Chuck Toad really wants that ‘Conventional Wisdom Stenographer of the Year” Village Media Idiots award, doesn’t he? (As Malia Obama phrased it: “Sad.”) Via the Atlantic:
Outgoing Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick has ruled out running for president in 2016, putting to rest speculation that an end to his gubernatorial career meant that he had his eye on the White House.
“I’ve thought about it, but no, I can’t get ready for 2016,” Patrick said on NBC’s Meet The Press. “This is the first elected office I’ve held, and it has been two really challenging, fun term. But I didn’t run for the job to get another job, just to do this job.”…
Patrick, who led the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division from 1993 to 1996, suggested that Eric Holder’s ability to bring a federal civil rights case [in Ferguson] will be hampered by the higher burden needed for federal charges. “It will be very difficult,” he said. “It’s very important I think, that DOJ is investigating it and I know that Attorney General Holder has been urging that investigation and will drive it through to conclusion.”
Of course, Patrick only said he couldn’t “get ready for 2016“, so we’re free to speculate on future campaigns…
***********
Apart from speculation, what’s on the agenda for the evening?
beergoggles
I like the guy but I think he’s too short to get elected president but our idiot populace. Maybe he’ll get nominated for SCOTUS..
jl
In the first link, I first read
” languishing Sunday political gabfest ”
as
” laughable Sunday political gabfest “.
So I plan to work on my reading comprehension this afternoon.
CarolDuhart2
#HandsUpWalkout. Proud of those kids.
I’m not surprised at this was it ever really a possibiliity? Eventually there will be a second black President, but coming right after Obama would mean being in his shadow.
Nothing prevents him from being VP. He’d be a good one.
Redshift
I saw something on Twitter this week about Obama and one of his daughters mocking Chuck Todd’s book during their Christmas shopping, but I didn’t care enough to click through and find out if it was true or just well-deserved fictional snark.
Starfish
No one from Massachusetts is going to win a national election unless they can mask the fact that they think that southern people are generally dimwitted and wrong about everything.
Starfish
@Redshift: It was true. They went to an independent bookstore to buy a giant pile of books, and they talked about how Chuck Todd looked lonely. The video is lower down the page here.
trollhattan
What’s worse than unpaid slavish labor via an internship? How about internships for a fee? The unspoken bonus is you’re paying for the privilege of being a gofer in freaking Indiana. Mr. Colon certainly has the right last name.
Belafon
@Starfish:
Having lived in the South and attended college in Massachusetts, it sucks when you have to mask something that blatantly true.
burnspbesq
@beergoggles:
First things first. Let him spend a few years in private practice or teaching, save enough money to send his kids to private colleges, and then put him on the D.C. Circuit. Or the next Democratic president can nominate him to be Solicitor General. He’d be an upgrade over Verrilli.
beltane
@Belafon: It will be a good day for this country when someone wins the presidency running on the specific premise that southern people are generally dimwitted and wrong about everything. Until that day comes, things will just get worse and worse.
SatanicPanic
@Starfish: Why not? It’s not like Obama tore it up in the South after that “clinging to guns and religion” quote. He still won.
Gin & Tonic
@burnspbesq: save enough money to send his kids to private colleges
Imagine, some of us have even managed to save enough to send our kids to private colleges on less than $213,900/yr.
Major Major Major Major
Happy National AIDS Day! Never forget.
http://www.motherjones.com/mixed-media/2014/12/flashback-reagan-white-house-thought-aids-was-pretty-hilarious-1982
KG
@SatanicPanic: hell, Obama won Virginia, North Carolina, and Florida after the “clinging to guns and religion” comment. That’s three confederate states.
ETA: and won two of those in 2012, too.
Southern Beale
Been listening to a lot of Beltway Pundits lately and the storyline I’m getting from the Villagers is that Hillary needs to “earn” her 2016 nomination because, Murca demands it from their pols! (Really I think the media demands it so they are given something tasty to chew on for a few months, and if Hillary doesn’t give them their Twinkie she’s a Loser.) So some sacrificial lambs better step forward and pretend to be in the running because apparently it’s been decided that we must have that. Hillary needs to work for it because the media wants a story.
The Other Bob
If Patrick runs for President, I expect the a-holes in the media would be stating that it was unlikely that America would be ready for another black President considering the popularity and failure of the first one.
Here in Michigan it was common “wisdom” that Michigan would not elect another woman Governor right after the first one because Granholm was so unpopular when she left office.
It was pretty offensive.
NCSteve
@beltane: Right. Because the only people who live in the south are white conservatives. No one else who might happen to reside in the south counts.
It’s one of those rare things stupid white southern conservatives and northern liberals agree on. Which, of course, means it is necessarily false because it is generated by lizard-brain idiot tribalism.
Belafon
@Southern Beale: Let me name a few of those places who say that: Balloon Juice, Daily Kos, and Little Green Footballs. And those are just the sites I visit.
skerry
OT: Bill Cosby has just resigned from Temple Univ board.
schrodinger's cat
@Southern Beale: No matter what the Punditubbies say, it is not going to be a cakewalk for Hillary.
Belafon
@NCSteve:
As a fellow southerner, who has Perry, Cornyn, Cruz, Abbot, and Patrick as my leadership, it gets really annoying when some other Southerner flips out because someone calls the South stupid. It is, on the whole, stupid. While there are exceptions, the population is pretty idiotic. Tell me that voting to not pay for your children’s schools in order to keep blacks from being educated is not stupid.
99 0s plus 1 100 averages to a pretty small number.
Tenar Darell
@Starfish: LOL. You mean this…
gogol's wife
@Starfish:
I believe they were saying that Obama looks lonely in the picture on the cover of the book.
mai naem mobile
@burnspbesq: i believe one if not both daughters are college grads.
What black person wants to be POTUS after what they’ve put Obama through? He won’t but gawd i hope theres some score settling with the loons in his memoirs.
CONGRATULATIONS!
Another victim of HILLARY.
Well, not so much. I think he’s realized that 2016, like 2008, is going to be a shit-poor term to serve. Ideally, we should do to the Republicans what they’ve always done to us and let their guy win so he can clean up the aftermath of the shitfight and get all the blame (see Carter, James E., Bush, George H.W. and Obama, Barack H.) but it’s looking like we may have some Supreme noms coming up and I’d prefer a Republican be elsewhere than the Oval Office when that happens.
Belafon
@mai naem mobile:
I’m hoping there will be others soon, just like I’m hoping there will be lots of women candidates. This country will have to be dragged kicking and screaming into the 21st century.
trollhattan
@schrodinger’s cat:
No, it’s not. The neocon and teabag wings will at last hold hands and joyfully go after her tong-and-hammer. The cons have their giant bag of Grievances mit All Things Clinton they’re simply dying to dump on the table.The ’90s will seem like just yesterday.
Bystander
I love the apology from the “publicist” for Rep Fincher. “”I’d like to apologize to all of those who I have hurt and offended with my words, and pledge to learn and grow (and I assure you I have) from this experience.”
She should start off learning the accusative case, but I’m betting she has a new gig so fast there will be no time for grammar ‘n stuff.
jl
@Southern Beale: Crazy Uncle Joe will be there for the first few primaries. Maybe he will count for something in their shallow pre-scripted horse race analysis. But then, maybe not.
NCSteve
@Southern Beale: The CW about “earning it” is idiotic, but I do fear that she very much needs a sufficiently serious primary to stress-test her campaign organization, identify the weak spots and, above all, smoke out the ass-coverers and backstabbers. If Hillary’s “inevitability strategy” had worked in 2008, she would have gone into the general election with that gaggle of leaderless prima donnas, backbiters and general assholes and no awareness of how truly awful they were as a group. Penn, Wolfson, Ickes, Doyle, and, oh my Sweet Aunt Nelly, that second tier of hacks, hangers-on, sycophants and sleazeballs like Geraldine Ferraro, Lanny Davis, David Holbrooke, and Sean Willenz, each and everyone of whom seemed to be made far worse by mere proximity to the toxicity of the inner circle.
Tough primaries don’t seem to do much to improve Republican campaigns because they’re basically all fueled by the need to get the votes of the delusional and hateful so excessive connection to reality and decency is punished.
scav
OT minor snort giggle. ChiTrib weather blurbish: “On queue, Dec. 1 starts winter — and a polar plunge grips the Chicago area.”
I’m personally slightly fonder of the image of the dreaded Polar P. standing on a traditionally minded sailor’s hair-treatment, but the thought of this Polar P. standing in an orderly progression of likeminded PPs works rather well.
CONGRATULATIONS!
@Gin & Tonic: Save for have my wife quit her job immediately (she wants to) I honestly don’t know what I’d do with that much money.
jl
@trollhattan: With Ferguson igniting casual paunchy thoughtless middle age white guy racism among the pundit class, seems like today is the 80s again. So rehashing the 90s will seem like at least some small progress to me.
Though I remember hearing some idiot House GOPer saying they will try to smear Hillary with her husbands infidelity. Hope bright ideas like that hold sway with the Repubs.
aimai
@beergoggles: That would be cool. I think it was obvious to all of us here in MA that he wasn’t going to be able to run 1) after Obama and 2) after his wife demonstrated so obviously that she was really not into the public service lifestyle. I think there are lots of things he would be good and and should be considered for, in a just world, in the Justice Department or in an appointed role during the next democratic presidency. Or maybe he’d go for Senator in Ilinois since I think they’ve always wanted to move back there. But the presidency? No.
aimai
@Starfish: Is that why Mitt Romney lost?
Another Holocene Human
@beergoggles: Maybe he could move to another state and run for governor there. He must have a high shit tolerance because he was governor in Massachusetts, which has a very corrupt political system. He ought to run for mayor of Chicago or something like that. Karen Lewis isn’t running and Rahm sucks. Unfortunately, Deval is not going to run against Rahm, I can almost guarantee that. :(
mai naem mobile
@Belafon: you’re going to have the vast majority of ppl born before 1950 if not 1955 die off before you can get rid of a good bunch of non teachable\reachable racists and that isn’t happening for another 20-30 years. Obama is\was a special kind of individual following a phenomenally disastrous presidency of the other party.
Another Holocene Human
@CarolDuhart2: As a white voter, I like what happened when I pressed that button (middle aged Black centrist Democrat) so I’d push it again in a second. I like Cory FYWP as well but he’s not running in 2016 in a Democratic primary after that Wall Street tonguebath he gave on national TV. (The sad thing is, Andrew “knife in the night” Cuomo DOES think he’s going to run in a Democratic primary in 2016 … hahahhaha.)
beltane
@jl: I am not a Hillary fan but the one thing that consistently makes me feel sympathetic towards her is when the Republicans try to smear her with Bill’s philandering. The GOP should definitely run woth that one.
Another Holocene Human
@Starfish: Patrick is not from Massachusetts and I’ve never heard him tribally mock Southerners the way the Yankees do.
askew
That’s a damn shame. He’d be a huge improvement over Hillary who we are going to be stuck with. Deval could actually inspire our base and not just for being a token. The only reason anyone is going to be excited by Hillary is because she is a woman. Because there is nothing else exciting about her.
Cacti
Just saw the best evidence yet of how systemic the corruption of St. Louis area law enforcement is.
Jeff Roorda, the spokesman for SLPOA that demanded the NFL fine and punish Rams players for the “hands up” gesture, is…wait for it…
A former dirty cop.
He was fired by the Arnold, MO Police Department in 2001 for misconduct, including falsifying official incident reports.
Link
SatanicPanic
@askew: I don’t think it’s fair to call her a token, she’s definitely competent. I don’t know if she’s exciting, but I don’t know if that matters to me either. Probably not.
trollhattan
@jl:
If they’re loony enough to nominate Ted Cruz, then it will be fascinating to see how they make Bill into Hillary’s avatar and not invite an equal scrutiny of Ted’s lunatic father.
Dinesh whatsiz butt published an entire book on how the president’s dad, who he never knew, informs his commie ways even today. Ted’s very alive, extraordinarily bizarre daddy OTOH has no affect on Tailgunner Ted whatsoever, I suppose.
(Of course the Dems will be reticent to use this because, Democrats.)
askew
@Southern Beale:
God forbid that we make Hillary work for something like she is just another politician. We should just give her the nomination on a silver platter and then thank her for deeming to run. Lordy, the entitlement of Clinton fanatics.
NCSteve
@Belafon: So, dumber than, say, Maine, Wisconsin, Ohio, Iowa, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming?
The fundamental problems in this country, the root problems underlying all other problems, are the out-of-control growth of the wealth and power of the top .1% and idiot tribalism. Tribalistic thinking is, and always has been, fostered and carefully nurtured by economic elites for the express purpose of keeping those who might otherwise threaten them if united at each other’s throats. The psychological and neurological predilections and predispositions that cause northeastern urban liberals to sneer and engage in invidious stereotyping of those they (inaccurately) call “hillbillies” is the exact same as those that fuel racism and misogyny.
If you can’t free yourself of the prejudice and the urge to engage in invidious stereotyping against white southerners or the rural or, for that matter, people who prefer dogs to cats or cats to dogs, you’re part of the problem, not part of the solution. You’re just another tool of the Kochs and Karl Rove, doing their holy work of keeping the plebs angry and distracted and in a state of perpetual mutual animosity, as surely as if you were some Gadsen flag waving Tea Partier or gun-hoarding stone racist.
And, worse still, you’ve left a back door open for all those other grotesque little prejudices you think you’ve freed yourself from to creep back into your head where they can slot themselves comfortably back into the grooves you’ve kept so well-oiled and broken in for them.
Cacti
2016 is going to be a big old bag of crazy for the GOP nomination.
Today, Ben Carson, MD (who rejects evolution) blamed the women’s liberation movement for the events in Ferguson.
Another Holocene Human
@Belafon: Tribalism is no less annoying and no more based in rationality when it is expressed by people who, collectively, have failed at everything as when it comes from the children of a successful first world society.
I went to elementary school in Massachusetts. Trust me, the main dig on Southerners was “Haw, haw, you talk funny! You must be stupid!”
After some high school, throw in slavery, losing the Civil War, listening to country music, and being fat to the litany of truly erudite, well-reasoned, and hilarious insults.*
(Okay, the bit about them losing the Civil War is pretty hilarious.)
*-the notion that there are millions of African Americans living the South, not to mention other minorities such as Mexicans and Vietnamese, is kind of shocking to these folks–they somehow assume all Blacks fled the South during the Great Migration
askew
@SatanicPanic:
Every single person I’ve seen argue that Hillary is the best choice for president in 2016 starts with she’d be the first female president and that would excite women. Then it’s the same electable bullshit that we got with Kerry in 2004. There really isn’t anything else for her to run on. She was mediocre as a Senator and was pretty much a non-entity as SoS. She has no big accomplishment to run on and no defining issue or cause now that Obama succeeded at getting Obamacare passed when Hillary failed miserably with healthcare reform.
At least with Elizabeth Warren, no one mentions her gender first when talking about why she’d make a great president. She has a signature issue. She helped get CFPB in place. She has accomplishments to run on. She excites people not because of who she is married to or her gender, but by who she is.
max
@jl: With Ferguson igniting casual paunchy thoughtless middle age white guy racism among the pundit class, seems like today is the 80s again.
I feel like I’m living through a mashup of the last two years of the second terms of Reagan, Clinton and Bush the Younger. With all of the bad stuff and none of the good stuff.
@Belafon: It is, on the whole, stupid. While there are exceptions, the population is pretty idiotic. Tell me that voting to not pay for your children’s schools in order to keep blacks from being educated is not stupid.
The Southern elites are evil and stupid and wrong about everything, and the Yankee elites tend to be stuckup rich bastards who think Chris Christie & Mitt Romney(!) are neat.
max
[‘America: frequently sucktacular, especially the conservatives.’]
CONGRATULATIONS!
@jl: I know a lot of the old PUMA folks, as well as the racist women in my own family who would sooner hack their own arms off than mark a ballot for a black man. And they’ve been good, solid GOP voters for the last 8 years.
I cannot think of a better stratagem to drive them right back to the Democratic Party. The one thing they all have in common is that they all love them some Hillary and all it’s going to take is one blockhead (my money for this one would be on Newt) implying that Hillary drove her husband to it, because frigid bitch.
That would be the motherfucking end. At least for that election cycle.
beltane
@trollhattan: The media will claim it’s out of bounds to go after a candidate’s parents. End of story.
Another Holocene Human
@NCSteve: You said it better. Shoulda skimmed the thread before going off.
SatanicPanic
@NCSteve: I’m broadly in agreement with you, but this is a bit much:
“You’re just another tool of the Kochs and Karl Rove, doing their holy work of keeping the plebs angry and distracted and in a state of perpetual mutual animosity, as surely as if you were some Gadsen flag waving Tea Partier or gun-hoarding stone racist. ”
uh, those people are more at fault than anyone else.
Another Holocene Human
@skerry: 10 years too late from when he RAPED a Temple employee. Shameful.
jl
@CONGRATULATIONS!:
Lil’ Newtie trying to smear Hillary with Bill’s infidelity would be just too perfect for words to express. Especially if he has traded in his current Missus for a new one by 2016, though he’s getting a little old for that stuff. Is he going to run again? I want more lectures on how it is important to see the many intersections of many issues, on multiple levels. I miss that stuff.
beltane
@efgoldman: I’d settle for the state governments of any of those places to pleasantly surprise us, even once, by doing something which makes their states a better place. We can’t judge them for the good they do when they never do any good in the absence of federal troops on the ground. Yes, every single one of the other states in the rest of the country has enacted backwards ass laws during the past 30 years, but not everything has gone backwards all the time. Sucking some of the time vs. sucking all of the time is the difference here.
SatanicPanic
@askew: I’m just saying I don’t like calling her a token, like we just found her and we’re putting her up to running because she’s a woman. She’s not awesome, but she’s clearly got an agenda and her own views. Not all of which I agree with, but still.
Another Holocene Human
@CONGRATULATIONS!: I do:
Southern Poverty Law Center
ACLU of Florida
a couple of my good local charities
MOAR (in STL)
Innocence Project
and more and better Democrats in the 2016 primaries
no worries, I could make good use of that money
schrodinger's cat
“Liberal” NYT has got someone to criticize Obama from the left on his Executive Order on immigration, who goes on to refer to the President as the Deporter-in-chief.
Another Holocene Human
@aimai: Ooo ooo he could run against Mark Kirk! That would be an excellent pickup for the Democrats. Do it, do it.
That would mean moving to DC in effect, though. Have a feeling the wife would be peeved if she already hated Boston.
beltane
@schrodinger’s cat: There was someone on NPR doing this last week. I changed stations before I caught the man’s name but I wonder if he’s making the rounds.
Another Holocene Human
@askew: Obama is/was a token? Jeez, man, you say some dumb things but that one takes the cake.
How much does a Black man have to accomplish not to be a token. Lemme call Clarence Thomas and tell him he was right (and I was wrong). An idiot on the internet just proved his motherfucking point.
ETA: @SatanicPanic: lol I didn’t even see your comment and how you interpreted it
Askew, who besides Brian fucking Schweitzer is trying to run for Prez on the Dem ticket and is also a token?
CONGRATULATIONS!
@NCSteve: Goddamn. I’d quote it all but what’s the point? Spot on. Every damn word.
I keep in mind that my idiot in-law back in Ohio, who’s a racist GOP blowhard (he would laugh and agree with this description of him) is also one of the finest people I’ve ever met in person, has never once been rude to me, is a good parent with a good wife and good kids, a die-hard union guy, and my favorite traveling companion ever because he’s a full-certified EMT.
He has flaws, but shit, if we want to start that pissing contest, I bet I’ve got him beat, and not in a good way.
I try to keep that tribalism shit in mind. Nobody is as bad as the media says they are. Nobody. Not liberals, not conservatives. And they have their reasons for keeping the pot boiling, and those reasons have nothing to do with “the public good”.
schrodinger's cat
@beltane: Lawrence Downes is the name of the author.
gene108
@Cacti:
I do not think so.
I think the GOP learned their lesson from 2012.
The 2016 GOP Presidential Primary will be one of the most carefully scripted events in political history. The smart GOP operatives will make sure potential candidates do not end up in situations, where they can say the stupid stuff that came out during the 2012 primaries.
It will be photo-ops and meetings with friendly, friendly crowds, with maybe a couple of debates moderated by Fox News or some other right-wing hacks to make sure nothing but softball questions get asked.
EDIT: It is not hard to get every Republican politician to say the same damn thing, when they get on camera. I’m sure whatever power that allows such levels of group speak will be deployed for the primary.
? Martin
@Another Holocene Human: He’s not saying that. He’s saying Hillary is a token female candidate. Put another way: what is Clinton’s signature policy agenda?
beltane
@schrodinger’s cat: A different person, I think. The “deporter in chief” epithet must be the new thing in certain circles.
Another Holocene Human
@beltane: They actually tried to go after Barack Obama’s mom but that didn’t play well in Peoria.
Nowadays they want you to forget his mom ever existed.
Another Holocene Human
@? Martin: It’s probably “stay the course”.
I should have realized–askew lives to attack Hilary. Of course he was talking about Hilary. It’s a little late to call her a token, though.
Kropadope
@Another Holocene Human: I don’t think he was calling Obama a token, but rather Hillary. I also don’t agree with that assessment. Hillary has a real agenda. It will be rather harmful to the nation and Democratic priorities, but it is her own.
schrodinger's cat
@gene108: Good luck getting the likes of Ted Cruz to shut up when cameras are rolling.
jl
Apologies if a commenter has already posted this, but the GOP flack who nitpicked the Obama kids has an arrest record from her teen years.
GOP Staffer Who Said Obama Girls Lacked Class Was Arrested As A Teen
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/lauten-sasha-malia-class-arrested-teen
Wait until I’m president. I may change my mind at the Thanksgiving turkey pardon and kill, pluck and gut those birds live on TV.
If I walk out holding an axe and a big pot of hot water, you will know it’s going down.
beltane
@Another Holocene Human: Yeah, I remember that now. It kind of segued into the whole birth certificate nonsense because the dogs on the right cannot stop chewing a bone even when the bone is ground to dust.
beltane
I hope JC is OK, there’s an armed nutter on a rampage in his part of WV http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/gunman-loose-after-killing-four-west-virginia-n259261
askew
@Another Holocene Human:
Nope not at all. Obama ran on hope and change and being right on the Iraq War being a mistake that should have been opposed. He also has charisma, inspired millions with his speeches and excited the base in a way that didn’t rely on being the first black president or on his wife’s accomplishments. Hillary has none of that.
Deval Patrick, Elizabeth Warren are not tokens either.
I am saying Hillary is a token because her supporters have nothing else besides her gender and her husband’s accomplishments for reasons to support her.
I’ve been asking since 2007 for a Hillary supporter to give me 3 reasons why she’ll be a great president that aren’t based on her gender, her husband or the lame “electable” nonsense. And none of them can even give 1. She’s a paper tiger with a great PR team.
Bobby Thomson
@aimai: In fairness, he thinks that about everyone. And in fairness, he’s generally not wrong.
? Martin
@gene108:
Oh yes it is, particularly when they are all competing in the primaries. Market differentiation is a critical thing and the only way you can get market differentiation is by saying something different. Because the conservative viewpoint is strictly anti-government, by virtue of 35 years of conservatives differentiating on the ‘government is the problem’, you wind up with a field fighting over what part of the country they would burn down the fastest. Democrats have a much more nuanced bag of tricks being able to advocate for government, against it, transforming it, etc. Now, they suck at it because they’re terrified to commit to anything (which is why Warren is so popular as she’ll commit to a policy prescription) unlike the GOP who commit to every idiotic destructive idea that comes along and then flame out as a result.
jl
Not in a good mood today. My only happy thought is that if Patrick ever runs for president, and the media and pundit horse race knock on him is that he is too short, that will some small progress of sorts.
I did not know Patrick was considered ‘too short’ for national elections.
gene108
@? Martin:
Depends on what will be the most pressing issue by 2016. Very few candidates have “signature” issues this far out before a national election.
I do not understand why liberals believe she’s a Republican masquerading as a Democrat or why they feel she’s going to get us into another major war.
Hillary was to the left of Obama on gay marriage and gun control, for example, in 2008.
askew
@SatanicPanic:
She doesn’t have an agenda. She pushed for absolutely nothing while in the Senate and has really never taken a real leadership role on any U.S. policy outside of her attempt at healthcare reform in the 1990s. She gets a huge pass on having done absolutely nothing of value in her political career because she is a woman and because she is married to Bill Clinton. I can’t even tell you what she believes in because her entire political career has been shifting positions and not saying anything of value. She doesn’t really seem passionate about anything other than being president and improving lives of women overseas. She’ll be the first Democratic candidate for president in my lifetime that I can’t think of one good thing to say about.
KG
@gene108: Iowa and New Hampshire depend too much on “retail politics” where the presidential hopefuls actually meet with “real” people and have a slice of pie with them in a diner or some such nonsense. If the entire primary is scripted, it’ll back fire in a real big way. I don’t think we’ll see as much crazy as we did in 2012, but 2008 levels, seems about right. And I could see someone doing the 1996 Pat Buchanan torches and pitchforks routine.
WereBear
@jl: Women running might skew those results; though I bet a tall woman would do better.
Some of these things are hard-wired. And many people don’t use anything but the hard-wiring.
? Martin
@Another Holocene Human:
And that’s the problem. She’s a well-known national figure and you’re leading with ‘probably’. And ‘stay the course’ is just as much chickenshit as ‘free market solution’. It’s a way to duck the problem by either leaving all of the decisions to your predecessor (stay the course) or to a group that you by definition exclude yourself from (free market).
But I can’t point to an issue that she’s specifically looking to advance or a policy prescription on how to do it. That doesn’t mean she’d be a bad president, but ‘stay the course’ is a pretty low bar for the office, don’t you think?
SatanicPanic
@askew: I don’t think she’ll be a great president. I think she’s a known quantity with middle-of-the-road boring political views. That doesn’t make her a token, anymore than it makes all the other boring Dems tokens.
askew
@gene108:
She is significantly to the right of Obama on foreign policy. She wanted to arm someone in Syria. She wanted more intervention in Libya. She was against coming out against Mbrark in Egypt. She voted for the Iraq War and has continued to lie about that vote since she took it. She was against the OBL raid.
She may have been to the left of Obama on a couple of issues in 2008, but overall she is much more conservative on economic and foreign policy issues.
? Martin
@KG: Until the GOP comes out for a beneficial role of government in some capacity, it’s going to be more of the same. Ted Cruz is already leading the ‘Abolish the IRS’ charge.
SatanicPanic
@? Martin: but that’s not the same as saying she’s a token, like the Democratic party just plucked her out of obscurity to burnish its pro-woman credentials.
askew
@SatanicPanic:
What makes her a token is that the only reason she is the frontrunner now and was in 2008 is because she is the spouse of an ex-president and a woman. If she was Hillary Smith a 2nd term backbencher Senator from NY with no major accomplishments while in the Senate along with her lack of charisma and lack of ability to inspire people, she would have lost to Dodd and Biden in Iowa.
Basically she is running on entitlement, her spouse’s accomplishments and her gender. That makes her a token.
? Martin
@SatanicPanic: I think a lot of voters did that, but no not the party. Askew isn’t wrong by suggesting that ‘first female president’ is the leading rationale for many of her supporters.
SatanicPanic
@askew: No dude. The word token here is both insulting to her and to the Democratic Party. We don’t need token women because we have plenty of accomplished women in office. Everything you can say about her Senate career could easily be said about Obama’s- basically no accomplishments. Her personal story (not her gender) makes her compelling, just like Obama. You may not think she’s any good and you may not like her policies, but there are plenty of other people in the party that have exactly the same views, the same slipperiness and they don’t get called tokens. I really disagree with your use of the word here. It’s demeaning.
KG
@? Martin: I’m sure they see using the military to invade another country and install a “democratic” regime to be beneficial in some way. but I’m guessing that’s not what you’re thinking.
It’s amazing, actually, I mean, at least GW Bush and McCain, for all of their flaws, saw some benefits to government action in some areas. If a GOP candidate suggested something like campaign finance reform, medicaid/medicare reform/expansion, or education reform, they’d be run out of the party as DFHs.
SatanicPanic
@? Martin: But she’s neither obscure, nor is there a dearth of female candidates in the Democratic Party.
NCSteve
@SatanicPanic: So, okay, we’re better than them. Both morally superior and probably more intelligent. We’re the good guys, they’re the bad guys. Really, it’s their fault that we have no choice but to band together against them and denigrate them. They’re the author of their own misfortune so why not go ahead and mock and despise them for it, because, after all, they hate us even more than we hate them. Except they hate because that’s just how they are and it’s all they can ever be expected to be. They’re wired that way. Or, okay, even if we’re somewhat at fault, they’re definitely more at fault than we are, which absolves us of any responsibility to try to be better because, hey, it’s incumbent upon them to be better first because they’re worse than we are.
See the problem?
Look, I’m not claiming to nave any moral high ground here. This is directed as much at me as at anyone else here. I’m just as prone to mock and engage in vicious stereotype and mass caricature as anyone. The sheer wicked fun of mockery is all too irresistible. Fuck, this site is dedicated to it and it’s why I love it. But the reality is that tribalistic conflict is a game deliberately buggered to be unwinnable by design. Once you get that the game is designed to be unwinnable, you get that the only sensible objective has to be to stop playing it. And if the objective is to stop playing it, the idea that the magnitude of one’s blameworthiness, that the relative degree of one’s on blame compared to that of another, for keeping it going is meaningful is simply another means by which they keep their unwinnable game going.
gene108
@askew:
Other than be video taped, in 2002, at an anti-Iraq war rally, what did Obama do that was of consequence as a politician prior to running for President?
And his coming out against the Iraq was as a state Senator is what put him over the top, with Democratic voters in 2008. He voted to pardon the teleco’s, with regards to warrantless wiretapping while in the US Senate and did very little to rock the boat and take bold liberal stands, as a US Senator. He also endorsed Joe Lieberman over Ned Lamont for the 2006 Democratic Senate nomination in CT.
People seem to graft their worst fears about what a politician might do onto the Clintons.
I’ve seen from right-wingers, who do not rule out the possibility that Hillary would’ve had Vince Foster murdered, because she and Bill are so willing to destroy anyone who might hurt their chance at power.
I see from liberals who feel either one would sell out everything on a dime, because it would interfere with their ability to acquire more power.
gene108
@askew:
So was Biden, but liberals seem to love them some Joe Biden.
I think, over the last four years, since the Arab Spring, we can look at Obama’s record on that part of the world and what has transpired.
I think some of his decisions have not played out as smashing successes.
There’s no way to conclude slightly different approaches will automatically produce worse results.
gene108
@? Martin:
I think for a lot of Democratic voters, who were thrilled to contribute to a part of history by electing the first black President, there’s an itch to knock down the other first for a President and that is electing a woman to the office.
SatanicPanic
@NCSteve: I don’t know if tribalism is unwinnable. I’m not sure it’s avoidable either. I’m just saying that we mock people, they lynch people, and that’s a pretty important distinction.
SatanicPanic
@gene108: And I don’t really have a problem with that. I just don’t like the idea that Hillary is some rando we picked out of a hat, like some Christine O’Donnell. Give Hillary some credit.
askew
@gene108:
Obama was one of the most successful freshman Senators in decades after he got 3 bills passed in his first 2 years in office, which is 3 more than Hillary got in her entire 8 years. Added to that his work on getting videotaped interrogations as a State Senator, a compromise that was thought impossible by all sides. Plus, his incredible political skills, charisma, and ability to inspire millions are why he won.
And let’s not forget that Obama was right in 2002 on Iraq and Hillary was wrong and has never owned that mistake. He was right in Syria and he was right in Libya, with OBL and in Egypt.
I love how Hillary supporters can’t talk up her accomplishments, because she has none. So, instead they just tear down the opposition.
Still all you have is gender and her husband. That’s a pathetic set of reasons for why to vote someone in as POTUS. You can’t even use the good judgement argument, because she has been wrong on almost every major foreign policy decision since 2000. It’s truly sad.
askew
@SatanicPanic:
What does Hillary deserve credit for? That’s the thing. I feel like people are afraid to say she’s been an empty suit as a politician because she is a woman. I’ll give her credit for turning her husband’s infidelity into an asset for her political career. Voters hated her before that happened. I’ll give her credit for assembling the best PR team in politics that pushed out the talking points that she’d be the most accomplished person to ever run for president in 2016 and that she was more accomplished than Obama in 2008. Neither are true, but the media bought that lie and never allowed it to be questioned.
askew
@SatanicPanic:
Actually, you can’t say the same about Obama’s Senate career. He was able to get 3 bills passed in 2 years which is unheard of for a freshman Senator. He was remarkably effective as a Senator. He also had accomplishments as a State Senator. Hillary has no accomplishments as a Senator and never held any other elective office. It’s offensive to compare Obama’s strong record of accomplishments to Hillary’s none existent list. There’s a reason she ran on her husband and other people’s accomplishments in 2008. She had none of her own.
Mike E
@mai naem mobile: I hate saying this but racists are born every single day, so the “wait ’em out” strategy won’t work. Sadly.
Mike E
@jl: It’s project 24-7 for these GOP operatives… her jealous take on the Obama girls was a bit of a ‘tell’, and to say she had troubles as a teen (gawd, who didn’t) is just more insight into that rightwing phenomenon.
SatanicPanic
@askew: I stand corrected on Obama’s legislative accomplishments. But I also don’t remember anyone bringing those up when he was running. It was all personal interest, which is what you’re saying we should judge Hillary on. But to go back to my original point- Obama is an extraordinary pol, that doesn’t make it that Hillary is a token. I’m not going to call her an empty suit, but her accomplishments have been thin. So what? Plenty of male politicians have thin records. We don’t just assume they’re there because they’re men.
SatanicPanic
@SatanicPanic: Jeez, I mean, look at who NY re-elected for Governor. It’s quite possible that’s exactly the kind of pol they want there.
Starfish
@Tenar Darell: I love it.
Violet
@Mike E: They are nothing but projection. Look at what the wingnuts are whining about and it’s the thing they’re doing themselves. She criticizes the teenage Obama girls for doing something wrong? (Which they didn’t do, but that’s what she’s complaining about). Go look at her teenage years. Wingnuts pontificating about the sanctity of marriage? Go look for infidelity and/or same sex dalliances or relationships. Etc. They are nothing but projection and it’s a big fat tell, always.
Tenar Darell
@Starfish: Not mine. But my father used it, lots. You never heard it before? See this, on Wikipedia, for an intro to the “Brahmins.” The entry does help explain why you pick up on the supercilious superiority. I think it’s a byproduct of a particular brand of culture that seeps into all it touches. It’s not so much unique, as it is one model for elitism in our country. I suspect that the South has their own version of this kind of elitism, but not sure how it manifests.