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the playing of politics doesn't bother me (5.00 / 11) (#17)
by TheRefugee on Sun Mar 23, 2008 at 10:35:40 PM EST
the hypocrisy of claiming that "I'm a new, better kind of politician" is what bothers me.

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Exactly (5.00 / 2) (#21)
by andgarden on Sun Mar 23, 2008 at 10:38:06 PM EST


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Digging pretty deep for fools gold (none / 0) (#27)
by AdrianLesher on Sun Mar 23, 2008 at 10:51:31 PM EST
Wonkette took down the self-promoting (for the author) aspect of this article nicely here.

A more flattering view of this part of Obama's history, linked to by Wonkette, is here.

Even politicians who want to change things have to have a path to power. For any reformist president to succeed, that president will need practical political skills.

Obama critics wish they could pin Obama between a rock and a hard place. They would like to be able to aasert that either he's too nice to stand up to the Republicans, or he's too mean to be real about the type of politician he wants to be. Heads we win, tails we use.

Everytime Obama slips loose of their clever traps, the Clintonites express outrage.

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lol (5.00 / 7) (#32)
by TheRefugee on Sun Mar 23, 2008 at 10:58:28 PM EST
I'm sure you haven't been one of the Obama supporters finding fault with every single thing the Clinton's have ever done.  

Obama needs a path to power so misrepresenting his abilities and achievements is ok, even though he is a "new type of politician" who doesn't play the lobbyist game (he does or else why would he be accepting hundreds of thousands in donations from Wall Street (just like Clinton)).  You have a double standard, for Obama his Path to Power is legitimate, while Clinton's is Scorched Earth.

Hillary isn't trying to pretend she isn't a politician.  Obama is pretending to be an everyman who just happens to have "fallen" into politics.  If that isn't hypocritical then I guess I'm going to have to ask Webster to redefine the term.

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Thanks for nothing (5.00 / 5) (#80)
by ChrisO on Mon Mar 24, 2008 at 08:30:56 AM EST
Can I have back the time I just wasted following your links? The Wonkette piece consists of the author repeating elements of Spivak's article, followed by a snarky comment that adds absolutely no substance. The I went to the Vanity Fair article, wading through the glowing ass kissing we have come to expect from the media. It offers some support for the notion that Obama was instrumental in passing the death penalty bill, but that's all (although I have read different opinions from an Illinois anti-death penalty activist.)Seven pages of ass kissing, and a couple of paragraphs on the death penaly bill. Thanks.

I was amused, however, by this from Vanity Fair: "It has become all but impossible to mention Obama without invoking the name of his fellow Illinoisan Abraham Lincoln" Gee, could that be because his starry-eyed supporters continually compare him to Lincoln? That constant copmparison is particularly annoying to me. He's a Senator in the middle of an undistinguished first term, and he's already Abraham Lincoln with the moral courage of Martin Luther King. Any wonder why so many Dems are sick of this guy?

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The only (5.00 / 1) (#86)
by tek on Mon Mar 24, 2008 at 08:45:07 AM EST
thing I find disturbing about this is that it lumps Hillary in with Obama and I don't believe she's cut from the same cloth.  We know that Hillary has true liberal values and is competent to restore the country to a democratic condition.  As far as taking on the corporations, people can raise some valid issues with Bill's administration regarding his relationship with corporations, (he didn't insist that the oil drillers pay their dues to the public) but he was the first president in modern times to rein in the corporate wealthy.

I think the disconnect with Hillary is among people too young to remember Bill's campaigns.  I can still remember watching both of them in interviews. I had given up on the government because we'd suffered through two terms of Reagan and one of Bush I and it looked at the time like the Democrats just couldn't come up with a winning candidate.  Then I started to see the Clintons on tv.  I was blown away.  I happened to be studying the Gilded Age in graduate school at the time and I thought, these people really get it.  They know what needs to be done.  

I really thought Hillary could have been the candidate, but the time wasn't right for a woman.  She was no ordinary First Lady.  All of us watching her in the 90s knew she was presidential material.  I think she's more capable even than Bill because she isn't plagued with carnal addictions that it seems the majority of male politicians can't keep under control.

As far as the Far Left's grievance with Bill being "DLC" or too moderate, it's a shame they don't realize that's what made him electable.  The Democrats had been running people who were just too far left of the American mainstream to either get elected or keep office--look what happened to Jimmy Carter.  Right now, we are at a time when we desperately need a president who is center because the very serious problems in this country affect Americans of every political persuasion.  The Right and the Far Left bucked against Bill Clinton during the campaign, but after he took office he was hugely popular.  At the end of his administration he had poll number up in the 70s and he'd been impeached!  

I agree with Richardson and all the "progressive" bloggers that Democrats should get behind one candidate:  Go Hillary!

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KISS, not the band (5.00 / 1) (#105)
by TheRefugee on Mon Mar 24, 2008 at 09:51:44 AM EST
is Obama's campaign.  Keep it simple stupid.  Obama's draw is that he doesn't have the baggage that a longtime DC player has.  Because of that it is easy for people who don't really understand politics to think that Obama, being new and spouting change, can actually walk into the WH and demand change....and get it.  

It isn't an age thing it is a question of what you look for in a candidate.  Hillary supporters are looking at a broader picture, drawing off of years of public record to make a fair assessment of Hillary's quality and qualification.  

Obama supporters are taking the narrow view...new and different, excellent motivator and speaker...he has to be good.  When ever anything bad comes up concerning Obama they don't go digging for the truth, they attack.  They don't know Obama's past anymore than we do because there isn't that much public record...what is there is finally starting to come to light and we're finding that the telegenic Obama might just be telegenic and no more.

You are dead on about the fact that Hillary supporters are comfortable with Hillary because of her and Bill being known.  What I think the Obama supporters continually overlook is that there is no perfect candidate.  That every candidate has made mistakes, has baggage.  That they are willing to ignore or overlook Obama's baggage is a mistake, either now or in the GE.  

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Hillary's Corporate Ties (none / 0) (#107)
by AdrianLesher on Mon Mar 24, 2008 at 09:55:11 AM EST
I find it amazing that Clintonites are oblivious to Clinton's close corporate ties, baldly exemplified by the campaign being run by Burson Marsteller head Mark Penn.

The constant refrain of the Clinton people is either that Obama is too far left or too far right. Both can't be right, and the evidence of Obama's life points to him being a person steeped in values of tolerance and progressive values.

Compared to Republicans, Clinton does have more liberal values. However, it is no accident that she is so popular among more conservative democrats like Ferraro and Bayh. She hasn't fully cut her ties from her Goldwater years.

[ Parent ]

is this supposed to be funny? (none / 0) (#109)
by Capt Howdy on Mon Mar 24, 2008 at 09:58:11 AM EST


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