Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

The Giant Orange Man Baby is having a bad day.

It’s easy to sit in safety and prescribe what other people should be doing.

Nothing says ‘pro-life’ like letting children go hungry.

Fani Willis claps back at Trump chihuahua, Jim Jordan.

The gop couldn’t organize an orgy in a whorehouse with a fist full of 50s.

Boeing: repeatedly making the case for high speed rail.

Every reporter and pundit should have to declare if they ever vacationed with a billionaire.

“The defense has a certain level of trust in defendant that the government does not.”

Bad people in a position to do bad things will do bad things because they are bad people. End of story.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

There are a lot more evil idiots than evil geniuses.

We won’t go back.

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

The next time the wall street journal editorial board speaks the truth will be the first.

This must be what justice looks like, not vengeful, just peaceful exuberance.

Washington Post’s Catch and Kill, not noticeably better than the Enquirer’s.

The choice is between normal and crazy.

Pelosi: “He either is stupid, or he thinks the rest of us are.” Why not both?

Everyone is in a bubble, but some bubbles model reality far better than others!

Perhaps you mistook them for somebody who gives a damn.

That’s my take and I am available for criticism at this time.

Let us savor the impending downfall of lawless scoundrels who richly deserve the trouble barreling their way.

The jury literally has a bell they can ring to force Trump to show up on command. Greatest thing ever!

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

You are here: Home / Politics / Politicans / Bernie Sanders 2016 / Late Night Post-Debate Open Thread

Late Night Post-Debate Open Thread

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I only followed the secondary sources (mostly the Guardian liveblog, apart from various twitter feeds). Concensus so far seems to be that it was a substantive debate about issues that will change absolutely nobody’s mind, because c’mon, this is America.

Most immediately noteworthy thing, IMO, is that Clinton brought up reproductive rights — which were mentioned not once during the previous eight debates — and the moderators could hardly wait to switch to a ‘less divisive’ topic.

And reporter Jen Epstein helpfully reminds us there’s supposed to be one more debate, next month, location ‘to be determined‘ but it’s right before the California primary.

Massive block of tweets below the fold, for faster scrolling.

Reader Interactions

229Comments

  2. 2.

    mclaren

    Yes, Bernie Sanders proposing a minimum wage of $15 per hour is “shooting for the moon” because it’s just so unrealistic. I mean, would anyone actually pay workers $15 per hour?

    Um…yes, in Seattle. And Los Angeles.

    But wait! That sky-high minimum wage in Seattle has driven countless businesses into bankruptcy and reduced the number of minimum-wage jobs, right?

    Wrong. The $15 minmum wage in Seattle has increased the number of businesses and increased the number of minimum-wage jobs.

    Oops.

    But c’mon, folks. Let’s not let reality get in the way our punditry!

  3. 3.

    Bailey

    To date, I haven’t really cared much about the transcripts of Hillary’s speeches, but the fierce way in which she’s protecting them — and making weird conditions that Republican candidates also must release their transcripts — seriously makes me wonder what her comments entailed.

  4. 4.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Bailey: /nods/
    Where there’s that much smoke, there must be a fire.

    Justin Wolfers ‎@ JustinWolfers
    Only one of these candidates wants to win a general election. #DemDebate

    I don’t get that one.

  6. 6.

    srv

    TL;DR. Could you condense from all those tweets?

    @mclaren: I would be careful about declaring victory until the deep economic analysis has been done.

  8. 8.

    BR

    @MobiusKlein:

    Yeah, I can see the sense in a state by state minimum wage, but it should probably be mandated federally based on cost of living. I’d think that’d push California well above $15 / hour — probably like $20 or $25 — but Wyoming might still be at $10.

  13. 13.

    Cacti

    Bernie’s continued insistence on slagging southern Dems is, dare I say, starting to sound a bit dog whistle-ish.

  14. 14.

    Aqualad08

    @rikyrah: Can’t believe that reproductive rights were never brought up before tonight.

    I can… there simply isn’t enough difference between the two of them for pundits to get a juicy soundbite out of it. That and it really hasn’t been in the media spotlight until Trump drank a galleon of diarrhea over it a few weeks ago.

  15. 15.

    Major Major Major Major

    @Bailey: Ugh, was that it? That’s a no-brainer. I don’t know much about the internal politics, like for a politician, but ’round these parts it’s a no-brainer. Then again, this is SF, so the sample skews rather anti-Zionist in my experience.

    There are even loads of ways to say “palestinians are victims” and still sound hawkish. “Palestinians are victims of palestinian terrorism.” There, see?

  16. 16.

    KC

    What is strange to me is that we are essentially asked to assume the worst about Clinton because she won’t release speeches she gave as a private citizen, though the way we found out about the speeches is via multiple years of tax returns she released. Yet, we are simply asked to go awe shucks when Bernie doesn’t do the same with respect to his tax returns. If we are going to assume the worst about Hillary, why should we not do the same about Bernie? As of now, he’s offered less disclosure than Romney.

  19. 19.

    Aqualad08

    @rikyrah: Oh, plenty of ways. But the moderators want them yelling at each other. They aren’t going to yell at each other over issues they both have clear, progressive records on.

  20. 20.

    Aqualad08

    @KC: Meh. I’ll bet a fiver that the most embarrassing thing on the returns is that they aren’t overly charitable.

  21. 21.

    Bailey

    @KC:

    Well, a private citizen that everyone absolutely knew was running for President.

    I definitely want Bernie to release all of his tax returns as well. He has indicated that he will. Granted, I haven’t watched every debate but I’m not getting the sense from him that he’s guarding them like Fort Knox, just that he hasn’t released everything yet. My guess is that he’s held off because his deductions to charity are low or something which would paint him as something of a hypocrite.

    HRC, on the other hand, did some really crazy two-step to avoid the transcript question. Like I said, previously I did not care. But her response to this is so over the top weird that I’m now forced to wonder.

  22. 22.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    To date, I haven’t really cared much about the transcripts of Hillary’s speeches, but the fierce way in which she’s protecting them — and making weird conditions that Republican candidates also must release their transcripts — seriously makes me wonder what her comments entailed.

    At this point I don’t have much problem with her pushing back against it, because she’s being held to a different standard than every other candidate, D or R.

    She’s disclosed a lot more about her personal finances than her immediate opponent, but he’s insisting it’s not enough, while also acting slippery about why he hasn’t released his own info.

    I’ll be glad to have a Dem candidate who will call bullshit when the media or opponents try to make her play by a different set of rules.

  23. 23.

    sinnedbackwards

    I am annoyed that the universe moves so much more quickly than when Gutenberg was young that I cannot possibly keep up.

    Did Hellernie blow it by a slip? Is Bernary behind briefly?

    Jesu, people. We need to beat Republics!

    That means vote Hillary and cheer Bernie, or vice versa. Not so hard.

    And believe in unicorns and ponies but vote and expect trotters and
    draughthorses.

    Go Dan Patch and Man O War.

  24. 24.

    Betty Cracker

    Re: HRC’s speech transcripts — as someone who occasionally writes speeches for bigwigs to deliver at trade shows and conferences, I suspect she doesn’t want to release the speeches because the content would be embarrassing. I doubt there’s anything that contradicts the policies Clinton advocates, let alone anything incriminating. But it’s standard to flatter the group you’re addressing. And even something innocuous could be taken out of context by a political opponent. That said, I am surprised no smartphone videos of said speeches have emerged.

  26. 26.

    AkaDad

    Anyone willing to look at the primary honestly, knows that Bernie lost a while ago. He’s actually gotten way more support than I expected. I just hope all Dems put aside their differences and vote when the time comes, which means every election, from President down to the local school board.

  27. 27.

    Major Major Major Major

    @Betty Cracker: that witch Hillary had known tax-dodgers Apple and Google put a backdoor in everybody’s iPhone and Android that automatically deletes all recordings of Goldman Sachs speeches. Snowden tried to warn us but Hillary’s secret puppet Obama kicked him out of the country.

  28. 28.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Cacti: also, how many people were in the audience(s) for those speeches? If there was anything newsworthy in them, it would have leaked (Nancy LeTourneau said one of them is actually on youtube– I haven’t bothered to look because I really don’t care). There are probably some platitudes about how glad she is to be there with her good friends who do such great work, something no one there noticed but Bernie (and the Republicans) can turn into applause lines and ads.

    And, as I like to remind everyone– the idea that she should release the transcripts of those speeches? It came from Chuck Todd. Chuck Fucking Todd.

    ETA: @Anne Laurie: I think Bernie thinks the first automatically leads to the second. I think he thinks he can do it, though maybe he’s wavering since any chance of winning NY seems to be sipping away.

  29. 29.

    redshirt

    @Betty Cracker: I saw a poll recently, don’t remember where, but it showed CEO’s overwhelmingly in favor of higher minimum wage, longer maternity leave, better unemployment insurance, etc. And yet none of these or related issues can even be discussed today.

  30. 30.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    Well, currently she’s the only Dem running that is getting paid millions for making these kinds of speeches so she’s being held to a different standard because she’s in a class of her own in that regard. Her rationale for not releasing them makes about zero sense, particularly to tie her releasing them to whatever GOP candidates are or are not doing. I thought the point of Dems was that we’re NOT the GOP?

    Anyway, it’s just one action of hers that I can literally find no good reason for. Well, that and putting a government server in her own house and asking everyone to just trust her on that.

    We’ve heard from Bernie that all tax returns will be released. If they aren’t, then we can go burn down his house. Or Bern it down, as the case may be.

  31. 31.

    Cacti

    @Major Major Major Major:

    that witch Hillary had known tax-dodgers Apple and Google put a backdoor in everybody’s iPhone and Android that automatically deletes all recordings of Goldman Sachs speeches. Snowden tried to warn us but Hillary’s secret puppet Obama kicked him out of the country.

    The Intercept would like to know when you can start.

  33. 33.

    Anne Laurie

    @Aqualad08:

    I’ll bet a fiver that the most embarrassing thing on the returns is that they aren’t overly charitable.

    The nastier guesses I’ve seen so far is that the Sanderses don’t do charity at all, because it’s the state’s job to support its citizens dammit. Or else that their deductions are on the sketchy side, because Jane’s “consultant” status could hide multitudes. Most common assumption, though, is that they have a bigger nest egg socked away than befits Bernie’s poor-little-socialist image… some or all of it in invested in those horrible unAmerican BIG WALL STREET BANKS!!! which need to be broken up.

    In other words: Bad for image, but no big headlines.

    The longer he drags his feet on releasing them, though, the worse people are gonna assume.

  34. 34.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    Her rationale for not releasing them makes about zero sense, particularly to tie her releasing them to whatever GOP candidates are or are not doing. I thought the point of Dems was that we’re NOT the GOP?

    I guess you could say Bernie’s not acting like the GOP with regards to his tax returns.

    Mitt Romney never blamed Ann for the failure to cough his up.

  36. 36.

    Bailey

    @redshirt:

    I didn’t. Until HRC acted as though they contained the secrets to the origin of the universe. She was so weirdly dodging and weaving that now I wonder what she said in that rarified audience.

    I wouldn’t have necessarily cared what Mitt Romney said to his audiences, either, until video evidence told me otherwise that I should care very much.

    Watching that debate, you can’t honestly think she’s tap-dancing around the request because there isn’t something that is very incriminating in there, right?

  37. 37.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    Do you imagine Ann Romney has ever completed a household task of any variety?

    Beyond that, I don’t think Trump has released his yet, either. Was there an absolute deadline when this needed to be completed?

  39. 39.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    Do you imagine Ann Romney has ever completed a household task of any variety?

    Do you imagine Jane Sanders really doesn’t know how to print prior years’ returns from TurboTax?

  40. 40.

    mclaren

    @redshirt:

    Maybe we care so much about a few corporate speeches because Hillary got paid $600,000 to give a speech at Goldman Sachs in which she said (right after the global economic crash) that “bashing the bankers is unproductive” and “it has to stop.” Meanwhile, the guy Hillary’s daughter is married to is…a hedge fund trader at Goldman Sachs.

    Oh, and by the way — Goldman Sachs just coughed up a five of 5 billion dollars and was forced by the SEC to admit that Goldman Sachs played a key role in blowing up the entire world economy due to massive endemic fraud committed by Goldman Sachs.

  41. 41.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    So what was the actual deadline for these releases?

    He’s clearly said that he’ll be releasing. If he doesn’t follow through, then you have an argument.

    What, again, is the reason that Hillary won’t even entertain the idea of transcripts for her speeches?

  43. 43.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    He’s clearly said that he’ll be releasing. If he doesn’t follow through, then you have an argument.

    He’s been saying it for multiple weeks now.

    He hasn’t followed through.

  45. 45.

    mclaren

    @Betty Cracker:

    I doubt there’s anything that contradicts the policies Clinton advocates, let alone anything incriminating.

    Provably false.

    Hillary has now pivoted left in the general election and claims that we need more stringent regulation of derivatives and the banks that issue them.

    Meanwhile, a few years ago, Hillary was giving speeches at Goldman Sachs (currently paying a 5 billion dollar fine for massive fraud that was instrumental in crashing the U.S. economy in 2009) telling everyone that “bashing the bankers in unproductive” and “it has to stop.”

    One of those statements is not like the other.

    See the article “Lament of the Plutocrats” from 2013 for details.

    It’s obvious to anyone with a nervous system that Hillary has been doing this kind of bait-and-switch for many years. She says one thing publicly that sounds great to the public — “We need to be careful about foreign interventions” and “We need more regulation of big banks” — while she exactly the opposite to the power brokers and billionaires at her private speeches.

    It’s the old switcheroo, Betty. Tell the rubes one thing, while assuring the power players at small closed meetings that you’re really going to do exactly the opposite.

  46. 46.

    dollared

    @Cacti: Totally agree with this. If I were Clinton, I would spend a great deal of energy forcing the media to recognize the double standard they apply to her.

  47. 47.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    Hilary, is that you? You’re continuing to dance around the same question that she is.

    You’ve got him, in a highly watched debate, vowing to release very quickly. If he doesn’t, go crazy with your anger.

  48. 48.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    Hilary, is that you? You’re continuing to dance around the same question that she is.

    Jane, is that you?

    I can show you how to print things from TurboTax. It’s really not hard, and can be done in minutes rather than weeks.

  49. 49.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    Again, was there some hard and fast deadline? Can you tell me when that was?

    And once Sanders releases whatever he’s committed to, what will your cover for Hillary be?

  51. 51.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    Again, was there some hard and fast deadline? Can you tell me when that was?

    Again, it doesn’t take weeks to print things from TurboTax.

  52. 52.

    Betty Cracker

    @mclaren: From what I understand, these speeches weren’t at “small closed meetings” but rather large conferences, where it’s not at all unusual for big companies to cough up massive sums for boilerplate pablum from celebrities. I suspect Clinton just barfed up platitudes about leadership for $$$ like so many former officials before and since.

  53. 53.

    mclaren

    @Bailey:

    Anyway, it’s just one action of hers that I can literally find no good reason for.

    Here are some other of Hillary’s actions that no one can find any good reason for:

    [1] Voting in favor of the Iraq quagmire.
    [2] Forcefully urging that the U.S. get involved in bombing Libya, leading to the current quagmire.
    [3] Claiming that it’s useless to break up the too-big-to-fail banks.
    [4] Coming out against a nationwide federally mandated $15/hr minimum wage.
    [5] Coming out in favor of the TPP until she recently flipped and came out against it.
    [6] Refusing to end extraodinary rendition.
    [7] Persisting in defending that indefensible 1994 crime bill and the disgraceful 1996 Welfare Deform bill that just recently threw 100,000 poor people off food stamps in some of the poorest deep south states.
    [8] Giving that speech 2 years ago in which she claimed “America needs a more assertive foreign policy” when America is currently mired in 4 different major wars and has black ops units in 137 different countries.

  56. 56.

    amk

    @mclaren:

    since you already seem to know what she said (with all the sexist imagery your gutter mind could spew out), why the fuck do you care about the transcripts? what an asshole.

  57. 57.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    I guess you missed the debate tonight.

    As well as missing the thrust of your defense of Hillary.

    Do all your arguments devolve into pointless trolling?

  58. 58.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    I guess you missed the debate tonight.

    Nope, just heard Sanders give the same slippery answer he’s been giving for weeks.

    Not a Bernfeeler, so his non-specific promises don’t mean a lot to me.

  59. 59.

    mclaren

    @Betty Cracker:

    Did you even bother to read the article? Your claim is incorrect.

    n a recent afternoon, executives at Goldman Sachs invited a few hundred major investors to the Conrad Hotel in lower Manhattan. The bankers and their guests filed into a large room and turned their eyes to Hillary Clinton.

    A locked room with a couple of hundred billionaires (“selected investors”) in one of the most exclusive hotels in New York.

    Hardly a “big conference.” This was a private meeting for the wealthiest of the wealthy in one of the most ritzy four-star hotels in Manhattan.

  61. 61.

    mclaren

    Hillary does seem to have won this debate. Sanders flubbed the answer about how Hillary was influenced by giving those speeches. He should’ve mentioned Hillary’s son-in-law, the hedge fund trader at Goldman Sachs, and how reluctant Hillary will be when her son-in-law gets accused of insider trader and criminal fraud in the next economic crash to actually prosecute him.

    As a matter of practical fact, unless Sanders wins California in a total shut-out, he’s not going to be the nominee at this point. So all this backbiting is pointless.

  62. 62.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    Bernie Sanders is annoyed he is losing this campaign, Hillary Clinton is annoyed he hasn’t lost yet

    I don’t she’s annoyed that he hasn’t lost. The fact is she’s leading by an insurmountable 2,500,000 votes. He has lost.

    It’s like the old movie “Weekend at Bernie’s” – his candidacy is dead, but none of his friends can see it.

  63. 63.

    Cacti

    @mclaren:

    Hillary does seem to have won this debate. Sanders flubbed the answer about how Hillary was influenced by giving those speeches. He should’ve mentioned Hillary’s son-in-law, the hedge fund trader at Goldman Sachs, and how reluctant Hillary will be when her son-in-law gets accused of insider trader and criminal fraud in the next economic crash to actually prosecute him.

    Yeah, that would have been a real coup de grace for him.

    (giggle)

  64. 64.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    He’s made some specific promises? For weeks? Links? I see his interview from, oh, 4 days ago and 10 days ago, but that doesn’t seem like weeks of promises to me. In fact, it’s barely after some GOP candidates released their own.

    And you forgot to answer when the definitive deadline is. I mean, last time you just mindlessly changed the subject, but I’m curious as to when that deadline is. ???

  65. 65.

    Bailey

    @mclaren:

    Agreed. Frankly, I would have just pointed out that she was no longer in Congress at the time so there were no votes to take. But that we don’t know what her decisions as President would be.

    His answer was terrible there.

  66. 66.

    Betty Cracker

    @mclaren: I guess we have different notions of what constitutes a “small closed meeting.” Several hundred people in a hotel ballroom sounds more like a conference than a cabal to me, but wevs. FWIW, I think it was a dumb move politically on Clinton’s part to make those speeches. I bet she wishes she hadn’t now.

  67. 67.

    EconWatcher

    I’m pretty s@Betty Cracker:

    If the transcripts just contained pablum about leadership, she would have released them by now, because her refusal to do so is causing real damage.

    So do the transcripts contain evidence of a secret conspiracy between Hillary and GS? Of course not.

    But here’s what I bet they do contain: Something like, “we need to move beyond the pointless and unproductive blame game,” as well as praise for the critical work that GS and its ilk do in lubricating the machinery of the world economy, and words of appreciation for all the employment they create. I can almost hear her saying it.

    And in other circumstances, disclosure of that would be embarrassing but not devastating. But in the context of the specific challenge Sanders has brought, it would hurt very badly.

    And truth be told, it should. If she’d taken this money in 2004, I wouldn’t have that big of a problem with it. But after the financial crisis, after the massive bailout of GS by taxpayers at 100 cents on the dollar of their contracts with AIG (remember how many phone calls between Paulson and Blankfein in the weeks leading up to that?), voters have a very legitimate concern that GS owns the government. And taking huge speaking fees from GS after that was grotesque. If she also assured them something to the effect that we need to move beyond the blame game, that communicates something important to GS, and to us.

    Of course, I can’t prove exactly what she said. But that’s because she won’t release the evidence about a legitimate matter of voter concern.

    Cole and others have said that anyone would have taken those fees if offered. Can you picture Obama doing it? I find it very surprising to see the contortions people go through on this blog to justify it all. I mean, Goldman Sachs? After the AIG bailout?

  68. 68.

    KC

    I like both candidates, but we are here speculating all about Clinton, but basically saying awe shucks to Bernie. It is convenient that he plans to release his latest returns, but hasn’t committed to releasing more. Maybe this year’s returns are “boring,” but what about last years? I just think it’s pretty unfair to be overly critical of Clinton for giving paid speeches, a job I’d happily take, while not admitting we are asking her to go over and above a level of disclosure we are not holding her opponent to.

  69. 69.

    Aqualad08

    @mclaren:

    When you come up with a rebuttal to my facts and logic, please let us know.

    Well, when you produce facts and demonstrate logic, maybe someone will take you up on the offer. All you’re giving us is innuendo and three-year-old articles from Tiger Beat on the Potomac written by someone who previously wrote a story about how Elizabeth Warren speaking at the 2012 Democratic National Convention would be a BAD thing.

    Get a grip, kiddo. The only person you’re impressing is yourself. The rest off us are just egging you on towards an inevitable and merciful coronary…

  70. 70.

    dogwood

    It’s obvious there’s just a different standard of concern when it comes to women and people of color. Obama had to release 2 versions of his birth certificate, but held the line at releasing transcripts. Neither of these demands were ever made to White candidates. Hillary Clinton is not the only candidate who has given speeches, paid or not, to various groups, yet she is being asked to do what what male candidates are never asked to do. Bernie has dodged releasing tax returns from the get-go which is standard for all candidates. I don’t expect this to change in my lifetime. Women and people of color have to prove they are worthy or real Americans. It’s just assumed that white males are entitled to their positions. I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump never releases his returns, and it probably won’t matter.

  72. 72.

    Ken

    @EconWatcher: @EconWatcher:
    But her not releasing them HASN’T caused her damage. I really think the Clintons are into game playing. Not releasing the transcripts, Bill yelling at Black LIves Matters protesters, Hillary referring to unborn children. etc. They are constantly gagueing (sp?) media responses to gaffes. It’s almost like all of us are their lab rats.

  73. 73.

    Divf

    @Ken: we are not the lab rats, the media are. And deservedly so.
    ETA: the Clintons learned a long time ago that the media are the enemy.

  74. 74.

    KC

    @Ken: I suspect it’s because a lot of people would be happy to give a few nicely paid speeches. The truth is, because she’s been transparent with her returns, we know more about her finances than any other current candidate.

  76. 76.

    Betty Cracker

    @dogwood: There’s a shitload of sexism directed toward Clinton, but requesting the speech transcripts isn’t an example of it, IMO. She is the only Democrat who has made shitloads of $$$ giving speeches, including to groups whose association is at issue (GS).

  77. 77.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @EconWatcher: I love how you assume that, if she’s saying flattering things to these audiences in private, you simply assume that those are the words her heart is behind, rather than what she says in public. I can’t figure out any valid reason for that assumption, though I confess that I classify mclaren’s capacity to find a conspiracy behind her sofa cushions as invalid.

  78. 78.

    Yutsano

    @Bailey:

    And you forgot to answer when the definitive deadline is.

    Now. The deadline is now. Even if he had to write in to Kansas City to get the physical copies of the returns, that takes at most 75 days**. He’s been running for President for a year. Only Bernie and Trump have not released full tax return information. The lack of disclosure and accountability for something that has now become a routine part of the process is a big problem with me.

    ** Pretty sure the IRS could accelerate this timeline since Congresspeople do have special privileges to get info faster.

  79. 79.

    dogwood

    @Betty Cracker:
    I’ll beg to differ. Mitt Romney made a ton of money giving speeches, and democrats didn’t demand to see the transcripts. It’s a double standard.

  80. 80.

    EconWatcher

    @KC:

    No one I’m aware of is criticizing Clinton for giving paid speeches.

    She is being criticized for taking $675,000 from Goldman Sachs after GS helped bring the world economy to its knees for its own profit, hurt hundreds of millions of families across the globe, and then used its political muscle to get bailed out at 100 cents on the dollar for its counterparty contracts with AIG. The baliout followed on extensive negotiations and multiple phone calls between GS former Chairman Hank Paulson, who was then Treasury Secretarty, and GS current Chairman Lloyd Blankfein.

    The decision to use taxpayer money from ordinary people to bail out GS at 100 cents on the dollar is one of the low moments of U.S. postwar history. And voters–especially D voters–have a right to exepct at least that GS would be kept very much at arms length after that. Why couldn’t Hillary see that? Why can’t you?

  81. 81.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    I think the Sioux and Cheyenne are better debaters, but I think General Custer held his own.

  82. 82.

    John S.

    @KC:

    Taxes =/= Speeches

    Mitt Romney released his taxes (eventually), but what sunk him was what he said behind closed doors in a speech.

    I suspect there is a lot less damning information in Bernie’s taxes than in Hillary’s speeches. That’s why Bernie seems to be simply dragging his feet on the taxes while Hillary has dug in her heels on the speeches.

    I’m pretty sure Bernie doesn’t have any transcripts for speeches made off the Senate floor. He’s not one of the cool kids on the paid lecture circuit, though that certainly might change.

  83. 83.

    David ?Canadian Anchor Baby? Koch

    Clinton is only ahead by 2,500,000 votes, making it a virtual tie.

    I think the only solution is to have moar debates.

  86. 86.

    Betty Cracker

    @dogwood: If any of Romney’s industry ties were controversial and it came out that he’d addressed those groups, the content of his speeches would be demanded too. It’s situational. But Romney was a big business shill and proud of it, so his speeches were immaterial — except the 47% thing.

  87. 87.

    Bailey

    @Yutsano:

    Well, that seems quite arbitrary.

    In 2008, Obama released his tax returns on March 25th. At that point, Clinton had not yet done so. She finally released hers on April 4, 2008. Given we are only in the second week of April, we are not wildly off pace here. Assuming there is some deadline after all.

  88. 88.

    Morzer

    I’ll give you my guess as to why Clinton won’t release the speeches, even though it makes her look distinctly shifty and dishonest. There’s no obvious right-wing craziness in them, but an awful lot of very embarrassing pablum along the lines of Bill’s praise of Romney back in 2012 for having a “sterling business career”. Once that gets juxtaposed with her recent attempts to pretend to agree with Bernie on economic issues, she’s going to look hypocritical at best. The reason no-one has offered up a transcript/video of the speeches is that they really are that boring and so don’t seem likely to find a buyer. Once the primary is over, no-one will care if the GOP demands to see the transcripts, so she’s just gritting her teeth and waiting for it all to become irrelevant. It doesn’t say much for her judgment that she scurried around giving those speeches in the first place, but then her judgment has generally been poor on such issues so, no change there. I imagine she’ll win the primary going away, but the Democratic party is unlikely to gain much from having her as its most visible advocate.

  90. 90.

    Darkrose

    @Bailey: I don’t really care about the Sanders’ taxes. However, the shifting explanations are eyebrow-raising, especially the Turbo Tax excuse.

    I’ve used Turbo Tax often, and whenever I do, after I file electronically I save all the forms as a PDF and print a copy to file. I keep them for seven years in case I get audited, or if there’s a problem. It takes a few minutes at most. I simply can’t imagine how someone who knew he was running for office never thought to that.

  91. 91.

    KC

    And what if we find the Bernster’s had a few nice investments tucked away with some of the enterprises he’s been yelling about? Or, he’s had a few tax issues in the past that don’t look so great? Yeah, I get it–awe shucks, he’s ole Bern, no biggie, still a solid cat.

  92. 92.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @EconWatcher: Your discussion of Goldman getting 100% of its contracts with AIG paid out leaves out a critical element: the law was 100% on Goldman’s side. Thanks to the Commodities Futures Modernization Act (a bill which, by the way, Sanders voted for), derivatives contracts were privileged in bankruptcy proceedings. The hammer Goldman held in those negotiations was that, if they didn’t get paid at 100%, they could go to court, and the government would have been ordered to pay them out ahead of many other things, including all of the insurance policies that AIG had written. It was a low point, but the outcome was determined in 2000, not 2009.

    As for the speeches, I agree that they were politically dumb, but also completely meaningless in anything other than a symbolic way. Absent any evidence whatsoever that they had any influence on policy, I consider them to be a misdemeanor and, frankly, I really don’t care about the transcripts. FWIW, I don’t care about Sanders’ tax returns either, and consider the whole game of candidates revealing their returns to be a whole lot of pointless kabuki.

  93. 93.

    Bailey

    @Darkrose:

    I have no idea his family’s tax protocol, nor do I care. I do know that when it comes to releasing tax return information, historically, he’s not radically late in doing so. In fact, he’s pretty much on par with when Clinton released hers in ’08. So I’m not getting the drama here. It’s not as if he’s refusing to. Like Hillary is with her Goldman Sachs speeches.

  94. 94.

    Damien

    Interesting how much the I/P issue is similar to the primary season, though obviously a lot more tragically.

  95. 95.

    ? Martin

    @Morzer:

    I’ll give you my guess as to why Clinton won’t release the speeches, even though it makes her look distinctly shifty and dishonest. There’s no obvious right-wing craziness in them, but an awful lot of very embarrassing pablum along the lines of Bill’s praise of Romney back in 2012 for having a “sterling business career”.

    I think even that overstates it.

    Hillary won’t release the transcripts because she’s been on the receiving end of a quarter century if everyone digging into every single component of her life. She is very guarded, and for good reason, and if the documents are otherwise meaningless, then she draws her line in the sand. She can’t win on the issue – releasing them or not releasing them has the same political outcome. Since the political press has no ability to measure the value of any of this shit, she’ll do it for them.

  96. 96.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    I have no idea his family’s tax protocol, nor do I care.

    A guy who entrusts his personal finances to a gal who can’t figure out how to operate a printer is definitely somebody we should trust with national economic policy. Not to mention nuclear launch codes.

    It all speaks very highly of his organizational skills. Maybe he could make Jane the Secretary of the Treasury. ;-)

  97. 97.

    Darkrose

    @Bailey: Again, I don’t care what’s in his taxes. But for fuck’s sake, printing from Turbo Tax is not rocket science. Just say, “I’m not ready to release them” and quit pretending like there’s some deep mystical secret involved in printing a PDF. Hell, for a nominal fee, I’ll walk them through how to do it over the phone.

  98. 98.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    Your assumptions about her printer skills are beneath you. (I hope. I mean, I hope this isn’t the best that you can do.)

    Curious, in April 2008, were you all up in Hillary’s grill demanding she release her returns on your schedule?

    Worst case optics in both scenarios: Bernie’s folksiness regarding his wife Jane backfires because she took a week longer than necessary. On the other hand, Hillary digs in further, refuses to answer the content of her messaging to Goldman Sachs after having collected millions from them after the biggest financial crisis in our lifetimes in which they were a key player all while assuring the public that she, too, can break up the banks.

    I’ll let you decide which one is truly sketchier.

  99. 99.

    Bailey

    @Darkrose:

    Well, I believe he has said something along those lines.

    Back in the day during her first run, Clinton had even suggested that she wouldn’t release her returns at all unless she was the nominee. Outrage?

  100. 100.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    Your assumptions about her printer skills are beneath you. (I hope. I mean, I hope this isn’t the best that you can do.)

    Hey, she’s the one who’s gone on TV and said she just hasn’t been able to retrieve them from TurboTax.

    So that leaves a couple of possibilities:

    1. She’s being slippery like Bernie

    2. They’re both kind of dumb

    Given Bernie’s performance with the NYDN, I’d say number 2 is a real possibility for him. I don’t know enough about Jane to say for sure.

  101. 101.

    Bailey

    @? Martin:

    It’s not as if anyone is actually forcing her to run for President. She can be sneaky and guarded and have all the private servers in her house that she wants and give speeches to the most reckless of financial institutions and be a private citizen.

  103. 103.

    Morzer

    @? Martin:

    If there really is nothing in the transcripts and they are absolutely anodyne, Clinton is a damned idiot for not releasing them a year ago. I personally don’t believe she’s an idiot, which leads me to suspect that there are all sorts of flattering remarks and unctuous ass-kissing of aspiring oligarchs in those speeches that just won’t fly in a Democratic primary. My take is that the Clintons and their circle are thoroughly at ease with the Wall Street mob and HRC let it show just a bit too much in those speeches. I remember Bill Clinton and Corey Booker rushing out to defend Bain (*cough*) from the “nauseating” attacks of ….why, yes… Barack Obama (!) back in 2012,in those far-off days before Madam Secretary clasped all things and utterances Obama to her like a sacred relic. On the other hand, the saga of the emails and the server suggests that Clinton really doesn’t think through some of this stuff very thoroughly, so I guess the case for idiocy isn’t completely closed. Either way, she has some of the worst political instincts I’ve ever seen and if the GOP could find a competent candidate I would be genuinely worried about November.

  104. 104.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    Yeah, weird. 74 year old man is computer illiterate. Stop the presses!

    You’ve not addressed the fact that not having released the returns by April 14th is hardly historically relevant.

    Your hero, HRC, announced in 2008 that she wouldn’t release at all unless she was the nominee. She had to be dragged into changing that tune.

  105. 105.

    Bailey

    @Darkrose:

    Because there is some assumption out there that candidates do every thing by an exact certain time and that there is a purity of transparency that must be achieved by some arbitrary date selected by Balloon Juice commentators.

    The fact that HRC wasn’t going to release at all until shamed into it kind of lets you know that we’re not dealing with the most pure candidate when it comes to releasing tax info in a timely manner.

  106. 106.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    Yeah, weird. 74 year old man is computer illiterate. Stop the presses!

    So 74 is too old to use a computer, but not too old to be POTUS?

  107. 107.

    piratedan

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym: ty for that reminder… I had completely forgotten about that. So, with that being said, I can understand Martin’s statement a bit better now too… it just doesn’t fucking matter what she does regarding those transcripts because I have little doubt that somebody somewhere will be sure to parse out the most damning bits out of context to grind whatever axe that they have to sharpen.

    It’s not as if the media hasn’t had the knives out for her before… Whitewater, Vince Foster, Benghazi, e-mail-gate… and you know what, she may actually be guilty of something. somehow, somewhere, shown some tone-deafness in a speech (like anyone is free from any of that) but at this point, I have scandal and outrage fatigue when it applies to Hillary. Is she perfect, no… but at this point, I think she’s learned quite a bit in the last 20+ years and as such, I think she’ll do a good job of incrementally moving the needle forward to get things done. I say this knowing that we need to flip the other two legislative bodies as well otherwise we’re simply maintaining the walls against the tide of stupid (and their well funded string pullers). There’s still a lot of education and unfucking that has to be done, at the national, state and local levels.

  108. 108.

    Morzer

    @Cacti:

    Remember the happy days when Bush I was utterly amazed by the cutting-edge technology available at the supermarket checkout?

    I think an awful lot of people over 50 are effectively computer-illiterate, but it doesn’t stop them from running businesses or showing good judgment when making decisions. They have the good sense to do the things they can do well and hire younger geeks to take care of such details as a private server in their basements. *cough*

  109. 109.

    Cacti

    When Bern retires, he should start a charity or foundation of his own.

    Something like: The Bernie and Jane Sanders Center for adults who can’t do taxes good, and wanna learn to do other stuff good too.

  110. 110.

    Bailey

    @Cacti:

    Should I count up for you the number of presidents that never used a computer?

    These are your “arguments?” The weakest of tea.

  111. 111.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    Should I count up for you the number of presidents that never used a computer?

    These are your “arguments?” The weakest of tea.

    My condolences that your candidate of choice hasn’t mastered the technology of the 20th century, much less the 21st.

  113. 113.

    piratedan

    @Bailey: so… we’re gonna take the total number of presidents… and then determine what was officially the first computer (Univac?) or are we going to draw the line at the first IBM home computer? The Mac?

  115. 115.

    Morzer

    @piratedan:

    The problem with hiding the transcripts is that you effectively confirm people’s suspicions that there must be “something there” while unleashing the worst side of their guesses as to what it might be. At the same time, you give yourself no defense or rebuttal because you’ve removed whatever evidence might have spoken for you from the public domain. Sure, if you had released the transcripts, there would have been lines that were parsed or distorted – but you could at least have responded. Now, there’s no way to prove that Clinton didn’t, for example, endorse debt-slavery and enforced prostitution to repay student loans etc etc. If you do turn around and release the transcripts now, you’ll look weak and be accused of doctoring/editing/omitting/fabricating etc etc. The smart call was to get out ahead of the pack a year or more ago when nobody would have cared or remembered, but instead Clinton went with paranoia and secrecy and made herself look worse than she had to.

  116. 116.

    Cacti

    @Bailey:

    You seem rather ageist. Amongst your other notable charms.

    No lil’ Bernfeeler, it was you who said 74 is too old to know how to use computers.

    I guess on the nuclear launch console for President Bernie, they could put a special sticker that said “Push here to make the boom booms”.

  118. 118.

    Morzer

    @Bailey:

    I miss the good old days when we used to argue about whether FDR’s inability to handle the Jacquard loom disqualified him from the presidency.

  120. 120.

    NR

    @Cacti: This is pretty hilarious coming from someone who supports a candidate who said “What, you mean like, with a cloth?” after she was asked if she wiped her email server.

  121. 121.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @Morzer: The problem is that you’ve reached the point of arguing that not releasing the transcripts is bad because of inferences that other people might draw. What’s missing there is any accusation, let alone evidence, that there was anything actually wrong. It’s just the perceptions that bother you.

    At this point, Hillary Clinton knows a lot more than you or I do about how actions are going to be perceived and what mischief people will get up to if given a hard copy rather than speculation about what’s in the transcripts. Given her history, I find it amazing that you still don’t get the way that her enemies will misleadingly quote her and make bogus arguments from those transcripts.

    The political error here was giving the speeches in the first place. That was a mistake, but, again, absent some sort of evidence as to how they represent actual corruption rather than being dumb, it’s not one I care that much about. That mistake is in the past, and, given that she made it, I think the decision not to release the transcripts is perfectly defensible.

  122. 122.

    piratedan

    @Morzer: agree Morzer, you can consider it an own goal… but I don’t think I’m alone in my Hillary scandal fatigue. It’s not as if we’re not seeing the same fucking playbook trotted out against her that was used by the GOP with Obama. Say a bunch of shit, take something completely out of context, hammer it endlessly and hope that there’s something there. When there isn’t, retract nothing and rinse and repeat at the next opportunity.

    At this point, I’m waiting for the video where she orders her young sith apprentice to behead Vince Foster to keep her secrets before I worry about anything tone deaf or inopportune about Hillary. Not when we got the GOP playing out a version of Idiotcracy or The Handmaids Tale ongoing.

  123. 123.

    Bailey

    @Cat48:

    Hillary hasn’t stopped running for President. Arguably she started in 2000 and hasn’t stopped yet.

    Let’s not hide behind the poor private citizen defense. She took an insane amount of money from the most significant player in the financial crisis after taxpayers spent billions in bailout. The fact that she made horrible decisions during the 10 minutes she wasn’t officially holding office doesn’t excuse her.

    So question: is this a better request to answer now in the primaries or when Trump is her main rival, knowing how anti-bailout his supporters are?

    I agree with the poster above that HRC’s political instincts are awful and all hopes for a dem winning is that the GOP nominate someone only marginally worse than Atilla the Hun.

  124. 124.

    Cacti

    @NR:

    My groupie has arrived!

    I’m flattered that you’d throw your panties at me. But that Bern you talk about feeling is really a turnoff.

    You should probably see about some antibiotics.

  125. 125.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @NR: The problem is that, at this point, if Sanders’ excuse is true and he genuinely wants to release the tax returns, it means that he also doesn’t have anyone on his staff who understands computers well enough to print something off of Turbo Tax. Sanders himself not being able to use computers, or not knowing the terminology as Clinton didn’t, isn’t a problem; not employing anyone who does is a problem. Or, it would be, if I thought that was really the case. More likely, he’s stalling on releasing the returns and his stated excuse is bullshit.

    As I said before, for me this is largely a non-issue, but anyone who does care about whether or not candidates release their tax returns should be really damned skeptical of Sanders’ statements on the matter.

  126. 126.

    NR

    @Bailey: Hillary Clinton is the worst presidential candidate from a major party at least since Mondale, possibly since McGovern.

    Literally her only hope of winning is if her opponent makes a deeper crater than she does when they both crash and burn. That’s a pretty scary situation for the Democratic party, and the country, to be in.

  128. 128.

    Morzer

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    If you think perceptions don’t matter in politics, I have some very intriguing bridge-shaped material available at an astoundingly, yuugely wonderful price. I’d point out that the wisdom of HRC in this area has led to alarmingly high unfavorables and a wide-spread perception that she is a serial liar. Unfair? Sure – but not exactly an advertisement for her tactical brilliance in handling such matters.

    I would also remind you that she was gratuitously secretive before the scandal machine really got going – which was one of the big reasons why her health reform plan went down in flames. Lots of meetings behind closed doors, failure to get key Democrats to buy in and no sort of effective push-back against the wild rumors that proliferated. On that occasion also, she chose… poorly.

  129. 129.

    Cacti

    @NR:

    Gonorrhea is a very treatable condition, but if you let it go, it can lead to serious complications.

    I hope you get the medical attention you need.

  130. 130.

    David M

    The focus on the Goldman Sachs speeches is kind of absurd, given that she gave a lot of other speeches. Giving them only to GS would be newsworthy, but if they are just one among many, so what? Same with the fees. Unless she charged GS a different rate than the other companies, what’s the big deal?

  132. 132.

    Morzer

    @piratedan:

    I agree. I’ve been sick of Clinton scandal-like materials for a very long time, but I really do believe that she’s often her own worst enemy in these matters. Still, on we go, with a hope-like concept in our hearts and a fervent prayer to a non-existent divine entity that the GOP remains obviously deranged in the most public way possible.

    I’d be happier if our two choices weren’t 10 years behind and 10 years ahead of their time respectively, but so it goes.

  133. 133.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @Morzer: If you want to argue that this is a personality trait that is a liability while campaigning, I’ll agree with that. I happen to think that it’s counterbalanced by a number of very positive things that make Clinton a much better candidate than first appearances make it seem. But, yes, it’s a negative.

    This particular tempest in a teapot, though, isn’t an especially damaging instance of that character trait. The consequential difference between releasing them and not releasing them is probably pretty small, even if what is in the transcripts is innocent when evaluated in the full context, which they absolutely wouldn’t be.

  134. 134.

    Morzer

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    I think Clinton might well be a decent president, but I am not convinced by her as a politician and I have trouble seeing her doing anything for the future of the Democratic party. I really do fear for the future when I consider how palsied and ineffectual the party has become in too many states, especially when I see clueless cronies like Wasserman Schultz in key positions.

    On the slightly brighter side, the elections went well here in Korea and it looks as if the reigning conservative party has lost the majority it held for 16 years, largely because the economy sucks and young voters actually turned out to express their feelings. (Youth unemployment is at 12.5%, which is apparently a record).

  135. 135.

    Cat48

    @Bailey:
    It’s just a fact she was a private citizen. Neither of them look very good right now. Sick of the primaries!

  136. 136.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @Morzer: For a variety of reasons, I think we’re in the middle of a period when political parties are pretty likely to struggle to hold together and have coherence. The problems are systemic, and the identities of the people running are symptoms rather than causes. And, to be honest, long term I’d rather have our problems than the Republican problems.

  137. 137.

    Morzer

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    I prefer our side of the equation, but I am extremely worried by the various ways in which the GOP has gamed the system, coupled with our failure to organize effectively in response. I don’t believe that the Clintons will do much, if anything, to rebuild the party at the state/local level and I fear that in choosing the candidate who is behind the times we may lose the younger voters that we should be bringing into our coalition. I hope I am wrong about this, but I look at some of the possible future presidential candidates on our side and feel distinctly underwhelmed.

  138. 138.

    Bailey

    @Morzer:

    Agreed. And I can’t think of a more condescending message to send to the largest generation of voters that are, to date, lining up on the Dem side: “Just realize Hillary is so pragmatic.” That is sure to keep them engaged.

  139. 139.

    EconWatcher

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    You know, I was a litigator for two decades, but no matter how much law I had on my side, I never managed to settle for 100 cents on the dollar of my clients’ claims. And the U.S. government had a lot of leverage in negotiating with GS, no matter what law GS might cite, because the timing of agreement to pay was critical to GS’s survival, based on accounting standards. As you know, U.S. GAAP does not recognize contingent assets.

    So the agreement to pay GS 100 cents on the dollar seems pretty inexplicable–unless you factor in that the deal was largely negotiated between the immediately preceding Chair of GS, who was then Treasury Secretary, and the current Chair of GS. Then it gets pretty clear, doesn’t it?

    Dude, you’re a smart guy–I enjoy your comments on this blog. Let me suggest something respectfully: If you find yourself having to defend the AIG bailout as all straight and above-board in order to help defend Clinton’s conduct, that might suggest that there was something amiss in Clinton’s conduct. Of course, she was not responsible for the bailout. But GS should have been treated as a pariah after that, and she sure as hell should have understood that.

  140. 140.

    Darkrose

    @Bailey: Except I said, repeatedly, that I don’t give a shit about the deadline. My only issue is that the stated reason–that Jane Sanders can’t retrieve past tax data from Turbo Tax–seems like an excuse, given that printing returns from Turbo Tax is not quite easy, especially if you’ve gone through the process to actually complete your return in Turbo Tax. At least come up with a better excuse than “the computer ate my homework.”

  141. 141.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @EconWatcher: You have a lot of things wrong. For one, those weren’t contingent assets; Goldman had collected collateral from AIG over the course of 2007 and 2008, and it had insurance on the deals from other banks, making them a secured creditor. That collateral might not have been as valuable as they hoped, and there might have been problems collecting the other insurance, but from an accounting perspective, Goldman wasn’t under the sort of time pressure you claim.

    The government, on the other hand, was. Simply letting AIG enter bankruptcy wasn’t an option. Aside from the problem of insurance policies, an AIG default would have triggered a lot of other CDS contracts, pulling more banks into the abyss. Goldman had the collateral, and the power to push AIG into insolvency. They held all the cards.

    As for Clinton’s speeches, I just don’t see them in the same light that you do. It was dumb to do so, but not especially egregious. Frankly, other than the perceptions that other people have, I largely consider them a non-issue. Largely, I find the entire speechmaking industry inexplicable and unseemly, but we as a society seem to have decided that it’s okay to charge people for telling them boring pablum. And, like it or not, it’s just not possible to turn the whole banking industry into pariahs, and that’s what you’re asking for.

  143. 143.

    EconWatcher

    @Tissue Thin Pseudonym:

    Neil Barofsky, Inspector General for the TARP, disagrees with you about Goldman’s leverage, and about the necessity and propriety of the 100 cents on the dollar deal. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/17/business/17aig.html?_r=0

    One of the other AIG counterparties–UBS–actually volunteered to take a modest haircut, and Goldman used its political power to get the government to reject that, because of course it would have made the deal to give Goldman 100 cents on the dollar politically and practically impossible.

    Defending the AIG bailout at 100 cents on the dollar is pretty much on par with saying the Iraq War was a good idea. There are people still saying it, but I’m surprised to hear it on this blog.

    On the other hand, Hillary accepted those speaking fees way back in 2013, when she was a callow youth of 65, and we’re constantly told that she learns from her mistakes. So I’m sure it does not reflect on her judgment.

  144. 144.

    Morzer

    @StellaB:

    To be precise, it’s an event at the Clinton Global Initiative forum, hosted by Goldman Sachs. Whether that makes it one of the paid speeches Clinton gave is harder to determine. Nor is there any indication of whether her speech is typical of the ones given at those paid events. I am guessing not, since the speech you found is specifically part of a series devoted to encouraging women and girls in business.

  146. 146.

    Morzer

    @EconWatcher:

    If HRC was a callow youth in 2013, I think we can safely say that the Clintons were far, far ahead of the curve when it came to gay marriage.

  147. 147.

    Tissue Thin Pseudonym

    @EconWatcher: I guess we’ll just have to disagree, because I differ with your version of events is evident. Even that NYT article you link is a lot more equivocal than you say it is, especially with regards to the involvement of French bank regulators and the role they played in the negotiations.

  149. 149.

    Aimai

    @Morzer: why would you guess not? Paid speakers are actually hired primarily to repeat their greatest hits in front of an audience that wants to hear them. Even the accusations that the speeches were essentially bribes dont require that clinton have said anything other than bland pap. You know who got in trouble for stuff said in private on the dem side? Obama for his. Perfectly reasonable remark about “bitter clingers.” I am so over bernie and his friends trying to bern down the house when its full of people who will get hurt.

  150. 150.

    Morzer

    @EconWatcher:

    “A youth” generally means “a male below the age of adulthood”. Callow isn’t gendered explicitly, but does seem to be applied to young men more often than to women.

    I do, however, think you might be taking my jest a little too seriously.

  151. 151.

    StellaB

    @Morzer: There you go! There’s no way that HRC can get this right. Any transcript released won’t be “the real transcript”, there will always be another speech that hasn’t been released, words will be scrutinized for hidden meaning, quotes will be constructed from sentence fragments. There’s no particular upside to releasing transcripts.

    She’s given speeches witha similar theme to numerous groups. My guess is that she doesn’t write a brand new speech for each event. Who would?

  152. 152.

    StellaB

    And why he heck won’t she admit that she murdered Vince Foster and Kathleen Willey’s cat too?

  154. 154.

    Aimai

    @Bailey: what are you talking about? The clintons have released their taxes for years. In a timely and complete manner. Why doesnt bernie release the transcripts and communicatiins he has had with cuba? Or the sandenistas? Or the NRA? Or Hamas? Christ clinton and the press have gone easy on him.

  155. 155.

    Morzer

    @Aimai:

    I would guess that it wasn’t typical of the paid speeches because, as I noted, it was on a specific topic and in a specific Clinton Foundation Forum. If you have evidence that it was typical, by all means present it, but until you do I would say this is a different style (and focus) of speech to the typical ra-ra speech that you get at Wall Street events.

    I’ve already said that I think Clinton has handled the issue of these speeches poorly and that the content was probably fairly innocuous but at variance with her recent reinvention as an economic progressive. Ranting at Bernie and his supporters (or me) about burning the house down isn’t going to improve the quality of Clinton’s judgment on this issue. Politics ain’t beanbag and HRC’s taken some pretty questionable shots of her own at Bernie, just as she did at Obama in 2008. So it goes.

  156. 156.

    Morzer

    @StellaB:

    If you think HRC actually writes her own speeches, I can only marvel at your fresh-faced innocence and try to preserve it in amber for future generations. I imagine that her speech-writer(s) would have come up with something different simply because this is a specific event as part of a dedicated series, so HRC wouldn’t want to simply trot out the usual platitudes about free enterprise and the American way etc etc. It might be that the paid speeches to Wall St companies were all pretty generic and similar, but I really doubt that they all regurgitated the same modest content about women and girls in business that was deployed for this event.

  157. 157.

    Bailey

    @Aimai:

    Pretty simple. When HRC ran in 2008 she was not forthcoming about releasing her taxes. Obama dogged her on this. HRC even stated that she may not release them at all unless she was the nominee. She did not release the until about this time of year in 2008. All this to say, that Bernie is hardly delinquent in releasing his tax information and HRC no paragon of virtue on the matter.

    http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/04/04/clinton-releases-tax-returns/

    CNN begs to differ from your own recollections on HRC’s willingness to release timely information.

  159. 159.

    PsiFighter37

    @mclaren: Your comment proves how little the types that screech against finance know. There is no such thing as a ‘hedge fund trader at Goldman Sachs’. That’s like a goddamn unicorn – it simply doesn’t exist.

  160. 160.

    Percysowner

    @Bailey: The thing is, if someone is too computer illiterate to print out their tax returns from Turbo Tax, then they are too computer illiterate to use Turbo Tax for their returns. If they can’t figure out a simple File->Print, then who knows what mistakes they made with the other parts of the program. They used Turbo Tax because they AREN’T computer illiterate.

  161. 161.

    sherparick

    @mclaren: Apparently you were asleep during civics class and switched the channel when “School House Rock” showed “Just A Bill.” http://www.schoolhouserock.tv/Bill.html

    Raising the minimum wage is something a President can propose, but only Congress can make the change in the law. I am sure Bernie will uses his special Green Lantern powers to cause Speaker Paul “Ayn Rand” Ryan and the Tea Party Republican majority in the House to pass it along with single payer to replace that “terrible Affordable Care Act,” which both Bernie and Paul Ryan detest. Yes that is the ticket, Obama and Hilary just don’t have the “will” to force these Republicans to like Darrell Issa, Marsha Blackburn, Louis Gohmert, Jason Chaffetz, etc. etc. to enact the “revolution” rather then spend their time proposing cuts in Social Security, block granting Medicaid, privatizing Medicare, and block granting food stamps to the tender mercies of the Paul LePage and Scott Walkers of the states. Bernie will do this by getting all the Bernie bros and sisters to yell really loud at them.

    And if some miracle a bill gets through the house, it will face Mr. Obstruction, i.e. Senator McConnell and the Senate filibuster, the now constant requirement to get 60 votes to get any law not pleasing to Republicans and hard right of the talk shows and Heritage Foundation through the Senate.

    I see at least one or two questions on climate and environment were allowed in by the CNN panel. And HRC had to raise question about reproductive rights herself. The Village Media certainly does not want to discomfort its advertisers.

  162. 162.

    seejanerun

    @Cacti: In general, Sanders’ supporters give him credit for saying he’ll do something as if he had actually done it.

  164. 164.

    Bobby Thomson

    @Bailey: 2008 Clinton was a shitty candidate and I not only didn’t vote for her, I loathed her. Sanders is fitting those shoes perfectly.

  165. 165.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Morzer: Jesus Christ already. Clinton was on a speaking TOUR. You can find the schedule. She’s making those speeches days apart from one another. Do you think she’s coming up with custom-tailored content for every appearance? What kinds of sordid obsequious things do you think she told the deli and bakery association and the camping association and so forth?

    @seejanerun:

    In general, Sanders’ supporters give him credit for saying he’ll do something as if he had actually done it.

    In general, Sanders’s supporters think if he’s ever been wrong it was only ever for the best intentions because of his purity of heart. So over it. So very over it. He’s a dick and he should go away.

  166. 166.

    Morzer

    @FlipYrWhig:

    You do realize that I was arguing that the speech in question WAS NOT TYPICAL OF THE PAID SPEECHES TO WALL STREET? If you are going to rage at me incoherently, please don’t do it when we are actually in agreement on the key point. Still, just to make that point clearer, I will repeat that I suspect that what Clinton said was pretty innocuous in itself, but embarrassingly hard to make consistent with her recent reinvention of herself as HRC TRUE AND PRAGMATIC ONCE AND FUTURE PROGRESSIVE!!! We find the defendant HR Clinton guilty of gratuitous tactical ineptitude, but not of egregious counter-revolutionary activity. Happy now?

  167. 167.

    NCSteve

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yeah, that’s what all of the Obama supporters, me included, said about her tax returns in 2008. And she just sandbagged us until our speculation was insanely over the top and then she released them and they were all “meh.”

  168. 168.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Morzer:

    You do realize that I was arguing that the speech in question WAS NOT TYPICAL OF THE PAID SPEECHES TO WALL STREET?

    Why should you, or we, presume that there is something called THE PAID SPEECHES TO WALL STREET that is any different from the paid speeches to sundry organizations and associations and trade groups that were the bulk of the list, being as the speeches in toto took place at regular intervals and for a standard fee? The whole premise is ridiculous.

    ETA: Giving her the least benefit of the doubt, I suppose one could criticize her for taking any money at all from Wall Street. But the fact that OMG SHE TALKED TO WALL STREET is taking place at the exact same time as she’s talking to camping groups and women’s groups and universities as well leads me to believe that the content is standard content.

  169. 169.

    TylerF

    @bailey This isn’t hard. Sanders is running based on his honesty and integrity. His hedging on releasing his tax returns, including his truly bizarre reason why he hasn’t, directly undermines the foundations of his campaign. It is a much bigger deal that he hasn’t released his returns.

  170. 170.

    Jeffro

    I watched last night and you know, whatever. As a practical matter, these two are about 98% aligned on the issues.

    It’s unfortunate that for all practical purposes, for both of them, this is their last shot at the brass ring…neither one of them is going to ramp down until that last vote is counted at the convention, I’m sure.

    Having said that…one of them has a path to the nomination, and the other does not.

  171. 171.

    Morzer

    @FlipYrWhig:
    Because people tend to give different speeches to different groups?

    How this fairly well-known fact escaped you is hard to imagine, but sure, let’s all agree that obviously speaking to the Assembled Milkmaids of Delaware requires precisely the same speech and themes as an address to The Veterans Of Milwaukee or, for that matter, the Confederation Of Hedge Funders And Associated Vultures. Why shouldn’t we all ramble off into fantasy land together.

    “Noble churners of butter, I stand before you today in this charming rustic setting….” What could be a better way to address the capitalists of Wall Street? And how it would delight the hearts of the sturdy vendors of motor vehicles in Chicago! Imagine the delight experienced by the Teachers of the Bronx when they learn that their labors in preserving the quality of cream cheese through diligent churning had not passed unnoticed!

    One speech to thrill them all, one speech to find them, one speech to bring them all and in the conference hall bind them…….

  173. 173.

    Calouste

    @Bailey: Definitive deadline for tax returns? What about before the first vote is cast, or in other words about 2 and a half months ago.

    You can go to the IRS website and right on the front page there is a link where you can ask the IRS to send you the tax returns they have on file from you. They’ll send the last three years to you in 5-10 days. There is no excuse to not do that within a few weeks after starting the campaign. Any other action means you’re hiding something, you’re incompetent, or you think you are too good for that.

    Besides of course, Sanders and his wife have been lying multiple times about their tax returns.

  174. 174.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Morzer: Not if you’re giving a speech for a standard fee every few days for months in a row. The people who signed you bought the package.

    “Hello, members of [GROUP], it’s such a pleasure to be in [CITY] with you. I’ve had a great time today [DOING ACTIVITY | SEEING LANDMARK | EATING FOOD]. I’d especially like to thank [CONTACT PERSON] and [FRIEND], who I’ve known for [UNIT OF TIME], for putting this together. They do great work, don’t they? Now I’d like to say a few words about [LIFE | CHALLENGES | OPPORTUNITIES | CURRENT EVENTS]. When I was [A CHILD | IN COLLEGE | IN LAW SCHOOL | FIRST LADY | SENATOR | PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE | SECRETARY OF STATE], I had to deal with…”

  175. 175.

    gvg

    I think the transcript doesn’t exist so Hillary can’t produce it. A transcript is transcribed by someone very fast who was there, or from a recording. I don’t think at the time this routine speech was considered important enough for someone ti bother doing that. Hillary may have speech notes of what she planned to say, and I think that is what people expect, however most good paid speakers ad lib a little and react to the audience so the plan notes might not be perfect. Then someone who was there can say that isn’t what I remember…and they may be correct or they may be misremembering since it’s been years and no way to prove who is right because no video or transcript! In addition Hillary was apparently giving similar speeches over and over, I think it’s possible that she and her staff just edited the speech a little for currentness over and over and may not have saved a specific copy of each speech plan. Even a transcript can be doubted so unless there actually is video of each speech I don’t think it can be settled to most people’s satisfaction what was said.
    The media has been acting like they hate the Clinton’s for decades and blow up the most innocuous stuff into big deals but even they don’t really blow everything up, there isn’t time. As far as I can tell it’s kind of random what they will fixate on and mostly impossible for the Clinton’s (or other democrats too) to really guard against every possible future attack. This is a time waster trap.
    I am kind of irritated with Sanders not releasing several years of past tax returns the day he started running. He should have known it would come up and he knew he was running against Hillary who has the past 30 years continous returns out there. I might not have been so determined to see them if I wasn’t still mad that we never did see Romney’s after decades of it being normal and now the GOP candidates are doing the same thing. I still want to see Romney’s some day. I am sure he is hiding something big. Bernie I don’t know about. I don’t approve of his looking clueless or disorganized but it also makes it harder for us to put pressure on the GOP candidates and I am sure every one of them is hiding lots.

  176. 176.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Calouste: Calouste, you’re forgetting something. Bernie is disheveled and has an distinctive speech pattern! That how you can tell he’s honest!

  177. 177.

    JasonF

    The micro reason Hilary hasn’t released the transcripts is because anything less than “You fuckers are evil and all deserve to die” will be taken out of context and used to portray Hilary as being in the pocket of Wall Street.

    The macro reason is because you don’t jump every time your opponent comes up with a new reason to ask you to jump. It’s the same reason Obama didn’t release his birth certificate until after the primary, and didn’t release his so-called long form until well into his presidency.

  178. 178.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Bailey: It’s not as if anyone is actually forcing her to run for President. She can be sneaky and guarded and have all the private servers in her house that she wants and give speeches to the most reckless of financial institutions and be a private citizen.

    But you didn’t care about the speeches till tonight, right? You’ve sure got your talking points down for a recent convert.

    @Bailey: To date, I haven’t really cared much about the transcripts of Hillary’s speeches, but the fierce way in which she’s protecting them — and making weird conditions that Republican candidates also must release their transcripts — seriously makes me wonder what her comments entailed.

  179. 179.

    randy khan

    I’ve said these two things about the HRC speeches before, but they bear repeating:

    1. Don’t assume there are transcripts. There’s no particular reason why there would have been transcripts – they weren’t hearings.

    2. One reason HRC is pushing back is that she doesn’t want to release all of her speeches. Once she releases one, she’s probably going to having to release them all.

    Sanders and the taxes is a pure unforced error. The explanations for the delays are stupid, and it’s not like he hasn’t known he’s going to have to do it. I don’t think it makes any difference in the long run (or even the short run), but for better or worse it does look odd that HRC has released her tax returns back to infinity and he hasn’t.

  180. 180.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @JasonF:

    There was a whole chorus raised for the release of Obama’s college transcripts. Romney got away with hiding his taxes (remember when he wasn’t actually technically the CEO of Bain even though he had signed as CEO? or was, but didn’t know anything?), now Trump are getting away with not just taxes, but look at Trump’s financial and personal history, and Cruz’s extreme rhetoric and oh yeah, his 5 mistresses. That story got stuffed down the memory hole the day after it appeared. There are just double standards for white men and everyone else. If I were Hillary, I’d dig in too.

  181. 181.

    Barbara

    It’s depressing that reproductive rights didn’t come up until now, but I think Hillary (and any other like minded politician!) should sound the alarm about the threats to reproductive rights, like access to contraception, occurring at the same time we are seeing the emerging threat of Zika, which causes birth defects, making it pretty obvious why contraception and reproductive freedom are really important issues for the health of women and children. Even the Pope is starting to wobble.

  182. 182.

    negative 1

    @redshirt: Because it strongly implies a conflict of interest, and that perception is loathe to go away when she ‘doesn’t want to talk about it’. Saying ‘I too think banks are bad’ doesn’t make that conflict go away.

    The problem IMHO is that Hillary is really good on a lot of issues, but at the end of the day there are plenty (read young) Dem voters who are essentially single issue voters, and that issue is capitalism, which Bernie has a massive advantage on. I think most pundits dance around this issue as well, as the thrust of most pro-Hillary punditing is that Sanders doesn’t care about issues A, B, and C and why can’t the young people care about something other than a rigged economic system?

  183. 183.

    Gelfling545

    @Bailey: if you were a foormes SoS you’d get offered millions, too . You don’t get this type of speaker for a free chicken dinner & return bus fare. Also, you’re really ok with Sanders releasing his tax returns after the majority of primaries have been held? You think it’s wrong of her to insist that the GOP candidates be held to a similar standard when you know that if she said “Good Morning” at the start of a speech it will be turned into an attack somehow? Hmmm.

  184. 184.

    Barbara

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne: Basically, if she releases the transcripts not only is she giving in but she is completely losing any control whatsoever of the narrative, and will be forced to respond to all kinds of bad faith insinuations for the next six months.

  185. 185.

    randy khan

    One more thing on the tax returns: I have a paper copy of every tax return I’ve filed for at least the last 20 years because I make a copy before I file and am lousy at throwing things away. At a minimum, even slightly prudent people keep their returns for 3 years after they file them because that’s how far back the IRS usually can go (and you should keep older ones if you have a rental property or depreciation deductions). I find it odd that a sitting U.S. Senator doesn’t have paper copies of recent returns (or PDFs) handy in case he needs them.

  186. 186.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @Barbara:

    How many people were in attendance at these speeches? Hundreds? And not one single person who was there has come forward with anything that would finally put the nail in the coffin of the career of the Witch of Wall Street? Must be a massive conspiracy between GS and the Clinton Foundation to have everyone killed one by one who has tried to step forward and reveal Hillary and Lloyd’s master plan to finally finish the middle class off once and for all.

  187. 187.

    Barbara

    @negative 1: negative1, I actually don’t know many young voters who hate capitalism so much as they hate that it isn’t currently working out for them. It is my strong hypothesis that a sense of disaffection held by many would vanish once a good job appears. In other words, I am not convinced (not based on evidence) that what we are seeing is an enduring disgust with capitalism on the basis that it creates too many “losers,” but rather, that these are people who were raised with a sense that they would not be among the “losers” and they are pissed. I am actually pissed too, but for a slightly different reason, and that is the fact that our system is artificially creating “winners” by stacking the deck against certain kinds of players. E.g., the whole student loan debacle (which Obama actually did a lot to take away some of the “rents” being conferred on banks through student loans, but more needs to be done). For this, I think Elizabeth Warren is basically the kind of person we need — who can turn a laser eye on the financial industry and look at what kinds of practices need to be prohibited or regulated out of existence.

  188. 188.

    Joel

    @JasonF: Ding ding ding.

    If Clinton releases the speeches, she’ll be cast as weak. And that can be fatal in an election.

  189. 189.

    the Conster, la Citoyenne

    @Barbara:

    I think the zika virus is the thing that will turn out women in great numbers in this election. Like ebola worked against the Dems (because it involved black foreigners), I think the zika virus might be the perfect storm to help Hillary – and she’d be smart to keep mentioning what’s at stake for young women, especially. The Olympics in Brazil this summer is going to raise this as a yuuuuge issue. Yuuuge. Hillary needs to play up her passion as a grandmother and mother to keep women and children safe from these horrible men that not only won’t accept reality, but would consign you to die for their fucked up principles.

  191. 191.

    Barbara

    @randy khan: I think most presidential candidates (and political appointees in need of Senate confirmation) hire someone to look at tax returns to see if there are any red flags. It’s kind of stunning that he would let this issue fester. Maybe they have a hinky home office deduction or it will show income paid to Mrs. Sanders from working as a paid staff member to her husband, and start questions about whether she really should have been paid. Seriously, it’s probably nothing that is outrageous, but it might seem that way if your reason for running is railing against the rent seekers.

  192. 192.

    Barbara

    @the Conster, la Citoyenne: Yes, I had that thought as I read the paper this morning (I still, literally, read “the paper” version of the NYT). Here we have a group of nuns trying pretty obviously to deprive their female employees of access to contraception at the same time that public health authorities in even the most Catholic countries in Latin America are urging women to use effective contraception unless they know they want to become pregnant. This isn’t about spacing your children or the beauty of “natural” family planning, on the one hand, or “late term abortions” for the mental health of the mother, this is about trying to avoid a devastating birth defect that will cause many to seek abortion if they think it exists in a fetus, and it actually threatens to swamp the narrative.

  193. 193.

    Captain C

    @Anne Laurie:

    Most common assumption, though, is that they have a bigger nest egg socked away than befits Bernie’s poor-little-socialist image…

    I suspect that it’s also because it would reveal that their yearly income puts them in the top 1% of earners. Bernie’s Senate salary alone would put them in the top 2%; it would only take a little more to put them over the threshold. I noticed him specifically going after the top “tenth of one percent” rather than the “1%” in the debate at least once.

  194. 194.

    different-church-lady

    @FlipYrWhig: How does one give a speech to a street anyway? Do you, like, go down to the bull statue with megaphone and start shouting at the pavement?

  195. 195.

    different-church-lady

    As far as Schedule C is concerned, does “Cooking and Eating Kittens” get deducted under meals, or entertainment?

  197. 197.

    Barbara

    @cleek: $200,000 severance for someone with a salary of $160K begs for an explanation. It’s definitely not the norm for the little people. And I’m not inclined to harass them on this issue, but it does highlight that they are the recipients of the kind of “high class welfare” that contributes to outcomes that seem unfair, and unfairly biased towards people with money and influence.

  198. 198.

    chopper

    @BR:

    Yeah, I can see the sense in a state by state minimum wage, but it should probably be mandated federally based on cost of living

    this is much smarter and more effective. federal wages are already heavy on locality pay. but when all you really want is to throw out simplistic policy with no thought of follow through, you don’t worry about those sort of details.

  199. 199.

    FlipYrWhig

    @negative 1:

    but at the end of the day there are plenty (read young) Dem voters who are essentially single issue voters, and that issue is capitalism, which Bernie has a massive advantage on.

    I really don’t think this is true. Along the lines of what Barbara was saying above, I have the feeling the frustration is something different: it’s that smart white young people in the 21st century feel precarious rather than feeling like kings of the world, and a lot of them like that Bernie Sanders sounds pissed off at the right people. I’m not sure they’d even say “capitalism.” I think resentment at “Wall Street” in those quarters has more to do with the fact that they know people who work in finance are doing well, while comparably smart people who don’t work in finance (because they majored in other things, for instance) have roommates and loan payments and jobs making coffee.

  200. 200.

    Calouste

    @Captain C: Sanders has been in Congress for 25 years. His total salary over that time is between 3 and 4 million dollars. His wife had a similar income during most of that time, so in total they have made at least $6 million in the last 25 years. Plus Sanders is entitled to a Congressional pension which he is not drawing at the moment.

    Sanders is trying to give off an image that he is not rich, talking about having a small car and stuff like that. But that money must have gone somewhere, and his 2014 tax summary shows $11 in interest and $2 in dividends, so it seems they have spend it somehow.

  202. 202.

    cleek

    @Barbara:
    right.

    and if they’ve been making $300K-ish (give or take, adjusted for inflation, etc) for several decades, they must have quite a tidy pile stashed somewhere. or, they’ve quietly given a ton away to charity. or, they’re the world’s worst investors.

    either way… he’s running a campaign based, at least in part, on a notion that large amounts of money are inherently immoral. and i want to know if he’s a hypocrite.

  203. 203.

    gwangung

    @Morzer:

    Because people tend to give different speeches to different groups?

    Not really. They tend to come from a set of prepared texts, customized with a few paragraphs. There’s not only the writing of speeches, but the delivery of them, too.

    How much public speechifying have you done?

  204. 204.

    Davis X. Machina

    This just illustrates the futility of the Democrats having adopted a virtue-takes-all primary process….

  205. 205.

    Barbara

    @cleek: I hate the idea of reinforcing this narrative by demonizing him for having been well-paid. I suppose he could have given it away (and maybe he did, or at least more than most people) but still, I don’t think this narrative helps anyone. Of course, he’s the one who has been feeding it for the last 8 months, but that is one reason I have found it hard to support him and I would like the response to be more like, “of course he was well-paid, as is every other Senator, what did you think?” without casting further aspersions. And maybe point out that Sarandon and Dawson and the other celebrities supporting Sanders don’t have the self-awareness to understand how unfair and ridiculous this whole narrative actually is. Presumably, the view is something like “other people making money is outrageous, but supporting Sanders makes my millions in the bank totally pure.”

  206. 206.

    TylerF

    @cleek Couldn’t agree more. He’s running as the integrity & honesty champion of the little guy. He should have been the first candidate to release his taxes. That he wasn’t and hasn’t indicates he thinks there is something damaging in them. If his returns show him to be less honest or humble then he has led his supporters to believe, it could be catistrophic for his campaign.

  207. 207.

    starscream

    She should ask Sanders to release his Martha’s Vineyard speeches to big fundraisers.

  210. 210.

    chopper

    so jane sanders knows her way around turbotax enough to do her family’s taxes, but can’t figure out how to click the link to download previous returns? and in spite of having a staff she can delegate such a 5 minute job to, she just can’t do it?

    it’s pretty horseshit. if you don’t want to release your returns, just say so. at least romney was up front about it.

  211. 211.

    Bailey

    @Calouste:

    Before any vote has been cast? You mean, some arbitrary deadline that you yourself came up with that no other candidate has ever been held to? Okay, that seems reasonable.

  212. 212.

    Bailey

    @Princess:

    Okay, so you’re saying Clinton’s responses last night to the question was….entirely normal? Rational? And given that she’s in the past said she’d look about releasing them and yet still hasn’t? Again, that was a normal response?

  213. 213.

    chopper

    @JasonF:

    he macro reason is because you don’t jump every time your opponent comes up with a new reason to ask you to jump. It’s the same reason Obama didn’t release his birth certificate until after the primary, and didn’t release his so-called long form until well into his presidency.

    and why when they kept coming and asked for his college transcripts he told them to fuck off.

  214. 214.

    Bailey

    @Gelfling545:

    It’s pretty consistent with when all other candidates have ever released their tax returns, so sure. Why should I hold him to a different standard?

  215. 215.

    randy khan

    @gwangung:

    @Morzer:

    Because people tend to give different speeches to different groups?

    Not really. They tend to come from a set of prepared texts, customized with a few paragraphs. There’s not only the writing of speeches, but the delivery of them, too.

    How much public speechifying have you done?

    Exactly.

    I have a friend in the business, and I know from talking to her how hard it is to get her speakers to do different speeches for different groups. If the speech is going to be different, it has to be something the speaker actually wants to talk about or pay a lot more money than the speaker usually gets.

  216. 216.

    chopper

    @TylerF:

    i don’t even go as far as that. i just don’t understand the lame-ass excuse they’re giving that they can’t figure out fucking turbotax. when they know how to use the fucking software because she uses it for their fucking taxes!

    it makes literally no sense at all. as far as political excuses go it’s complete shit and horribly thought out; it implies they’re either complete morons, completely incompetent (FFS, delegate it to someone!), or lying through their teeth.

    i hope there’s an honest excuse for it but for the life of me i can’t figure out why she went on tv and fucking said that.

  217. 217.

    feebog

    I am so freaking tired of the transcript issue. One, as pointed out upthread, what transcripts? Who supposedly recorded these speeches and then transcribed them? HRC certainly didn’t. Has anyone thought to go to GS and actually determine if there are in fact transcripts? Two, even if GS did record and then transcribe them, what legal obligation do they have to make them public? And regardless of what HRC may or may not have said in those speeches, what politician in their right mind willingly gives up anything like a transcript of a speech that might be cherry picked and then used against her in a general election?

  222. 222.

    Paul in KY

    @Barbara: We shouldn’t give a shit if our nominee is ‘rich’. They all are rich to one extent or another. Our greatest Democrat rode around in a private rail car.

    When it is apparent you are rich, you need to use that to your advantage. Pres. Roosevelt did that. LBJ did too.

  223. 223.

    Morzer

    @randy khan:

    I’ve been both sides of the divide, as a speaker and as the “content-preparer”. But perhaps I and my clients had/have higher standards in this matter. Either way, if the speeches are innocuous, Clinton is an idiot for not releasing them a year ago and making it a non-issue.

    One good reason to think that their content must be significantly different to the one speech that is on Youtube is that there would be no reason to hide the transcripts if the one and only infinitely looped speech was already out there.

  224. 224.

    J R in WV

    @mclaren:

    Faux News didn’t just “cherry-pick” to pervert the truth about minimum wage increases, they lied like a rug, as usual. They’re known to show Republican dignitaries as “D” when they get arrested, for example.

    You’re smart, you know this already.

  225. 225.

    Bailey

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Not sure your insinuation here. You may need talking points to get through life but I sure as hell don’t.

    But no, I hadn’t even watched a debate until last night. HRC absolutely piqued my interest given her strange decision to ignore the question of releasing her transcripts entirely.

    And since I don’t live under a rock, nor am retarded, I’m well aware that the private server she installed in her own house was a completely bone headed decision that no one to date has provided a rational reason for. Perhaps you can explain?

  227. 227.

    different-church-lady

    @Calouste:

    Sanders is trying to give off an image that he is not rich

    Comparatively, he isn’t rich. But if he hadn’t spent so much time pushing the idea that money is dirty, he might not be in this (hypothetical) corner right now.

  228. 228.

    different-church-lady

    @TylerF:

    That he wasn’t and hasn’t indicates he thinks there is something damaging in them.

    Or he’s just pissed off that anyone would dare to ask for them.

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