Uncle Fred
What a bellylaugh I had watching the gargoyle-like
Tennesse Republican Rep. Zach Wamp (correct sp) on Hardball. Zach, the head of the Draft Fred Thompson Committee, was on the air crowing about how Uncle Fred has apparently decided to make the presidential run.
I don't have the exact transcript on hand, but Zach claimed that Thompson (who just completed a five year run on Law & Order and who has two dozen film credits) was neither a "movie star" nor was he a "career politician" -- even though Good Ole Fred served as a Washington D.C. lobbyist and then sat as a U.S. Senator for nearly a decade.
And Zach Wamp ain't exactly a genius either. But I will grant him one point: more than anything Thompson embodies the accelerating crisis of Republican conservativism.
Quick... name one political feat you can associate with Fred. Ok. Didn't expect you to given that his decidely undistinguished legislative career. But how pathetic it is that Fred is being resurrected as a warmed-over stand-in for Dear Departed Ronnie. Democrats are often quite rightly slammed for not having any new ideas. But the Republicans? This is the best they can do? Try to-reanimate the ghosts of two decades past?
That said, I have little doubt that Thompson could indeed take the Republican nomination. Which tells you a lot more about Rudy, Mitt and McCain than it tells you about Good Ole Fred.
Winning the general election, however (and against any Democrat), seems a much more unlikely possibility. I give a clear majority of Americans more credit than that. Been there and done this already with Reagan -- that's quite enough thank you. What Reagan had going for him was several previous decades of ardent cold war campaigning and as foolish a character as he was, he had least brightly burnished his anti-communist credentials. Reagan also capitalized on the debacle of the Carter administration and the Iranian hostage crisis.
This time around the debacle is the making of Republican George W. Bush. In that context, Thompson appears on the stage not as successor to Reagan but as cheap caricature. Promising the sort of Bush Lite that his campaign must inevitably embrace seems hardly an attractive option. Any talk nowadays about a Shining City on a Hill is likely to evoke images of a smouldering, smoking and devastated Baghdad.
Please tell me I'm not daydreaming.
Tennesse Republican Rep. Zach Wamp (correct sp) on Hardball. Zach, the head of the Draft Fred Thompson Committee, was on the air crowing about how Uncle Fred has apparently decided to make the presidential run.
I don't have the exact transcript on hand, but Zach claimed that Thompson (who just completed a five year run on Law & Order and who has two dozen film credits) was neither a "movie star" nor was he a "career politician" -- even though Good Ole Fred served as a Washington D.C. lobbyist and then sat as a U.S. Senator for nearly a decade.
And Zach Wamp ain't exactly a genius either. But I will grant him one point: more than anything Thompson embodies the accelerating crisis of Republican conservativism.
Quick... name one political feat you can associate with Fred. Ok. Didn't expect you to given that his decidely undistinguished legislative career. But how pathetic it is that Fred is being resurrected as a warmed-over stand-in for Dear Departed Ronnie. Democrats are often quite rightly slammed for not having any new ideas. But the Republicans? This is the best they can do? Try to-reanimate the ghosts of two decades past?
That said, I have little doubt that Thompson could indeed take the Republican nomination. Which tells you a lot more about Rudy, Mitt and McCain than it tells you about Good Ole Fred.
Winning the general election, however (and against any Democrat), seems a much more unlikely possibility. I give a clear majority of Americans more credit than that. Been there and done this already with Reagan -- that's quite enough thank you. What Reagan had going for him was several previous decades of ardent cold war campaigning and as foolish a character as he was, he had least brightly burnished his anti-communist credentials. Reagan also capitalized on the debacle of the Carter administration and the Iranian hostage crisis.
This time around the debacle is the making of Republican George W. Bush. In that context, Thompson appears on the stage not as successor to Reagan but as cheap caricature. Promising the sort of Bush Lite that his campaign must inevitably embrace seems hardly an attractive option. Any talk nowadays about a Shining City on a Hill is likely to evoke images of a smouldering, smoking and devastated Baghdad.
Please tell me I'm not daydreaming.
May 31st, 2007 at 5:28 am
Whatever his limitations (and they may be legion for all I know), Thompson has more credits than Hillary, Obama, or Edwards, none of whom has accomplished squat as far as I can see. Richardson, of course, has more experience; he’s failed at increasingly higher levels of responsibility. Laurence Peter would be proud.
I can see the slogan, “Hasn’t been indicted. Hasn’t screwed anything up yet.”
May 31st, 2007 at 5:57 am
“Thompson has more credits than Hillary, Obama, or Edwards”
What a laugh. Isn’t it a little early in the day for happy hour?
May 31st, 2007 at 6:36 am
“Credits?” Are you including dinner theater and equity waiver?
Thompson’s eyebrow raising smears of Patrick Fitzgerald might give the not quite dead ender Republican pause; seeing as Fred was a Prosacutor at one time. Though the Republican level of lawlessness ( Purgery is legal if their was no crime involved) slides through the puditry without much mention. Wither Travelgate? Where art thou damned Phone Calls from Al Gore’s office?
Fred does have one thing going for him, the latest crush from the ever callow young suitor Chris Matthews… How in the late spring a young man’s fancy beings to wander….
May 31st, 2007 at 7:47 am
From a realpolitik point of view, he’s probably the most formidable Republican candidate. He’s got the smokey-voiced gravitas, and if he has the right handlers, I can see him succeeding where the nativists on one hand and the neocons on the other fail.
I’m sure that some of his TV and Hollywood work wil lget him tarred by association with “leftists.” Hell, I enjoyed his work – seriously – in quite a few films. No Way Out is a great late cold war thriller, Fat Man and Little Boy is arguably an anti-nuke film, Class Action is old school Naderite, he was very good in Cape Fear and the very progressive Thunderheart and Bury my heart at….(whcih is on HBO these days)..
I think that on the strength of Thunderheart, he’d be Leonard Peltier’s candidate.
May 31st, 2007 at 7:58 am
Yes, perhaps too early to laugh. I had a nightmare recently that the Terminator got elected governor of California.
May 31st, 2007 at 8:56 am
Reagan didn’t capitalize on the Iranian crisis, and you will find almost nothing in his campaign about it. The threat from Carter was that he would do whatever it took to get the hostages home before the election if Reagan made that a big issue.
Everyone here is always pulling out polls as proof of their positions beging right at the moment. If you want the best polls showing approval, look at the election results of Reagan’s two presidential elections.
Marc’s just mad because Reagan ejected him from a taxpayer-paid college education for unsportsmanlike conduct.
–
I remember that Reagan said that he didn’t leave the Democratic Party but that the Democratic Party left him. By the same token, the Republican Party has left conservatives. Maybe Thompson or someone will fill that void.
I get tired of simply voting against the Democrats and would like to have a Republican who would earn my vote for actually being conservative. Any “Republican In Name Only,” like Bush and many in Congress, are not going to get my votes this next election. And, if having wives run for President to circumvent the 22nd Amendment is in style, I’ll vote for Nancy Reagan for President.
May 31st, 2007 at 9:23 am
I would not count out the three amigos (Rudy, John and Williard, er Mitt) because it is an open secret that Fred Thompson was one of the laziest guys in DC. I know this is the United States of Amnesia but for those of you who can spell “GOOGLE” you might check back to 1995 when Fred was the new kid in town from the Volunteer State and was already being touted as a possible Presidential candidate. Alas, his performance in the Senate soon put an end to that.
But I’m sure that Chris Matthews will find him to be a manly man. But will he really dump Rudy? I mean, he’s already cheated on John. These Irish Catholic boys can be so fickle!
Tramp!
May 31st, 2007 at 9:24 am
And Woody’s just upset that Strom isn’t around to vote for anymore. Now if that nice mister Lott would just run.
May 31st, 2007 at 10:32 am
Did not capitalize on the Iran hostage crisis! Again how can Republicans write so well when they cannot read? The back-door deal during the campaign had the Reagan people make a deal with Iran to release the hostages only when and if Reagan won. Why did Reagan do this? What the f*** was the Iran-Contra scandal except Reagan getting caught at the pay-back?
Thompson is another Reagan for sure, an empty suit with presidential cosmetics and the ability to make cliches sound new.
May 31st, 2007 at 10:42 am
Please see Glenn Greenwald in SALON today on Freddy. Another interesting “Values” candidate!
May 31st, 2007 at 11:13 am
Pity the poor Republican voter:
There once was a leader
Who lived in the tubes
So many voters of value
What on earth could he do?
So he fed them some words
without any dread
lied through his teeth
and put them to bed.
Bravely he stood
on a platform festooned
with promises broken
and littered with fools.
The house in a shambles
the beds all unmade
the candidate followers
had little to say.
The voters befuddled
bemused and bereft
had to stay home
seeking safety instead.
May 31st, 2007 at 11:24 am
Oh, Hank Husqvarna! I didn’t know that you were a follower of the conspiracy theories of Lyndon LaRouche. I had to laugh out loud when the Democrats said that the fact there is no evidence of an October surprise is that much more reason to investigate it. Here’s information on it. There was no such thing. Congressional Record
rlc, George Wallace (segregation today, segregation tomorrow, and segregation forever) was a Democrat. I think that Klansman Harry Byrd would fall into his camp.
May 31st, 2007 at 11:47 am
Woody-There’s a lot of things that you don’t know.
What you proffer as evidence is all heresay. That it comes from government sources makes it all the more suspect. The Reagan operatives who made the deal will be free from their oath in five years.
May 31st, 2007 at 12:08 pm
Dadgum, Hank, everything that you and I proffer is heresay, but I couldn’t get any of the people with first-hand knowledge to come to Marc’s site to discuss it. The best that I could do is put up the Congressional Record, but you don’t even accept that if it goes against what you choose to believe incorrectly.
I’m afraid that you fall into the category of what Reagan described thusly: “It isn’t that liberals are ignorant. It’s just that they know so much that isn’t so.â€
May 31st, 2007 at 12:12 pm
Woody, where does the congressional record stand on Hillary’s murder of Vince Foster?
May 31st, 2007 at 12:33 pm
“Reagan said that he didn’t leave the Democratic Party but that the Democratic Party left him.” Reagan left the Democratic Party to become a hired shill for General Electric when it was run by Lemuel Boulware, one of the most reactionary corporate honchos in mid-20th Century America. Reagan wasn’t as bad an actor as many people thought. His portrayal of a President for eight years proved that. Also, the notion that Reagan achieved some major conservative watershed goals during his tenure is total bullshit. He grew big government bigger – and decided it was okay not to pay for it in ways that would shame most Keynsians. He also decided – when he actually sat down with the leader of the Evil Empire and found him to be a more decent and complex man than he’d expected, that maybe we should share our defense technology with the Soviets. Shades of Julius Rosenberg! Of course his henchmen put a stop to any such crazy peacenik notions.
The latest GOP import from a movie set, Thompson is the last best hope for GOPers who actually think they might win the Presidency in ’08 – a guy in a Reagan mask. It’s not going to get any better than that for the party in the foreseeable future.
As for the Iran/Reagan Camp deal, Abolhassan Banisadr, the first President of post-Khomeini Iran has confirmed that people representing Reagan’s campaign made a deal with the Iranians. Banisadr fell out with the clerics and fled for his life to Paris It’s hard to imagine that either the timing of the release or the secret – and criminal – missile deals with Iran were a coincidence. Given the unliklihood of such events being random, I’ll take Banisadr’s assertions – since he was actually there – over anything Woody or Lyndon Larouche or Peggy Noonan or even Bill Casey whispering into Woodward’s ear on his deathbed might have to say about the question. I don’t believe, incidentally, that Reagan himself had anything to do with this. Probably run through Casey – at a very long arm’s length. Reagan had – as his Iran-Contra lies proved – a great capacity for “not knowing” of inconvenient events that might reflect poorly on his sunny image and I’m sure this was one of them.
When GOPers have to dig up George Wallace – who ran against the Democratic Party of Humphrey and McGovern – and helped write the script for the racist GOP’s “Southern Strategy” – or make references to “Harry” (sic) Byrd being a Klansman in order to smear the majority party, you know the desperation factor is in full effect. I love watching Woody flail and flounder these days. One of the pleasures of Marc’s blog.
May 31st, 2007 at 12:46 pm
Incidentally, if Reagan “didn’t leave the Democratic Party, the party left him”, why would he describe himself as a “hemophiliac liberal bleeding heart” in his earlier years as a Democrat ? I guess one of the pleasures of being a phony “conservative” is that you can say any goddam thing, no matter how full of shit you are.
May 31st, 2007 at 1:26 pm
This has been written about a fair amount – based on a Washington Monthly account when Thompson was running for the Senate – but the key to understanding Thompson is “the red pickup truck”. The Thompson campaign rented a red pickup truck which an aide would drive to within a couple blocks of the scheduled campaign events. Thompson would drive to the appointed meeting place in his luxury sedan, dressed in his campaign costume of boots and jeans, the aide would turn over the keys to Fred who would greet the waiting crowd in “his” red pickup truck. After the event Thompson would drive the truck a couple of blocks out of sight of the crowd, hand it over to an aide and drive off in his fancy car. Just like they do when they’re making movies.
May 31st, 2007 at 1:33 pm
reg, too little time, so much to rebut.
George Wallace was a Democratic governor and ran in the Democratic primaries for president four times and won several states, including Michigan and Maryland, before being shot ended his campaign. I’d say that made him a Democrat.
On the other, yes, I did mean Klansman “Robert” Byrd rather than segregationist Harry Byrd, another Democrat whose extreme positions on race led to the closing of many Virginia schools after he denounced Brown vs. the Board of Education decision.
On Iran’s “October Surprise,” it’s unfortunate that the one guy you mention who could refute all the Congressional testimory ran off and isn’t available. What bad luck. I had three guys to refute him, but they were off fishing and weren’t available, either.
On government size, you think that making government bigger is increasing the military budget, whereas Clinton made the government smaller by cutting military jobs. The size of government has more to do than just the budget and employees. It involves regulations, paperwork, and legislated costs placed on businesses by the government. It’s great to pass laws where the buck can be passed to companies and indirectly to consumers without most people understanding that.
Also, I’ll take a Justice Scalia by Reagan any day over Clinton’s Justice Ginsburg, who legislates what she wants rather than what the lawmakers intended.
I think the best judge of whether or not Reagan was a conservative would be the people who supported him rather than someone who viewed everything he did as wrong or stupid. BTW, he did bring about the collapse of the iron curtain, but you probably have some other, unavailable insider to dispute that.
No floundering here, reg. Now, why don’t you quit lying to us and to yourself and quit responding to my comments, as you previously committed. In the world of truth and logic, you always come out second.
May 31st, 2007 at 1:37 pm
I’m pretty skeptical of the October Surprise and other conspiracy theories…..wouldn’t put it past Casey et. al but its too pat.
I also believe Oswald was the lone gunman.
May 31st, 2007 at 2:35 pm
So George Wallace didn’t run against Humphrey and McGovern ? Nobody disputed that he was a member of the racist wing of the Democratic Party – most of whom eventually joined the GOP. Wonder why…
I didn’t say that Banisadr wasn’t available. You made that up. He fled Iran. He’s living in Paris. Has written quite a bit about Iran, etc. in intervening years. Who are the three guys you have access to who can dispute what a Kohmeini era insider says that they did when Banisadr was directly involved in that government ? Perhaps you would believe the word of the Iranian government over a guy who had to flee Tehran for his life. The absence of other definitive evidence from Gary Sick or Lyndon LaRouche or whoever isn’t evidence that Banisadr was lying. Why the hell would he lie ? Perhaps there’s some reason why a guy who broke with Kohmeini would lie about Reagan, but I’ve never seen anything offered up that makes me think the most obvious explanation for a series of rather dramatic events happening the way they happened isn’t true. You don’t want to believe your cardboard hero was a fraud.
May 31st, 2007 at 2:50 pm
Actually, the number of non-defense employees at the end of Reagan’s second term was about the same as under Carter – went down in his first term and up again in his second. Not an impressive feat for an apostle of “smaller government”. Clinton cut government employment overall more than Reagan, with cuts in non-defense employees that were maybe two-thirds as large as Reagan in his first term (before they crept back up to previous levels.) Reagan’s heir, George H.W. Bush, grew non-defense employment and cut military employees much more than Clinton did as the Cold War ended. It would be nice for there to be some factual analogy to your commentary – but that would be too much to ask. As for piling up debt, there’ s no comparison between recent Republican Presidents and Democrats. The Democrats may be “tax and spend”, but the GOP is the party of “cut taxes and spend”. Perhaps your accounting skills might lend insight into which is more fiscally irresponsible.
May 31st, 2007 at 2:53 pm
“BTW, (Reagan) did bring about the collapse of the iron curtain”
I’m rolling on the floor, Woody. Anybody who could make that assertion with a straight face is a total moron.
May 31st, 2007 at 2:55 pm
If and when you learn the difference between correlation and causation, we might discuss Reagan and Gorbachev and the causes of the Soviet collapse. Until then, there’s no point.
May 31st, 2007 at 3:23 pm
Here’s a discussion of some of the stock myths about Reagan defeating the Soviets, focused on data related to Soviet military spending in the Reagan era.
http://econ161.berkeley.edu/Politics/fitzgerald.html
May 31st, 2007 at 4:20 pm
Woody: One of the legacies of Ronald Reagan was” Love your country, hate your Government”. He meant for you acolites to be wary of government, not to rely on hearsay; remember, Trust but Verify.
The Iran Contra hostage exchange has been verified by people who were the actors in this drama. Try the European press and released MI-6 Documents. I know you can’t bring witness evidence to this site but I’ve seen it. Check the CIA transhipments out of the Cabazon Reservation and the Reagan operatives in charge of the payback to the Ayatoilets!
Another of your shibboleths: that Bonzo’s co-star brought down the Soviet Empire, pass the peyote pipe. I served in the White House during Nixon I when the China initiative forced the Soviets to station 880,000 troups on the Sino-Soviet border.
After four years of extending supply lines, feeding, srming and rotating this huge garrison, the Soviets were bankrupt.
When smiley-face was elected, the Soviet treasury was looted in the China Folley and was already making clandestine overtures to us for aid.
Reagan was merely an Alfred Newman-like witness to the crash. Did you ever hear about the “rabbit and the rain” fallacy?
How come one can write so well and apparently show no appetite for reading. Bon Chance.
May 31st, 2007 at 5:39 pm
he did bring about the collapse of the iron curtain
I love it! And a perfect moment to bring out the perfectly analogous Homer Simpson understanding of causation:
Homer Simpson: Not a bear in sight. The Bear Patrol must be working like a charm.
Lisa Simpson: That’s specious reasoning, Dad.
Homer: Thank you, dear.
Lisa: By your logic I could claim that this rock keeps tigers away.
Homer: Oh, how does it work?
Lisa: It doesn’t work.
Homer: Uh-huh.
Lisa: It’s just a stupid rock.
Homer: Uh-huh.
Lisa: But I don’t see any tigers around, do you?
[Homer thinks of this, then pulls out some money]
Homer: Lisa, I want to buy your rock.
[Lisa refuses at first, then takes the exchange]
May 31st, 2007 at 5:40 pm
Since I generally don’t trust the gummint, I’m not certain that lassitude is disqualifying. The Peanut Farmer used to vet the White House tennis court sign-ups, so ’tis said, but his diligence brought us only “malaise” and stagflation.
Gimme Silent Cal any time. The man campaigned from his front porch. As the immortal Cole Porter wrote,
You’re the top!
You’re an Arrow collar.
You’re the top!
You’re a Coolidge dollar.
You’re the nimble tread
Of the feet of Fred Astaire,
You’re an O’Neill drama,
You’re Whistler’s mama,
You’re Camembert.
You can have Fred, Mitt Headroom, Hillary, Barack, and hip hop. Gimme Silent Cal and Fred Astaire.
May 31st, 2007 at 5:52 pm
I’m not sure it was Carter’s “diligence” that brought us stagflation. But then I’m no economist.
Trivia question – who wrote Carter’s “malaise” speech ?
May 31st, 2007 at 6:09 pm
“You’re the Top” comes from the musical “Anything goes” which appeared on Broadway in 1934. Now, let’s see. Who was President then? Well let Mr Porter tell us from another song from that show (both sung by Ethel Merman BTW):
“Well Franklin Knows, Anything Goes!”
May 31st, 2007 at 6:35 pm
Reg,
It was Chris Matthews.
May 31st, 2007 at 6:52 pm
For whatever reason that strikes me as very funny.
May 31st, 2007 at 7:13 pm
Samuel, go ahead and apply your Simpson’s story to Al Gore and global warming correlations. The number of pirates in relation to temperatures comes to mind.
As for the rest, you spend too much time reading and believing every conspiracy claim in left-wing blogs. This may help you:
26 Reasons What You Think is Right is Wrong
Let’s start here:
May 31st, 2007 at 7:38 pm
Sounds like good advice Woody. Now why don’t you try following it.
May 31st, 2007 at 9:07 pm
Woody-It will be a lot easier to post with you now that you’ve admiited a natural antipathy for critical thought and an almost nauseating distaste for deductive historical exposition.
May 31st, 2007 at 10:06 pm
“Anything Goes” has an FDR reference:
“So Mrs. R.
With all her trimmins
Can broadcast abed from Simmons
Cause Franklin knows
Anything goes.”
They don’t write ‘em like that no mo’.
May 31st, 2007 at 10:25 pm
I’m really thinking that if the word gets out that Thompson was in a truly radical-left film, Thunderheart, that may affect his campaign…
June 1st, 2007 at 6:25 am
Uncle Fred can’t win, no extreme right or left ever will win… that is why all candidates always run towards the middle (to get the swing votes)…
This will be between Guilianni and Clinton or Obama. Most likely Clinton since she is less extreme than Obama, eventhough Obama is much more presidential than Hillary could ever be.
June 1st, 2007 at 8:04 am
So what’s the Malaise speech trivia answer?
I remember hearing the speech and finding it somewhat inspiring. Also remember listening on radio to the Carter-Reagan debate where Regan used the stack-of-dollar-bills-reaching-to-the-sky image (can’t even remember what for) and wondering how anyone could vote for the guy. Soon after I stopped trusting my political instincts as any kind of useful barometer (except in the negative sense). Which is why I’d like to agree with Marc’s assertion about Reagan — that the public shrugs him off him with a ‘been there done that’ — but can’t.
June 1st, 2007 at 9:27 am
I’ll bite on the “Malaise” speech. Nowhere in the speech is the word “malaise” used.
Grumpy that’s the line! I was too lazy to put on my CD with Cole singing it (he recorded several sides for Victor in 1934-35).
They don’t make em’ like that anymore? You got that right!
But, somehow I think the writing team of Lennon/McCartney produced work to be mentioned with the greats of the “Golden Age” – Porter, Arlen, Mercer, Warren, Coward et. al
June 1st, 2007 at 9:32 am
BTW that reference is to the fact that Elinor Rossevelt was doing a radio commercial at the time with the proceeds going to a charity. Imagine if Laura or Hillary did that now! (I’m not speaking of PSA’s – these were commercial endeavors)
June 1st, 2007 at 10:56 am
“less extreme than Obama”
I’m having trouble figuring out where Obama is “extreme”. Surely it was much less extreme to oppose invading Iraq on the thinnest of pretexts than to support it.
June 1st, 2007 at 11:01 am
Actually Obama’s health care plan, since it doesn’t include mandates in the initial proposal, is less “extreme” than Hillary’s. You’re right that he’s easily the most “Presidential”.
“So what’s the Malaise speech trivia answer?” Randy got it (at 6:35pm) – Chris Mathews wrote that speech of Carters. Which I find ironic given that the speech is caricatured as the wimpy Dem speech of all wimpy Dem speeches and Mathews is the Blatherer In Chief calling for Manly Men Candidates.
June 1st, 2007 at 11:13 am
I agree about Obama. He seems to naturally steer away from the extremes; I think it’s the exotic name that makes everyone assume he’s looking to lead a revolution.
The New Yorker profile a few weeks ago gave some nice background on how he formed this fairly sober persona in reaction to his parents’ socio-political naivete (as he saw it). I came away from the artcle admiring him more, seeing him as more presidential, while liking him a little less.
June 1st, 2007 at 12:20 pm
I think that Obama has core values and experiences that will make him the most substantively “progressive” candidate – but he doesn’t feel as compelled to pander to the left in the primaries, which is where I see Edwards positioned partly out of conviction and partly because it’s the only shot he’s got, and to a degree Hillary – who I think voted no on the last war funding bill because Obama did first. Obviously all candidates steer to the center in office because there’s not much choice, but Obama will be the least disappointing IMHO. I think it’s delusional to base one’s opinion of a candidate on campaign policy promises as opposed to who one believes they actually are when the need to garner votes is stripped away. One of the reasons I trust Obama is because he’s not running as the most “left” candidate. I think that he is far more likely to inspire some sense of hope and idealism among ordinary, non-hardcore political types than any other candidate, especially among the young. That’s more important for me than being the favorite guy of Kos or The Nation or whatever, or with the health care program spelled out on paper that Ezra Klein likes the most.
June 1st, 2007 at 12:21 pm
Bob Dole did a Viagra commercial after he retired. Reagan was a spokesman for GE before he got into electoral politics.
I’m waiting for the Bill Clinton Astroturf commercial:
“When I was a younger man and had a life,” stated Clinton, “I owned an El Camino pickup in the ’70s. It was a real sort of Southern deal. I had Astroturf in the back. You don’t want to know why, but I did.”
June 1st, 2007 at 4:02 pm
Trouble is Reg, he has hit a wall. All the recent polling data show a Clinton runaway which bothers me as much as anyone and its because his platitudes go only so far.
June 1st, 2007 at 5:20 pm
Jesus Christ…it’s early as hell. There aren’t any walls. Obama might not catch Clinton, but he’s got a better shot than Edwards IMHO and a good campaign with a good ground game can beat her. Obama isn’t “platitudes” anymore than any other candidate – that’s the “Edwards haircut” of discourse on Obama I’m afraid.
Obama’s the only guy in the race I actually give a shit about in terms of who he is and where he’s been in his life. Edwards is the real lightweight IMHO. Watch an interview with Obama and compare him to the rest – he doesn’t seem like some overeager, programmed retread but comes off as far more at ease with the interview and with himself. Edwards, whether it’s fair or not, has opened up too many avenues to make his “two Americas” angle seem calculated and phony. Also, fair or not, his wife’s health issues call his long-term viability into question. And if any candidate has “a wall” to deal with, I’d say it’s Hillary. She is where she is and who she is and she’s going to have to struggle to make it all stick – nothing new and lots of negatives that will start to eat at her support the longer the campaign goes along. Frankly, I think she’s the only Democrat who has a good chance of losing to a GOPer in ’08.
If you really really don’t want Hillary, work hard for the person you think might have the best chance of stopping her. The California primary will be mucho important. Don’t let the insider hacks and has-beens run away with it. Obama’s strength is that he’s the only candidate who can make the pollsters look like idiots because he has a real chance to shift the demographics of who comes out to vote for him, even if ever so slightly – which is all it takes. Polls are constructed on the statistical evidence of elections past. Obama’s the only guy who’s not locked into that paradigm.
June 1st, 2007 at 9:56 pm
Obama Optimist Alert: You guys (and I admire you) who really believe that Obama has a chance need to study the “voting curtain effect” last verfied in the Tennesee (Ford (D) race). The phenomenon has to do with what white people (even liberals) do after polling one way and voting another way when there is a black candidate. Good luck to this country.
June 1st, 2007 at 10:03 pm
That effect’s would be a bigger problem for Hillary IMHO.
June 1st, 2007 at 10:07 pm
I actually think that Obama’s biggest problem right now is those liberals and lefties – particularly “coastal” types – who are so dead certain that everybody else in the hinterlands is so fucking racist that Obama doesn’t have a chance in the general election – therefore they’ll tend to support Edwards, who really doesn’t have a chance to stop Hillary and would make a terrible candidate in a general election because he comes off as phony and lightweight.
June 2nd, 2007 at 9:32 am
Gee, when did Tennesse Ernie Ford run? I loved his version of “16 Tons” and good populist message too!
June 2nd, 2007 at 11:23 am
Reg- Do you really think that Obama’s biggest problem? Golly. I am an Obama supporter but I know your middle premise about the hinterlands is also true, ” so fucking racist”, maybe not to take Obama’s chances away entirely but it cannot be over-stated as a threat. I have put my money where my mouth is (the max) towards the Obama effort but to paraphrase Shaw: no one ever lost money overestimating the depth of racism in this country.
Locicero- stick to your serious posts…humor eludes you.
June 2nd, 2007 at 12:40 pm
Absolutely. Obama fairly easily won over downstate Illinois voters and downstate Illinois was damn near like the Deep South years ago. Obviously there are lots of racist voters, but the hardcore are also mostly part of the GOP base at this point. I think that Obama’s race is less of an issue than Hillary’s gender (and her last name) with lots of “moderate” hinterland voters.
I think there are more likely-Democratic men who will engage in the “Ford” effect behavior you cite because Hillary’s a woman than there are likely-Democratic voters in general who will reject Obama on the basis of his race. I actually think that we might have the GOP to thank for this – given the Powell-mania of yore.
I come from the mid-west and travel there often. My family may not be completely typical, but I do get some guage of attitudes in the “Bible belt” via them and their friends – brother-in-law is a hard-core libertarian, sister is a recovering moderate Republican who has recently tended Democratic, but holds her nose. Obama is the most appealing major candidate to both of them in the current race – largely on the basis of how he projects himself. (Brother-in-law would love to vote for Ron Paul, but wouldn’t vote for any of the other GOP guys on civil liberties and Iraq debacle grounds.) Neither of them would vote for Hillary and just might sit that one out – “Clinton”, not gender being the decisive turn-off.
Obviously we haven’t erased racism, but Obama is a very appealing guy and electing a President isn’t inviting a guy to marry your daughter (although lots of white folks probably wouldn’t mind their daughters marrying a guy like Obama – the approval numbers on interracial dating have been going up dramatically, even taking lying to pollsters into account.) The fact that a bunch of black morons slammed him for not being “black enough” is an indication that he’s not percieved the same way Sharpton and other old-school figures are by either whites or blacks. My wife and her family (who are black working-class with only one generation between them and the Southern emigres – but now turned what’s called “middle-class”) can’t stand Sharpton and love Obama. More crucial, Obama’s the first candidate I’ve seen the younger generation in their late teens and early twenties show any enthusiasm for. I think Obama can pick up more new voters than he’ll lose likely-Dems over his race.
I also think that if Obama ran, he’d be smart to put some tough-sounding white guy with a military background in the veep role – like Holbrooke or Anthony Zinni. “Obama’s Cheney” – but not totally nuts and with real-wold experience in military matters.
June 2nd, 2007 at 12:45 pm
Granted that Obama was running against another black guy in Illinois – so that’s not a great test, but given the choice between a black conservative and a black liberal, Obama was able to make the sale. I’ve read accounts of his campaigning and I think he genuinely has the ability to connect beyond racial stereotypes or anxieties.
June 2nd, 2007 at 12:52 pm
Also, my point about fearful liberals was that it’s his biggest problem right now during the Dem primary in garnering base support – i.e. activists, bloggers, etc. – away from Hillary and Edwards. I think his biggest problem in the general election is probably his lack of longterm experience in DC – which, of course, could also be something of a plus given people’s loathing of Beltway hacks. But it will be the big talking point against him. People always talk about “lack of foreign policy experience” being a big deal with voters, but they seem to have no qualms about electing state governors with no foreign policy credentials whatever. Giuliani’s “national security credentials” are the biggest fraud on the current landscape – he actually made the dumbest, most deadly security decision in recent history, which was to put the emergency response center in World Trade Center.
June 2nd, 2007 at 4:14 pm
I guess no one here has looked seriously at the polling data. At this point, and I’m sorry to say this, come Super-Duper Tuesday (Feb 5) Hillary will RUN AWAY with it and that will be that and her numbers, if anything, look better today than last month. And it is not too early. Those first contests are less than SIX MONTHS away. If Edwards doesn’t win in Iowa he is toast. If Obama doesn’t win something before 2/5 he’s gone. Hil can place and still come out on top since she has big leads in CA, NY, NJ and other Super States.
Interesting post over at MYDD to the effect that Edwards and Obama split the so-called “Progressive” vote and if you combine their totals they easily best Clinton. So who get’s out of the way? Neither and that is the problem.
June 2nd, 2007 at 5:12 pm
This is pure fatalism…they’ve barely started campaigning.
June 2nd, 2007 at 5:30 pm
Richard – from what I’ve seen the polling data at this point has rarely determined who the actual nominee is.
June 3rd, 2007 at 12:03 pm
Reg, I’ve never seen Edwards come off as either phony or lightweight. He has certainly been tared as such relentlessly by the mainstream Press, you know, the good folks who told you Al Gore was a laughingstock.
I’d say, rather, the presure being asserted by the right to portray Edward as lightwiegh is pretty much in perportion to the actually work he’s done interjecting real substance and populist notions into the campaign.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:01 pm
“Edwards, who really doesn’t have a chance to stop Hillary and would make a terrible candidate in a general election because he comes off as phony and lightweight.”
If Edwards would make a “terrible candidate in a general election,” and in fact “comes off as phony and lightweight,” then I guess I am living in an alternate reality, Reg.
Not that I doubt your family who live in the midwest, but I am wondering what part of the midwest here thinks that Obama is the best of the major Democratic candidates.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:05 pm
Although I agree with the assessment of Hillary’s chances in the midwest. She would do well not to even bother campaigning here. But a candidate and personality like Edwards could really do some damage to Republican strongholds here. Folks in the midwest here like southern charm (unmanufactured, ala Hillary and Barak Obama).
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:11 pm
What might be maddening of all to me about Obama is that the man doesn’t go into specifics about anything…how to cover uninsured Americans with health insurance, a coherent policy on disengaging in Iraq…nothing. He is a lot of talk, but with no tangible explanation of how he is going to do these wonderful things he talks about. Say what you want about Edwards, but he put his butt on the line by showing his cards on many issues (specific health care proposal, how we will get out of the war). Obama, like Hillary, is playing it safe right now. For that reason, and many others, I have more respect for Edwards.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:16 pm
And I’m sorry, but while being a “community activist” might be a nice thing to put on one’s resume, it doesn’t qualify a person to be president, nor does it increase their electability. In fact, when people around the press room around here hear “community activist,” the first thing that they think of, rightly or wrongly, is that they are a Gloria Steinhem/Al Sharpton/Jesse Jackson type. And in these parts of the country, that is bad politics.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:21 pm
If I were the GOP in 2008, all I’d do is pull the old guilt-by- association card and show commercials featuring Obama standing next to Sharpton and Jackson at his campaign rallies. It wouldn’t change my mind about voting for Obama (I actually like the guy), but his political missteps practically write the future for him.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:23 pm
You’ve got a fantasy Edwards going there – he’s a trial lawyer. His expertise is manufactured charm and calculated appeals. Edwards sold his soul to vote for the war. In some ways worse than Hillary because he probably knew better. Edwards only shot is pumping the base to the left. He’s only slightly more “authentic” than Ms. Clinton. At least with Hillary I won’t be disappointed.
But more to the point, there’s not a chance in hell that Edwards could stop Hillary in the Dem primaries – even with Obama out of the race.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:26 pm
Name a single misstep of Obama’s. Sharpton is, frankly, closer to the Hillary wing of the party than Obama is – I’m sure there are plenty of pictures. The old-line black Dem political hacks are tending to Clinton. Which is fine… I like Charlie Rangel, but frankly I expect him to stick with Hillary and hope he does. Also the feminist hacks are living in Hillary’s butt. Also a plus for Obama.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:27 pm
“what part of the midwest here thinks that Obama is the best of the major Democratic candidates”
Illinois is still in the midwest last time I checked.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:31 pm
“Sharpton is, frankly, closer to the Hillary wing of the party than Obama is” – that’s not parsing political positions in terms of rhetoric but the symbiosis between old-school black “leaders” and the Dem establishment. They need each other. Obama breaks some of that mess up, and its about time.
June 3rd, 2007 at 1:36 pm
KN – I’m sympathetic to Edwards but with no help from the press, I see an awful lot of where he is now as stereotypical Dem primary political calculation. Without his “populist notions” or his pressing the war now that he’s got no realtime decisions to make about what to actually do about it, he’d be a total zero. He’s got to distinguish himself from Hillary. Problem is, when he was in the Senate he was Hillary-lite so far as I can tell. His experience IMHO is less impressive than Obama’s – one Senate term (okay, he’ll have maybe two years in the Senate on Obama, but chose not to run again for whatever reason – but prior to that you’ve got a mega-rich trial lawyer. Screw that…it’s bullshit.
June 3rd, 2007 at 4:10 pm
Reg, your assertion that Hillary’s vote for the war was based on her honest belief in a just cause is undermined by the recent revelation that Hillary had access to the National Intelligence Estimate, but preferred not to read it.
http://www.thenation.com/doc/20070618/von_hoffman
June 3rd, 2007 at 4:13 pm
…as was the case, to be fair, with a lot of Democratic Senators (including Edwards and Dodd), and near unanimous numbers of GOP Senators. The difference, though, is that Edwards has apologized for his vote. Hillary has not. Her position is most certainly not more honorable than Edwards.
June 3rd, 2007 at 4:16 pm
“Illinois is still in the midwest last time I checked.”
Well, I was thinking of the lower midwestern states…
June 3rd, 2007 at 4:19 pm
“Edwards sold his soul to vote for the war.”
Edwards was also a member of the Democratic Leadership Council at the time, and he has since separated himself from that organization, despite the fact that he could have raised the kind of cash and political connections that Hillary has raised had he maintained his membership there.
I am willing to cut Edwards a break and chalk it up to having a legitimate reawakening.
June 3rd, 2007 at 4:24 pm
Obama has had the luxury of not having been put in the kind of position that Edwards and Hillary Clinton have been in. I have little doubt that his votes on the war would have been different..remember, the senior Senator from Illinois who did vote against the war has never had presidential aspirations. He could afford to vote that way. Obama has wanted to be president for his whole life.
June 3rd, 2007 at 4:42 pm
Instead of “missteps”, I suppose I should have said “no steps,” since people have put all of their life’s hopes into him (including apparently you) without knowing much of what he stands for, since he has been in office so long and has not taken an initiative on anything that he is an unknown quantity.
There are some missteps. Most obnoxious to me is his speeches perpetuating faulty stereotypes about the Democratic Party (“we” as Democrats don’t recognize Christians and their beliefs…speak for yourself, buddy..). I was quite upset when he dismissed the late Paul Wellstone as a “gadfly.” Most importantly, I think that any opponent should attack him, rightly so, for his helping to found the Hamilton Organization, an outfit designed to undermine fair trade reform. It is why I don’t fear these boogey man numbers showing Hillary and him with the lion’s share of the support for the nomination. Once the primary voters of states with big manufacturing centers find out about Hillary and Barak, and compare their nasty or bare records as compared to Edwards, I have hope that Edwards will pull off the same kind of surprise that he orchestrated in 2004.
After all, for one, it is early. And secondly, I don’t have much faith in polls.
June 3rd, 2007 at 4:53 pm
The fact that Edwards – and not Hillary Rodham Clinton or Barak Hussein Obama – has been the brunt of personal attacks by the right (including the nasty New York Post, Faux News, Oxy Moron, the Washington Post, the Scary Blonde Pundette, etc.) should tell you something on who the Republicans themselves think is more electable in a general election matchup (a point that was made by Bill Maher on Real Time last week, when he called Edwards the most electable candidate, and basically stated what I just said, that the right was picking exclusively on him because of his high electability).
June 3rd, 2007 at 8:40 pm
Reg, I’d be more comforatable with your Obama love if it didn’t seem to require some dipping into the great swamp of right wing bullshit.
EEEKK! a dreaded Trial lawyer!! Katie, bar the door! (I confess, I love it when Bucannon says that). I like trial lawyers, even rich ones. Which of his cases were fixed, or who shouldn’t he have represented? The Party that hates trial lawyers, by the way, is just going bonkers over a candidate who thinks purgery is legal if it isn’t directly tied to another conviction and the liar in question is Republican. Point being, their are good lawyers and bad ones.
I’ll say it: forget about the war vote. The situation and details of Bush’s deception have now been compleatly distorted and misrepresented by the right. Clinton’s vote may have been wrong; but her explination (restated tonight) is true as well. The White House did lie to these people. You can say She was stupid to be fooled…. You can also say we lived through a period where a dishonest idiot was running the country with ZERO ACCOUNTABLY to ANYONE. Ken Starr fan Ariana Huffington might offer HER explination as to why She told American Gore and Bush were the same.
“Feminist Hacks living in her butt?” You proud of that? Well, a Woman was on the podium tonight, defacto represention for fifty percent of the population that is still largely shut out of the political process. Not so long ago we were told any Women making a credible run for the Presidency would have to be a Condi Rice style corperate tool. Clinton was impressive tonight, and deserves credit rather than derison for proving this conventional wisdom wrong; whatever the circumstance.
June 3rd, 2007 at 8:46 pm
I’m not going to respond to this stuff because I think most of it is baseless…give Edwards a pass if you will, but Obama is the only one who showed good judgement regarding the war – which is my main criterion for determining which of these people I would trust with the keys. The notion that Edwards has some great record of public service and Obama has “no record” is bizarre.
Having seen the debate tonight, I thought all of the candidates did well – Gravel and Kucinich being the weird exceptions, as well as essential to the process. I liked Hillary much more than I expected and thought her explanation of her Iraq vote in 2002 was credible – and less opportunistic than Edwards. Edwards is a good candidate although a bit desperate to prove that he’s the Great Liberal Hope. Biden, Richardson and Dodd all seemed like thoughtful guys – there wasn’t a person centerstage there who I think would be a bad President. Obama still stands out – he was the first to challenge a premise of Blitzer’s idiotic questioning, which is IMHO a hint as to who has gravitas and is truly thoughtful and who is the same old same old. I really like the fact that Obama isn’t playing the Dem primaries as a feint to the left. And I liked the fact that he didn’t trash Biden for his “yes” vote on funding but made the obvious case that this issue is difficult, given where Bush has pushed us. Much more realistic and serious as an alternative to Hillary IMHO. But in all honesty, I came away impressed with Hillary in the context of being a mild Hillaryphobe. Still think she’s the worst candidate in a general election and that Edwards is less likely to be able to catch her in the primaries.
June 3rd, 2007 at 8:52 pm
:”EEEKK! a dreaded Trial lawyer!! Katie, bar the door! ” It’s not rightwing talking points – it’s how he’s spent most of his life. I’m not impressed. What the hell kind of a resume is that ? Next to nothing. I wouldn’t even mention it if the bullshit against Obama – including “Hussein” – hadn’t been dragged out in this thread. The notion that Obama stereotypes Dems as being irreligious is just horseshit. But this is the crap that people who want a stereotypical Dem retread who pulls populist in the primaries and does what Bill Clinton did in office have to hang their case on. Pathetic…
June 3rd, 2007 at 8:58 pm
“dipping into the great swamp of right wing bullshit” – to clarify my going hard for Obama and against Edwards in this thread, the crap about Obama being some kind of cipher with no serious record was a jumping off point of this discussion. That might be a valid talking point for defending Hillary, but hardly for pushing Edwards as a strong candidate or a tribune of the people. The arguments got even cheaper as they went along…
June 3rd, 2007 at 9:00 pm
“The fact that Edwards – and not Hillary Rodham Clinton or Barak Hussein Obama – has been the brunt of personal attacks by the right…”
David – I’m beginning to think that you’re not writing from Kansas but another planet.