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It seems like every day there’s a new one, doesn’t it?
Of Mr. Obama’s criticism that America should never have gone to war against Iraq, Mr. McCain said: "That’s history, that’s the past."
"What we should be talking about is what we’re going to be doing now," he told 600 workers gathered in a large manufacturing hall festooned with flags and orange Texas Instruments banners.
Erm, in politics, "the past" is what we typically call "your record." And St. McCain’s record includes authorizing and cheerleading for George Bush’s totally awesome invasion and occupation of Iraq. Sorry, St. McCain, you can run but you can’t hide.
And this bit is kinda funny:
"I’m a proud conservative liberal Republican – ah, conservative Republican," he said as the audience laughed.
"Easy there," he said, pausing a moment. "Let me say this: I’m a proud conservative Republican and both of my likely opponents are liberal Democrats."
Like a well-oiled machine, isn’t he?
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bom dia pups
More war less jobs.
Morning BT. This cannot be a quote from McBus as there is no “my friends”
Edsel comes to mind
I’ll keep it clean and not comment on this line. Speaking of Craig…….
It’s not him its his minions. He’ll tsk-tsk as the party wages savage warfare. He will be above the nastiness in public while planning it in closed sessions.
Must we suffer from another clown that can’t put a complete sentence or thought together? Really, what is going through the minds of Republicans to put up with these intelectual giants? Maybe the rank and file Repug thinks these guys are smarter than they are so it seems OK to them. YaHuh these guys seem pretty smart to me YaHuH.
Hey McBatshitCrazySaint,
A liberal conservative, eh? LOL! Freud applaudes you.
I look forward to the Obama/McCain debates.
A conservative liberal Republican doesn’t want to talk about the last eight years. Hmmmmm. How strange.
Hi BT
Ahh, yes, the real debates can’t come soon enough for me.
Hell, I may even pity McBatshitCrazySaint when he can’t use his ‘mah frens’ phrase. Naw, no I won’t. :)
Juan Cole skewers McCain on this today, too, ripping apart the supposed bases for his claims. In short, the vaunted naval hero/POW McCain knows as little as about Iraq as he does about the US economy, or the price of silicon chips in Shanghai. Given how different the world is today from 1968, that should worry even Tweety, Russert and the rest of the MSM, which continues to view McCain as an “informed” leader and a manly man.
Cole also points to two excellent articles at Tomdispatch.com. One, cited below, is a parody about our Commander-in-Chef and his recipes for disaster.
Tomgram
Great post, BT! Obviously, McBush doesn’t want to talk about the fact that he had such poor judgment in the past that he supported taking our eyes off the prize and driving the bus into the ditch called Iraq. But if he had poor judgment then, why would anyone think his judgment has improved with his loss of memory?
Looking ahead, with no thought for the past, is being born into a new world every morning.
The link didn’t work. Let’s try it the hard way, too.
Tomgram
http://tomdispatch.com/post/17…..r_disaster
running as the more experienced candidate, only without a record … yeah, that makes sense …
I was listening to NPR (I know, I know, but there is a little more news) and I heard one of mccain’s advisors say that mccain is the real candidate of CHANGE. It seems that the rethugs that back these 1/2 wits are 1/4 wits themselves. There does not seem to be the desire to question the idea that the main idea of his candidacy is that he won’t change anything except become more bound to what has been done, so how can he be the real candidate of CHANGE? Of course the NPR report made no comment about this conundrum.
OT (sorry): Christy, if you’re around, I sent you a very interesting link via your aol account.
When I heard McCain’s “That’s history, that’s the past,” the first thing that came to mind was the George Santayana quote: “Those who do not learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” But I think something more is going on here. McCain’s “Stay in Iraq for 100 years until we win” shows that the past is not just history for him. He is, in fact, still fighting the Vietnam War. Iraq is his chance to get a previous traumatic failure in his past right this time. The problem is that he never learned the lesson of Vietnam, that no matter how long we occupy a country its inhabitants will always outlast us because that is where they live. As a result, he champions a position that dooms us to persist in a failed war simply because he couldn’t handle the alternative then or now.
yes his Fact Check on McCain and Political Progress in Iraq is a must read
OT, Left at 140 last thread & copied here
CTlil February 29th, 2008 at 7:18 am 140
In response to SanderO @ 60
What Perris, Sangemon, SanderO & so many of you say!
Medicare, medicade, free education (at least through HS…………Socialism!
The best insurance our taxes buy!
.062 out of every earned dollar to $102,000 =’S less than $7000. That’s it. The millionare, billionaire and zillionare pay no more than $ 6,324 annually!
Medicare is .0145 cents out of every earned dollar up to the last earned ! dollar
If those dollars stayed in the accounts they were paid into and if every dollar was taxed the same (No CAP of $102,000) we could afford healthcare and OH so many things like free college………… ect. ect.!
OB BAYBE!!!
send that off to obama and give him permission to use it
Wouldn’t it be great if, at the first Obama/McBush debate, the moderators were Joe Six-Pack Christian Extremist Redneck and Latte-Drinking Liberal Fascist or DFH as opposed to Pompous Cocktail Weenie DC Pundits?
Jus’ askin’
I think if we consider his lobbying staff, what you meant was a welll greased machine
yup
Does any of it make any difference? I remember thinking that anyone as stupid a W would be blown out in an election…wrong…44% of voters have been so brain washed that they won’t vote for a Dem (librul) for Pres. The election will be decided by ~10%, mostly low information voters, who get their info from MSM and talk radio…It is going to be a hard fight.
I tend to agree, I hear people who claim they are democrat saying they are going to vote mccain
I personally believe this is a race issue but they won’t admit to it
and don’t forget the “flipped votes” we are sure to see from those electronic voting machines
we live in a bubble hear at the lake, let’s hope our bubble is not too far off the mark
44%?? Where did you get that #?
Slightly OT, but Joseph Stiglitz and Linda Bilmis were on DemocracyNow today discussing their new book, The Three Trillion Dollar War. I think that you have to wait until tomorrow to hear it on the website if the program is over in your area or you don’t get it.
right, we can’t take victory for granted. for instance Hillary did, and she’s paying now.
I was just pondering this. You think McCain looks like one of the cadavers that Republican ghoul in SD stripped clean now, wait till he is standing next to Obama. And then when he starts to speak….
Very perceptive, Ellie!
I don’t think that camp wants to discuss that though.
Yeah, that is the past. It is irrelevent.
As Ronald Reagan would say……blah, blah, frigging blah….
McBush is talking Mcgibberish.
-G
Replay should be available around 11am ET
It’s a WAG that I pulled out of my a**, *g*…It’s a rough guess based on reading polls that ask questions that differentiate Rep v Dem concepts. The results are around 44% R 46% D 10% U.
Standard Rove tactic: appropriate the best attributes of an opponent as one’s own while labeling him or her with your client’s worst attributes. Boil them down to a few buzzwords, repeat, repeat. (”War hero Bush”, “flip flopper Kerry”.)
One thing blogs can do is spot instances of this early. And like a rapid response team, accurately skewer the abuser of fact. That won’t affect authoritarian followers, who can tolerate any hypocrisy about their chosen leader. But it will bolster progressives and make independents think before puling that lever.
audio is already available for downloading.
if there is anyone left who doesn’t watch/listen to democracy now! regularly, it is available on radio, tv and podcasting (see the link above)
imo, this is the best daily news program – better than anything i’ve found anywhere else. highly recommended.
John Sidney McCain III supports torture by the United States Of America.
Good morning, BT.
Lol! O.K. The WAG I’ll accept. I thought maybe it was a MSM-provided figure. If so, I was gonna question your sensiblities. *g*
Race is a big issue but, since LBJ, most of the people that would never vote for an AA are in the Rep Party and would never vote Dem any way. In the 46%, I think there are more who would not vote for a woman than not vote for an AA.
Agree. We can give up and say all this is for nought. Or fire up progressives and work hard with independents. We get the government we work for, not what we deserve.
Just seconds before John Sydney McCain III said that he is a liberal Republican, he also said that his debate would be “dispirited”. We have video courtesy of the DFW Fox affiliate.
I’m listening to Byron Dorgan on CSPAN discussing the complete lunacy of our ever-increasing Strategic Oil Reserve in a time when our reserves could provide downward pressure on current and future oil/gas prices.
I feel for the guy cuz he’s beating his head against the Misadministration/Oil Profits wall. :(
“Be careful or the past might bite you on the ass”
OT. The stock market is reacting to bushie’s rosy remarks on the economy. Down 230. Jeeze my pension is looking fuck**g bleak.
“…”That’s history, that’s the past.”"
I wonder if the criminals and instruments brought before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals could have used that excuse.
“That’s History; the past”
The crap that comes out of McCain’s mouth would be funny… …if I didn’t know a lot of people are gonna vote for him.
Now, Domenici. Oh, fuck. Repubs are great! We’ve done good things! Don’t fucking prosecute me!
According to Sen dumenecci oil cost us 400billion last year….”all that money going to foreign countries”
Jeeze, lets see. The illegal invasion and occupation of Iraq is over $700 per year… money going to a foreign country and getting lost
I want a well stocked, and physically well positioned oil reserve –strategic, you might say. But I want a reasonably sized one and reasonably supplied one. Do we need to compete against the consumer at this time? I don’t think so. (But have no numbers to back myself up with, not even a waggin’ one.)
Dorgan had the #s, Ellie. Most of us are on the same page with you. SENSIBLE, cost-effective reserves, not oil company, obscene profit-making reserves.
From Ohio…
I say bring it on…
Obama and Clinton could handle this in a great way…Hold a leadership conference about CHANGE for the real problems in our country.
Jointly they could define Liberal as “working for the good of the people and the constitution” and then explain another major party for the last eight years has been about____(inserts Hugh’s list here)…Although, ignoring McCain and Repugs would be even more effective – just don’t take his bait. Just change the “game” with actually “change”.
Jointly, they could commit to addressing one item between now and the election and bring change on one small front to show just which party is being the party of change and what change is all about…It would be a new paradyne,but it would open eyes and shut mouths…I would focus the change effort in NOLA perhaps.
Let McCain start the Liberal name calling. Dems have a chance to show they are about change, about Constitutional charge, not the same old lobby $$$ network. “Conservative” would be defined as “closed” to the Constitution,”closed” to the people as current history has shown citizens…and Dems could show this contrast not through spin and name callling but through a “put up and shut up” approach of “doing one small work of change”.
Values have nothing to do with “conservative” or “liberal” labels. McCain has not figured that out. Let him shoot out of his mouth all he wants. The Reps have not been the party of “value centrism” for the last eight years and McCain has the endorsement of the leader who brought on the de-valuing of our great country with disrespect for the Constitution.
I’ll take the “Liberal label” proudly and raze you a “conservative republican” any day of the week Mr. McCain. Just keep the liberal label rhetoric coming and you’ll do it on your own. This country is in serious need and there is no time for name calling.
The prospect of having another petty, nasty joker a la Bush in the White House makes me FURIOUS.
NPR came out with a poll yesterday, including this gem:
However, public attitudes about the war in Iraq have turned more positive, which is a favorable development for McCain. A steadily growing number of Americans say progress is being made in Iraq. Moreover, 47% now favor keeping U.S. troops in Iraq until the situation there has stabilized, the highest percentage expressing this view in well more than a year.
If it is all going to foreign countries, where did the $40 billion, last quarter, Exxon-Mobil profit come from?
Oh, gawd, Domenici is going to give examples. I’m changing the channel. I can’t take it anymore.
That should be:
They have to refill the oil reserve because, I suspect, they have been stealing from it and need to cover that up before a Democratic presidency.
Why should they need to “refill” a reserve? Isn’t a reserve to be kept there in case we have an emergency? So why isn’t it already full?
Biodun and Raven:
I hope you guys are having a good time, but I miss you!!
Santyana to McBush:
Maya Angelou:
History, despite its wrenching pain, cannot be unlived, but if faced with courage, need not be lived again.
Often we decide to hire people based on past performance. Given that Bush and McBush want to prolong the Dover Coffin Production, and have both heavily bought into an administration that has our people being blown up who shouldn’t be there but has not been able to get the MRAPs over there that would protect them, McBush doesn’t get hired.
Study Faults Delay of Armored Trucks for Iraq
Where the hell has McBush been who has floor privileges in the Senate, and knows where it is for the past five years of this war? McCain is the Ranking member of the Armed Services committee and he’s been on it for years.
Hillary Clinton is a member of it as well. Earth to Hillary: Bodies blown up—->No MRAP’s what have you done about it?
You and your daughter visited trailers in Appalacian Ohio and I know Chelsea relates. She was given a $200,000 job at a hedge fund number crunching with no prior experience (no one else on the planet would get that gift under any circumstancs and she spends the night in her boyfriend’s $3.5 million apartment from money his dad gave him. Your daughter is not serving in Iraq.
Committee on Armed Services Hillary Rodham Clinton New York
The Evolution of Chelsea Clinton–No No Iraq–Yes Yes Silver Spoon and Money for Nothin’
Chealsy and Mommy: Luxury is Our Name: Chelsea Clinton: Secret Weapon or Weapon of Mass Destruction?
good point, eg.
probably to some no-tax island in the caribbean. If it all stayed here then let us see the damn taxes.
OT..I wish Obama would stop this crap..reminds me of Lieberman:
link
You’re damn right the Thugs need to be crushed and defeated..just look at what they have done to our Country!!
This link shows the popular vote % results for the US Presidential elections:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L…..ote_margin
I hope someone from Obama’s camp reads FDL.
Like a video game, they need to acquire and reserve ammo for the upcoming battle.
Don’t forget health and armor!
McCain is implicitly acknowledging that he is unfit to make critical national security decisions? “History” has a lot to do with the future, as well.
Oh yeah! I guess I’m just overtly aggressive. That could explain a lot. *g*
The short version of the long history of “strategic reserves” is that they are almost always entirely counterproductive. They are built up when supplies are tight and sold off when a glut develops, which is right before the next shortage. What you are witnessing with the SPR is SOP.
The country is not Firedoglake. A political message of “crushing the Rethuglicans” wouldn’t work. That’s not what the vast general public wants to hear. Obama is taking political advantage of the irrational fears that many have (unfairly) about Clinton.
Well, they can be released anytime now!
Now Pete, we’ve argued a bit in the past about candidates, but I have got to say.
This is the kind of criticism I can sink my teeth into. It is outrageous that two candidates sit on the armed services committee and this issue with the MRAP’s has not been addressed!
The Chelsea bit leaves kind of a bad taste in my mouth, she should be serving in the war her mom helped start, I can live with that. But the criticism for being a spoiled little rich kid… …she didn’t choose her parents. What would you have her do? Try to imagine growing up being nationally ridiculed by the right wing. I can just picture her having to cope with the awkwardness of being a teen PLUS McCain/Limbaugh publicly mocking her just because they can get away with it… I think Chelsea has always conducted herself admirably.
I think past SOPs for many US programs are going to be revised very soon!
StMcBush’08™ the giver: http://thinkprogress.org/2008/…..e-schools/
I don’t make a habit of watching morning shows, but ABC repeated this crap verbatim this morning: …while Obama is looking at the past, John McCain is looking ahead…
What makes you think that?
I don’t see why chelsea – or anyone else – should be faulted for not fighting in an in immoral or illegal war, despite the actions or beliefs of his or her parents.
CHANGE! Don’t fight it, embrace it.
@70
This line is almost identical to a line in Bloomberg’s op piece in the Times yesterday…
I wonder…foreshadowing of the Obama-Bloomberg ticket? (Bloomberg= former Dem/former Rep turned Independent after much polling research.)
Hillary Clinton made a big point of criticizing Iraq Obama because he had not held a meeting.
If you use what my President calls “the google”–I like to learn computers from Shrub because he’s an Ace–you’ll find a zillion hits all making the same mistake Clinton did. Only they aren’t in the U.S. Senate and she is.
Every possible hit on the web inclucing Salon, CNN, WaPo and including a kabillion “liberal progressive”blogs has Clinton’s criticism of Obama not holding a Senate Foreign Relations Committee’s Subcommittee on European Affairs meeting and they incorrectly say like Clinton is clucking in Texas and Ohio that that particular committee has jurisdiction over Afghanistan. John Kerry’s committee actually oversees U.S. conduct in Afghanistan that is allegedly as far as the Senate could impact it including Nato’s activities there.
The only thing wrong with Clinton’s allegation used in the Cleveland debate and today in her speeches is that Obama wasn’t on the committee that she meant to refer to and the committee she did refer to has nothing to do with Afghanistan.
Maybe Penn, Grunwald and Williams can get a high school geography teacher to teach her the difference between Europe and the Near East countries.
Afghanistan Now
Near East South Asia Center
for Strategic Studies
The NESA Center participating countries include (countries in yellow on map belo Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Egypt, India, Iraq, Israel, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Maldives, Mauritania, Morocco, Nepal, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Tunisia, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.
I’m hoping that some of this money Clinton is raising can go for a remedial course in how the Senate works for her when she returns–the orientation course that is given to freshman senators and perhaps they can bring in a tutor that will get Clinton to write on a blackboard–Obama’s committee no Afghanistan–Afganistan John Kerry’s committee so she gets it straight.
The subcommittee Clinton was referring to that oversees activity in Afghanistan including Nato or anything else as far as the US Senate can “oversee” anything is this one:
Subcommittee on Near Eastern and South and Central Asian Affairs
Obama is not on it–and it controls the U.S.’s relationship with Nato in Afghanistan–also an important point for Hillary–Afghanistan is not a European country. Obama’s committee deals with Europe; not Nato and not Afghanistan. Other than that she made a brilliant point.
John F. Kerry, Chairman
Christopher J. Dodd
Russell D. Feingold
Barbara Boxer
Benjamin L. Cardin Norm Coleman, Ranking Member
Chuck Hagel
Vacant
George V. Voinovich
None of these people could pick up their cell and check with Foreign Relations as to what subcommitte controls what.
And even if it had, it would have been a useless point. People out of a job inOhio don’t give aren’t tuning into the nuances of a Senate legislative sub.
Change what? Vocabulary?
I agree..I wish he wouldn’t push that meme so hard…It might make some people think he means it. The worst “bipartisan” statement was..” I can work with some Republicans, like my good friend Tom Coburn”.
As schizo as it seems, I agree with you also.
It’s just that I feel the first point, “Your child lives in luxury while ours die in Iraq” is valid, whether or not one agrees that Chelsea has more of a duty than the rest of us, due to her lineage.
The rest, however, is hitting her, just for being her. That is what I think is unfair.
Here’s Steve Clemons on Obama’s hearing problem:
In December, I did some research into how Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton each used legislative machinery at their disposal in the Senate to get some sense of their “executive abilities”. For some reason, I expected Hillary Clinton to be too busy for things like subcommittee hearings and Obama to be drilling in and learning as much as he could because his experience in federal level legislative affairs might be perceived as weak.
I found the opposite — and discovered that Barack Obama, despite his role as Chairman of the European Subcommittee on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, had not held a single policy hearing during his tenure. In the Environment and Public Works Committee Subcommittee on Superfund and Environmental Health, I found that Clinton had chaired and been actively engaged in a number of hearings during the same period.
When I discovered this, a number of Obama’s own foreign policy advisers called me — and one said, “I am as surprised as you are.”
http://www.thewashingtonnote.c…..002909.php
Because if John McCain looks at the past, he’s looking at his own mistakes and if he looks ahead, all he can see is the Grim Reaper.
I’m also pretty tired of the implications that Chelsea Clinton isn’t qualified for her job.
The woman has a degree in History from Stanford, and a Masters in international relations (i.e. politics) from Oxford. She worked for three years for an international financial and management consulting firm before being hired by Avenue Capital Group as an investment analyst, not a “number cruncher”. She’s not being paid any more than anyone else in that business; maybe less.
Vocabulary, yes, but not exclusively. Words DO matter despite the charge from some that they don’t.
New energy initiatives will rewrite SOP wrt SPR.
They are expanding it. First from 700 million bbls to a billion, then to 1.5 billion barrels. Expanding the Nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve
Yawn. I’ll believe when I see it. Both D candidates are pretty centrist stuff, despite rhetoric of one of them.
I think it is relevant to point out that those statements were made to the editorial board of a conservative newspaper. It’s not like his stump speeches are filled with praise for the Republicans.
George Bush said he was a “uniter not a divider” because that is what people want to hear. I don’t think this tells us much about policy.
Ah, back to political discussion. I had to get my cereal mix in the dehydrator.
I just saw an interesting debate of sorts on MSNBC between to black gentlemen, the repug I’ve seen numerous times but the dem is a mystery. Would any of you happen to know his name?
No..I see it as a multi-political cycle effort..defeat Republicans at the ballot box..and for the Dem President to appoint an AG that will restore the rule of law. Both of those efforts would destroy the current Republican party as a National political party. There is little question in my mind that a Pres. Dodd would do that.
eCAHN
These are my opinions. I represent me only. I could be completely wrong, but, hey, I’m just having ‘a discussion’.
That didn’t take long. HA!
As my comments are my opinions.
I heard on some news outlet or another Senator Luger saying that he wanted Obama on the committee due to his expertise regarding loose nukes. At least I think that’s what I heard. Anybody got any idea what that meant? I know that I’ve heard something about Obama helping to keep track or create a system to keep track of loose nukes before, but does that have anything to do with his subcommittee? Or with what Lugar was talking about?
Iraqpaganda from McBush, enabled by the media. Looking at the past is called learning the lessons of history so we don’t repeat them!
Prairie Today: Cooked Goose
Ah, back to political discussion. I had to get my cereal mix in the dehydrator.
I just saw an interesting debate of sorts on MSNBC between
totwo black gentlemen, the repug I’ve seen numerous times but the dem is a mystery. Would any of you happen to know his name?____________
Nevermind, I found it :)
I think those of use to the left have always had a delimma over oil and increasing gas prices. The only realistic way of promoting fuel conservation and the development of new energy sources is to increase the price of oil and gasoline. Yet that’s a political killer, so we favor releasing reserves to lower gasoline prices.
I used to commute 40 miles to and from work before I retired, so I have a real feeling for the delimma. The only answer I can think of is for a Democratic adminstration to really push alternate source development while trying to maintain affordable gas enough to remain in office. It’s certainly not ideal.
But what about new energy initiatives altering the SOP for the SPR?
Do you think that’s a viable theory?
Obama has been working on the Nunn-Lugar program that works with Russia on disarmament of real WMD.
I had the opportunity to speak with Obama for several minutes about his involvement with the program, he was knowledgable about both the specifics and the overall goals.
correction: …those of us to the left… Damn, and I actually read it before submitting that time.
This story talks about that topic:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.c…..arson.html
I’ve been conflicted with this Fern.
I fully subscribe to the premise that we shouldn’t have ever been there. I fully subscribe to the premise that we aren’t protecting the people we have over there–I have had the links up several times contrasting 2005 articles that we didn’t have MRAPs over there when the soldier directly confronted Rumsfield and he gave the ridiculous answer that we fight with what we have. That said, I can understand why anyone wouldn’t want to be in the fish in a barrel situation Iraq is, or to send their kids. It’s one thing to be brave and defend your country, and quite another to play Russian Roulette exactly like the scene in Deer Hunter–I don’t know if you remember the revolver to the head scene, or the movie.
But I wasn’t just hitting that Chelsea isn’t in Iraq. I was hitting the arrogant, elite, effete sense of entitlement that the Clinton’s have. Chelsea was given a job through her parents’ connections with a hedge fund that pays $200,000. She hasn’t had one second of background in the way of job training or formal or informal study that would have earned her that job if she had been anyone else. Read and Enjoy:
The Evolution of Chelsea Clinton
eCAHNomics…Do you know of Austan Goolsbe? Obama’s senior economic adivsor is/was a senior economic advisor for the DLC.
DLC.org
The SPR is penney ante marginal stuff; it doesn’t matter much whether it’s productive or counterproductive. Just delicious irony that it’s the latter. Don’t think any strategic reserve policy would ever make much difference even if properly administered. The fundamental problem is one of human psychology, not politics. In an emergency, everyone thinks that the emergency will get worse, so emergency reserves must be saved for the even worse problems ahead. During gluts, no one (political party being irrelevant) can imagine that the commodity would ever become scarce again. BTW, if U.S. releases SPR reserves next year, it would fall into the pattern of selling into a developing glut. These high oil prices are reining in demand and bumping up supply.
Chelsea Clinton is not fair game. Would you turn down a job paying that much if you were offered it? I think not. I still don’t get all the hatred of the Clintons, but leave Chelsea alone.
I’ll bet after you spoke with him, and probably before, you didn’t envision him as a “cipher, empty suit, or a nothing burger” terms the press, the Clinton camp, and the thugs throw out.
Nope. TNR had a review of Obama’s advisors, mainly econ ones.
http://www.tnr.com/politics/st…..38;k=12040
Without rereading it, Goolsbe may be one of the behavioral economists. I like what that group has done to otherwise completely irrational “rational expectations” theory, but it is not at all a macroeconomic field. Can help in designing some govt programs more cleverly, if properly applied.
I guess then we should abandon Obama. Let’s definitely seat Michigan, Florida and steal back all the Super Delegates bolting out of the corral. That’s going to get a lot of votes for HRC–have you phoned that into Penn and Maggie?
chelsea clinton is every bit as much fair game as mitten’s sons are – but only because she has campaigned for senator clinton. once a family member joins the campaign… then they become fair game, imo.
that said, there are fair and unfair ways to attack members of a candidate’s campaign. my point is only that whatever is fair for the family members of an R candidate ought to be the same standard we use for our own candidates.
There’s a very narrow sense in which McCain’s argument would make sense, if it were someone besides him making it.
For instance, I once supported Edwards over Obama, despite Edwards’ foolishness in voting for the AUMF, in part because Edwards was aggressively demanding that the Democrats defund the war, at a time when both Clinton and Obama acquiesced to giving Bush money on his terms. Obama’s judgment was better, but one could make a “what are we going to do from here forward” argument. And I’m relieved not to have to defend Edwards’ vote, though I would have liked to see Obama more aggressively work to block Bush now (Clinton I had no hope for, she still seems to think she was right on the AUMF).
However, McCain’s idea of what we should do from here forward is endless war. His record matters, because he did not apologize for anything as Edwards did, and he’s been very consistent, both in the past and in the present, in calling for military aggression, usually more than anyone else. He wanted a ground invasion of Serbia, he pushed for the escalation (aka “surge”), he called for 100 years of occupation, and he joked about bombing Iran.
I don’t think any President of the U.S. is in any position with leverage to impact the price of gas until something is done about the demand. We have nothing in place to substantially impact the demand for the next several years–not ethanol, not any other alternative fuels, certainly not or submissive relationship to OPEC and all other countries that supply oil to us.
Graduating with honors from Stanford with a degree in history followed by a masters from Oxford in international relations don’t appear to be signs of elitism to me. That’s a lot of hard work.
the republicans hate him because he took all their best platforms and put them into policy, they no longer had a platform so they went after his personal life
the democrats hate him because they believe the spin from the republicans
Thanks for the advise.
It’s both.
I believe that the conduct of someone’s 27 year old daughter, and in particular a candidate’s conduct as a parent toward them is not only fair game, but essential in assessing whether you want them as your President. It goes to integrity.
I’m not seeing the children of the people trailers in Ohio, even if some of them graduate from Stanford, or Oxford, getting their first job out of school after majoring in Philosophy as a numbers cruncher at a NYC hedgefund. Mommy and Daddy swung the job. She has no qualifications for it. I could assume that Clinton would put people in jobs with no qualifications much like Bush has done with many of his major positions and the list I could make is as long as Hugh’s.
Maybe ECAHN can advise me differently.
You say that it is more human psychology than politics, but aren’t these two components entirely connected? How can the electorate seperate their personal emotion from their politics? They can’t. In our own discussion this morning that fact is illuminated.
You assume that the current and past strategies and conditions of the SPR (and other US programs) will not change. I disagree. So, while I respect your obvious intelligence, I denounce and reject your individual psychology that drives your arguments.
well, in the case of chelsea clinton, since she’s already been out campaigning, i agree she’s fair game. i think the case for the family members of candidates who do not participate in the campaign is a little more complicated.
Not supporting Clinton and pointing out why you want her out of the race should not be equated with hate. If you or anyone does this, you’re completely missing the vote. I don’t hate Clinton. I do hate it when she lies about Obama and knows better however.
When Clinton criticized him for not doing anything about NATO in Afghanistan for the committee he chairs, or more accurately the sub he chairs, she has ample tools and qualifications to have checked first to find out that he doesn’t chair the committee that does that. John Kerry does.
Clinton is not someone with a 6th grade education. She is a member of the Senate; she damn well should learn what committee does what before she opens her mouth. If I know what a Senate sub does and doesn’t, maybe she should know it before trying to showcase it as a debate point, or maybe she shouldn’t be hired for the job of President.
I agree with you. And I’m not trying to make Chelsea a major focus, even if she is the NY Magazine cover lady this week. I do find it odd at night though that Suzanne is always quick to jump on anyone that mentions Chelsea saying it’s not propper to talk about candidate’s kids when after Bill she is a major family member campaigning as she’s 27, and since Jane Hamsher has done headline blogs on Chelsea’s roll in the campaign. That doesn’t seem very consistent.
and i don’t remember anyone objecting to comments about romney’s sons.
I never discredited a major in history or philosophy at Oxford as elitism. I really do believe in education after high school as key to a lot of problems. But I also don’t know anyone who works in stocks or investments or banking –and I’ve checked with plenty of them, who would hire Chelsea Clinton with no qualifications for a $200,000 job at a hedge fund as her first job. It doesn’t add up to anything but nepotism.
And I didn’t see Ecahn in chiming in to agree with you point out how majors in these areas at the two schools translate or extrapolate into a job for 200K crunching numbers in a hedge fund as a first job out of school.
Is it constructive to major in liberal arts for all kinds of reasons–sure — a lot of people go to a grad school that has a strong basis in science and do that. I had liberal arts as one major and did it. But I don’t see how Chelsea is qualified for the job she was given, and I don’t know any people in the financial field who do either.
Pete, this is exactly the kind of criticism that is unhelpful. A question was raised about Obama’s chief economic advisor.
Re-read your response at 110.
Whenever a criticism and concern about Obama is raised, you jump into attack mode. I’ve said it before and I will say it again. It does not help your cause.
Hedge funds are not helpful. Legalized piracy.
If that is true, then how could anyone ask someone they love to campaign with/for them. Forget ask, how could they allow it?
Chelsea Clinton is supporting her mother. Her mother is not my favorite candidate, but what would you have Chelsea do?
Ummm if I weren’t qualified for it I wouldn’t go for it.
While innovation and being savvy and prescient on the fly are pluses, training should matter for a $200K job.
I think then, in addition to would I go for it–and I understand and appreciate your honesty–I would always want you to call me on something I said with it, would you or I hire someone for a job like that who had no experience when, particularly in a mecca like New York City where you have so many qualified applicants from everywhere in the world and every strong college, wouldn’t you go after someone who has a strong background working in whatever prepares you to excel at a Hedge Fund?
I don’t know all the best preparation for a “hedge fund number cruncher” but we can both think of a lot of ways to train to be one and jobs with experience we might like to see in someone’s resume first.
I think it’s great for her to campaign for her mom. I think it’s totally healthy to help your parents in any way you can who are campaining. That wasn’t my criticism of HRC or Chelsea.
Unfortunately for Romney’s sons, their father was a hawk who, tried to pass off the idea that his sons were performing some national service equivelent to service in a war zone. Many of us take particular offense at those who talk in brave terms while sending the children of others into combat. If they really believed that the war was as important to the continued existence of the United States as they said, they should be in the military, the way thousands have been before.
I took the quote from upthread. I have not researched Chelsea, but this is dramatically different from how you have described her qualifications.
Who is wrong?
i’m not saying she shouldn’t campaign for a family member. and if you’ve been objecting comments made about romney’s sons – then i have no quarrel with you.
although my personal thinking is that members of a campaign are fair game – i’m not wedded to that. my major issue is that whatever we think the rules ought to be, we apply those same rules to the family members of all the candidates – R and D.
very, very, true
I made some of those comments about Mitt’s kids. But the criticism was pretty much confined to Iraq and the 5 strapping young men fighting the islamofascists via the mittmobile.
Do you recall criticism about their jobs, opportunities, education, etc?
bingo
I don’t know what it is. I seem to spend an inordinate amount of time defending a candidate I don’t even particularly support. For some reason there seems to be a certain amount of bile involved with criticism of Chelsea.
Lol. I have the same experience. I actually voted early for Obama, but find myself defending the Clintons. I guess part of it is the hatred and vile attacks they endured from the day they won the election. I’m taken aback to find references approaching that intensity on FDL.
Me too..WTF?? The nasty attacks against portions or members of the Democratic Party are going to come back and bite us in the ass. An example are the attacks against the DLC as worse than the anti-Christ…now it turns out that Obama’s economic advisor since his Senate campaign is/was the senior economic advisor for the DLC. I don’t have a problem with it but the people that have hyper-partisan opinions might and that is a problem.
BlueTexan, can you give us a run-down of what’s going on there re Tuesday’s primary?
Yeah, I’ve fully agreed with your comments regarding caution. We’ve only won three presidential elections since 1968 and both were by moderate to conservative southern Democrats. I have high hopes, but think we will be foolish be doing end zone dances while on the 45 yard line.
Hopefully, BT will answer. All of the papers I’ve read indicate that the early turnout in every county is at least twice what it has been in any past election. Additionally, somewhere around 65 percent of the early voters are voting in the Democratic primary, which is a far greater percentage than any other recent primary.
However, it is generally believed that many of the early voters in the Democratic primary are Republicans. There are various interpretations on why they are crossing over;i.e., they actually favor a Democratic candidate; they want to ensure the least favored Democrat can’t possibly become President; or they want to ensure that the most beatable Democratic candidate is nominated. I personally can’t believe Texas would vote Democratic in the general election and believe it is due to a combination of the latter two reasons. I hope I’m wrong.
As the troops said about General George Patton, “Our blood and his guts.”
Exactly right. We cannot repeat this often enough. Even some of the worst that he does not activelyhelp to plan, he utterly depends on and he knows it. Witness his happy acceptance of Hagee and his backtracking on every one of his signature ‘maverick’ positions (even his opposition to torture).
Apparently whoever thinks that what you just quoted makes much sense is wrong.
I forgot McKinsey and Company, but I didn’t forget Stanford/Oxford History and instead of Philosophy which may have been a minor at one of the two places, International Relations. Her 200K Hedge Fund job at Avenue Capital was provided by Mark Lasry–longtime Clinton friend and huge donor. Lasry always “hedges” his bets and is a George Bush donor as well.
Take a look at what you just said. She majored in History at Stanford. Then she does a year where she spends writing about her dad’s role in Ireland for a master’s thesis. She is hired for about $120,000 by a company who gives advice to large pharmaceuctical and health care companies.
I know a little about those companies having worked in the health care field for years. Essentially Chelsea was a 22 year old kid who majored in history with another yearwriting a thesis on her dad’s role in Ireland.
If you think that’s the kind of person who advises pharmaceutical and large health care companies in any substantive way, you’re dreaming and whoever fed you the quote is dreaming.
Every other new hire for McKenzie was an MBA. Chelsea had nothing near any training in business. No one has any idea what she actually did for McKenzie, but I can tell you that what they do is not done by 22 year old kids who are essentially history majors. History is interesting–granted–I took a few of those courses, but that doesn’t prepare you for the nuances of big bucks health care consulting.
Many many publications have described her job as a “numbers cruncher.” If you prefer investment analyst–I won’t argue with your choice of words and I’m not denigrating that occupation. I’m saying Chelsea isn’t qualified to do it.
So essentially Cheslea was a history major who got a $120,000 job with a $10,000 sining bonus alongside every other hire who was an MBA–whose company refuses to discuss what it is she did for them who then went to work for her mom and dad’s friend.
Chelsea, as Gawker said, gets trotted out anytime the Clinton’s need to look like a family–despite the obvious unfamilial relationship between Hillary and Bill.
The Tin McMan, with no heart, mumbles while rusted. Might it be the Wizard of Oz, rove-ingly stole both his heart and, apparently, his brain. Explains the straw man aspect of the guy.
You win Pete.
Chelsea Clinton is evil incarnate spawned by the devil in an unholy union consumated over Vince Fosters rotting corpse.
How could I have been so blind. Thank you for showing me the light.
I thought it was appropriate to dig and find that Chelsea was told she was going nowhere at McKinsey because it was clear she was way out of her skillset and she was told she would never be promoted and it would be better if she left. That’s why her daddy found her the front job at Avenue Capitol where she is no where near an analyst anymore than Britney is batting cleanup for the Yankees.
Those are your words, and I try not to deal in gossip items like Hillary’s Vince Foster affair, Hillary’s flings with the Arkansas troopers when she was much younger, and the release of the Bill Clinton Jennifer Flowers tapes next week.
But I was assessing whether a then 22 year-old history major who had written a thesis on her dad’s minimal involvement in peace in Ireland–which did not work out peacefully qualified her at all for what McKinsey and Company does or what the hedge fund does and it does not. I did not say she was evil incarnate; she is simply an arrogant spoiled kid that has never really had to work for a living and couldn’t possibly no a health care problem because all her health care bills are paid for by mommy and daddy or essentially comped for her by the phony facade jobs she is given that are arranged by her dad.
I wouldn’t expect to see Chelsea in the work force long. After straightening the ringlets, she only talks to millionaire scions who are heirs to fortunes at the bars she frequents.
When asked about Iraq, this was her typical answer much criticized on the web:
“My mother made her decision given the information available at the time. I suppose you had clairvoyance.”
But Chelsea didn’t rush to go to Iraq.
On a campaign stop in Iowa in December, a 9-year-old student reporter for Scholastic News asked Ms. Clinton if she thought her father would make a good “first man.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t talk to the press, and that applies to you, unfortunately. Even though I think you’re cute,” she told the little girl.
I have more and will catch up with you later.
She didn’t leave McKinsey and company voluntarily. She was told she was not being promoted–ever–and it was up or out. She did not distinguish herself, and McKinsey and company employees do what I said in the beginning she has no earthly idea of how to do. They advise large enterprises on how to restructure, which major executives to keep, and why, including how to restructure financially.
This is stuff that will never be part of her brain.
When she was told she was being hoisted from McKinsey she began drinking showing up at the Karioki bar on 2nd avenue, 2nd on 2nd where she often had to be held up and semi-carried out by friends to a cabl
Her arrogance was reflected in her answers when her mother was often criticized to her face. On the Iraq war, Chelsea arrogantly responded:
I would add, as I’ve always emphasized and as Bill Maher pointed out:
Clinton’s qualifications on National Security advertized by her ridiculous commercial that she is up in the early AM dealing with a national security crisis that of course would have Obama drooling in the corner–the debates with McBush will actually be delicious and McBush knows he will get his ass mopped up–come because she was married to a President.
She’s as qualified as a football player or singer’s groupies are to perform.