South Carolina: One Mound of Dung Too Far
That's was a pretty big-sized can of whup-ass that got opened up in South Carolina Saturday night. The Billary campaign's gonna have a lot of thinking to do in the next few days. First on the agenda, when it comes to Big Dawg: Use' em? Or Lose 'em? Here are my thoughts.
January 27th, 2008 at 2:38 am
That’s creepy. It looks like Two-Face from Batman. Hillary’s is the deformed half of his face, what with the giant eye, poofier hair, and bigger smile.
January 27th, 2008 at 5:38 am
Almost as bad as Chelsea.
January 27th, 2008 at 7:13 am
As a republican I love it. Hillary is imploding and needs a major overhaul…but Bill will hurt that effort. Obama, although a nice guy and good candidate, has little experience, bad policies, and hates corporate America. How could a republican lose this fall? Of course it isn’t easy but the once proud democrats who assumed a walk in the park for the next election are eating each other up. Good stuff!!
Mike
http://mtaricani.blogspot.com/
January 27th, 2008 at 10:18 am
As Obama continues to win and the Clinton’s become more desperate, the Secret Service needs to double Obama’s protection.
Ron Brown’s Funeral
January 27th, 2008 at 12:38 pm
Perhaps Hillary and Obama in a Duet will solve the problems for Dems (NSFW)
January 27th, 2008 at 4:01 pm
I would have liked to have heard the conversation from Clinton to Kennedy.
January 27th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
When Hillary gets the nomination, all of these people who watched her snatch the nomination from Obama through underhanded tactics will still support her. This is what is wrong with American democracy.
Truth be told, there will probably be a very large portion of Obama suporters who will refuse to vote for Clinton.
At least McCain opposes torture.
January 27th, 2008 at 5:53 pm
I agree. Spot on comments, jc.
January 27th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
Where’s your faith, cummings? Hillary will tell one or two Scary Republican stories and all the Obama people will come crawling back.
January 27th, 2008 at 6:50 pm
Of course I’ll vote for “any Democrat” (other than Lieberman, who’ll probably end up as McCain’s VP) over the GOPers for reasons that are hardly controversial among sane liberals – as opposed to left-wing wackos and nihilists – but if Hillary is the candidate it weakens the party from both directions, internally and externally, because of the utter cynicism on display.
Catch this bit of crap from Bill C (props to him for not referring to “nigras”):
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/01/27/clinton-camp-says-obama-i_n_83451.html
January 27th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
So people who are not normally part of the process and feel included because of Obama and will feel excluded because of his very visible defeat through racist activity – they are “left wing wackos and nihilists”?
Is Hillary on the record opposing torture? I believe there really is NO difference at all between HRC and McCain. McCain is perhaps more personally likable.
January 27th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
The article that reg links is the classic Clinton attack of saying something bad about Obama and then saying that they didn’t mean it or that someone else on their staff said it without their approval. Of course, when they go through their explanations and denials, they make sure to repeat the charge several times within that.
January 27th, 2008 at 7:45 pm
There in fact is little difference at all between McCain and Clinton on a host of issues….trade (both are for sending jobs and capital overseas), war (both pro, and both carefully relegating their criticisms to “how it has been conducted”), crime (both pro-death penalty, both pro-mandatory minimums, both in favor of more cops), health care (both are in favor of keeping it in the private sector),…I could go on and on. About the only difference, as jcummings noted, is torture, in which McCain is actually more enlightened about than Hillary, as he generally opposes it.
January 27th, 2008 at 8:06 pm
“they are ‘left wing wackos and nihilists’?”
If they, in effect, assist the GOP in controlling the government, yeah. Of course. Not worth debating after 2000…
January 27th, 2008 at 8:07 pm
I guess you should dissolve the people and elect a new one.
I guarantee many many many Obama supporters will not vote for Hillary. Call them what you want. And 2000 was a stolen election. Blame Gore.
January 27th, 2008 at 8:09 pm
To wit, Reg…you’re saying Black folks who won’t vote for racists are nihilsts.
January 27th, 2008 at 8:20 pm
Zzzzzzzzzzz….
January 27th, 2008 at 9:52 pm
Claiming that the Clintons, with a single sentence, suddenly turned Obama into “the black candidate” seems almost Orwellian to me (and idiotic for those who actually believe it). How is it racist to point out the obvious truth that Obama has an advantage in a heavily black state?
The truth is, Clinton had to make the point he made. Defeat is a self-fulfilling prophecy. If the public took Hilary’s defeat in SC as a sign of a weakening campaign, it would follow her into super Tuesday. They had to reassure the faithful that there was a reason for her defeat. Being neither stupid nor racists, they were sensitive to the issue, hence Clinton’s immediate qualification that Barack ran an excellent campaign. By the way, can anyone explain to me why Obama’s race didn’t help him in South Carolina, and why the Jackson wins in the eighties aren’t indicative of this?
Someone commented earlier on this thread that the word “racist” has lost all meaning, and boy is that the truth. It’s become an empty epithet whose purpose is to cow and silence the politicaly unorthodox.
January 27th, 2008 at 10:00 pm
Politically unorthodox?
What kind of joke is that. First off, your comment insults the intelligence of Black and other voters in South Carolina, as if they would vote for -any- Black politician. you think Condoleeza Rice and Colin Powell are popular among the Southern Black proletariat?
It is movement qualities that impress Democratic voters – white and Black – outside of the liberal metropolises. Obama is running a campaign genuinely tappign into American social movements, not unlike Lula in Latin America. Like Lula, he’s no Leftist but he is tapping into the Left.
Obama is percieved, as was Jackson, as a – movement- politician. Someone who inspires people to get involved in the process. To simplify that to his race is disturbing. If Clinton happened to mean that South Carolina voters are intelligent and progressive and can’t be manipulated by their racist fear of people with the middle name Hussein, then he was perhaps mroe correct.
I’m not an Obama supporter. I’d vote for him thoguh, in the fall election, were I American and in a swing state (safe state I’d vote for a Left candidate)… It is beyond racist how the Clintons have campaigned, with their insinuations of Islam their deliberate manipulations, etc. Maybe it’ll work among hte Jewish bourgeoisie. I hope not.
January 27th, 2008 at 10:34 pm
I’m not saying that blacks (or members of any racial minority) would vote for someone just because they were a member of the same group. All things being equal, however, being black would tend to give an advantage. This is beyond obvious, and is not an insult to anyone’s intelligence. Do you imagine a Jewish candidate wouldn’t be heavily favored in Jewish areas (probably not as difficult for you to dump on that group of AIPAC-giving tribalists).
January 27th, 2008 at 10:46 pm
Precisely why Bill Clinton is full of his own caculated crap re: SC…from Josh Marshall, a major (former?) fan.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/064892.php
January 28th, 2008 at 12:00 am
And Greenwald…
http://www.salon.com/opinion/greenwald/2008/01/27/clinton/index.html
January 28th, 2008 at 2:03 am
Reg –
Your two articles do everything but invalidate Clinton’s comparison. Josh Marshall:
In 84 and 88 SC was lightly contested and a black candidate won.
In 2008 SC was heavily contested and … a black candidate won.
Where exactly is the syllogism here?
Greenwald takes issue with the comparison on ethical grounds that one should not bring up race in an election, without touching the question of whether and to what extent Obama’s being black actually helped him in SC.
Again, I think it’s the anti-Clinton crowd that’s turning this into a racist issue. Clinton had to explain (spin, whatever you want to call it) this defeat, and pointing out that a black candidate has an advantage in a heavily black state with a history of supporting black candidates – is simply stating facts.
By the way, Gephardt baldly made this same point in the earlier election, and I’m not aware that he was crucified for it.
January 28th, 2008 at 6:10 am
It would be truly a very good thing if Obama would insist on being referred to as a person of mixed race, rather than “black.”
His skin is not even close to black, and his heritage is as much “cauasian” as “negroid.”
He has little in common with most Afro-Americans, since his father was born in raised in Africa.
Surely, he has faced some of the same types of discrimination Afro-Americans face, and on that score, he can claim to be “black.”
But he has also avoided much of the racism the average African-American faces and, there’s that nagging fact that he’s no more African than he is European in background.
It would be great if Obama would insist on being viewed as an individual of mixed racial background, with the emphasis on individual. Very few Americans are ethnically pure anyway, and racial identity politics are deadly.
January 28th, 2008 at 6:47 am
MarkC – Josh Marshall shows the utterly disingenuous comparison of Obama’s overwhelming victory in a hotly contested race – one in which the white candidate began with a significant majority of the black vote and was about 20 points ahead overall quite recently and in which her surrogate was “the first black president” according to certain characterizations even among black folk, and also in which prominent blacks were used by the Clinton’s to denigrate Obama’s ties to the black community (Andrew Young: “Billl Clinton’s as black as Obama” or raise references to stuff like teenage drug use like the BET black billionaire and cash payoffs were made to black ministers) is no comparison at all UNLESS one considers the black vote some kind of done deal for any black candidate. The Clinton’s obviously didn’t going – but then going out it became “a black thing.” With Obama “bookending” major victories over Clinton in one of the Whitest of white states and a state in which the black vote was hard fought with one of the most popular political dynasties among black people in American history, Mr. Bill was being a dishonestly dismissive asshole. No biggie. Frankly, the Clinton overreach is becoming an ace in the hole for Obama.
But don’t try to tell me, having read Marshall, that Obama’s candidacy or even his SC victory bears comparison to Jesse Jackson’s when he won not just an overwhelming black vote that was hotly contested and that he had to move dramatically in his direction after starting out behind Clinton among African-Americans, but he won the majority of women, of men, of youth, etc. Even if you break those demographics down along racial lines only, Edwards did better than Clinton. Hillary only came in second because she got about 20% of the black vote. She did not get a majority of white women – Edwards did better than Hillary among white voters in general and Barack got a quarter of the white vote in a three-way.
So Bill Clinton’s spin – coming from a master pol who’s part of a very sophisticated machine – is just that: spin. Trying to put Obama in the box reserved for Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton. It’s crap – especially coming from the key spokesman for a campaign that pulled out every stop to woo the black vote in South Carolina and that began with the black vote “in it’s pocket.”
January 28th, 2008 at 6:50 am
That should have read “…payoffs were made to black ministers.) It is no comparison at all…” and “The Clintons obviously didn’t going in – but then going out it became a “black thing.”
sorry
January 28th, 2008 at 6:55 am
“He has little in common with most Afro-Americans”
http://tinyurl.com/2pl6sy
January 28th, 2008 at 7:06 am
Let’s also not forget that the “third man” (who’s too often left out of the dicussion and is an excellent candidate) was running on turf that could be considered “home” – Senator from the sister state, born in South Carolina, invoking a classic “poor white” southern childhood. Jesse Jackson was, himself, from South Carolina. Which makes the Jesse Jackson comparison even more dubious and very thin spin.
So, no, coming from far behind and winning by a large margin, campaigning against a political figure with ties to the state and the most popular political dynasty among black voters in recent history bears little or no comparison to a black candidate winning black votes in an essentially uncontested race in his “home state” 20-odd years ago.
January 28th, 2008 at 7:30 am
More Clinton campaign “race spin”, via WitnessLA:
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/la-oe-rodriguez28jan28,0,5950176.column
January 28th, 2008 at 7:40 am
http://www.salon.com/comics/tomo/2008/01/28/tomo/index.html
http://picayune.uclick.com/comics/trall/2008/trall080128.gif
I see a trend among the pathetic Democrats in this new cartoons
January 28th, 2008 at 8:04 am
You’re now learning what conservatives you when Bill Clinton ran for re-election–character matters.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:17 am
I don’t dump on Jews, but Kissinger and Roy Cohn were truly hated as was Goldwater. Koch didn’t get the Jewish vote wehn he lost the election in NYC. Most movement-tye Jewish people supported LaMont over Lieberman. Its movement politicians that move people who seek movement – tautological to be sure, but true.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:18 am
BB sounds like Julius Streicher.
You all need to read David Roediger.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:20 am
Jesse wojuld have beat George sr. in 88
January 28th, 2008 at 8:24 am
Even liberals show hope of being educated.
LINK: Is the right right on the Clintons?
Hillary’s campaign tactics are causing some liberals to turn against the couple.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:32 am
Obama is too much of a positive personality, and too smart, to stay in the wringing hand, negative, and depressed Democratic Party.
He is too much of a self-reliant successful achiever to be held back by democrats low expectations and unwillingness to let him move away from skin colors he so desperately wants for himself and the American people.
He is finding out, from two of the best, in his own party just how badly they depend on differences, dependents and victims that gov’t ‘programs’ can ostensible ‘correct’, but in reality keep them different, dependent and depressed.
Obama is too damned good for the Democratic Party. His positive personality and initiative wil be allowed to florish in the Republican Party, and in the end do much more good for those who really need hand-ups instead of hand-outs.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:44 am
http://www.tnr.com/politics/story.html?id=4fcd1eb2-bd1f-44e3-bc1a-784b3db810ec
January 28th, 2008 at 8:49 am
They’ll all vote for Dershowitz’s candidate, she of participating with AIPAC on its whisper campaign against the guy with the Hussein middle name.
I know a lot of American Jews who will tell stories of someone in a gym locker room or some kind of chain e-mail with all sorts of conspiracy theory about Obama, well designed theory, some of which go so far as to call him a “manchurian candidate” for the Muslims. Eric Alterman has covered this issue on his blog over the last week. This is a concerted attempt by the Lobby to sunder Obama. It will probably work.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:50 am
JC thinks Chinese water torture isn’t really torture.
January 28th, 2008 at 9:44 am
excuse me?
January 28th, 2008 at 10:15 am
I have to admit it makes me nervous when Wood starts stealing my links…
January 28th, 2008 at 11:48 am
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-dreier/white-voters-deserve-more_b_83604.html
January 28th, 2008 at 12:33 pm
Don’t worry, reg. We’ll share links until Obama gets the nomination, and then I’ll start posting about why he is the anti-Christ.
January 28th, 2008 at 12:48 pm
Presumably you’ve got the goods on the bodies he (or Michelle?) buried in that strip of yard he purchased from Rezko’s wife…
Meanwhile, here’s another one – good commentary on Obama’s dicey relationship with the old guard black leaders:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/11/AR2008011102000_pf.html
January 28th, 2008 at 1:12 pm
I’m sure going to listen to lectures on character from Woody and his party of Tom Delay, Bill “let it ride” Bennett, and George W. Bush and Dick Cheney!
And I won’t even mention the yahoo who made the smarmy comment above on Chelsea!
geez guys, dump on the Clinton’s policies all that you want. And you familiy values creeps can denounce Hil for not leaving Bill if you want – after all multiple affairs and marriages are the GOP way. But hittting the kids?
Makes sense – we’re a sick people!
(Yeah, I know, don’t tell me – I shill for Bill and Hil!)
January 28th, 2008 at 1:59 pm
“In fairness”, rlc, so far as I can tell the nasty stuff about Chelsea on these last threads came from “the left” – which, of course, often mimics the far right in attacking Dems not so much for real political weaknesses or even character flaws but as an “equal or greater evil” v. the GOP, a la the old Hitchens and his former buddy Cockburn, thus fair game for damned near any charge no matter how extreme. I think that’s why it’s easy for them to swing all the way right as the arteries harden, like Hitch.
January 28th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
That and a fiffth of Glenfiddich!
January 28th, 2008 at 2:09 pm
Also, in fairness, Reg I’ll have more to say tomorrow about the Ted Kennedy Endorsement of Obama. That and the piece by Caroline in yesterday’s NYT is really big news and should really scare the Clinton machine.
January 28th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Here’s the speech (thanks to WitnessLA)
http://tinyurl.com/34thl9
January 28th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
I will quote the Angry Arab – “Bill Clinton’s southern strategy is as racist as Nixon’s”
This is a golden opportunity to show the massses the corruption of the two party system.
January 28th, 2008 at 2:47 pm
Bob Dole, the Republican opponent in the 1996 election when character was an issue, sure had more than Bill Clinton.
January 28th, 2008 at 2:50 pm
Predictions:
1. After Obama wins the nomination, he will make an “I am brown” speech in which he explains what everyone knows but insists on denying, which is that he is of mixed racial background, not “black.”
2. Both Clintons will happily campaign for Obama.
3. All the sturm and drang about the Clintons will evaporate as the GOP realizes the last thing it wants to do is draw attention to comparisons between the Bush era and the Clinton era.
4. Bush will suceed in starting another war or a substantial new phase in the Iraq or Afghanistan wars to give his party a more credible fear stick with which to hit the public.
5. The Democrats will shamefully cower before the fear stick and, then, flaggelate themselves with it.
6. Stocks will rebound about 10 percent from current levels, but will not rally. Oil will again surpass $100, but will not maintain that level. Platinum, gold and wheat will reach new record highs.
7. Something unexpected will happen.
8. Led Zeppelin will tour.
9. I will not be able to afford tickets.
10. I will make a 10th prediction.
January 28th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Zeppelin is supposed to headline Bonaroo.
January 28th, 2008 at 2:53 pm
Think that Bill Clinton can capitalize onspeculation about this title for Obama? Maybe it will offset the idea that Hillary rules over Satan.
January 28th, 2008 at 2:54 pm
I think Obama will not – and should not – make some kind of speech identifying as “brown” (which means South Asian in Canada, Latino in the States – it is a meaningless signifier)….why would or should this help him? And if it would, isn’t that a sign of a sick culture? What the hell does it matter?
January 28th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
“Brown” needn’t be the label. Mixed race is the fact and America has for a very long time been a nation of mixed races. One of our greatest legacies would be that the mixing continues and, even, deepens.
I will admit, though, that I’m pushing the envelope with that prediction. Obama is, after all, a politician and a smart one. Once he gains the lead, if he gains the lead, in the general election, he’ll probably play the race issue as safely as possible. Which would mean letting people to continue to mislabel him as “black.”
January 28th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
“Black” is a social designation – almost every “African-American” is obviously of mixed race (which is itself a dubious concept EXCEPT as rough designation of origins.) I’ll swear on a bible that my “black” mother-in-law is more “Native American” than “African” if subjected to some kind of DNA test, which is more-or-less true of lots of “blacks” from the southwest and Florida. If whites adopt a black or asian child, is that kid black or asian. Well, yes and no. Again, “race” is at least as cultural as genetic – there are, in fact, people strictly of European origin of an older generation who have lived their lives as “blacks” in America, either because of marriage to a black person in much harsher times or by social and cultural choice (the musician Johnny Otis is a perfect example – I’ve spoken with older black folk who saw his band at the Apollo 50-60 years ago who had no idea he was actually a Greek-American and swore he was “a brother” despite the light skin – which in fact wasn’t much lighter than Adam Clayton Powell’s or Billy Eckstine’s.)
I can guarantee you that when a young Barack Obama walked the streets of South Side Chicago, folks didn’t point him out because his skin was lighter than some (and darker than some other “blacks” as well.) On the Chicago police radios they don’t say “keep your eye out for guys who might be light-skinned enough to have been born to a white woman from Kansas and give them a pass ‘cuz they’re not ‘black’.”
January 28th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
“Again, I think it’s the anti-Clinton crowd that’s turning this into a racist issue. Clinton had to explain (spin, whatever you want to call it) this defeat, and pointing out that a black candidate has an advantage in a heavily black state with a history of supporting black candidates – is simply stating facts.”
What makes this reprehensible, as opposed to slightly sleazy but expected spinmeistering is that a former President and leader of his party is the spinmeister. That adds a touch of darkness to the racial undertone, makes it harder to dismiss and sullies a man whom the party should be able to depend on as a advocate for its general election candidate. Clinton could have played a forceful role as a cheerleader in the general election. He’s now hurt Obama by making that less likely even if his criticism backfires and catapults Obama to the nomination.
January 28th, 2008 at 4:06 pm
And even if it doesn’t backfire and his wife wins the nomination, it probably diminishes her chances in the general election; even if it only turns off a tiny percentage of Dem voters in the end, that’s enough to make the difference. It’s a bad strategy all around.
January 28th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
Black is a social designation that blurs important distinctionS and helps keep the bad science of racism alive.
reg says race is more of a social than a genetic distinction, but, in fact, there is no genetic distinction whatsoever for race, unless you want to divide humanity into dozens of “races.”
Science tells us there is likely to be as much genetic variation between Michael Jordan and Barack Obama as there is between O.J. Simpson and George W. Bush.
The only reason we group Jordan and Obama together is because the share genetic traits that are visual–skin and hair–therefore easily indentifiable.
Obama offers an opportunity to tear down another pillar in the myth of race, if only our politics can be made to acknowledge what biology tells us.
reg argues that Obama is legitimately black because racist cops say he is. I think Americans can do better than that.
January 28th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
geez guys, dump on the Clinton’s policies all that you want. And you familiy values creeps can denounce Hil for not leaving Bill if you want – after all multiple affairs and marriages are the GOP way. But hittting the kids?
Chelsea is an adult, who is responsible for her own decisions. She is campaigning for her mother, with full knowledge like the rest of the country that her mother is running a racist campaign, and will say anything to win.
This is not “hitting the kids” – Chelsea is of age and a public figure of her own volition. Sure it’s a stupid joke but honestly it had to be said and it’s a drop in the bucket compared to Bill’s outrageous remarks over the past few weeks.
January 28th, 2008 at 5:18 pm
The fevered Clinton critics’ logic is familiar, if unpersuasive: Bill’s out of bounds, so it’s ok for us to be in the gutter.
Clinton’s remarks about Jesse Jackson winning in SC, etc. are only racist by inference and those who huff and puff the loudest about it are, perhaps unwittingly, exposing their own bigoted presumptions.
Whatever either Clintons have said is miles above in tact, decorum, appropriateness and sanity, what their more vehement critics are saying about them…
January 28th, 2008 at 5:18 pm
Correct on the science, BB.
Led Zeppelin need to tour, man.
January 28th, 2008 at 5:29 pm
‘… but honestly it had to be said’
I think you could make a case that nothing would be lost if it had gone unsaid.
January 28th, 2008 at 5:35 pm
“Clinton’s remarks about Jesse Jackson winning in SC, etc. are only racist by inference and those who huff and puff …”
They’re not racist in a serious sense, but they intentionally open themselves up to racial inference and that’s enough to deserve condemnation. Bill has diminished himself and his wife in an area where they’d both shown some integrity in the past.
January 28th, 2008 at 5:51 pm
“intentionally open themselves up to racial inference and that’s enough to deserve condemnation.”
This is a good example of how and why the conversation about race is the U.S. is so inert. Moral narcissists are always waiting pounce on any statement that can in any way be twisted to be racist. As evets admits, for her, even the fact that it COULD BE CONSTRUED as racist makes it worthy of the racist label.
It’s no wonder at all, of course, that politicians can’t address the bigotry and psuedo-racial divisions in America–they’re not allowed to talk about it with any honesty.
January 28th, 2008 at 6:11 pm
I love watching Democrats playing hopscotch in their own minefield.
January 28th, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Minefields in a civil war….
January 28th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
“I love watching Democrats playing hopscotch in their own minefield.”
Indeed, there is some mirth in it. But the laughs we shared when Larry Craig became the new poster boy for the GOP’s freaky self-negating homophobia fell much more to the wicked side of funny.
January 28th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
The fevered Clinton critics’ logic is familiar, if unpersuasive: Bill’s out of bounds, so it’s ok for us to be in the gutter.
Chelsea is a willing public figure, and all I’m guilty of is making a dumb joke, for the sake of making a dumb joke. (You think I was trying to persuade anyone? C’mon. It’s obvious she’s ugly and that’s where it ends).
The Clintons, on the other hand, are making more than a dumb joke. They’re attempting to cynically manipulate white America’s fear of black, in order to win an election.
So, fine, Bill’s using coded language, he’s no nitwit. He is out of bounds. He is exploiting racism. That is very clear at this point.
But you, BB, are simply miserable for towing that hypocritical “who-me” Clintonian line. Think for yourself. Did you actually say Clinton and decorum in the same sentence?
E-hem.
Anyway, I’d say by all objective measures I’m a lot less hypocrital about my smearing. Take my dumb joke or leave it, but don’t pretend like it’s any worse than what the Clintons are up to. Not by a long shot.
January 28th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
“As evets admits, for her, even the fact that it COULD BE CONSTRUED as racist makes it worthy of the racist label.”
First of all, evets is a he, but I’ll let it pass and won’t accuse you of sexism.
The comment not only can be construed in a certain way; its meant to be construed in that way.
It isn’t intended as an observation on political demographics; it’s intended (with a failed attempt at subtlety) to demean. It’s intended to dismiss or explain away Obama’s accomplishment on the basis of race.
If a political pundit makes the same remark you can pass it off as mere commentary (though flawed). If a campaign flak wants to traffic in this stuff it’s not much more than a mild turn-off — I understand that it’s not Bull Connor turning on the fire hoses.
The big problem is that it comes from a former President and therefore takes on added weight. Clinton’s stooping to the level of a sleazy political flak hurts the ultimate nominee, be it Obama or his wife and that pisses me off.
January 28th, 2008 at 7:54 pm
It’s the “easily identifiable” traits that keep “race” alive as a social category – and to deny that this category exists in society and has had dire consequences is foolish. Anyone with the “visual markers” of African or partially African descent in the Americas understands that “race” is real when the shit comes down. I don’t think that means Obama’s candidacy is doomed by any means, but it’s clear that when prominent “liberals” like Bill Clintoin immediately try to link the fortunes and relevance of two “black” candidates in order to diminish them and put them in a box, some racist bullshit is going down.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:31 pm
That the Clintons and their surrogates are leveraging race is beyond debate. It may be what they need to win the nomination – like Black Obama says, they’ll say anything to win. Such tactics do not justify their victory.
Anyway, further up in the thread, one Richard Locicero called me a yahoo. I resent that. Talk to anyone, it’s obvious that I’m soooooo Live Search.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
reg at 3:38 – golden. A tree among shrubs.
BB – You are right, scientifically, but not in re how the dominant culture thinks. And your suggestion that Obama identify as “brown” simply muddles and contradicts your own point and your incessant notion of “mislabelling.”
January 28th, 2008 at 8:53 pm
reg argues that Obama is legitimately black because racist cops say he is.
Just as my atheist ass would be in Auschwitz 60 years ago, regardless of my own alienation from Jewish culture. I’m usually not with reg on the whole pragmatism thing, but seriously- yeah Americans can do better than that, ideally, but in reality, America is still a highly White Supremacist society, and will continue to be one even after a Black man is president. So the designation of Black or that of any other minority group is not some scientific mistake, it is a reality that all people not of the dominant wasp culture live with daily.
As Sartre put it, for the sake of the Anti-Semite, I’m a Jew. You don’t destroy prejudice by muddling the affirmative designation that comes with cultural signifiers.
January 28th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
I didn’t know Johnny Otis was white.
January 28th, 2008 at 9:21 pm
And your suggestion that Obama identify as “brown.”
Not my intention to suggest that he do so, just a prediction that he will make a speech emphasizing that he transends the more widely trafficked ethnic categories, e.g. “black.”
He could do worse than calling himself “brown,” though. It has the benefit of being factual, in terms of skin color. That’s not much, but it’s a start toward basing discussion of ethnicity, “race,” skin color, hairstyle and stereotypes on reality.
JC writes:
“So the designation of Black or that of any other minority group is not some scientific mistake, it is a reality that all people not of the dominant wasp culture live with daily.”
It most certainly is a mistake and specifically the product of bad science that grew out of a white supremacist worldview.
I certainly acknowledge it’s an uphill battle and possibly even a little eccentric, though not nearly as much as my other campaign to make the word “suck” synonymous with “good” as a step in the journey toward stamping out homophobia…
January 28th, 2008 at 9:27 pm
Fair enough. But all the pretty liberal words and “discourses” in the world aren’t gonna change people’s attitudes. I think as well if Obama was to do that he’d alienate a lot of people.
Of course, reg talks a good game but he’ll be all out for the racists he describes here when they are the nominees.
January 28th, 2008 at 10:23 pm
“pretty liberal words”
J “I’m not a Trotsky Fan” Cummings channels Ann Coulter — Try as I might to imagine a more hideous anti-intellectual coupling, I can’t…
January 28th, 2008 at 10:25 pm
Ow! That photo! My eyes! My eyes!
My first thought was: how could James Spader’s plastic surgeon have botched the latest tune-up so thoroughly?
jcummings wrote: “you think Condoleeza Rice and Colin Powell are popular among the Southern Black proletariat?”
Funny you should ask. I was just looking at this:
http://tinyurl.com/2s8ya2
70% of black Americans think Colin Powell is a “good influence”; he ranks just under Barack Obama (at 76%). Rice doesn’t do quite as well, admittedly. She’s no Oprah.
Interestingly, I just read a poll showing that, when Powell’s name is included in the list, Republican voters go more for him than for *anyone* else now running on the GOP side. Even with all the credibility hits from the Iraq debacle, even being a Republican, Powell could probably draw black voters (though probably not as easily from jcummings’ “black proletariat”). He could almost certainly beat Hillary — which isn’t (quite) something you can say about McCain.
Powell has declared himself too old, but he’s actually a little younger than McCain. What if McCain becomes too much of a gaff-o-matic as the campaign goes on? (I’m not sure he could top his comment about Chelsea being so ugly (?!) because Janet Reno is her mother, but maybe even worse is coming). The GOP might get desperate enough to threaten Powell with assassination if he doesn’t step up to the plate. It wouldn’t work — he could simply avail himself of Obama’s secret service protection. Yes, Powell is being tapped for advice by Obama. (Who is Giuliani getting foreign policy advice from? Daniel Pipes. OMG.)
With regard to all this race blather, maybe Obama should give the “I am Kenyan-Kansan (and so can you!)” speech already.
I’m having trouble seeing Bill’s comments about Jesse Jackson’s primary performance (which was quite good, in retrospect) as being very racial, much less racIST. There are quite a few points of resemblance between Jackson’s campaigns and Obama’s run (and between the two men themselves) that have nothing to do with racial politics. Jackson was a superb, charismatic orator; so is Obama. Jackson was short of hands-on administrative experience in government, and was faulted for it (even by some black movers and shakers); so is Obama. Jackson appealed to young white liberals; so does Obama. Jackson was evangelical Christianity straight up; Obama’s pretty solidly in that category himself, even if he isn’t Rev. Obama.
I think Obama has a better shot because he doesn’t have the negatives Jackson had back then (not to speak of now), and he’s not running so far to the left of mainstream America, if he’s even left at all. (He seems quite centrist to me.)
He’s black? He’s “not really black”? *Yawn*. With every new census, Americans in an ever-greater numbers tick the box labeled “mixed race.” I won’t pretend race doesn’t matter, but why pretend that it matters more than it really does? Sure, Obama’s skin color is an initial attention-getter, but it’s the message and its delivery by the messenger that’s giving him momentum. It’s less that he’s black and more that he’s “Bobby”: young, fresh, passionate and inspiring. When Bill Clinton said he’d like to vote for Obama someday, just not this time, I kinda believed him.
January 29th, 2008 at 1:16 am
>>>(I’m not sure he could top his comment about Chelsea being so ugly (?!) because Janet Reno is her mother, but maybe even worse is coming).
He said that? That’s funny! But not as funny your uncovering that Jackson and Obama had the same astrological sign or whatever. That’s so lame dude. Nice Colbert reference are you colorblind like him too? That’s what Clintons are betting on: guilty whites who pretend they don’t see color, the guilty white media not to blow the whistle while the Clintons run a backdoor racial campaign.
January 29th, 2008 at 1:34 am
“Backdoor racial campaign”?
How does that work?
If you’re going to be a bigot in America, you’ve got to use the code words, e.g. state’s rights, welfare abuse, urban crime threat and so on, or be straight out about it and blame ethnic minorities for this or that.
Race isn’t the kind of thing you can even try to benefit from politically without actually making racists comments, even if you do rely on code words.
The Clintons haven’t done that.
I watched a bit of CNN today and one pundit after another made the same observations Bill has made about Obama and “the black vote.”
If they aren’t “backdoor” racists, how is he?
January 29th, 2008 at 4:05 am
BB you’re playing dumb and, again, wasting everyone’s time.
January 29th, 2008 at 6:24 am
My bad MT, I think Powell is popular in spite of his Bush years and admired for being the “Critical” element in the court.
BB at least Coulter is funny.
January 29th, 2008 at 6:24 am
Maybe racism is really too loaded for what’s going on in the Clinton campaign. However, this doesn’t diminish the negative impact of what Bill said. This was a clear attempt, for short-term political gain, to dismiss the SC results as mere ethnic loyalty and thereby painting Barack Obama as the the “black candidate”, not the candidate of “the millions”, as Bill says, who will be voting in a week. This strategy of divide and conquer is disastrous for the Democratic Party…. but when have the Clintons ever cared about that.
January 29th, 2008 at 8:07 am
Chileno: I said, quite explicitly above, that I won’t pretend race doesn’t matter. So what’s your beef?
OK, so maybe double negatives throw you. They are kinda complicated, aren’t they? So I’ll say it very slowly, and in simplified English:
… race … matters.
That’s better, isn’t it? If you read that sentence too fast, and skip a word, you’ll notice only one word, and that it doesn’t make any sense by itself, which might make you go back over the thing and read two whole words. In a row. As a sentence.
So tell me: Did you get it, finally? Are you happy now?
As for Clinton’s thing about Obama running as “the black candidate”, that’s hilariously inept of him, I admit. I’m reminded of how Pat Schroeder replied when asked if she was running as a woman: “Are you saying I have a choice?”
January 29th, 2008 at 8:37 am
The Legend of Barack Obama
“When Barack was just a boy, he made his classmates weep with his hopeful and rousing recitation of the alphabet.”
January 29th, 2008 at 10:17 am
nteresting fact about the Clintons and the black vote – In 1992 Bill Clinton won 82 percent of the black vote in the general election. In Nov. 1988 Michael Dukakis had won 89 percent of the black vote. I think this notion that black folks all love Bill Clinton, aside from highly-publicized, opportunistic associations and an FOB aura on the part of certain AfAm celebrities, increasingly out-of-touch elders and wealthy “VIPs†– over and above his having been the only Democrat to actually win the presidency in the last quarter century and his presiding over relative prosperity with a fair degree of competence – is a bit of bamboozlement that the Clintons themselves took for granted at their peril. They alsos proved themselves “generous†in dispensing “street money†to black churches to help “get out the vote.†Unfortunately, this is standard practice among old-school Dems and it has been considered effective. The Obama campaign, to their credit, decided not to compete with the Clintons at that “street†level but attempted to elevate their appeal to voters across the board – and appear to have a good chance of succeeding.
January 29th, 2008 at 11:02 am
Chileno: are you honestly saying you wouldn’t hit that?
And while we’re sayin…I’m only sorry Gore didn’t win because Karenna is so hawt…
January 29th, 2008 at 11:23 am
Bob Williams: “I love watching Democrats playing hopscotch in their own minefield.”
Great line. Mind if I steal it? Pretty much sums up this entire thread, concisely and without breaking a sweat.
January 29th, 2008 at 1:26 pm
I’ll leave Chileno to stew in his own venom. Maybe he and Woody could form a circle jerk. But I guess I shouldn’t be too surprised that adherents of the “Party of Ideas” usually end up with ad hominem ones.
January 29th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
Michael Turner you hit it right on the head! I’ve been trying for days to figure out who that photo looks like and the Illegitiamte spawn of James Spader says it all!
January 29th, 2008 at 2:14 pm
reg claims:
“They alsos proved themselves “generous†in dispensing “street money†to black churches to help “get out the vote.â€
Isn’t this allegation a lot more sinister than merely pointing out that Jesse Jackson won the 1988 SC primary? Reg has worked himself into such an anti-Clinton lather, he now thinks it’s okay to assert that Afro-American ministers are cheaply bribed.
Can you imagine the uproar if Clinton leveled such a charge toward the Obama campaign? Yet reg, channeling the mainstream media flavor of the week, feels it’s okay to make the accusation without a shred of evidence. The scare quotes reg uses there are pretty scarey indeed.
Maybe reg’s right that Clinton Democrats have invested heavily in GOTV through Afro-American-led churches. Seems like a sound strategy to me, and one that works with Euro-American-led labor unions, churches and other groups as well. But why is reg singling out Afro-American-led churches and saying that in their case, it’s “street money”?
Marc Davidson writes:
“This was a clear attempt, for short-term political gain, to dismiss the SC results as mere ethnic loyalty and thereby painting Barack Obama as the the “black candidateâ€, not the candidate of “the millionsâ€, as Bill says, who will be voting in a week.”
Let’s stop pretending that Bill was on some kind of mission about this. From what I’ve read, he made one single comment about it. More important, the comment he made–that Jesse Jackson won SC–has been made by virtually every political analyst commenting on the SC primary before and after the fact.
And when it comes to race-baiting Obama, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet. Should he win the nomination, you can bet the GOP will take every opportunity to imply to its core bubba voter that Obama’s lurking in the night to rape their daughters.
January 29th, 2008 at 2:33 pm
Of course the Jesse Jackson remarks were “racial.” I don’t think they are racist, but the reasoning that Clinton intends leads to a worrisome end.
He is suggesting this: Obama is black; Jesse Jackson is black; South Carolina Democrats are more black than white; South Carolina Democrats voted for Obama; South Carolina Democrats also voted twice for Jesse Jackson. Don’t you see…they just voted for Obama because he was the black candidate, as they did for Jesse two decades before. Were Obama white, he would have lost. He was black so he won. Obama is therefore the Black Candidate.
Clinton, much as Karl Rove did a couple of weeks ago in the Wall Street Journal, where he called Obama, among other things, “lazy,” was daring Obama’s people to call him racist. That would have served the Clintons’ purpose, and corroborated the charge that Obama was a race-identified black candidate. Unfortunately for them, what it did was attract criticism from those not a part of the campaign, like James Clyburn and Ted Kennedy. And the Kennedy endorsement, on top of the sort of revulsion many of us felt when we heard Bill Clinton the past 3 weeks, may have signalled a mass movement of progressives–those who were triangulated out of the centers of power during the Clinton/DLC insurgency of the 1990s. I at least was reminded of that fact when I listened to him.
We will see….It didn’t seem to bother Maxine Waters.
January 29th, 2008 at 2:40 pm
The discussion of street money reminds me of a campaign back in the 70s when a business Democrat was running for mayor. He promised certain black ward chairmen $50 for each precinct committeeperson, plus a little on top for the chair. At a meeting of one of these wards, a well-known woman supporting the other candidate was present. She asked the candidate if it were true if he had promised to pay each of them $50. He nervously denied the illicit payments. The woman turned to her friend and said, “I told you, Mary Lou, he’d never keep that promise.”
January 29th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
The Clintons won’t leak this about the Obama campaign because it isn’t true. It happens to be true about the Clintons…and yes, a lot of old-school black ministers are, in effect, “cheaply bribed” in these deals. If you want to get your panties in a twist because of political reality that anyone who is intimate with these campaigns could confirm, tough. I had this confirmed – that the Clintons spread a lot of money to the black churches – by an African-American source whose sister works very closely with Willie Brown in the Bay Area. If it’s not unseemly for a particular candidate to distribute “GOTV money” directly to churches, I don’t know what is. There frankly are lines that shouldn’t be crossed, given that these are non-profits. If they want to engage in GOTV as part of their mission, that’s legitimate, but it shouldn’t be funneled by a particular candidate and, in effect, be tied to endorsements – which it is. I’m equally critical of labor unions leaping into this primary because there’s no candidate who isn’t effectively pro-labor and strong on all of the issues. It’s all insider bullshit and has an enormously over-hyped effect – as proven by Obama’s own endorsements by labor in Nevada. I think it’s disgusting that AFSCME – a hack union if there ever was one – is pushing the Florida delegates issue. The Democratic party will continue to be the piece of cowardly crap it’s been at least since it got aced by Reagan – and Clinton spent his presidency packaging tepid liberalism in Reaganesque nostrums – if we choose to follow this sclerotic, hack “leadership.” Charlie Rangel, Gerald McEntee, Terry McCauliffe and the rest of them – up to and including Bill Clinton V.3 – are the “living dead.” Time for an intraparty burial…with appropriate eulogies.
January 29th, 2008 at 2:48 pm
The Jesse Jackson remarks weren’t “racist” IMHO but they were intentionally demeaning and clearly false as a comparison (of the ‘84, ‘88 and ‘08 primary campaigns in SC as much as of Jesse and Barack as pols.)
Bill Clinton is damaged goods. 8 years of this narcissist running loose is more than I can bear and a thought that will likely lose Hillary the election once it sinks into the “middle” wing of voters – which is all that matters in an “old Democrat” campaign.
Get over it.
January 29th, 2008 at 2:55 pm
Incidentally, with “Euro-American led” unions the money flow is in the opposite direction – which in a Dem primary like this with 3 candidates who are very close on the relevant domestic issues is a total waste of members’ money and only marginally effective – if at all- although certainly a short-term ego-boost for the upper-echelon bureaucrats.
January 29th, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Years ago I was talking to an old-time Texas Democrat. It was prior to an election, and he reminisced about “hitting all the bake sale” in Houston, right before a primary. I didn’t know what the hell he was talking about.
Well, he said, before the primary, one of his jobs was to go to the bake sales at black churches. Everyone knew who he was and what candidate he was working for. He’d lay down money, say $500-1000, for a cake.
If his job was suppress Black turnout, the money would buy a nice, sedate, spiritual sermon the Sunday before election day. The money could also buy a full-throated political battle-cry, if that was what was needed.
This was 1960s and 70s Houston, and it was uttlerly routine. I don’t see how Arkansas could have been much different.
January 29th, 2008 at 3:01 pm
“you can bet the GOP will take every opportunity to imply to its core bubba voter that Obama’s lurking in the night to rape their daughters”
The alternate scenario, of course, will have Bill Clinton as the rapist.
Frankly, at this juncture – and with apologies to Stanley Kramer – I think more of the non-rabidly partisan “swingable” voting blocs in America (which are the only ones who will really matter in November ‘08, would rather that the answer to “Guess who’s coming to dinner?” be “Barack Obama” than “Bill Clinton.”
January 29th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
“The alternate scenario, of course, will have Bill Clinton as the rapist.”
Don’t bet on it. Do you really think the GOP wants to make this election a referendum on the Clinton years? The Democrats could not possibly be so lucky as to have their opponents running against peace, prosperity and fiscal responsibility.
Hillary would love nothing more than to spend day after campaign day talking asking the question: are we better off now than we were 8 years ago?
On the economy alone, it’s best to worst in many categories. Clinton presided over the fastest GDP growth of any postwar president. Bush II, the slowest. Personal income growth, job creation and poverty, same stories, the data are in and they show Clinton with the best postwar performance and Bush with the worst.
What better way to remind voters that the GOP is led by a bunch of resentful white men who didn’t get the girl in high school than to try and replay their surreal obsession with Bill Clinton’s sex life.
I still think Hillary’s unelectable, but that’s strictly because she voted for the war and has yet to make clear where she stands on the issue. Bill is a huge plus for her and for the Democrats and always will be.
January 29th, 2008 at 3:44 pm
Yeah, it was kind of over-the-top of me to suggest that the GOP would make an issue of Bill Clinton as an aggressive, out-of-control womanizer and worse. Where do I come up with this shit ????
January 29th, 2008 at 4:08 pm
Like their not going to portray Barack as the “Manchurian” or is that the “Meccan” Candidate, Reg? Sure they will slime Bill the big dog. Point is – do they really want the US electorate to be comparison shopping Bill versus the Boy King, AKA as “Uncurious George?”
I expect a nasty campaign whomever we pick.
One advatage for the Dems if its Obama vs. McCain. Both are media darlings so the playing field will be reasonably level. If its Hil vs John advantage GOP. Barack vs Mitt is Advantage Dem as EVERYBODY HATES ROMNEY. Hil vs Romney – MoDo and Broder’s heads explode!
(say maybe that would be worth it!)
January 29th, 2008 at 4:46 pm
“I expect a nasty campaign whomever we pick”
Absolutely
January 29th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
You can expect the worst from the Republicans regardless of the Democratic candidate. Hell, the Dems could run Ronald Reagan and he would be napalmed with whatever they could find, or make up. This is a contact sport for them in a way that it is for few dems. So, while I continue not to care where Bill spends his evenings, or whether cummings’ rumor mongering about Hilary is true, reg is right to suggest this is an aspect of electability.
Just about any Democrat can win against this slate of Republican candidates. It seemed like a slam dunk with the war, but as that fades while apprehension over the economy increases, the slam dunk has a little less slam in it.
Despite her continued popularity in the Democratic primary, Hillary is the weakest candidate in the general election amongst Democrats. Either Obama or Edwards is a stronger run than Hillary. She would probably still win, although against McCain I’m not so sure. Even though he has revealed himself to be a total panderer, he still wears enough of the patina of the maverick upstanding outsider to play off the inevitable Hillary backlash.
Why take the chance for such a tepid candidate?
January 29th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
By the way, that Pat Robertson endorsement of Rudy Giuliani really turned the tide, didn’t it ?
My favorite GOP primary race in memory…
January 29th, 2008 at 4:53 pm
Oh, yeah and this simpering asinine excuse for the campaigning in Florida. There is no honor at all with the Clintons. They are revolting. This is just what they are made of. It’s as good as they ever get.
January 29th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
“Yeah, it was kind of over-the-top of me to suggest that the GOP would make an issue of Bill Clinton as an aggressive, out-of-control womanizer and worse. Where do I come up with this shit ????”
I cut and paste that just to make it a little easier to remember.
There will ALWAYS be elements of the American right that can’t let go of Clinton hatred. But they’ll be confined to the seedier parts of talkradio and blogs, while the RNC feasts on photos of Obama in a bernouse or Bill shaking hands with Yassir Arafat.
The RNC talking points this fall are going to be all fear of brown people, all the time. And that goes whether it’s Hillary or Obama or Al Gore, for that matter.
Never underestimate the canniness of GOP politicos. Granted, they have a natural advantage in the media, but they play a very good game and won’t be dumb enough to try and make big Bill’s sex thrills an issue.
How soon we forget that Clinton’s approval ratings were never higher than just after the Lewinsky nonsense…
The GOP is the war party. They know very well they have no credibility
January 29th, 2008 at 5:58 pm
Did anyone see Mitt yesterday campaigning in a black neighborhood yesterday. First, when the kids were running around, he bellowed: “who let the dogs out?” Then when he approached a mother with her baby, he complimented one or the other on their “bling-bling.”
He’s going to be so much fun to run against in the fall.
January 29th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
Well big John McCain took Florida and, thanks to GOP rules not allowed by the Dems, its a “Winner take all” state. I’ll be waiting for the pundits to point out that nearly 2/3 of Repub voters chose someone else. Now there’s a great way to go into the General!
January 29th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
“there will ALWAYS be elements of the American right that can’t let go of Clinton hatred.”
Let me insert the words, “and American left that can’t let go of Clinton hatred.”
As I have long stated, this is yet another victory of the right: they have so inflamed Democratic voters with their 16-plus year hysterical denunciation of the Clintons (for ALL the wrong reasons), that the Democratic base is determined to put the Clintons into once again into power for ALL the wrong reasons….those being to stick it against the “Clinton haters” (who spend time, incidently, sharing cordial and loving conversations and yuks with the Clintons…see Karl Rove hamming it up with Bill and Hil, Right wing demagogues who funded the “smear campaigns” against the Clintons visiting with Clinton over dinner and at his Harlem “office”…thank you recent Vanity Fair, sheesh…).
If Democratic voters really wanted to “stick it” to the far right, they would put into power a far more independent thinking, more progressive, kick-the-system-in-the-ass individual like Barak Obama, or John Edwards.
Still, my own governor (Kathleen Sebelius, a prominent figure of the DLC) yesterday endorsed Obama. So MAYBE there is hope…
January 29th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
Good point, David.
The American left does have a problem with moral narcissism, having an insatiable desire to find moral fault in any political figure with real power.
I don’t, however, see any reason to believe that Edwards or Obama won’t face exactly the same right-wing headwinds that so bent Bill Clinton. Maybe they’d compromise less, but I doubt it.
January 29th, 2008 at 10:34 pm
Turning America in a new direction has to be a long-term project. The biggest possible mistake is to believe that a president to could achieve it at a single go.
The problems run deep in the culture, the politics and the economy. We should think as much about where we’d like to be in Nov. 2012 as in Nov. 2008…
January 30th, 2008 at 7:58 am
I don’t see Edwards or Obama comitting government-backed mass murder in Waco, and then having liberals defend it.
January 30th, 2008 at 8:10 am
Now, it looks as if I might have the opportunity to vote for John Edwards…after he becomes the Vice-Presidential candidate of John McCain’s.
January 30th, 2008 at 11:17 am
http://counterpunch.org/cockburn01302008.html
Adios Rudy! Farewell Edwards! Hello Ralph!
McCain vs. Clinton?
By ALEXANDER COCKBURN
and JEFFREY ST. CLAIR
Before his handlers told the press Bill Clinton wouldn’t be taking any more questions, the former president gave it as his considered opinion that his wife and John McCain are a lot alike, and that assuming the two become their parties’ nominees, the fall campaign would be “the most cordial in history.” Setting aside such well-known traits as ill-temper towards subordinates, what Mrs Clinton and McCain certainly do have in common is a readiness to hang their own party out to dry when it’s a matter of personal advancement.
January 30th, 2008 at 11:21 am
worth reading the above piece, Dems.
Also
http://www.naderexplore08.org/
January 30th, 2008 at 2:12 pm
Oh Boy! Just what we need! Our friend from the Great hite North comes up with the only egomaniac more Napoleanic than Bloomie! Right, I’m really going to listen to Alex Cockburn on this!
Bet you find the NDP a capitalist tool!
January 30th, 2008 at 3:11 pm
The NDP? I’ve been a member my whole life. We have a social democratic party. Its not left enough for me but the Left has a lot of influence, particularly in urban areas. My Member of Parliament is one of the best leftwing politicians in the world, Olivia Chow.
Again, at least we have a social democratic party. When Americans with social-democratic views start boycotting racist centre/right candidates like HRC, you will too. Its up to you.
January 30th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
Hmm.. on the one hand, I’ve got to give Obama a slight edge; both in experience (less of it, but a better record), and electability (alas, only the gut can lead here).
ON THE OTHER HAND, eight years of reminding Marc Cooper of the sweetest campaign promise of the new century. That he would take his uttlery debunked by reality world view, his cheap bigotry, his utterly incompent ass and move it to the land of Cummings!
Hillary, you tantalizing nymph!
January 30th, 2008 at 10:32 pm
You’re a Charmer ok. If I were Marc, I would plant a virtual big pointy toed boot right up your rude ass on your way out his door.
January 31st, 2008 at 12:48 pm
@Michael Turner: what isn’t it that you don’t get about double negatives being not uncomplicated? You are a very bright individual, but just because you don’t not disclaim your recognition that race doesn’t not matter, the benefit of the doubt you gave Clinton – that he didn’t go negative in a racial way with his comments about Jessie Jackson & South Carolina – was undeniable.
In other words, you contradicted yourself and I could care less (or couldn’t?) if you plead to us your profound personal recognition that race…matters… (whew! That translation wasn’t unhelpful – not!), the point remains that no matter how profound you are in your unshallow understanding, you still went to bat for Clinton, and you used the arguments of colorblind white guilt which ironically (or intentionally?) end up hurting those oppressed by racial stigma.
So perhaps you aren’t as unshallow as you think?
@Michael Turner, listen tough guy if I had any venom left to stew in I would have lashed out and sunk it into your jugular with nothing less than, are you ready? “Altavista that’s what you are”. I mean I could have said that but I didn’t. So just cool it, Mister.
January 31st, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Oops, second bitch-slap meant for richard locicero.