Larry Johnson on Clinton’s Speech

Heh:

She is right about the issues. But we now know we cannot trust Obama on the issues. He has no core. He has no foundation. He has no fundamental principle. He is a man of convenience and opportunity. He is an ideological chameleon and will glom on to people he thinks can help him get ahead. This does not make him a bad person. He’s just a typical Chicago pol.

Uh, isn’t that what people have said about the Clintons since the early 90s? This Clinton adoration cracks me up. As if the Clintons were ever people of principle.

Remember, Hillary Clinton voted for the war and is still unrepentant. Bill Clinton gave us DOMA, “welfare reform,” and NAFTA, among many other policy atrocities.

Sorry. I should be gracious about Clinton’s speech tonight, but these PUMA types drive me nuts.

The Clinton Convention? BS.

Geez, Dick Morris is an asshole:

Hillary and Bill have hijacked the Denver convention, making it into a carbon copy of what it would have looked like had she won until the last possible moment. By the time Obama gets up to speak and put his stamp on the convention, Hillary will have had one prime time night all to herself. Bill will have pre-empted a second night. Hillary will have had all the nominating and seconding speeches she wants. And the roll call of the states would record, in graphic detail, how the voters of state after state rejected Obama’s candidacy in the primaries. Only then, after three and a half days of all Clinton all the time will the convention then, finally, turn to its nominee and allow him to have an hour in the sun!

Dick, have you ever been right about anything?

The Clintons will have a prominent role at the DNC. As an Obama supporter who lives in the real world, I’m OK with it. Hillary deserves her own night simply because she almost beat Obama. Let her supporters enjoy her while she sings the praises of Barack Obama. Her speech will help the Democratic nominee.

Bill also deserves a prominent speaking role as the most successful and popular Democratic president since JFK. It makes sense, and I believe it’s tradition to let ex-presidents to speak at conventions.

On the roll call vote, who cares? I think the superdelegates will go for Obama in large numbers to give the appearance that the primary race was not as close as it really was. The Clinton people have asked for the roll call vote and they deserve it. It’s OK.

Snip

This Clintonian tour de force raises a key question about Barack Obama: Is he strong enough to be president or can he be pushed around? His failure to stand up to the Clintons makes one wonder how effective he will be against bin Laden, Iran, Chavez, or Putin.

Well, Obama is using strategy and diplomacy to deal with the Clintons. I think it would be great for our next president to use strategy and diplomacy as tools to deal with the rest of the world.

“Please Don’t Vote for a Democrat”

Mike Meehan is only trying to help Republicans. That’s why he’s posted a patriotic billboard in Orange County, Florida that shows the an image of the burning World Trade Center with the caption “Please Don’t Vote for a Democrat.”

Nice!

Remember, Bill Clinton was in office on September 11, 2001 and it was Bill Clinton who ignored the Daily Presidential Brief of August 6, 2001 entitled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in US.”

So 9/11 is the fault of the Democrats.

See?

If you vote for Democrats, you’ll help cause another terrorist attack.

If you have any doubts,  Mr. Meehan was nice enough to post a video of his hit single, the Republican Song:

If you can’t bear to watch it, you can read the lyrics ,which are also really nice:

The Democrat secular progressive move,
political correctness is killing us too.
They want to take the money from the hard workin man,
and give it to the lazy folks that don’t give a damn.

Democrats and Liberals, shame on you,
don’t punish us all just to please a few,
Your holdin people back while we’re pickin up the slack,
and that’s why we can’t vote for a Democrat.
Oh no, a no, no, no, no, no, no…

See, the problem with Democrats is that they want to help lazy people (might that be code for something?) at the expense of all hard-working white Americans. That’s why if you read Obama’s platform, you’ll read that it’s just full of new entitlement programs for lazy people.

Seriously, I have a hard time imagining that these kinds of fact-free attacks will have much of an effect any more, but what’s to keep him from trying?

Hell Freezes Over: I Defend Clinton

I’m sure you’ve read about it.

Clinton said:

“My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California. You know I just, I don’t understand it,” she said, dismissing the idea of abandoning the race.

First, I ran for delegate from DC for Jerry Brown in 1992. Our primary was in May, and by that time it was clear that Bill Clinton would be the Democratic nominee — even if he didn’t have all the delegates necessary for the nomination until June.

But, more importantly, I think Clinton’s remarks about RFK have been overblown. I always love Keith Olberman’s special comments, but his fake outrage was a bit over the top.

I didn’t take it that Clinton thinks she needs to stay in the race in case Obama is assassinated. She was simply, and inaccurately observing that it is common for Dem races to be decided in June (June is the new March!). To me, she just seemed to be trying to tell people that it’s not over yet.

Deluded? Definitely.

Waiting for Obama to be killed?

No.

Hell Freezes Over: I Agree with Ann Coulter

In 1992, I was living in Washington and found myself very involved in the Democratic primary there. I ran for delegate for Jerry Brown, and found that process to be an odd one. The Brown campaign called me and asked to run for delegate simply because I had shown up at a Jerry Brown event and put my name on a piece of paper.

I knew Brown reasonably well, as I grew up in California and I thought he was a great governor. Sure, his 1992 campaign was unconventional (it pre-dated mass use of the internet, but pundits made fun of his use of an 800 number to try to get contributions that he limited at $100 per donor). He had some guy name Joe Trippi running his campaign who was quite successful working for a guy who didn’t get the nomination, but made the race more difficult for Bill Clinton than it should have been.

Eventually, I joined the Clinton fold and tried to like him even to the point of attending his inauguration.

But I always had an uneasy feeling about him. I felt that he was willing to disregard political convictions in the name of political expediency.

The Monica thing bothered me most than most Democrats, as I thought that perhaps he should have resigned over the incredible stupidity and selfishness he demonstrated at the time.

But in 2000, after a brief flirtation with Bradley, I was firmly in the Gore camp. Beyond the Florida fiasco, Gore should have won that election and would have done so easily if not for the Clinton fatigue that plagued the nation.

Think of where our country would be right now if Gore had won. 9/11 may have happened, but Gore would have committed the resources to the effort in Afghanistan to definitively defeat the Taliban and to kill or capture Bin Laden.

Instead, Bush was in power and he diverted resources from the fight in Afghanistan to attack Iraq: a country with a horrible dictator who posed absolutely no threat to the US.

In the lead-up to the Iraq war, I was in the street protesting such idiocy, but people like me were called traitors and worse simply for not being deceived by Bush and his cronies.

I worked my ass off for Dean in 2004, but alas, it was not to be. I was glad to support Kerry, who, like Clinton, voted to authorize force against Iraq, but then later admitted that was a mistake. Good people learn from mistakes.

So in 2007, Hillary Clinton announced that she was going to run for president. She refused to admit that her war vote was a mistake. Apparently, Clintons don’t make mistakes. She was defiant to anti-Iraq war Democrats in that defense.

At that moment, she became an unacceptable candidate for me for 2008.

I began to believe that Clintonian excuses for lacking a backbone on important issues was no longer acceptable.  She never deserved my vote.

But if I loathed the Clintons, I really came to disdain the O’Reillys, Hannitys, Malkins, and Coulters even more. Those people were beneath my contempt for their dishonesty.

For that reason, it was quite strange to read Coulter’s column from today:

In a Time magazine poll taken earlier this year, more than twice as many voters said Bill Clinton’s involvement in Hillary’s campaign made them less likely to vote for her as said they were more likely to vote for her. (Some even said that “having Bill Clinton around makes me less likely to vote for What’s-Her-Name.” One-third of the respondents were upset Bill didn’t call the next day, like he promised.)

So before remembering that we are now left with two dangerous choices for president — a young liberal who is friendly with terrorists or an old liberal who is friendly with Teddy Kennedy — take a moment to revel in the fact that our long national nightmare is over. It turns out getting rid of the Clintons was the change we’ve been waiting for.

Of course, Coulter’s hyperbole about Obama and McCain are silly, but getting the Clintons out of the White House IS part of the change I’ve been waiting for.

The Clintons, the DLC, Terry McAullife, and that whole triangulation mindset are some things that need to be gone from the Democratic party if we hope to build the Democratic party and elect strong leaders in our future.

Clintonite Kantor on Indiana?

Update: It looks like a hoax.

After rewatching the clip, Pennebaker told the Politico’s Ben Smith, “He does not say that. He does not say that … What he says is he’s surprised Perot’s numbers are holding. He says they must be shitting in the White House.” Pennebaker also told Smith that when the movie was released in theaters, no one thought Kantor said what he’s now alleged to have said, and that he thinks audio was dubbed onto the original video. Smith also spoke to the editor of the YouTube clip, and reports the editor “said that he enhanced, but didn’t alter, the audio in the second portion of the video.”

  Ok, so I was duped. The disputed piece was taken off YouTube - you can see the full video here:

 

Bill Clinton: Hillary Must Win NC to Win Nomination

Bill Clinton moves the goalposts again:

Bill Clinton said Friday in Charlotte that his wife’s presidential bid hinges in many ways on whether the New York senator wins North Carolina’s Democratic primary.

Speaking to about 4,000 at a rally at UNC Charlotte, the former president said Hillary Clinton would likely have to win the state’s May 6 primary to have any chance at winning the overall popular vote and ultimately overtaking Sen. Barack Obama as the party’s nominee.

Heh.

Rasmussen has Obama up in North Carolina by 23%.

I can only imagine how badly the feelings  the feelings of NC voters will be hurt when they learn that like MO, MS, GA, VA and many other states when they learn on May 7 that their state doesn’t count.

Hillary Clinton, Sexism, and Me

From the New Yorker:

It’s been odd during this election cycle as some Clintonistas have asserted that Obama supporters are sexist for not supporting Senator Clinton, who they view as the most experienced and best qualified candidate. While dismissing such claims (which are the same as asserting that anyone who supports Clinton over Obama is a racist), I have been searching inside myself to try to figure out if my dislike of Clinton has anything to do with some kind of latent sexism.

I admit that on a certain level, when Clinton is angry and giving voice to her anger, I have a visceral reaction. I feel like I’m 14 years old and else’s mother is scolding me for leaving a dish in the sink. Her tone makes me want to dig in my heels and leave that damn dish in the sink, since it’s not my house and she didn’t explain the rules ahead of time. It really drives me batty.

Is that sexism? Maybe, but I’m not sure.

I think more of it has to do with tone and style than it does with any kind of sexism just as in the way when I see Bush’s smirk or his stuffed-crotch flight suit or hear him saying something stupid (yet again), my blood pressure goes up a few notches. My reaction is the same when Bill Clinton is angry and shakes that index finger in a “How dare you call me a liar!” kind of way.

There are always going to be politicians who will rub some of us the wrong way for different reasons that go beyond policy disagreements, but when I think of what my real issues with Clinton are, they do go to matters of history and policy issues.

I cannot forget that she and her husband were the poster children of DLC centrism that decimated the Democratic party for a generation. Rather than saying what they think, the Clintons believed that it was best to see what was a poll-tested winner; standing up for what right has always seemed less important to those two than getting elected as witnessed by Senator Clinton’s vote on Bush’s war (I knew Bush was lying, why couldn’t she figure it out? Oh, that’s right…she knew too) and her support for silly bills like legislation to ban flag-burning.

So, no, my dislike of Clinton has little to do with sexism. It has more to do with a lack of honesty and authenticity on her part.

Bill Clinton is Still an Asshole

Clinton’s words:

“I think it would be a great thing if we had an election year where you had two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country and people could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics.”

So Obama doesn’t love this country?

Way to inject a right-wing narrative  into the DEMOCRATIC campaign.

Mark Penn is an Ass

Ugh:

Chief Strategist Mark Penn said he would put Wyoming and Mississippi, the next two states to vote, “in what I call the challenging category for us,” because Obama has “some very significant leads,” but he downplayed Mississippi in pushing the campaign’s argument that Clinton does best in the states that matter, the blue states and noting that he couldn’t remember the last time Mississippi went Democratic in a presidential race.

Amazing, but not surprising. Penn seems to think that the only states that matter are those that Democrats can easily win no matter who gets the nomination.

Maybe if Democrats in the past had tried to compete in all 50 states, they wouldn’t have been such miserable failure in electoral politics since 1994 (thanks Bill!)