohita, and I had the New York strip and a couple of white russians. The sky was mostly cloudy, but there were enough holes in it that the purple/pink sunlight came through as the sun set. As it set, the sun reflected off of the ocean and a beam of light went straight up and across the clouds for a couple of minutes. I wish I had grabbed the camera, it was really a sight to see.
We talked about everything but politics, and it was nice. I too feel that we have dodged a bullet with Hillary taking herself out of the running today. No, she has not formally done it, but I believe that it is damn near a done deal now.
Hard to believe that Hillary was her own worst enemy, but that will be the story that comes out of this whole mess.
Tom in Texas
Which odds are greater — Obama getting shot, or McCain keeling over with a heart attack?
I’m just saying maybe Hillary is keeping all her options open.
Jon H
RFK Jr is a “don’t spoil our view with windmills”-arguing, autism-junk-science-promoting wanker, who got busted for having almost .2 kilos of heroin when he was 30.
Also, he’s on record as wanting Clinton’s Senate seat.
Anyway, why should he care, Clinton’s offense wasn’t to the Kennedys. RFK can’t be killed again.
El Doh
Her supporters in the blogosphere have already taken this tack.
In fact, most of them are blaming Obama already, despite him not having commented on it thus far, and Axelrod defending her on Hardball.
But no, it’s all Big Bad Obama’s fault.
JenJen
Thank you, John. I worked the nighttime bartending shift, I’m only two frosty beers in (I’m no fuckin’ elitist, plus I’m out of wine), and I heartily join your celebration.
Weird, too, that her lame-ass lying “explanation” didn’t include any kind of apology to Barack Black Eagle.
I guess when you’ve got nothing else, your presidential blood-lust leads you to a “SOMETHING is going to happen to Obama, wink wink” stategy/tactic. Did she actually think that would be helpful to her somehow?
I can barely watch anymore. I literally wince every time she opens her mouth, wondering what kind of assinine, reckless thing is going to pop out next.
I understand Keith Olbermann showed the ruthless megalomaniac couple the door tonight. I plan to watch, right after I get a little more tanked.
binzinerator
If she holds on to her senate seat, she should be so lucky.
I was horrified. Sickened. Then I realized she just pissed away not her nomination — that was gone a while ago — but her entire political career.
What she said was historic in its ugliness, historic in the line she crossed. It will be for the history books. And in no way for a good thing.
Fuck you Hillary and goodbye. I was proud of you once. The nomination was yours to lose. But you pissed it away, and I think, much of the Clinton legacy as well.
I only wish if she had crashed and burned, it wasn’t because of this — that she might just be sticking around just in case the other guy gets shot.
Binz +5
wasabi gasp
Guys get to be assassins and guys get to be assassinated, but a lady isn’t even allowed to dream.
Jon H
Obama should name that 101 year old Indian woman, Myrtle Strong Enemy as his running mate.
Or at least his honorary co-vice president candidate emeritus, or something ceremonial like that.
Because that would be awesome.
John Cole
You know what I am thinking?
This website, when I redesign it, needs a ventrilo server so people can voice chat when they want. I think I can swing a 20 channel server along with the site fees.
Jon H
“This website, when I redesign it, needs a ventrilo server so people can voice chat when they want. I think I can swing a 20 channel server along with the site fees.”
Use voice-synthesis on the comments, it’d be cheaper and the load would be on the readers’ computers.
Plus, trolls could have funny voices.
Jess
After half a bottle of wine (summer vacation–yeehaw!), I’m feeling much like you, John. But I’m still feeling more pity than outrage–as I said in the other thread, I think she was trying to associate HERSELF with RFK–not Obama–and didn’t realize how badly it was going to come off. But then again, she did take full advantage of bitter-gate, and kharma’s a bitch.
But I do wish you’d hold Huckabee to the same standard–what he said was deeply wrong as well, even if he meant it as a lame joke. As Olbermann pointed out tonight, it’s a sick thing to put out there into the political discourse. I don’t even like it when blog commentators joke about it, much less would be political leaders.
chuck
Hillary is not a four letter word, it’s now worse. Don’t let the door hit ya where the good lord split ya.
At least this will short circuit _some_ of the crap we were all going to be subjected to if the Obama camp dare select someone other than HRC as VP. Now they can simply say Barack passed on her for his own health & well being…as well as that of this country.
cbear
Thanks, but no thanks. I heard quite enough of Myiq’s falsetto when we were in the joint together.
binzinerator
I have no words for this. Only as much bile and spleen as I have for the worst of people.
I don’t care who you vote for, not at all. Whomever you vote for will not change that you are a callous sick fuck no matter whose party you infest, no matter who you support.
Jess
But in tonight’s philosophical spirit of John and ConsLib, I have to say this has been an amazing primary season. So many surprises, horrible disappointments, and amazing wonders. We’re all learning a lot about what’s both great and gruesome about our country and its politics. I think we really are entering a new era.
But maybe that’s just the wine talking…
quimby
omigod.I hope you’re straight, because I am deeply, madly in love with you right now.
Rick Taylor
Yup.
myiq2xu
Then who was the alleged victim? Obama wasn’t even mentioned, and Hillary is the come-from-behind candidate in this campaign.
Not to mention she won California, like RFK, and is poised to with the remaining contests.
You fuckers are not only insane, you’re disgusting.
Conservatively Liberal
The only chat program I use is Xfire. You can create your own chat room and use both text and voice chat. Works really well, and maybe we could set up a temporary channel in there to yak away with. It is a pretty nice app, and we use it for our gaming community chat area.
I don’t know what your requirements are, but I think it would be cool to voice chat with some regulars. The text chat option is nice to have too (for those without mics), but it might detract from the blog.
Can’t have that happening! :)
John Cole
This blog is a medium for people to interact. I don’t know how added voice interaction detracts from that mission. I think it enhances it and adds a layer.
Billy K
LOL. She waited and waited for Obama to self-implode, but it was she who did so.
Billy K. +….8?*
* Gigging tonight.
lucslawyer
myiq2xu – I don’t know if you are old enough to have experienced the assassinations of JFK or RFK…my guess would be that you are not or you would remember the sense of utter emptiness and loss of those days…hrc’s reference to the latter was totally beyond the pale and she is well deserving of all the scorn being heaped upon her…
cbear
Jeebus myiq, have you been using the Flowbee again?
Conservatively Liberal
I am not saying the voice would interfere, I am talking about combined voice & text chat like Xfire uses. Whatever you come up with is fine with me.
You run the place, and we will be the peanuts in the gallery, k? ;)
Jon H
“Obama wasn’t even mentioned, and Hillary is the come-from-behind candidate in this campaign.”
Dream on, she’s been treading water at best and has no hope of catching up because there are no delegate-rich states left.
She’s Humphrey, not RFK. She’s the pro-war establishment candidate whose intention is to get the nomination without actually, you know, winning the delegates in the contests: she wants to win them in smoke-filled rooms, by leaning hard on the various committees to give her what she wants.
rachel
To heck with Hillary Clinton, her campaign, and all this pro- and anti- Clinton hysteria. I’m fed up with it.
Hey, y’all: how about Conyers subpoena-ing Karl Rove? What (if anything) is going to come of it?
Conservatively Liberal
And voice chat is fine with me, btw…lol!
Anyone here watch ‘Harvey Birdman, Attorney at Law’? I love Colbert’s voice work in it. The show itself is a riot, but Colbert as Phil ‘Ken’ Sebben really made the show worth watching. Colbert doing the voice of Reducto is a riot too.
Seeing all of the cartoon characters from the 60′ & 70’s in the situations they created is a real laugh. You just can’t imagine the characters getting away with the same stuff on the tube back then. That just makes it doubly funny.
Warren Terra
The only sense in which Sen. Clinton has been laboring under a handicap (and overperforming under the circumstances) is that anyone took her seriously despite her tying a millstone around her electoral neck six years ago when she enthusiastically promoted the Iraq war. She has only added to that handicap by refusing to explain or apologize. But I understand that you don’t like to talk about that issue, MyIq~U.
Otherwise, here in the real world, some people remember that Clinton started the contest with massive fundraising, 100+ superdelegates, half the DNC backing her (including half the delegate credentials committee, and with most of the other half uncomitted), the media already anointing her, etcetera. The only “come from behind” here is that she’s basically managed to hold pace with Obama since February, after racking up a performance within February that would have disqualified anyone else. At that point, holding pace was never going to suffice, and she showed that she couldn’t make up the ground, no matter how low she sunk.
Jon H
“I have no words for this. Only as much bile and spleen as I have for the worst of people.”
What bile and spleen? From the Kennedy’s perspective, Clinton just made a flat statement of history. No big deal. Nothing Clinton said could be offensive to the Kennedys. So why should RFK Jr be offended?
The problem with what Clinton said is that bringing up assassination in the context of the current campaign raises the possibility that one of the current candidates could be killed, and threats were made against Obama last year. Clearly, between Obama and Clinton, the black supposed Muslim is far more likely to be assassinated than the woman who has made nice with the right wing.
Chuck Butcher
I mentioned this downstream somewhere, where it will probably get lost so pardon the repeat if you ran across it. Mid-day Fri my good friend and super delegate Jenny Greenleaf DPO’s DNC Committeewoman announced for Obama. A couple months ago she complained to me that she was getting tired of being pestered by everbody including the international press (yes they were) so I told her she knew who I supported and why and that since I helped elect her I would just trust her judgement to be made on her best thinking rather than pester. She whispered in my ear and I’ve kept my trap shut until now that the news is out.
I’ve tried on multiple occasions to get across the idea that almost all of the supers are elected and that these are some quality individuals with the backing of citizen participation. Jenny and I like each other and we can agree to disagree on occasion and we have fun, but to the point, she’s darn smart and she really gives a damn.
Mike P.
Ouch. Hillary’s Maccaca moment has arrived, late but not lately unexpected. Ask not for whom the bell tolls…
John Cole
I would just like to point out that I have been trying to sleep for three hours now, and I am still failing. And this is on top of only 4 hours sleep last night because of my god damned cat.
I mean, I like lying on the couch at 4 am cranking Wolfmother-Colossal, and I did enjoy having a few tequilas from 9-midnight after wine and dinner, but it may be time to get on some Ambien or whatever the fuck it is people use to sleep.
And motherfuckers who do not recognize the tracks on “Hey Ladies” better recognize. I guess I better grab another Montecristo and the cutter.
Fuck it all.
Stemler
She’s done like I’m Jesus. While, I really wish she was done so this fucking election would end… It was just another in a long string of “gotcha fucker!” scandals that have plagued this entire election from all sides. Hillary brought up Bobby Kennedy’s assassination without expressly saying that she wasn’t referring to her secret desire to have Obama killed, so she must mean she wants to have Obama killed zOMG!11! To any sane emotionally divested person it’s pretty obvious nothing to scandalous happened.
Every single time someone says “typical white person” some asshole comes out and declares it the end. They’re wrong, and we have to put up with this shit all the way till the convention.
In other news something I actually give a shit about happened in the election today, and I have to go find out what it is.
Gawd… Sometimes i think the difference between the blags and the MSM is that the MSM has funnier commercials.
John Cole
What goes around, comes around. What goes around, comes around.
What comes around, goes around.
John Cole
Ben Franklin with the kite gettin’ over with the key
John Cole
The egg a symbol of life
John Cole
Humpty Dumpty was a big fat egg
He was playing the wall and then he broke his leg
Tossed it out the window three minutes hot
Hit the Rastaman he said *bloodclot*
Which came first the chicken or the egg
Michael D.
John + 10
rachel
Read a math textbook; maybe that will help you get some sleep.
Rick Taylor
I don’t know if this would work for anyone else, but sometimes when I can’t sleep, I lie back, relax, and count my breaths. If I start loosing track of the count and have to keep starting over, I usually fall asleep after a while. If I make it to 300, I get up as I’m not sleepy enough.
John Cole
I saw the colossal landscape
Of which i never was a part
It was a magical day
Of which i’d never seen before
The first time i saw colossal girl
The first time i saw colossal girl
Lupin
In 2200 or so historians will write that when RFK died, the country died too. After that we got Nixon who begat Reagan who begat Cheney.
I was 14 then. Things were never quite the same afterward.
cbear
WTF? You and Tunch smoking the catnip again?
TenguPhule
Can we declare “Piss on IQfailure” Day?
Hillary came into the race with every advantage in the book and blew it all because she fucking sucks at running for president.
You’re down, you’re out and we don’t feel like putting you out of your misery because we wouldn’t be able to hurt you any more.
TenguPhule
A well deserved irony of the fucking day.
HeartlandLiberal
I can tell you exactly where I was and what I was doing for the following: hearing that JFK had been killed (high school Latin class); hearing that Martin Luther King had been killed (at work at Birmingham, Alabama Public library); and hearing that RFK had been killed (walking out door of apartment to go to class early the next day, had not heard it the night before). Those events are embedded in my memory, indelibly.
Hillary Clinton has no political future at the national level now. None. She has effectively self-destructed. She is a pariah, a wraith.
Thank $DEITY for small favors, is all I can say.
The nation has been saved from someone who clearly, clearly, should never, ever be let near the White House again. In any shape, form, or fashion.
DougJ
Have you guys been following the Malkin/LGF possible Dunkin Donuts boycott? This shit is too funny:
rachel
Bwaaaahh! This is a joke, right DougJ? I mean, I know those guys are nuts, but are they really that crazy?
Rarely Posts
Elitist? Yup. Not only did Obama supporters and his campaign dishonestly twist Hillary’s words to mean something that they didn’t, they also arrogantly corrected her on the national stage for something that had nothing to do with Obama. This uniter stuff is really working out well, isn’t it? I’m a heartbeat away from sitting out the election.
Doug H. (Fausto no more)
You’re a heartbeat away from letting John McCain have the big shiny red button because some people said bad things on the internet? How elitist of you.
Chuck Butcher
Where are the checks? The black and white checks? Damn I’d buy a gross of DDs if it wasn’t a two hour drive to get to one – if it isn’t farther.
nightjar
Ain’t we all, in an ashes to ashes sort of way. Just that most of us don’t go around pining for lost causes and holding our breath until others notice our desperation.
Marc
I really wish Malkin et al. would find some pretext to boycott Wonder Bread. The symbolism would just be so…perfect.
D-Chance.
Someone save this page for posterity. When Cole wakes up sober and rereads his previous night’s postings, there may be a 3am-4am purging of the thread…
:)
John S.
Waaaaaaaaaah.
Had you and your fellow Hillbots not done this with Obama’s ‘bitter’ comments, you might have a leg to stand on. But you don’t. Hillary and her fans want it both ways, and you’re not going to get it.
Turnabout is fair play, motherfucker.
libarbarian
I prefer the full title of “John +5, Holy Avenger”
libarbarian
The RFK comment offends me because it makes no sense. If anything happens to Obama she will be the nominee even if she had already dopped out. Its not a threat, its just a sign that shes not thinking straight.
b. hussein canuckistani
I see why John wants to move to voice chat. There’s no amusing paper trail for people to read the next morning. Careful with that hangover, John.
jake
That’s FLYING Spaghetti Monster, you drunk pagan.
Bey
As Yoda and Anthony Lane would say: Oh, break me a fucking give.
I think it’s telling that you accuse the Obama supporters and campaign of “arrogantly” correcting her “on the national stage”. It sounds rather like you believe they don’t have the right to criticize her at all.
As if you believe they are being…..well…..
Uppity would be one word for it, wouldn’t it?
Hillary couldn’t get the Kennedy endorsements that matter – Teddy and Caroline. So she grasped at straws. RFK woulda-coulda-shoulda been the Democratic candidate in ’68 if he hadn’t been martyred. Hillary woulda-coulda-shoulda been the Dem candidate in ’08 if it hadn’t been for Obama.
This is about her refusal to accept the evidence of her own lyin’ eyes. And, like GWB, she is incapable of admitting the slightest mistake.
She’s skirted this before, but it was only in print. Print doesn’t have the power of video. Her increasingly desperate and unhinged claims (Zimbabwe? Civil Rights?) already had the saner members of the public scratching their heads wondering how far out on the limb she was willing to go.
Yesterday she overstepped. What could be ignored in March, couldn’t be ignored after the events of the last couple of weeks. She killed her own campaign yesterday and she knows it. You could see the resignation during the “apology”.
What makes me angriest about her is the damage she’s done to future female candidates. She whipped the maenads into a froth, pandered to everyone in sight, and went far into crazy denial land. And the next woman who dares to run for President is going to be left with her legacy.
Fulcanelli
Ahhh, Montecristo, eh John? Splendid choice. #2 torpedo?
The genuine cubans are always my first choice when we go to the carribean on our occasional cruises. But them I am an ‘elitist’ liberal from blue new england… I’m also partial to La Gloria Cubana.
I don’t think hillary’s going anywhere. She’s in this clusterfuck primary until they pry it from her cold, dead fingers. She can’t bail, too many heavily invested big buck donors for starters. Too many irrational, hormonally invested female voters and blue-collar white crackers in her corner. That’s a pretty big voting block.
For over thirty years I worked in the blue collar world and these folks ain’t analytical political junkies that will hunt down a political lie or contradiction on the intertubes like bloggers. They’ll argue to the death knowing .07% of the available information on a given candidate rather than admit they’re wrong. ‘Bitter’ maybe?
Over the last eight years I led more Bush supporters than I could count right by the nose, firing them up over their pet issue, agreeing with ’em, telling them how wrong it is, then I’d pull out the long knife and ask them “so why would you support Bush when he he’s fucking you over like that?” {Insert dumb stare here} And then they’d go back and tune in rush limbaugh on the radio… Who’s telling them to vote for Hillary.
Nope, “Tonite, We Dine In Hell Hillary” isn’t going anywhere. She’s gonna just hang around and fuck it up royally, to the point where she wins or the the dems lose to McSame. She’s gonna stay in the game and rip those pungent protein farts that just hang in the air in the democratic elevator right up until the election and beyond if she’s not the winner. After being the right-wing whipping-girl and enduring the humiliation of bill’s pecadillos for all these years she’s numb, battle-tested and assured of martyrdom either way, win or lose. So why quit?
We Obamabots may carry the torch but seem to hold all the weaknesses. Profound disgust with politics as usual (Hillary); revulsion over hypocricy and bald faced lying from politicians (Hillary); idealism in believing a candidate in the Bush/Rove/Cheney era can still actually inspire us to act like a united country and get shit done to fix our problems and blind (Hillary? Not.), mind-numbing fury at a war and it’s costs we knew, like Bush the elder knew (but Hillary didn’t care), was a cosmic scale mistake before it started.
We expected this shit from the the right wing, but she’s the trojan horse, the achilles heel in our own party. And it’s gotten infected. Will the DNC amputate?
Hillary is going to settle for nothing less than being king or at least kingmaker with the support she has and even then I wouldn’t trust her or them at all. Too volatile. Witness the first American suicide bomber.
Meanwhile, in a radio studio in an ‘elitist’, wealthly enclave in South Florida, a fat, drug-addled pervert lights a fresh cigar and turns up the microphone…
Ted
Shouldn’t be that hard to find one. Corporations usually do a good deal of charity donations and other work. Someone just needs to dig through all of that and find something.
Ted
Dude, if he hasn’t purged the database of all of his blog posts during the years he was a complete wingnut such as yourself, I don’t think he cares about drunk-blogging posts. After all, the former is far more embarrassing.
Raenelle
The remark also kills any chance she had of being Obama’s running mate. No sane person would expect Obama to nominate a person who’s raising the idea of assassination. The idea that he has to nominate her, that she somehow deserves it–gone.
Schadenfreude IS richly satisfying. Not in an uplifting way, of course, but for right now, a nifty guilty pleasure.
John Cole
I wasn’t drunk. I couldn’t sleep.
Ted
Never mind. D-Chance isn’t a wingnut. I was thinking of someone else with a similar handle.
I guess I should have my coffee now.
Conservatively Liberal
Sadly, it is no joke. I told my wife,who just happened to be going through her Rachel Ray cookbook, that she was supporting a supporter of terrorism. When I told her the reason, she laughed her ass off and said ‘You’re kidding!’, I said that I was not, and she said that it must be a secret requirement to get a lobotomy to become a republican.
I couldn’t argue with that. Makes sense to me.
Bob In Pacifica
semi-iq, didn’t Hillary miss apologizing to someone? How about Obama, and his family? After all, he is the guy whose mortality is keeping Hillary in the race.
Maybe a nice card to the little girls: “I hope it didn’t upset you but I’m still running because your dad might die.”
If Robert Kennedy, Jr. doesn’t mind see any harm in using the anniversary of his dad’s murder as an excuse for Hillary to keep slandering the guy whose life prevents her from the nomination, well I guess Junior is not the measure of his father.
Chris Johnson
I’m with Jess. This is a strange kind of blessing, if we can handle it- all the rot is exposed now. Our sexism, our racism, our legacy of political assassination- it DOESN’T HAVE TO BE THIS WAY.
We have to make some decisions about what we as Americans consider to be acceptable. By that I mean what we’ll vote for, but also, what we will ACCEPT in our political calculus.
Like I keep saying, spending $300,000 a DAY to stay busy in hopes someone will MURDER your rival? Uh no. It looks like on the whole, America (and notably its pundits, the ones who set the tone) will NOT accept that considering our bloody history. We can’t change history, but you can’t baldly lay plans counting that as part of your leverage to win. You can’t USE the odds of bloody murder as a talking point.
I wasn’t sure the media had a line that could be crossed, especially after years of Bush.
It’s fucked up how they’ll swallow the bloody murder of thousands, millions of brown foreign people for an excuse as cheap as ‘we needed to look tough so terrorists won’t hurt us’, but this they won’t swallow. But hey, he’s one of OUR brown people! o_O
At least we’re beginning to see traces of civilized behavior…
Soylent Green
Any of you who have ever climbed a big mountain know what a “false summit” is. After a long tiring haul upward you see above what you are sure is the top. Your adrenaline surge pushes you upward but as you crest it you see yet another, higher summit ahead.
Hillary’s gaffe is what we collectively hope will yank her off the damn stage so we can get on with the real contest. It doesn’t matter how thoughtless her words or how feeble her apology or even what she said in particular, only that it was a stupid blunder — we will take anything we can get to call the last straw.
There is no last straw. This is not over until Hillary says it is. But she will run completely out of ammunition within a few weeks. Most of the remaining SDs will declare for Obama soon after the voting is done, while an impressive number of SDs who are pledged to her will switch if she doesn’t concede then. They know as well as we do that taking this bullshit to Denver will cost us the election, that it’s her 2012 strategy in play now that must be thwarted.
If they have to the superdelegates will put him over the higher number the hillbots claim is needed, putting to rest all that disenfranchisement noise. Then we can seat FL and MI as voted; she can take all of Michigan’s delegates and never mind her gross insult to the half or more of Michigan voters who would have voted for Obama.
Two more weeks should do it. If then she tries to go nuclear, I don’t know what the answer is. When did Godzilla ever go back to the water without destroying Tokyo first?
Rick Taylor
It doesn’t make sense to blame Obama’s campaign (which said very little) for comments that Hillary made herself. Unlike us, Obama’s campaign barely said a word; they didn’t need to. And the reaction in the press was wide spread and would have been the same if wacky people like us didn’t say a word. I actually do agree that Hillary Clinton most probably made a mistake. I don’t think she was intending to suggest that Obama might be assassinated; my own guess is she was intending to subtly draw a comparison of herself to RFK, though it’s difficult to figure out what her intentions were. At the minimum, what she said was a genuine gaffe; it was kind of bizarre, tone deaf, open to mis-interpretation, and I don’t think her apology addressed what offended people. Given that, one doesn’t need to posit a conspiracy by Obama to understand why it’s getting the coverage it is. Obama has made gaffes of his own and gotten roasted himself; I’ve said before all politicians make gaffes, what’s important is how they recover from them.
Rex
Rants like these are the only reason that I have ever wished I lived in West Virginia. I think we would get along famously.
God bless you, Mr. Cole.
Rex
It’s a guarantee that Hillary has already worked through a dry run of the “National Healing” speech she would deliver in the event of Obama’s assassination.
Tsulagi
Okay, let’s do the math.
Cranky as hell, and getting progressively so lately. Can’t sleep. Restless. Adding +’s with probably only a disapproving cat as company looking on. Posting Humpty Dumpty rhymes to a blog while a Friday night turns into early Saturday morning hours. Whoa.
Hmmm, all symptoms pointing to a probable underlying serious deficiency….Dude, you need to get laid!
John Cole
Beastie Boys- Egg Man
ThymeZone
I really hate the fact that my doctor says I can’t get drunk on my ass any more.
And I’ve told my boss that not letting us drink on the job, at that fucking Kamp Krusty where I work, is cruel and unusual punishment.
That’s all, now back to your regularly scheduled Goodbye Hillary celebration.
Rarely Posts
Rick Taylor, lol. No conspiracy, just an arrogant dressing down where none was deserved. Obama’s campaign seems a little jumpy and overly sensitive to remarks that had nothing to do with him. It’s either that or this is their definition of going negative. Either way, the MUP’s underwear is showing.
w vincentz
How is it remotely possible that Barack is somehow responsible for the words that came out of Hillary’s mouth?
Wowsers! You Hillholes are insane!
nightjar
You’re an idiot Rarely Posts. Don’t you recognize the haughty outrage wrapped in a victorious mantle of WIN.
ThymeZone
True.
But there’s also this: On the Internet, nobody knows you have nothing to say. For a while, and then they catch on.
Grendel72
“Yeah, we’ve had late primaries before, and aside from the riots and the losing to Nixon nothing bad happened.”
scarshapedstar
Especially that son-of-a-bitch RFK Jr., who defended her and pretty much said “stop with the smarmy fainting-couch antics, for fuck’s sake.”
crw
On a happier topic…
What’s the over/under on McCain blowing his stack during one of the debates?
Carol
As delighted as I am that Clinton has so effectively poisoned herself with her own venom, I just haven’t been moved to rant in the blogosphere about it.
It probably sounds bizarre (I fully expect ridicule over this =P), but I just don’t want to be part of putting something out there that some maniac may take personally as a message from God to act upon (just as Hinckley viewed newspaper commentaries as a signal before his attempt on Reagan’s life). Categorize me as a nutcase if you will, but it’s the way I feel. So even though I’d so dearly love to leap on this mess, I just can’t.
I DID find something concrete I could do, though, that was satisfying even if nothing comes of it. I wrote to the NY Times asking that they formally withdraw their endorsement of Clinton. Yeah, it’s a small thing, but it felt right.
If you’re of a similar mindset, their email is: [email protected].
Rick Taylor
On a tactical level, that makes perfect sense. Ranting just gives her supporters a target to concentrate on to deflect from the content of her remarks; it’s all those Obamaites that are making a big deal out of nothing, as pretty well illustrated here.
ksmiami
Wow! Rarely Posts may be the biggest idiot on the balloon juice circuit. RP, get a clue, Hillary did this to herself, not Obama. By bringing up RFK and assasination, she crossed the Maginot line of political discussion. Even the Corner acknowledges that she is batfuck insane, or horribly self centered. There is no place for her in the Democratic party or in the national dialogue. She needs to go now! It is really sad, I used to defend the Clunton’s against the Right’s daily onslaught, but now…
Rick Taylor
I don’t get it. Here the reaction was free-ranging; they call this blog “Balloon Juice” after all. But the Obama campaigns response was measured as far as I can see. Just a short statement the remarks were inappropriate, which they certainly were, even if they were (as I believe) a mistake. No attempt to divine her meaning or to accuse her of hoping for an assassination. I didn’t see it, but I heard Axelrod said it was probably a mistake. All in all, I think their response has been measured, especially given that Clinton jumped on the Wright-wouldn’t-be-my-pastor bitter-gate and Ayer controversies when given the opportunity. So i honestly don’t know what you’re referring to.
tim
hahaha. Hillary isn’t going anywhere. I don’t support her candidacy, but I sure do enjoy watching Obama-freaks like John being tortured over and over again by her utter, balls to the walls indestructibility.
Again, if she was out of the race, if this thing was over, if she didn’t matter, if she was irrelevant, John and fellow hysterics wouldn’t have to keep announcing it over and over.
She said what she said, it was sloppy and ill- advised, but…so the fuck what? She’ll be back with and for more on Tuesday.
I really loooove watching Hills give the big flying finger to the media establishment and supposedly reformed republican fascists like John, and dem know it alls. It pleases me greatly.
Oh, and John…two letters: AA
tim
Hmmm….wine and drinks with dinner, then can’t sleep, so does shots of tequila and lays on the couch wide awake fantasizing about how the problem is obviously prescription drugs.
What voices in your head are you trying to silence, John?
What do they say?
Can you read this: I all-capped and spaced it so you ca read it thru your hangover haze (or are you taking care of that with bloody mary’s?):
A-L-C-O-H-O-L-I-C
Like your former hero, GWB, you should understand that concept very well.
John Cole
Yeah. Indestructibility.
I guess that is what you call naked and relentless and tone-deaf ambition. And I love how the Hillary supporters call this “freaking” out- I am rejoicing, and if the shoe were on the other foot she would be printing “I am not an assassin” bumperstickers and handing them out at rallies in SD like the did in NC after bittergate.
The funniest thing about calling me a fascist is that you seem to think that Hillary, McCain, or Obama are anything but center left and center right. Such a total lack of awareness about your own candidate is pretty amusing.
And if AA has a cure for insomnia, I am game.
John Cole
Yep. Hillary is done. The panic is setting in for even her supporters.
And why would I be hungover? I had five drinks over the course of 6 hours. WOO! TIME TO RAISE SOME HELL!
Rick Taylor
Rarely Posts:
To follow up, here’s a video of Axelrod’s take in Hillary’s comments (you need to sit through an ad). He seems reasonable to me; he even contradicts Chris Matthew’s remarks that Clinton intended to imply what people are saying. I don’t know what you’re responding too.
John Cole
All I think she did is say something pretty damned gauche while revealing that she knows she can’t win and is just sort of hanging around to see what happens. Bet the donors loved that, especially on top of the RFK shit sandwich.
I think people are confusing my glee with her demise with what I think she said.
Rick Taylor
Rarely Posts:
And this person argues more eloquently than I did the Obama campaign is wisely playing hands off.
The whole post is well worth reading; it’s the most definitive run down of why what Clinton said was objectionable, and even brings in the Huckabee gaffe. I’m bookmarking it as it does a better job than I can..
I think they’re desperate and looking for any way they can to make the story “Obama-supporters are hysterical” rather than “Clinton blew a new hole in the boat that is her campaign.” Considering their attitude of “your boy messed up, deal with it” when we complained of the Clinton campaign jumping on the bitter-train, I don’t have much sympathy.
crw
How can you afford to burn all that straw with the high price of commodities these days? You must be some kind of elitist limousine liberal.
Phoebe
John Cole:
Melatonin, not Ambien.
Also, lack of sleep can kind of make you drunk. And prone to possession by songs in your head. I know this well.
Melatonin with wine, an hour before you want to actually conk out. Bam.
ThymeZone
Oh, I don’t know, I think we know sore losers when we see them.
These are the people who made moon faces just a few weeks ago and said things like how great it would be to have a woman in the White House.
Now they are baring their fangs and shrieking “SexistMisogyny No Fair You Stole My Happy” and all manner of whiny stupid shit because they lost.
I guess they thought that having a fluffy pink cloud of womaniness in the White House was what Jesus had in store for them this year.
Well, as luck would have it, Jesus is a fairy tale and your fluffy woman candidate fucked up big time and lost.
Oh well, I guess the pantsuit industry will just have to wait another four years to get the recognition it so broadly deserves.
Rarely Posts
Rick Taylor, there was no reason for the Obama camp to react AT ALL. Certainly there was no reason for them to rebuke her on the public stage. Not only was she not talking about Obama, she also has made this same analogy to long campaigns in the past, most recently in March, with no comment from anyone. So the Obama camp has suddenly gone negative, well not so suddenly, or they are peeing their pants in fear.
ThymeZone
After enough real lack of sleep, it will make you psychotic.
Not can, will. Prolonged lack of sleep … a few days’ worth, for some people … causes the brain’s chemistry to get completely bolloxed up and at that point you will not be able to tell trees from people. You are a real and profound danger, to yourself, and others.
Chronic profound lack of sleep can lead to serious exhaustion and even death from exhaustion. It’s not uncommon in disorders that produce long periods of sleeplessness, such as bipolar mania. If you don’t step off a twelve story building thinking that you are going to fly, you can drop dead of exhaustion.
Rick Taylor
It seems pretty minimal to me, as the source I quoted explained at length. But then i defended Hillary back when she said Wright wouldn’t have been her pastor. I felt she had a right to distance herself from Obama’s baggage, although Obama’s pastor certainly had nothing to do with her.
But anyway, what exactly do you think the Obama campaign is peeing in its pants in fear about?
PaulB
ROFL…. Just as there was no reason for Clinton to react to “Bittergate”. Yet, somehow, she did. Funny, that.
Dear heart, Obama’s spokesman said that the remark was “unfortunate” and that it “has no place in this campaign.” I rather suspect that Hillary herself would agree with both of those sentiments. What, pray tell, do you find offensive about the response?
ROFLMAO…. Uh-huh… you just keep telling yourself that. Man, the delusions of some people….
Rarely Posts
You tell me, Rick Taylor. Why would a historical reference be unfortunate and have no place in the campaign?
John Cole
Rarely Posts-
Since you clearly did not read the metafilter link Rick gave you, here is an excerpt:
And regarding historical references, this:
Really, it would have been easier if you just followed the link and read it, but there it is so you can pretend no one has answered you repeatedly.
nightjar
That doesn’t matter anymore for the Hilbots. Because they’ve requisitioned the Karl Rove Dirty Book O’ Debate. Whereas, you find one instance of excess and magnify, repeat ad infinitum , and declare it the universal truth.
Rarely Posts
John Cole, no one has answered me. Saying something has no place in a campaign isn’t the same thing at all as saying, hey, ya stupid beotch, WE LOST to Nixon that year.
Implying you’re fighting against the Dem establishment has no place in a campaign?
Chuck Butcher
Sorry bub but fear looks a bit different, sort of like comparing Fl/MI to every civil rights victory or calling on the ghost of RFK for no discernable reason or making imaginary vote margin claims even the media is now laughing at. Confidence would look kinda like attacking the Republican (no the other one) and pretty much ignoring the loser.
nightjar
Why not make it a fight against the Universal struggles of good and evil. That’s a much bigger stage for Hill with a much bigger reward for victory. Which every day seems more and more like Great Martyr of something or other.
Genine
Obama is NOT the Democratic establishment. Hillary is and she had the advantage going into this campaign.
Since when is Obama part of the establishment? That’s another talking point that is maddening.
Chuck Butcher
Let me see if I’ve got this right, Hillary is fighting against the Dem establishment? Excuse me for a minute while I fall around laughing…
She was the Dem establishment so that would make her a counter-counterrevolutionary? Or did I miss a couple ‘counters’? hmmm. Or does this have something to do with the Democratic Party not desiring to be pointlessly torn to pieces at this late date? Or do you mean FL/MI sanctions which were more her team’s doing than any other single unit?
Flailing around like this for meaningfulness is exactly what led to her “unfortunate” comment and you are proving the outcomes.
Rick Taylor
The reference didn’t make much sense given the context. They were talking about why Hillary should stay in the race. If her point was that the primary season went on much later in previous elections and no one complained, she could have said that; look, the primaries in 1968 went into August, in 1992 Bill Clinton didn’t have the nomination sewn up until mid-June, etc. But instead of saying that, she brought up that RFK was assassinated. Now what does that have to do with anything? It’s a non-sequitur. I doubt this is what she intended, but when you say something out of the blue like that, people are automatically going to wonder what does RFK’s assassination have to do with why she should stay in the race, and some are going to the conclusion, oh my God, she’s suggesting Obama might be assassinated. People are understandably sensitive about this, considering what happened to Martin Luther King Jr. and JFK, and considering that Obama has been the subject of death threats and has received additional Secret Service protection because of this. So while I don’t believe her remarks were malicious, I do think they were tone deaf and insensitive; doubly so because she made them after we found out about Teddy Kennedy’s cancer. They were certainly “unfortunate.” I think Hillary Clinton would agree with that, seeing as she apologized for them.
Again, unlike some on this blog, I think it was a genuine gaffe, and not as bad as many of the things I’ve heard her say in the last month. I think she was bringing up RFK to associate herself with the Kennedy legacy, something she continued in her apology, pointing out she was a senator in what had previously been his seat in NY. I’d agree that plenty of people, including some on this blog, may have over-reacted. But we’re talking about the Obama campaign, not balloon juice. And it was definitely at best a thoughtless remark, and you don’t have to be a crazed Obama supporter to feel that way; the NY times who endorsed her earlier wrote an editorial basically saying, what the hell was she trying to say?
I’ll just add as context, and I know you are not personally guilty of this, that we’ve had Clinton supporters coming to this blog and calling Obama and his supporters pussies. When we’ve complained of his treatment at the Pennsylvania debate, they’ve joked we’re whiners, that Obama can’t take a punch. Hillary herself said if you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen, and showed no hesitation in throwing Ayers, Wright, and bitter-gate at Obama (Ayers was especially telling for me, as she was the one who brought it up out of the blue). So now when the Obama campaign makes a mild press release calling the remarks “unfortunate” with “no place in the campaign,” and otherwise leaves well enough alone, Obama himself not saying a word, and the reaction is ohhhhhhhh they’re going negative! They must be peeing in their pants! Honestly it makes me laugh.
So that’s my effort to answer your question; will you answer mine? What do you think the Obama campaign is peeing it’s pants about. This isn’t meant facetiously, I can’t read your mind, and I can’t guess what you might be referring to.
Rick Taylor
Sorry, Rarely Posts, I forgot to put that quote at the top of my post.
SnarkyShark
Not when you’re the establishment candidate who’s doing the implying.
You’re not really this stupid are you?
Rarely Posts
Rick Taylor, so if I remarked that though we don’t usually go on vacation in September we did in 2001 because remember 9/11 happened while we were in Paris…this would be an unacceptable historical reference? No way.
The other’s points about the accuracy of who is fighting the Dem establishment are valid, but that is not what was said. It was said that her remarks had no place in a campaign. That’s just bullshit.
btw, from today’s NY Times:
I can’t answer your question because I don’t know the reason. That is just what I think when I read the comments on this topic and here the Obama campaign say this has no place in the campaign.
Rarely Posts
Oh, buy the way, the DNC is the Dem establishment and I would say that is who she was talking about.
Dreggas
All these Hillbots…bless their hearts…
Dreggas
see that doesn’t help because she is making the argument that “hey he could be shot like bobby so I’ll stay in just in case”.
nightjar
And their brain farts.
nightjar
All this fuss and Rarely p. posts the answer himself. And no less from the mans own son. Case closed.
Sasha
Unsurprisingly, The Onion has again left us all in the dust.
Conservatively Liberal
I think I have figured out why Hillary and her supporters will not accept the statistical fact that their candidate can not win. Because the statistics they were shown used bar charts, and every ‘Hillary Feminist’ knows that the bars in bar charts are phallic symbols.
Maybe they would have been more willing to accept the statistics if we would have used pie charts instead?
Krista
I really don’t know if I’d go so far as to call that a defense. I know those aren’t your words but the journalist’s, but there doesn’t seem to be anything in RFK Jr’s statement that indicates that he thinks her statement was peachy-keen. It sounds pretty neutral, and can be interpreted a few different ways.
Kewalo
ROFLMAO!! One of the joys of reading your blog is when you post after a few drinks. It’s just flat-out wonderful!
I love to drink myself so fully appreciate your humor.
BTW I am so envious about your wonderful dinner, dang, it sounded delicious.
Delia
Somebody please help me. I just read a No Quarter thread on the RFK Jr. statement all the way through and I need to get the crazy rinsed out of my brain.
nightjar
I suppose boredom got the best of me today and I went over there and jumped in a thread about GOP not asleep or somesuch. I was a little surprised on how easy they folded when presented with some basic reality. There crazy ratfuckers but not as mean as most wingnut sites.
Jon H
scarshapedstar wrote: “Especially that son-of-a-bitch RFK Jr., who defended her and pretty much said “stop with the smarmy fainting-couch antics, for fuck’s sake.””
That’d be relevant, if there was any evidence he was thinking of anything but the idea that the Kennedys had been offended. Offense to the Kennedys is a minor part of the reason people are reacting as they are.
It doesn’t look at all as if he’s addressing the way Clinton’s the first candidate to make passing references to political assassination as part of her standard campaign rhetoric, in a year when the opponent is black, is falsely rumored to be Muslim (or even a terrorist), is often compared to RFK and JFK, and who has generated a great deal of concern that he might end up like those two or MLK Jr.
Chris Johnson
The Onion
Oh my GOD funny. Read the Cons in the picture giving pros and cons…
slippy hussein toad
Actually this is a Rush Limbaugh tactic he uses all the time. He makes some ASSHOLE statement implying something absolutely unacceptable, then waits for the appropriate people to get good and pissed off, then scolds them on the radio for not understanding that he wasn’t really saying that soldiers are cowards, or that he wasn’t actually making fun of Micahel J. Fox, or that, gosh, those interrogators were just like good ol’ fraternity boys blowing off steam.
This is how bullies survive in a world that finds them totally unacceptable: do their thing, then make up a fake apology that doesn’t even address what they were talking about.
And John is right. This is just too much, and Hillary won’t be recovering from it. It doesn’t matter what she or her dwindling number of supporters think or do anymore . . . the public shunning will soon become unmistakable. She’s not just fucked away her chances at VP (her chance of winning this election were gone months ago); she’s blown her chance of keeping her Senate seat.
bago
But what’s really insane about staying up for three days reading several different books in interleaving all of the narratives? It’s way more entertaining!
bago
And that onion post = pure win.