Login HereIs HillaryCo getting a little desperate? (updated)
"There's a big difference between our courage and our convictions, what we believe and what we're willing to fight for," Clinton told reporters here. She said voters in Iowa will have a choice "between someone who talks the talk, and somebody who's walked the walk."
Asked directly whether she intended to raise questions about Obama's character, she replied: "It's beginning to look a lot like that."
Hmmm. Going after Obama's strength -- honesty. That play sounds familiar.
"There's a lot that voters don't know about Barack Obama," Wolfson said on CBS's "Face the Nation."
Yikes. We've seen this kind of sleazy smear by innuendo from Wolfson before, during the phony OMG-Obama-will-meet-with-dictators! controversy.
Politics is a contact sport, but tactically, I don't think this is going to work for Hillary. It plays into Obama's efforts to paint her brand of politics as the kind we want to leave behind, and by making the attack personal, it drags her down from her inevitable front-runner perch.
Your thoughts?
UPDATE
Via TPM, Robert Reich weighs in:
I just don’t get it. If there’s anyone in the race whose history shows unique courage and character, it's Barack Obama. HRC’s campaign, by contrast, is singularly lacking in conviction about anything. Her pollster, Mark Penn, has advised her to take no bold positions and continuously seek the political center, which is exactly what she’s been doing.
...
All is fair in love, war, and politics. But this series of slurs doesn't serve HRC well. It will turn off voters in Iowa, as in the rest of the country. If she's worried her polls are dropping, this is not the way to build them back up.
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I’m don’t find Obama’s strength to be honesty… I find him to be tricky and disingenuous… but wrapped up in a real pretty package…
Sorry, off and running to work.
nice bingo mac
Looks like the wheels are getting a little wobbly on the Clinton bandwagon. Thank you very much!
Hey everyone!
Obama is my Senator, and I am not entirely happy with him.
For many of these reasons.
But Hil is not my point of comparison, Durbin is.
Frankly, Obama has his finger in the wind too much for me to consider him a real leader.
She’s finally played right into his campaign theme. Her campaign hoped they would be able to stay above the street fighting, and appeal for unity against the Repubs — great strategy if you can maintain it. Now she’s throwing that in, and having Wolfson out there as her “face” is very risky. The man offends me.
This seems a bad move for Clinton in my opinion also.
She really wants to make personal character the issue?
I think Hilary’s right about Obama. She voted on the despicable Kyl/Lieberman and Obama was nowhere to be found. They both suck.
Sorry Tex,
But There have rumors about Obama and Tony Rezko (not to mention Don King) that are not pretty. That has always been my biggest fear with him. That we would end up with a candidate that the GOP could take down at will becasue of skeletons in his closet. Better Hillary does it now. His voters will mostly go to Edwards.
This isn’t and never was intended to be hacky sack.
Exposing a candidate to some rough and tumble prior
to nominating them is a good thing. We don’t want to
discover he can’t take a punch in September of 2008.
Obama is suggesting students commit voter fraud…
What she says.
Wasn’t Clinton just complaining about John Edwards mudslinging in the last CNN debate?
Finian, Can you be more specific and do you have a link? I don’t know what you are referring to.
Tex, I agree with you that this move could backfire on Hillary b/c she has so many ethical issues herself. However, they are all old news, and a campaign with her kind of money and expertise certainly polled and focus grouped this before they undertook such a radical tactics shift.
finian,
That’s a pretty vague charge. Care to provide details and a link?
Speaking of getting the dirty laundry aired, On The Media just had a nice exposé on Hucksterbee.
hard to see how that was going to work without offering something significantly different than her brand of “centrism” which looks, to me, like more of the same - just competently managed.
Yeah, but her complaints didn’t poll well. So, she mustthink that if sharp elbows work for Edwards, they will work fo r her.
She scored big in the Senate race debate against Rick LAzio when he very rudley and aggressively left his podium to brandishsome piece of paper in her face. He walked deep into her personal space and she instinctively recoiled as if from an abusive spouse.
I was shocked tat he had done that, and his cmpaign fell apart as a reslut of people’s indignation. He was clearly trying to physically intimidate a woman (funny thing, he’s actually very gentlemenally towards women in real life).
Anyway, she was trying to put Edwards in that sam e posture, problem is–
1)He’s percieved as a nice guy
2) he stayed at his end of the stage
3) he was making legitiamte comaprisons not pulling some cheezy stunt
Obama represents youth and change wrapped up in a beautiful smile. The people love it.
Edwards seems to represent me as Im not sure what Obama represents.
Obama represents youth and change wrapped up in a beautiful smile. The people love it.
Edwards seems to represent me as Im not sure what Obama represents.
My thoughts are, I hope it runs her right into the ground. With all the bogus attacks on her and her husband’s integrity, both with and without cause, I don’t think she should be throwing stones. Too much glass around.
Don’t like Wolfson at all; he seems to be the Dems version of Karl Rove!
yikes three comments?
What do you think the odds are that Hillary & Obama will scratch each other’s eyes out, leaving Edwards as the one left with sight? Can we hope?
Hillary has a lot of problems, one of which is that the next principled stand she takes will be her first. Another is that she seems to be an excellent organizer and tactician, but has no concept of grand strategy. Hence, her tactics often seem inappropriate.
Paulson’s up on C-SPAN.
New design–will take some getting used to…
Paulson was All American for football at Dartmouth in the 1970s.
Rummy was a wrestler. Armitage too, IIRC. Ahnold a body builder.
Is there a pattern here? Should we consider a constitutional amendment preventing atheletes from running for politcal office?
link to the voter fraud-ette story
http://www.dailykos.com/storyo…..133459/537
plus I have to say how much I hate the new login system I got stuck in an update your profile thing and it would not let me register under by old screen name.
thanks. would love to have your commentary/
Paulson’s reading his speech as though someone else wrote it & he’s seeing it for the first time.
Interesting. Maybe it’ll work then. I still think the majority of Democrats in Iowa find him trustworthy, so we’ll see.
Except he’s not as smart as Rove, because he uses Republican frames to attack Democrats, which diminishes his brand.
Obama is a lightweight but then despite all the hoopla so is Hillary. Neither has exercised any significant leadership on any issue in the Senate. Almost all of the other candidates have. Dodd on FISA. Kucinich and Richardson on the Iraq War. Edwards on social and economic inequalities. But when we get to Obama and Hillary the candidates with the highest media exposure, there is nothing. I think that absence says a lot about them both.
Paulson:
Govt + ind to work together.
3 point plan, to help “able” borrowers continue to own homes.
Remind me again what that is. I’ve lost familiary with the concept.
So the “novelty” candidates are flinging the shit at each other.
BFD.
Edwards remains the pragmatic choice.
Hillary’s leadership on health care reform is instructive.
Recognize a real problem, make a big deal about it, and us it to build a donor base while never really advancing the issue significantly.
Paulson: national hotline of mortgage counselors.
Gee, somehow that seems incommensurate with the problem.
There’s a lot to be said for youth and change. My daughter says she is sick of baby boomers, and I kind of agree, even though I am one.
Paulson: Hope is but a phone call away.
Good thing my barf bag is at hand.
Actually, I wish this whole back and forth between the Clinton and Obama campaigns ends up netting a gain for Edwards, who I think truly deserves more than he’s getting. I think the media has decided to make Clinton and Obama the two that deserve all the attention and the people have decided to let them due to the novelty of their “minority” campaigns. Hopefully, before the primary, voters will come to their senses and do what’s right for the country, and I’m more and more concluding that may very well be Edwards, since we probably won’t be able to have Gore. At least Edwards served a fuller term in the Senate and has had a chance to prepare for the presidency. Obama got rushed into this too soon as near as I can tell. Had a lot of potential, but bloomed too soon. Hillary (or Billary) has too much of the wrong kind of experience, I think. She’s more a bridge to the past. She’s way too heavily involved as a corporatist and member of the establishment. I like Dodd, but I’m not sure he has quite the qualities and temperment we need at this time. Same goes for Biden and Richardson. If the press hadn’t successfully labeled Kucinich part of the lunatic fringe, and it hadn’t caught on with a majority of the people, he might actually be a viable candidate, although I understand that he has some serious flaws also. I guess I’m rooting for Edwards at this point.
I don’t remember the ROM (republican owned media) being this investigative and up front about any of the republican candidates/politicians over the last seven years. Where were they? /snark
me too. my eyes are not adjusting to the new font. :(
wishing for 12pt verdana and a slight non-white background.
Anyone else notice Edwards bad hair appearance on Olbermann last week?
Clever.
On The Media also has a great piece on Hillary branding herself Hillary, and how that ultimately diminishes her stature as a leader.
Paulson was All American for football at Dartmouth in the 1970s.
Rummy was a wrestler. Armitage too, IIRC. Ahnold a body builder.
Is there a pattern here? Should we consider a constitutional amendment preventing atheletes from running for politcal office?
J.C. Watts and Heath Shuler were both college quarterbacks.
Jim Bunning was a major league pitcher. Jim Ryun(sp?) was a world-class mile runner.
So… there may be something to this.
Yep — that could be exactly what HillaryCo is thinking. It’s infinitely better for Clinton if Edwards wins Iowa than if Obama does.
On the mortgage meltdown, the best solution is the one proposed by Brad Miller, D-NC, to let bankruptcy judges cram down the mortgages of homeowners in Chapter 13. It solves the problem for homeowners, essentially giving them the same rights speculators have to modify mortgages in Chapter 11. It cuts the Gordian Knot of CDOs and other structured financings, because it doesn’t require their consent. And it should save the investors money in the long run.
They are most scared of Edwards. He is the most representative of the people.
Paulson: In order to solve a problem created, in part, by too loose lending practices, we’re going to loosen them more. (That isn’t exactly what he said, but that’s the import of it.)
Obama’s not my first choice, but I give him some leeway because of what he’s had to overcome to be where he is. Plus, his voting record is really not too shabby, except for the last few months where it’s been fairly non-existent, which is disappointing. And the Rezko stories I’ve read have seemed quite minor to me (couldn’t find anything about Don King, who’s a Repube mostly, but traditionally gives to both Parties to get invited to the parties).
I remember saying right after that speech at the DemocratIC convention “Obama ‘08!” kind of jokingly. Yet, he made it a reality. Really an amazing story…his entire life.
And this whole “experience” hogwash…I want someone with real life experience. Who’s been in “the trenches” of our society. Who’s lived all over the world. That kind of experience can’t be taught, and is precisely the kind of experience we need in a leader…finally! If someone’s been kissin ass and schmoozing enough to be considered wise to the ways of Washington, then that’s not the person I want representing me.
Edwards is my first choice for now, and he’s certainly not perfect either. No one ever will be. But Obama has a good track record, and I think he should be cut more slack by us Liberals because of the amazing tightrope walk he has to walk. I remember constantly hearing just a year or two ago about how there’s no way he could win because of his name and skin color. Well, certainly seems to be putting that one to rest, although won’t know fer shure until voting day.
Drop me an email, I’ll straighten you out.
It sounds like a come on for the Psychics Network.
I thought it was just me and these old eyes. I’m trying to not “fear change”
LOL
low interest rates to stimulate the real economy.
fiscal policy - should increase public infrastructure investment.
wow. sounds not insane (to this econ illiterate prole)
The editing function is gone too…
I think we might be better off if we could ban politicans from running for President while serving in Congress.
If Hillary can’t take Edwards’ strong and direct criticisms of her policies and practices, how will she stand up to the Gooper campaign ahead or the tough guys in the world.
[rubs thumb and forefinger together playing world’s smallest violin….]
And her policies and practices should be criticized and scrutinized–along with every candidate. Who does her mortgage bailout help more…beleaguered victimized homeowners? Or Clinton crony Rubin’s Citicorp?
Demand better. Be better.
Edwards ‘08
i’m sure there will be changes and improvements as time goes on. (i am making a list of suggestions - just in case anyone asks, i’ll be ready).
Hope is but a phone call away.
If You’d Like to Make a Call, Please Hang Up and Try Again. If You’d Like to Make a Call, Please Hang Up and Try Again. If You’d Like to Make a Call, Please Hang Up and Try Again. If You’d Like to Make a Call, Please Hang Up and Try Again. If You’d Like to Make a Call, Please Hang Up and Try Again. If You’d Like to Make a Call, Please Hang Up and Try Again.
You got it.
My formerly R business owner friend has a good frame for the infrastructure problem: We had enough money to build the infrastructure when the country was a lot less wealthy than it is today. Why is it that now we don’t have enogh money to maintain it?
Paulson ducks out without taking Qs.
Pretty empty speech.
I hope that things don’t work for Hillary. No more Clintons and certainly no more Bushes. This Nation needs to get off the treadmill.
I don’t care who does it, but someone has to stop Hillary and her bloody ambition right now. Someone needs to put her in her place.
NYC area FDL meetup:
Wednesday, 12/5, 5:30; Parnell’s Pub, SW corner of 53 & First. Come one, come all.
Even some Republican?
Absolutely. If Clinton wins, my entire voting life will be made up of Clintons and Booshes. Jeezus…perish the thought.
Experience, as defined by the Conglomerate Media: Knows way around cocktail weenie circuit. That’s who we want leading us?
I’ll bet your list includes (working) preview & edit buttons. Didn’t realize how much I used ‘em until they were gone ;-)
There’s not enough money because Republics have been gathering punder unchecked for far too long.
Re: new design:
The whole site looks softer (a plus)…
Oh, there’s lots of answer to the Q, like yours & wars of choice, to name just 2. The point of his framing, I think, is to make one consider priorities, then & now.
The Thugs set out to loot the Treasury by hook or crook and pretty much succeeded.
brightening up the day of Edwards supporters…from on the ground in Iowa
“Jerry Crawford, Dem on the “Insiders” this morning says, “Mitt has one of the best organized campaigns he has ever seen in the state.” This is not spin and Jerry knows his stuff. He was instrumental in John Kerry’s Iowa win and works for Hillary this time. However, I would not under estimate the power of the pulpit for the Huckster. Jerry also continues to say, “if the caucus were held today, John Edwards would win.” This has been a consistent prediction. I’ll let you all know if I hear him say something different in the future.”
Since I didn’t post much until very recently, mostly just lurked, I didn’t use EDIT, but I do hope the heroic techies can fix PREVIEW. I agree that it will take time to get everything up and working properly — this was a MASSIVE effort (I’m in IT, so I have a good sense of it). I already see everyone adapting to the new ways of doing things and the workarounds, and helping each other. We just need to be very patient.
Kudos to Jane for this wonderful redesign! I love it!
wtf does that mean - “her place”
i dislike her policies probably as much as anyone here. but there’s no such thing as “her place” - please.
selise, if you’re still here.
Way back when (mid-1970s?) I got set up with a luncheon with a investment banking client who, among other things, owned a small farm belt bank. It was not my usual meeting, which were mainly with institutional investors, so I thought I’d see what I could learn. Things went well, and I was finally emboldened to ask: When you made all those loans to farms on the basis of inflated farmland prices, didn’t you realize that there was no collateral there? After all, if you need to foreclose, so do all the other lenders, and so asset (collateral) values collapse.
He looked at me like he had never considered that possibility, and after a pause, admitted it.
Nothing changes.
I hate to say this but the Fed is going to add some more coal to the train heading for the cliff.
The problem is that the financial system is all driven by fees and ROI on make believe financial instruments which are traded based on PERCEIVED value. We’ve really entered the realm of an economy which is like Monopoly board game.
All the capital has been sucked up into so called financial instruments which are traded like baseball cards and these managers extract enormous fees and shelter them or offshore them. Suckers invest in shares are give away part of the savings in fees in the hopes of making something for nothing… the tag line of the financial sector.
Sure print more money, issue more credit, add another card onto the house of cards. It won’t stand. The US economy is beyond the control of the Fed or even the Masters of the Universe. The casino is going broke and can’t pay their debts.
It was fun while it lasted by Marx told you that capitalism was going to be its own undoing. He was so right.
That may be true, but is Billary (or anyone on her campaign) the one to be pointing that out?
Add in the fact that the Grover N. branch of the GOP has been doing thier best to eliminate the very idea of a public Good from our national discourse. They’ll be happy to build infrastucture as long as they can control it in perpetuity.
What Hugh said.
Let them duke it out now. I find this an oddly encouraging development. They especially need to take each other to task for not showing up for challenging votes < :-</p>
Alphonso Jackson being replayed on C-SPAN from his opening remarks at housing forum.
Gonna be lots of ‘heckuva job’ awards going out on the housing crisis.
wow.
i can see people buying homes at inflated prices - after all we all have to live somewhere. but what i can’t see is banks lending the money (whether to farms or home buyers) based on inflated collateral prices… just does not compute.
Well, I won’t have any say in the nomination. In my view, any of the Democrats will be far superior to any of the Republican candidates, all of whom endorse the disasterous Bush Administration. I don’t have a problem with any dynasty issue. The election of FDR four times was a good thing, whereas the election of GWB one time was far too much. I want to be able to strongly support whoever the Democratic nominee is. Have a nice one.
As I said: It’ll take a while for me to adapt to the new design. Might even affect my zed hunt a little bit…*g*
Jackson: $4.2 billion to bailout foreclosures has exhausted all the administrative action we can take. We need legislation.
Yep, blame the Ds.
It was exactly the same thing from Countrywide on the housing panel this morning.
BTW: Hotline # is 888-999-HOPE,* in Spanish & English. How ironic is that?
*Think I heard it right; Jackson didn’t repeat it & I wasn’t watching the TV screen, which is behind me.
Here are some numbers:
By any chance, do your stats correspond to the announcement of Oprah’s endorsement?
Probably one of those “pay by the minute” British West Indies numbers. /snark
Same POV as you. I couldn’t have expressed it any better, Crosstimbers.
Got to drive in to work. Read you all later.
Hey Jane, Christy and gang.
I used to be GSD.
Now I’m me.
-G
reply
Yes, Ms. Winfrey has waded into the battle, bringing hordes of women over 50 to Obama’s defense.
Of course, this is also the woman responsible for foisting Dr. Phil on an unsuspecting populace.
LOL
Anyone want to waste some minutes, give it a call & report back.
Well Said. I am a confirmed Caucaus goer for Edwards here in Iowa. I think Edwards will do well in Iowa. I hope he can build on that momentum in NH and then really take fire.
“Now I’m me.”
It’s about time.
I am LMAO that a Clinton is challenging someones character……
I did well when Big Dog was prez, my partner was at the WH on Clintons Hiv council for 8 years….BUT….character…um don’t think they should go there. They threw us progerssives under the bus and will do it again. Hillary is a good Senator that is it!
This is def. not playing well for Hillary. Her internals must be a disaster.
Hey Jane, Christy and gang.
I used to be GSD.
Now I’m me.
-G
Hey Greg - givin’ up on the “Destroyer” thing? Welcome
GSDGregB!!Bill Bradley.
There’s just one conclusion; Dem athletes good, R athletes bad.
Evidence?
new thread.
Yes and we shouldn’t forget the James Frey of A Million Little Pieces incident. Perpetrated a fraud on all the bookclub members when Oprah believed in him.
Edwards taking fire: I saw on Meet the Russert yesterday that he’s polling quite well in South Carolina as well, another very early state. If Edwards wins Iowa, he still might do just okay on N.H., since he’s pretty far back there, but I like his chances in S.C. and some other states, so it’s possible.
John and Elizabeth both just need more airtime, and people will start moving over to them.
I’m a woman over 50. I’ve never watched Oprah, and none of my friends have either. When my daughter was in college (recently) she and her roommates would get home from classes and turn on Oprah every day. So, who knows, the Oprah demographic might just skew a little younger than we think.
Bill Bradley.
There’s just one conclusion; Dem athletes good, R athletes bad.
Did I mention Heath Shuler?
My thoughts?
There is a subset of Democrats who disapprove of anything Hillary does. The blogosphere gives them a microphone and they can say whatever they like about Hillary and their musings will be accepted uncritically.
But this move by Clinton doesn’t seem to me to be all that unusual. Iowans who are planning to vote for Clinton are more firm in their committment to her than Obama and Edwards supporters. In actuality, it should be Obama and Edwards who should be concerned. Hillary is just locking down her delegates and picking off a few more from other candidates.
It may be close and she may have more work to do, but desperate? Given how her campaign has built in contingencies this was probably all planned out. It’s time to make the other candidates look like risky investments.
Yup, all according to schedule.
Evidence…..
well, maybe I did go too far with that comment….SO, I will take it back.
707
Jane’s upstairs.
new thread on Waxman requesting docs from Fitz
The Bill Moyers journal on the run-up to the Iraq War had a segment that showed Oprah viciously attacking a young woman who had dared to question the administration’s premises. Told me all I needed to know about Oprah.
I don’t know if raising the issue of Obama’s honesty and integrity is actually a losing strategy. The comment in the OP sounds very much like an Obama Campaign effort at preventative dissuasion.
But we have to realize that Obama has been disingenuously attacking Clinton for supporting the Kyl-Lieberman Resolution on Iraq…which he didn’t vote on because he was absent. Whether that absence was intentional, justifiable (because he wasn’t notified), or simply because he didn’t think it was an important vote is neither here-nor-there.
What is important is that Senator Obama was a co-sponsor of an almost identical bill S.970. Titled the Iran Prevention of Nuclear Proliferation Act…it also called for severe economic sanctions against Iran by designating the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a “terrorist organization”. One of the first Democratic sponsors of this act (Clinton signed on the next day) Obama never submitted any Amendment or acted to withdraw his name from this bill.
http://www.govtrack.us/congres…..l=s110-970
Senator Dodd, also a co-sponsor, actually added a critical Amendment to the Kyl-Lieberman Resolution that expressly stated that the K-L version was not to be construed, in any way, as representing a Congressional authorization for military action against Iran. Sen. Clinton voted in favor of that Amendment. S.970 never had such a stipulation attached to it.
It’s thus puzzling why Sen. Obama is so virulent about Clinton’s vote on Kyl-Lieberman when he was himself a co-sponsor of S.970 which also designated the Iranian Revolution Guard as terrorists. Pot-meet Kettle!