The Audacity of Hopelessness (Frank Rich)

[Scurrilous]

<snip>

"WHEN people one day look back at the remarkable implosion of the Hillary Clinton campaign, they may notice that it both began and ended in the long dark shadow of Iraq.

It’s not just that her candidacy’s central premise — the priceless value of “experience” — was fatally poisoned from the start by her still ill-explained vote to authorize the fiasco. Senator Clinton then compounded that 2002 misjudgment by pursuing a 2008 campaign strategy that uncannily mimicked the disastrous Bush Iraq war plan. After promising a cakewalk to the nomination — “It will be me,” Mrs. Clinton told Katie Couric in November — she was routed by an insurgency.

The Clinton camp was certain that its moneyed arsenal of political shock-and-awe would take out Barack Hussein Obama in a flash. The race would “be over by Feb. 5,” Mrs. Clinton assured George Stephanopoulos just before New Year’s. But once the Obama forces outwitted her, leaving her mission unaccomplished on Super Tuesday, there was no contingency plan. She had neither the boots on the ground nor the money to recoup.

That’s why she has been losing battle after battle by double digits in every corner of the country ever since. And no matter how much bad stuff happened, she kept to the Bush playbook, stubbornly clinging to her own Rumsfeld, her chief strategist, Mark Penn. Like his prototype, Mr. Penn is bigger on loyalty and arrogance than strategic brilliance. But he’s actually not even all that loyal. Mr. Penn, whose operation has billed several million dollars in fees to the Clinton campaign so far, has never given up his day job as chief executive of the public relations behemoth Burson-Marsteller. His top client there, Microsoft, is simultaneously engaged in a demanding campaign of its own to acquire Yahoo.

Clinton fans don’t see their standard-bearer’s troubles this way. In their view, their highly substantive candidate was unfairly undone by a lightweight showboat who got a free ride from an often misogynist press and from naïve young people who lap up messianic language as if it were Jim Jones’s Kool-Aid. Or as Mrs. Clinton frames it, Senator Obama is all about empty words while she is all about action and hard work.

But it’s the Clinton strategists, not the Obama voters, who drank the Kool-Aid. The Obama campaign is not a vaporous cult; it’s a lean and mean political machine that gets the job done. The Clinton camp has been the slacker in this race, more words than action, and its candidate’s message, for all its purported high-mindedness, was and is self-immolating."

more

[Captain Hilts]

1. Frank Rich? Write a negative article on HRC? I'm shocked, SHOCKED!!!

[Straight Shooter]

5. It's amazing, isn't it? Will wonders never cease. n/t

[DURHAM D]

18. Frank is hoping for a sleepover at Barak's house. n/t

[Quixote1818]

21. Unfortunately for Hillary, he is spot on.

But you won't argue what he said, instead you will just pass him off as a Clinton hater. Thats the problem with the whole Clinton campaign, they never admit mistakes just as Frank Rich pointed out. If you can only blame everyone else on your failures and not try to improve then you are bound to fail. I would suggest maybe listening to what Mr. Rich has pointed out and learning from it.

[NDambi]

41. Bingo..and for long time to come...

She and Ghouliani will be the main focus...and discussion on what not to do when you run for office.

[mwb970]

52. Exactly.

As usual, Rich's analysis is insightful and accurate - unless you are a Hillary supporter, in which case it is treasonous slander. Or something like that.

[lastliberalintexas]

73. When he starts bashing Obama

what will you say? As a supporter of neither, I must admit that Clinton has received the lion's share of the negative press thus far. In fact, Obama has been treated so incredibly well by the corporate media that it scares me. So what happens when that worm turns? What will the Obama campaign's response be then? Does he take the advice of right wing jerks like Rich or any others in the media?

For as much as I can't stand Clinton (and I was a certified Hillary Hater from 2002 on), I am also amazed at the media manipulation of this campaign and the Obama supporters willingness to use the media attacks on Clinton, when they must know darn well that the entire tenor of the media coverage of Obama will change drastically once he is the nominee.

[Joe Bacon]

74. Phony Frank is consistent in his Clinton hatred

This worthless asshole has a inbred hatred of the Clintons and Al Gore. He and Whoreen Dowd made up lie after lie about Al Gore in 2000, in fact, this fat flatulent fart face kept telling us that Gore and the Clintons were the epitome of sleaze, not like that fine Bush. Yep, Frank Bitch kept saying that there was no difference between Bush and Gore except for all the sleaze and slime that oozed from the Clintons.

Fuck you, Frank Rich and Fuck The SCREW YORK TIMES!

[spiritual_gunfighter]

75. Calm down

Obama beat Hillary because he ran a good campaign, Hillary didnt. It's as simple as that. Frank Rich is just echoing that in his piece. Dont get all bent out of shape. Relax dude.

[tabatha]

2. That just about sums it up.

Good article.

[MariaS]

6. Ditto

[Tarheel_Dem]

3. wow! a better title would have been "The Audacity of Arrogance"

I think that sums up the Clinton camp quite nicely. The lack of a game plan past Feb. 5th was the height of arrogance and, and will be her undoing.

[jgraz]

76. A better title would be "I am now going to fucking take you apart"

Brilliant and absolutely devastating. Some of Rich's best work, which is saying quite a bit.

[saltpoint]

4. I'm recommending this piece by Frank Rich.

I think the TIMES is frustrating when it hires Bill Kristol to write columns, but it does far better with Bob Herbert, Krugman, Kristoff, and certainly Frank Rich.

Politics and preferences aside, look how this guy condenses sentences.

[K Gardner]

7. OMG.. this is brilliant. "The Clinton strategist drank the Kool-Aid", lol..

[BeyondGeography]

8. He lays it on thick...and they deserve it

==As for countering what she sees as the empty Obama brand of hope, she offers only a chilly void: Abandon hope all ye who enter here. This must be the first presidential candidate in history to devote so much energy to preaching against optimism, against inspiring language and — talk about bizarre — against democracy itself. No sooner does Mrs. Clinton lose a state than her campaign belittles its voters as unrepresentative of the country.==

[Whisp]

9. recommendable. great stuff. nt

[tyne]

10. One of my favs..

"Bill Clinton knocked states that hold caucuses instead of primaries because “they disproportionately favor upper-income voters” who “don’t really need a president but feel like they need a change.” After the Potomac primary wipeout, Mr. Penn declared that Mr. Obama hadn’t won in “any of the significant states” outside of his home state of Illinois. This might come as news to Virginia, Maryland, Washington and Iowa, among the other insignificant sites of Obama victories. The blogger Markos Moulitsas Zúniga has hilariously labeled this Penn spin the “insult 40 states” strategy."

[calimary]

55. Good Lord that Mark Penn has been an albatross from the beginning.

Unfortunate but true - Frank Rich is correct, I'm afraid.

The comparison to the bush war plan is startling - and startlingly accurate. And it does beg the question - if this is how she runs a campaign, how can we expect her to run a presidency? I would ask the same, and I HAVE, about rudy giuliani's magnificent game plan that cost him, what? Fifty MILLION dollars for ONE delegate?

I've had this head-over-heart decision about Obama vs Clinton - Barack has my head while Hillary has my heart. But I'm becoming more convinced that I backed the correct person when I voted for Obama.

Besides, I do NOT relish the idea of a Mark Penn in the White House. NO WAY that could be a good thing. It'd be karl rove 2.0. :scared:

[Carolina]

11. K&R!

[GodlessBiker]

12. Frank Rich is the master in these kinds of things. Keen analysis.

[AX10]

13. Look, Frank Rich wrote a hit piece on the Clintons.

Who would have ever thought he would do that?!? :sarcasm:

[mwb970]

53. Is it still a "hit piece" if it's all true?

Just wondering.

[bvar22]

14. Undone by smug arrogance.

After promising a cakewalk to the nomination — “It will be me,” Mrs. Clinton told Katie Couric in November.....

The race would “be over by Feb. 5,” Mrs. Clinton assured George Stephanopoulos.....

[Skidmore]

48. And laziness. Sheer laziness.

[FrenchieCat]

15. Rich is on target....as usual.

Kool-Aid for everyone......Red for the Clinton campaign to highlight the debt that they are in....

and Green for the Obama campaign for running a first time overall lean mean machine. Yeah!

[DaveT]

16. This is getting to be conventional wisdom: HRC had no

game plan after Super Tuesday.

This is putting it backwards. Her game plan was her ONLY hope in the first place -- win on Super Tuesday.

That idiotic clog of coast to coast primary elections was created to give the nomination to a character who had no meaningful appeal to Democratic Primary voters -- Senator Clinton. She has two assets only: the name identification of a Brand Name and tons of money. The fear among the DLC cretins who dreamed up Super Tuesday was that some Howard Dean type outsider might not fall apart in Iowa or New Hampshire, and then build up a national constituency by winning hit and miss primaries on the long road to the National Convention. Super Tuesday was the First Fire Wall.

And the only one, really.

Rodham Clinton's high riding poll numbers during the those meaningless months in 2007 were the product of the Brand Name. (Ditto for Rudy G. Remember him?) Once Edwards and the other also rans eliminated themselves, Obama inherited the bulk of the normal Democratic primary electorate -- and as he presents himself to the voters in State after State, HRC's lead amongst blue collar and senior Democrats melts away. This is possible mainly because Rodham Clinton's "support" had been a mile wide and an inch deep from the beginning.

When Super Tuesday failed to secure the nomination, her only assets of Brand Name and Big Bucks became irrelevant. She has had no strategy to counter Obama's rather thin soup of Hope, because she has nothing to say worth turning a vote. "I'm more experienced than the Other Guy." Give me a break. Am I the only one who remembers poor old Walter Mondale saying, "I am ready to be President."?


Flame retardant:I think Obama has a lot of talent and I am cautiously optimistic about his chance to win the White House and be a successful President. He was not my first, second or third choice. I would have supported Gore had he run, I was surprised that he didn't. My antipathy to HRC is based entirely on national security issues -- I believe she would keep us on the disastrous PNAC course, only providing a far more competent program of war and more war than what Shrub has offered.

[Egnever]

19. Good assesment

I would disagree on one point though. I think the only reason she is still in it is name recognition. Obama has proven time and again that once he goes into a state he can erase her lead. So at this point any illusion of victory she has left is onl;y there because name recognition carries her forward till Obama gets to town.

[Tatiana]

25. Fantastic assessment. There really is no compelling reason to vote for her.

She *hasn't* distinguished herself all that much. A failed health care initiative, an authorization that paved the way for an illegal and immoral occupation, a hawkish foreign policy...

And absent any distinct political stance like Al Gore (environment, social security) or John Edwards (poverty, going after corporations) or even Obama (open government, engaging foreign policy), she left herself open to be characterized. Obama has framed the discussion; Obama has painted himself as the agent of change; Obama has wrapped his candidacy around the blanket of hope.

Obama's communication is overcoming Clinton's name recognition and, as you say, exposing the true tepidness of her initial "support." That's why superdelegates are moving from Clinton to Obama. No one is moving from Obama to Clinton.

[blonndee]

33. Good post!

Quite thoughtful and a smooth read!

[flyarm]

17. Frank Rich is dead on..he nails it. eom

[Tatiana]

20. "Less than 24 hours later, Mr. Obama received the endorsement of the latte-drinking Teamsters."

Lord have mercy, the man has a way with words.

Rich could be a DUer, as everything contained in that column has been mentioned at least twice on here.

[4themind]

28. As I usually say after readng his articles...

OUCH

[Adelante]

45. HAHAHA

:rofl:

[juno jones]

88. LOL!

And the sentence before: "Tom Buffenbarger of the machinists’ union, derided Obama supporters as “latte-drinking, Prius-driving, Birkenstock-wearing, trust-fund babies.”

I drink lattes and I wear Birkies (which have been resoled multiple times by american shoesmiths) and I bet I have more blue collar street cred than 'Buffenbarger'. Hell most of my co-workers do as well and bless their apolitical hearts they are pretty much all for Obama.

Mr Buffenbarger, what car do you drive to your rallies? An SUV? A great shiny phallus? How dare you claim to represent the working man. This is the kind of alienation that the Clinton campaign has given us. Sterotypes and fucking assumption.

[Whisp]

22. kickable.

[Quixote1818]

23. He is exactly right and the Clinton supporters will never allow themselves to see that he is right

Which is exactly why her Campaign will fail. They ran their campaign just like the Bush administration ran the Iraq war. Never changing course and sticking with failed strategy's.

[Akimbo2112]

26. I'm a Clinton supporter......

and I agree with the notion that she's run a tragically ordinary campaign. But it isn't so much because of arrogance, in my opinion. I think she just got beat by a candidate that has rock-star appeal, enough policy savvy to hold his own, and not a lot of negative baggage to hold against him. Whether she's arrogant or not, she got a lot of votes. But Obama caught fire with early caucus victories (smart as hell if you ask me) and has really managed to sustain and increase his appeal to a surprisingly diverse demographic.

The Patriots were supposed to win too. It isn't like they lost out of arrogance, they just flat-out got beat.

[Quixote1818]

31. You make some good points. I don't know if anyone could have beat Obama this year.

They might have had to run Thomas Jefferson or FDR to beat him.

[anamandujano]

34. You try doing anything with the MSM working against you. Throw in

Karl Rove and it's amazing she got any votes at all.

[Perry Logan]

42. Well said. The arrogance meme is just another delusion of the anti-Hillarites.

Despite what they think, the anti-Hillary people cannot read minds.

[Cassandra]

51. The arrogance of her advisers is quite obvious.

They trash the 50-state strategy, Howard Dean, the DNC, progressives, the netroots, any states that didn't go for Hillary, etc. She may not be arrogant (merely projecting mega-confidence) but her advisers have trashed any attempt to build the Democratic party and pull it more to the left (which would actually be the old center).

[Colorado Liberal]

72. I had no idea I was a mind-reader

Yeah, I can't imagine why I would think someone is being arrogant when they refer to people who support the other candidate as "latte-drinking, Prius-driving, Birkenstock-wearing, trust fund babies", who don't have a clue about how the "real world" of politics works. I was an Edwards supporter, and was disappointed when he withdrew right before the Colorado caucus (and please don't waste your time telling me how caucuses don't count and don't reflect "real" voters). I was squarely on the fence between Obama and Clinton, until a Hillary supporter in our precinct went on and on (and ON) about how naive ALL of the Obama supporters were, and how he was an empty suit, and... for 10 minutes without a single thing to say about the merits of his candidate.

It may not be fair to evaluate the candidate's campaign based just on the supporters I have encountered (although, how else would one do so?), but I saw more than enough arrogance to convince me to swing my vote to Obama. People don't have to "read minds" - they just have to listen to the rhetoric being slung.

(And as an aside, I will support whoever the Democratic nominee is in the general election).

[NDambi]

43. I absolutely agree with you...it also didn't help that she had bozos running her campaign

[Skidmore]

46. Obama is a workhorse. He did the research and the work.

He has the ability to pick good staff and to financially manage other people's money. He has both a message and a record of success. Oh, yes, he can speak well too. It takes more than just being able to speak to rally the numbers of new voters and to get them involved locally.

[alcibiades_mystery]

58. She got beat by harder work and better organization

Example after example after example: The Clinton campaign is a clusterfuck of disorganization, while Obama's people are everywhere, organized and organizing. It's clear as day. Clinton got out-hustled, badly.

[RaleighNCDUer]

65. I tend to agree. There was an early confidence which might or might

not have been arrogance - "It will all be over after Feb. 5" - but you could smell the burning rubber as her campaign hit the brakes after Iowa. They didn't just coast along saying 'everything's OK', no matter how they publicly shrugged it off. But the sad fact is, it was so unexpected that they didn't know which way to turn. I suspect they were geared up for a fight against Edwards instead of Obama, and when Edwards was elbowed off the stage they were left floundering with the wrong campaign against the wrong candidate. I think they really expected Obama to make a decent showing, then fall back to be the 1st VP choice of her or Edwards.

[anamandujano]

35. Failed strategies like talking important issues and fending off the

dirty attacks of the Obama campaign.

These strategies always fail when the MSM is backing your opponent but there is nothing you can do about it.

[Tarheel_Dem]

39. dirty attacks? lol...

remember when Hill and JRE got caught (open mic) conspiring to rid the debates of Kucinich & Gravel?
Your candidate certainly can't claim any high ground when it comes to dirty tactics. Just ask the people of Wisconsin who, in exit polling, overwhelmingly (53%) thought she had run a negative campaign with mailers and attack ads.

Pot meet kettle.

[yourguide]

24. K&R

Great piece, and def captures the meat of the matter!

[List left]

27. Play nice kids

Bump

[tabasco]

29. But....but...I thought all of Hillary's staffers worked for free???

That "working for free" didn't last very long, did it?

Obama was even criticized here for paying his campaign employees!

Meanwhile, H. Clinton gets suckered for millions by the likes of Mark Penn.

[Breeze54]

30. Hasn't that been said over and over again?

I know I was saying that for the longest time.

[lisa58]

47. It's just like a congressional hearing...

...everything has already been said, but everyone hasn't said it yet.

[here_is_to_hope]

64. *snicker* n/t

[Breeze54]

107. No, everyone hasn't got it through their thick skulls yet!

She voted for the war and is with the DLC. He said he was against the war but he repeatedly voted to fund it.

Two peas in a pod.

------------

Obama defends votes in favor of Iraq funding

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2007/03/22/obama_defends_votes_in_favor_of_iraq_funding/

snip-->

As a candidate for his Senate seat in 2003 and 2004, Obama said repeatedly that he would have voted against an $87 billion war budget that had been requested by President Bush.

"When I was asked, 'Would I have voted for the $87 billion,' I said 'no,' " Obama said in a speech before a Democratic community group in suburban Chicago in November 2003. "I said 'no' unequivocally because, at a certain point, we have to say no to George Bush. If we keep on getting steamrolled, we're not going to stand a chance."

Yet Obama has voted for all of the president's war funding requests since coming to the Senate, and is poised to vote in favor of the latest request when it comes to the Senate floor this spring. Liberal groups have demanded that lawmakers cut off funds for the war as a way to force its end, but Obama has joined most Democrats in the House and Senate in saying he would not take such a move.

:eyes:

[Egalia]

32. Enjoy it while you can, Obamafans

Rich had similar things to say about Al Gore. He's doesn't like Democratic front-runners no matter who they are. Obama's time is coming.

[D23MIURG23]

36. The last 6 years of his writing make a McCain endorsment unlikely

or maybe thats just me.

[mwb970]

54. Um, Hillary is not the "Democratic front-runner" any more.

And exactly what "time" is it that is "coming" for Obama? I'm curious.

[rodeodance]

57. You are right--It is Obama's to lose now.

[kentj44]

37. talk about qualifications

the major one i see is an inexperienced politician organize and defeat a great political machine,it appears that senator obama does have the qualifications on that point.these last few days we will as clinton will divide the democratic party with her attitude that i'm the candidate or else the dems don't win the presidency.she will use her emotions to bring people back into the fold.we need someone with hope,clinton is running a campaign,obama is running a movement.

[democrank]

38. K & R

Brilliant, Mr. Rich.

[Major Hogwash]

40. Well, it's after February 5th. How's things going for you now, Hillary?

11 in a row.

Wanta make it 12 in a row?
13 in a row?

How about 15 in a row?

Or 17 in a row?

There is no way she can come back now.

It's over.

And it has been for 2 weeks.

[eridani]

44. See? It really is possible to rationally criticize a campaign--

--without once using the "B" word or the "W" word or the "C" word. Or the "S" word.

[Broadslidin]

49. "I Trust President George W. Bush" words from Senator Clinton's War Authorization Senate Speech.

An Answer to Frank Rich's Synopsis:

"It's not just her candidacy's central premise
- the priceless value of "experience" -
was fatally poisoned from the start by her
still ill-explained vote to authorize the fiasco."

[jakem]

50. kick for jlake!

[Sonnenschein]

56. Good analysis. But the main reason Hillary lost is not because she

did not have more field offices. The main reason was that she did not respond to the attacks from Obama forcefully but calmly while Obama was attacking her and her people everyday. She did not explain her vote on Iraq well like Rich said. When Obama accuse her of being divisive, she should have went on attack and wear her "divisiveness" not as a baggage, but as a badge of honor. She put herself on the line on our behalf. If she just smiled like Laura, she would not have attracted so much hatred from the right wing. She should have shamed Obama for implying that she is one of "the same old folks in Washington" who sit on status quo when Obama knows full well of the sweeping changes Clintons brought to Washington. She should emphasize on every stump speech that she has always proven that she can work with Republicans while Obama only hopes to. The fact that she won reelection with overwhelming majority in NY shows that Republican can vote for her if they get to know her. She should emphasis time and time ago that she voted for using force wisely and as a last resort as she said while casting her vote. She should emphasize that nobody would believe that we would be at war if Clintons were in the White House. She should say all this in a gentle tone like Obama does to her.

[JTFrog]

59. But WE DID ATTACK IRAQ when the Clintons were in the White House.

Are you sure you really wanna run with that list you have there? I'm thinking maybe you should do a little research and get back to us.

On October 31, 1998 US President Bill Clinton signed into law H.R. 4655, the "Iraq Liberation Act." <3> <4> The new Act appropriated funds to Iraqi opposition groups in the hope of removing Saddam Hussein from power and replacing his regime with a democracy.

The Act also said that "Nothing in this Act shall be construed to authorize or otherwise speak to the use of United States Armed Forces (except as provided in section 4(a)(2)) in carrying out this Act." Section 4(a)(2) states "The President is authorized to direct the drawdown of defense articles from the stocks of the Department of Defense, defense services of the Department of Defense, and military education and training for organizations."

The bombing campaign had been anticipated since February 1998 and incurred criticism from Anti-war movements and abroad.<1><2> Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates initially announced they would deny US military the use of local bases for the purpose of air strikes against Iraq.<3> Democracy Now! reported about an alleged secret policy, stating that "the Clinton administration has quietly changed U.S.nuclear-weapons policy to permit for the first time the use of tactical atomic warheads, in this case against Iraq"<3>, the Presidential Decision Directive (PDD) 60.<4>

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Desert_Fox

http://www.commondreams.org/views07/0303-23.htm

See Hillary Run (from Her Husband's Past on Iraq)
by Scott Ritter

Senator Hillary Clinton wants to become President Hillary Clinton. "I'm in, and I'm in to win," she said, announcing her plans to run for the Democratic nomination for the 2008 Presidential election. Let there be no doubt that Hillary Clinton is about as slippery a species of politician that exists, one who has demonstrated an ability to morph facts into a nebulous blob which blurs the record and distorts the truth. While she has demonstrated this less than flattering ability on a number of issues, nowhere is it so blatant as when dealing with the issue of the ongoing war in Iraq and Hillary Clinton's vote in favor of this war.

This issue won't be resolved even if Hillary Clinton apologizes for her Iraq vote, as other politicians have done, blaming their decision on faulty intelligence on Iraq's WMD capabilities. This is because, like many other Washington politicians at the time, including those now running for president, she had been witness to lies about Iraq's weapons programs to justify attacks on that country by her husband President Bill Clinton and his administration.

"While there is no perfect approach to this thorny dilemma, and while people of good faith and high intelligence can reach diametrically opposed conclusions, I believe the best course is to go to the UN for a strong resolution that scraps the 1998 restrictions on inspections and calls for complete, unlimited inspections with cooperation expected and demanded from Iraq," Senator Clinton said at the time of her vote, in a carefully crafted speech designed to demonstrate her range of knowledge and ability to consider all options. "I know that the Administration wants more, including an explicit authorization to use force, but we may not be able to secure that now, perhaps even later. But if we get a clear requirement for unfettered inspections, I believe the authority to use force to enforce that mandate is inherent in the original 1991 UN resolution, as President Clinton recognized when he launched Operation Desert Fox in 1998."

Hillary would have done well to leave out that last part, the one where her husband, the former President of the United States, used military force as part of a 72-hour bombing campaign ostensibly deemed as a punitive strike in defense of disarmament, but in actuality proved to be a blatant attempt at regime change which used the hyped-up threat of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction as an excuse for action. Sound familiar? While many Americans today condemn the Bush administration for misleading them with false claims of unsubstantiated threats which resulted in the ongoing debacle we face today in Iraq (count Hillary among this crowd), few have reflected back on the day when the man from Hope, Arkansas sat in the Oval Office and initiated the policies of economic sanctions-based containment and regime change which President Bush later brought to fruition when he ordered the invasion of Iraq in March 2003.

------

Scott Ritter served as a former Marine Corps officer from 1984 until 1991, and as a UN weapons inspector in Iraq from 1991 until 1998. He is the author of several books, including "Iraq Confidential" and "Target Iran". He also co-authored "War on Iraq" with William Pitt.

[Sonnenschein]

69. Remember, Clinton did not start the war in Iraq. He inheritated the war

from Bush 1. The air bombing forced Saddam to accept UN inspectors. I think Clinton stroke a balance in preserving the consistency of US foreign policy while changing it according to the current needs.

[JTFrog]

70. Did you read what the UN inspector quoted above said? The air bombing

was a farce. They tried to coerce the inspectors into falsifying information in order to use force to unseat Saddam.

I'll take the word of the man who was there and witnessed first hand exactly what was going on in Iraq and the Clinton administration over the bullshit hype they tried to use to justify the attack.

[Sonnenschein]

82. It was the same neocons sitting in Pentagon and CIA.

I have to give Bill credit for not giving in to them completely.

[JTFrog]

110. It was Bill Clinton and Bill Richardson. Honestly, do you have reading comprehension issues or are

you being intentionally obtuse?

[juno jones]

90. Yup, a half a million children and M. Allbright said it was an acceptable cost.

And ol' Maddie was standing right behind the Clintons in Iowa. That is when I really began to not want another Clinton.

[think4yourself]

103. I agree.

That was a sobering sight.

[eib1]

102. That's all good and true,

but if Clinton had negotiated with the Iraqis in 1998 and created an internationally-recognized peace settlement, then W's war would be indeed illegal and our ammunition against his usurpation of the White House more powerful.
I don't think there's any door the Clintons left open that the Bush Regime hasn't walked through.
It all has to do with reconciling with internal, Republican political enemies instead of fighting them; and this has been the formula for Democratic Party action since the 60s.
Why is it we're so willing to fight foreigners but unwilling to fight conservatives?

[RaleighNCDUer]

66. Mmm mmm, love that kool-aid.

What sweeping changes did the Clintons bring? Every major initiative that was passed, was a Republican initiative. The 'victory' of NAFTA which she touts in her book was a Republican victory. The Clintons don't 'work with Republicans' - they do the Republicans work for them. She garnered Republican votes in NY not by bringing them to the left, but by working on the right, offering no significant opposition to Bush economic or foreign policies. And if her IWR vote was for use of force as a last resort, why did it take her three years to get around to opposing the war?

[Sonnenschein]

68. Isn't that what the freeper always say? Every accomplishment

of the Clinton years were because of the Republican congress. We had a Republican Congress under Bush. Look where we are now. If presidents are not important, why do we bother to vote for democrats then?

[RaleighNCDUer]

71. Well, they should say it because they were all Republican initiatives.

There is NOTHING in decades of Democratic politics that supports NAFTA, or media consolidation, or 'welfare reform'. Those were all Republican issues, Republican solutions to a Republican view of the world - yet Clinton signed them and claimed them as Democratic victories.

Bill was the best Republican president in 40 years.

Let me spell it out so there is no misunderstanding.

They are BAD policy. A Democrat should be ashamed of ever supporting them.

Not to mention DADT, DOMA, the squelching of investigations into Iran/Contra, CIA drug running and its connection to the crack epidemic of the 90s...

Are we Republicans? Can we excuse all that crap just because the economy was good for a few years?

[Sonnenschein]

83. If you are against free trade, you should start buying American

only right now. If you think Democrats are in principle for feeding lazy people on welfare for life, then you are in the wrong party. Democrats are for hard work, not welfare for life. Democrats are for fiscal responsibility not credit card spending. "just because the economy was good for a few years?". If you claim Clinton only signed on to the Republican agenda, why then does the Obama campaign attack them being divisive? According to your logic, Clintons should be the model of unity, right?

[juno jones]

92. Do YOU have the right party?

Not everyone on welfare for life is 'lazy'. In fact the 'lazy' shit is a republican talking point honed by the Reagan 'revolution'. I would rather have a million pink welfare cadillacs tooling the streets than one more penny to war.

So welcome to DU, may you speak to enough people here to truly understand what is going down.

BTW dems like FAIR trade, where the people of the country see the value of their work and products. FREE trade means we get to tear down regulations and tariffs and send our own jobs overseas for cheaper labor costs. Dems tend to against that kind of thing...except the DLC.

[RaleighNCDUer]

100. I try my best.

I am ashamed to admit I have crossed the threshold of WalMart 3 times in the last 12 years. Frankly, with US manufacturing as it is, it is nearly impossible to "buy American". As a result, I don't buy much. I am a really lousy conssumer. My needs and my wants are few. I pay the extra bucks to by fair trade coffee - shade-grown when possible. I do my best not to exploit 3rd world workers just to save a few pennies. I work 1 1/2 jobs, but can't manage to save much because my daughter, raised by my crazy ex, is one of those who would be dependent upon welfare - due to mental conditions she cannot hold a job and has been mostly unemployed for most of the last 3 years, but now she's run out of government aid and I, and her aunt, have been paying her bills. In a just system she would be covered for her medical care, and she'd get job training. But republicans have been setting the agenda for 30 years, so she's on her own.

And by my lights, the divisivness engendered by the Clintons is due to their abandonment of progressives - they prefer working for republican agendas than working for Democratic ones. They don't support single-payer healthcare, they support economic and military imperialism, they work against populist movements in the American polity.

The republicans "hate" the Clintons so that Democrats will keep electing them - allowing the Clintons to keep carrying water for the Republicans.

[NDambi]

60. More interesting reading...Obama's inexperience may benefit U.S.

By David Ignatius

"When it comes to foreign policy, experience is a highly overrated asset." So says a former British foreign service officer named Jonathan Clarke, who has created a blog called theswoop.net that has dedicated itself to undermining Washington's fondness for conventional wisdom.

What my friend Clarke means is that the set of issues and strategies that shaped the Cold War generation has passed. He's a product of that generation himself, having served at the sharp end of the spear for the British government in various Cold War hot spots. But that era is over.

ADVERTISEMENT

The intellectual matrix formed by the Soviet threat, and before that by Hitler's rise in Germany, needs to be reworked. There is a new set of problems and personalities - and if America keeps trotting out the same cast of characters and policy papers, we will fail to make sense of where the world is moving.

The experience issue will dominate the final weeks of the Democratic primary campaign. Hillary Clinton's only remaining trump card is that she has been in the White House before and will be ready, as she repeats so tirelessly, from Day One. But ready for what? For a recapitulation of the people and policies that guided the country in the past?

The experience gap will overshadow even more the general election race against John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee. McCain embodies the idea of a wise, battle-tested man. "I'm not the youngest candidate, but I am the most experienced," he said after winning the Wisconsin primary Tuesday night. He's the tough old fighter pilot; he has fought the Cold War battles; he knows how to protect the nation in a time of danger. That's the McCain strategy in a compound sentence.

The assumption that experience equates with good judgment is a hard one to shake. We tend naturally to defer to the person who has been there before, measured the adversary, learned how the game is played.

Yet if ever there were a test of the efficacy of experience, it was the Bush administration's decision to go to war in Iraq. Bush's national security advisers were arguably the most experienced in modern times. But their performance was often very poor. That was partly, I think, because they overlaid the post-9/11 challenges on a Cold War template about the uses of military power.

We are the last major nation to make the transition from Cold War thinking to something new. China and India are rising thanks to new leadership elites that understand how to succeed in global markets; Russia is about to elect a new president whose formative experiences came after the fall of the Soviet Union; Pakistan has just rebuffed its own durable Cold Warrior, Gen. Pervez Musharraf; even Fidel Castro, perhaps the iconic survivor of the Cold War, has decided to step down. Only in America could John McCain seriously campaign for leadership as a symbol of the past.

The utility of inexperience was explained to me this week by Dmitry Peskov, the spokesman for Russia's President Putin. He said that what's attractive for Russians about Dmitry Medvedev, who is certain to be elected as Putin's successor in presidential elections March 3, is that he embodies "a generation that was not shaped by the Soviet Cold War way of thinking."

Putin himself is a transition figure, a man formed by his experiences as a KGB officer. But after him, explained Peskov, comes a generation of Russians who don't carry the same baggage.

They have traveled the world, seen things their parents could never imagine, looked at problems with fresh eyes.

To prepare for the next stage of the U.S. presidential campaign, try this thought experiment: Imagine the television footage of Barack Obama's first trip abroad as president - the crowds in the streets of Moscow, Cairo, Nairobi, Shanghai, Paris, Islamabad. McCain is a great man, and he would be welcomed with respect, deference, perhaps a bit of fear.

Obama would generate different and more intense reactions - surprise and uncertainty, to be sure, but also idealism and hope. Now tell me which image would foster a stronger and safer America in the 21st century.

Obama has liabilities as a candidate, but his inexperience paradoxically may actually bolster one of his core arguments - that he would give America a fresh start.


http://www.hattiesburgamerican.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080224/OPINION01/802240360

[ksquire]

61. finally!

[Seattleman]

62. Rich is wrong

Hillary,s campaign problems are stemming from the fact that a whole lot of people just don't trust her.

Everything else is pure spin.

[beezlebum]

63. K and R n/t

[Whisp]

67. kick

[lebkuchen]

77. Those living in a military community don't need hope but RELIEF

Clinton does not spell R-E-L-I-E-F any more than Bush spells H-E-L-P I-S O-N T-H-E W-A-Y.

We're hoping Obama will bring on that relief. If not him, then who?

[Sonnenschein]

85. Hillary actually worked to have natinal guardsmen get the health insurance.

Did Obama do anything except talking?

[lebkuchen]

78. Those living in a military community don't need hope but RELIEF

Clinton does not spell R-E-L-I-E-F any more than Bush spells H-E-L-P I-S O-N T-H-E W-A-Y.

We're hoping Obama will bring on that relief. If not him, then who?

[JamesA1102]

79. Rich will turn on Obama

Just look at how Rich went out of his way to insert Obama's middle name in his column. I'm sure that won't be the last time he does that.
Don't trust him. Rich pretends to be liberal but will do anything to protect his tax cut.

[tblue37]

95. I think that idiotic emphasis on the "Hussein" will end up eventually

"domesticating" it, so that people are no longer as reactive to it as when it was new.

[fightthegoodfightnow]

80. BRAVO - CLINTON LOST FOR TWO REASONS: SHE IS BILLARY NOT HILLARY & SHE SUPPORTS BUSH'S IRAQ WAR

.

[Sonnenschein]

84. Right. Obama played the antiwar card very well. But again he was not even in senate at that time.

He himself said he did not know how he would have voted. He was a local politician with liberal constituency. He had nothing to loose to be antiwar. If however Iraq was a sucessful democracy in 2 weeks with wmd found, Democrats would loose elections for 3 decades.

[DaveT]

94. If pigs had wings, they might fly in circle, too.

Are you really serious? Is that how you excuse HRC for her vote? Because Iraq might have turned out well?

In the first place, somehow or other I knew it would not turn out well. So did the overwhelming majority of citizens in Europe and millions of us who marched against the madness. So did General Shinsecki. So did anybody who could remember the last TWO times that the US got into a land war on the Asian land mass.

In the second place, does a good outcome (the finding of WMD and the establishment of a "successful democracy" in two weeks) make a war of agression right?

In the third place, do you think that a Senate vote in favor the IRC would have made any difference to how elections would turn out for the next three decades? The vote for the First Gulf War was much closer, and the result was far more successful -- but the Democrats won the next election anyway.

[fightthegoodfightnow]

81. NOTICE HOW CLINTON SUPPORTERS RESPOND

In most cases, nothing of substance related to his central point about Iraq and change.

[City Lights]

86. K&R

Outstanding work, Mr. Rich. :applause:

[candice]

87. Rich is a rabid anti-Clintonite...he admits to getting off on the Whitewater nothing

Meanwhile, Barry Obama soars in audacity of deception, such as when

makes a speech in New Orleans the week of the primary and outlining his recovery plan using the five main pieces of Hillary's New Orleans Recovery and Renewal plan delivered in June of 07!)

claims in a keynote speech in front of Civil Rights leaders at Selma memorial to have been conceived as a direct of the March on Selma when he was born two years before!

http://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=463&Itemid=34

[ORDem]

89. K&R n/t

:kick:

[tblue37]

91. This is the killer paragraph:

As for countering what she sees as the empty Obama brand of hope, she offers only a chilly void: Abandon hope all ye who enter here. This must be the first presidential candidate in history to devote so much energy to preaching against optimism, against inspiring language and — talk about bizarre — against democracy itself. No sooner does Mrs. Clinton lose a state than her campaign belittles its voters as unrepresentative of the country.

[kotsu]

93. oh, I dunno

Seems our last president managed to get the job doing nothing but telling us sweet little lies.

[CaptJasHook]

96. Nothing else to add. K&R

:kick:

[AikidoSoul]

97. Nobody says it better than Frank Rich

Nobody.

Kick and Rec

[rosetta627]

98. Excellent excellent analysis

Oh those latte-drinking Teamsters.
:toast: :toast: :toast: :evilgrin:

[Tom Joad]

99. It is the welcome end of the Clinton ERROR

"If the most important thing to any of you is choosing someone who did not cast that vote or has said his vote was a mistake, then there are others to choose from." Hillary Clinton


Former President Clinton has revealed that he continues to support President Bush's decision to go to war in Iraq but chastised the administration over the abuses at Abu Ghraib prison.

"I have repeatedly defended President Bush against the left on Iraq, even though I think he should have waited until the U.N. inspections were over," Clinton said in a Time magazine interview that will hit newsstands Monday, a day before the publication of his book "My Life."

Fuck you both, mr. and mrs clinton. Now move on.

[parkeradison]

101. Hillary's implosion

In retrospect maybe we can even call it the New York implosion. Six months ago the polls had both Hillary and Rudy with big leads. Now Rudy's gone, and Hillary is about to follow.

[dicknbush]

104. WE LOVE YU OBAMA OH YES WE DO WE LOVE YOU OBAMA AND WE'LL BE TRUE WHEN YOUR NOT...

NEAR TO US WE'RE BLUE OH OBAMA WE LOVE YO......EVERYONE

WE LOVE YOU OBAMA OH YES WE DOOOOOO

WE LOVE YU OBAMA AND WE'LL BE TRUUUUUE

WHEN YOUR NOT NEAR TO US WE'RE BLUUUUUEEEEE

OH OBAMA WE LOVE YOU......


SING IT AGAIN


WE LOV EYOU OBAMA OH YES WE DOOOOOOO

WE LOVE YOU OBAMA AND WE'LL BE TRUUUUUUUE

WHEN YOUR NOT NEAR TO US WE'RE BLUUUUUEEEE

OH OBAMA WE LOVE YOU...


OH I'M GOING TO FAINT OOOOOOOHHHHHHHHBBBBBBBAAAAAAMMMMMMMAAAAAAA YOU MAKE ME WEAK IN THE KNEES

[NM Independent]

105. Sounded like a perfect synopsis of what Obama supporters...

...already realized. That is why Barack gained so much momentum.

She played dirty.

He played clean.

Everytime she attacked or smeared, he rebutted with CLASS. She gave him too many chances to be the bigger person, and it showed. His attacks were on point, and were never rebutted well or with class. I never saw anything that resembled a smear from the Obama campaign.

I keep hearing the Hillbots saying that she was being the better person and staying "above it all" when Barack was attacking her (never saw it). Well, if that is the case she is damn stupid after watching Kerry get Swiftboated and never defending himself.

That's okay though. Go throw your fits and sit out the next election. Just know I'll be hoping for your slow death for the TREASON that sitting out the next election represents. That is assuming you KNOW what the hell is going on in the world and your not a conservative nutjob, if so then sitting out the election is definite TREASON. So, let's stop saying your going to commit TREASON by sitting out the election...when you how bad we're screwed if you don't. Anything but a landslide will be overturned by DieBold. WAKE UP!!

[NM Independent]

106. Also...

Why would we care if and when a journalist is loyal to who??

I don't want them loyal to anyone. I would expect him to pile in the bandwagon to give Obama shit the first time he screws up. You act like his opinion is invalid and his thoughts wrong because he didn't support Gore or he hates the Clintons. How ignorant can you get. Who fucking cares. I'd much prefer all journalists be strict centrists until they get home and lock the door.

You act like everybody has to be a strict progressive Dem. Well we don't, and like it or not GWB has driven millions of people over to your party. A lot of them are centrists, and there are even some conservatives. The party is, by default, going to become more diluted and the views switched more to the right. Get used to it and accept that the party will be better off for it.

[blonndee]

108. Hi neighbor!

:hi: Have you signed up for any Obama groups at his website? I just started doing that today and I'm hoping we can get some more groups in this part of the state and coordinate some events. I've never done that before, but I'm getting ready to do what I can. There's at least one in Carlsbad, but I think maybe one a little farther north would be good.

Oh, by the way, you might want to check out the New Mexico forum, especially when the GE gets closer.

[NM Independent]

109. Howdy

I haven't yet. I'll start getting involved pretty soon. I'm too busy trying to feed my family at the moment.

I've checked it the NM forum. I wanted to post a message to say Hi, but I guess I'm not good enough until I have some 1000 freaking posts...sheesh. Sucks too since Domenici is vacating his seat and the Dem's here need to get organized to take it over.