Joe the Plumber doesn’t like Sarah Palin anymore. Since the Tea Party blast directed at Palin, this is the second greatest news she’s gotten in a while. Having secured her outsider status, getting a little incoming from the right is not so bad for Sarah. As the attention on the former governor continues to rise, regardless of her electability status, which everyone keeps reporting is nil, Sarah is laughing all the way to the bank. That she’s filling the Hillary hole has not been discussed, but that’s part of her allure, even if nobody on the left, including Hillary’s former supporters, who remain in her camp regardless that she’s out of action, care one whit about Sarah Palin. The simple void of a female rock star since Hillary Rodham Clinton has been deployed to the State dept. has opened up a spot for Sarah, because there’s nobody else out there that can fill it. Though I’m still waiting for Liz Cheney’s entry. After enjoying a competent and eminently qualified female candidate on the national stage it’s clear the people want more, so some are settling for Sarah, especially since the rest of the politicians on the national scene are not only a snore but incompetent. Obama’s star having descended to earth. Just look at the state of the Congress and legislation, not to mention Pres. Obama’s agenda, which hardly resembles anything coherent. All eyes on the other side, waiting for the next election, because watching this vamping political nothingness is down right painful.
Clinton acknowledged that U.S. President Barack Obama’s approach to Iran had not borne fruit, blaming Iran for refusing to engage and suggesting that a fourth U.N. Security Council sanctions resolution was the only option. “I would like to figure out a way to handle it in as peaceful an approach possible, and I certainly welcome any meaningful engagement, but … we don’t want to be engaging while they are building their bomb,” Clinton said at the U.S.-Islamic World Forum conference. – Clinton tackles Mideast peace, Muslim ties in Gulf
Sect. Clinton is trying to cajole our allies in the Arab and Muslim world right now. It’s not going very well. In fact, the current state of Clinton’s job is to offer nothing but a bunch of words. Relegated to hand holding, asking for help on Iran, while the reality is that Iran is going to get weapons grade uranium to become a nuclear nation, which has always been the case, effective means of weaponization always the challenge. So, I’ve never understood all the international posturing about thinking otherwise. And even as this reality explains Israel’s and the right’s rumbling rhetoric, it was always a matter of when not if. But what this whole exercise from Clinton reveals is that over at State she’s got no juice to actually impact anything. The Middle East proving beyond the U.S. scope to mold once again. So, even as Clinton travels the globe, the most important representative Pres. Obama can deploy for our country, she’s powerless.
However, since her Senate colleagues weren’t exactly going to welcome her back and offer her the power she’d amassed as a presidential candidate, what else was a woman to do?
This reminds me of how different things are for women around the world. Even as they fight for basic human rights in some states, there are many nations around the world who have already elevated a woman to the top job. Not in the U.S. Why is that Latin America, a patriarchal culture if ever there was one, has had female presidents, but not the U.S.? Even after 2008, but also the continued rise of Sarah Palin, it’s clear the country hungers for it. Some women would rather have Sarah Palin than wait one minute longer. The Hillary hole one reason Palin enjoys such attention, coupled with the “it” factor that, regardless of her electoral challenges, Sarah Palin most assuredly has. So even as England had Thatcher, Israel had Golda Meir, Germany Chancellor Angela Merkel, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf in Liberia, even Ukraine’s heroine of the orange revolution, former PM Yulia Tymoshenko, the American presidency remains an elusive prize for American females. From the Oregonian editorial board, talking about President-elect Laura Chinchilla in Cartago, Costa Rica.
Isabel Perón became president of Argentina in 1974 and Cristina Fernandez Kirchner in 2007, but those roles come with asterisks. Isabel Perón was the third wife and running mate of President Juan Perón, replacing him when he died in 1974. After a tumultuous tenure, she was arrested and deposed. (Juan Perón’s second wife, Eva, was a political trailblazer because of her prominence as first lady, and a lively campaigner on his behalf.) And while Fernandez Kirchner won election in her own right, her husband and former president, Nestor Kirchner, gave her an advantage by placing her on the ticket when he ran successfully for president.
A woman was appointed interim president of Haiti in 1990. And in Brazil, two women, Dilma Rousseff and Marina Silva, are running for president in an election scheduled for this fall. Rousseff, who is chief of staff for term-limited President Luiz Lula da Silva, is considered a strong contender.
Why do women in the United States seem to face a higher hurdle to becoming president than women in Latin America? …
In Anne Kornblut’s book, someone I’ve pilloried for her part in helping create the negative national narrative on the Clintons, she talks about the difficulty of getting beyond the 18 million cracks in the ultimate glass ceiling. The “share of women in office in the United States is smaller than in more than 70 countries in the world, from Cuba to Rawanda to Norway,” writes Kornblut in “Notes from the Cracked Ceiling.” Kornblut going on to say if we don’t ask why the glass ceiling was cracked, but hasn’t been broken it might never happen.
This is a longer discussion than can be had in one single essay, as to why women aren’t poised to break through in the U.S. as has already happened around the world, because the subject is complex. In a country where women’s civil rights are enshrined in law, Democrats and Republicans are busy chipping away at these givens in health care legislation. Why modern women are letting it happen is part of the problem. Female leaders still apologizing for a woman’s right to self-determination in order to fit into the man’s paradigm. Not exactly inspiring. See Hillary’s falling to Mark Penn’s run like a man strategy. One can almost respect Palin’s strong stand against abortion, which amounts to a pro selective life stance as I’ve talked about before, even if it erodes women’s civil rights, because at least she’s un-apologetically wrong, you know, like Bush. (Again, wrong and strong, beats weak and right.) While female Democrats make deals like Pelosi did on health care posturing that they’re for women’s self-determination, which includes the right to have domain over her own body, but won’t fight for it, putting everyone’s needs above women. Beyond that you had Senate leaders like Reid and Ted Kennedy, but also Nancy Pelosi, saying they were neutral, but actually were always for Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton, even advising and pushing him on, something that obviously blindsided her team. I could go on, but you get the beginning of what is a larger problem for women, which begins with their own choices.
What’s clear is that nothing is the same since Hillary’s candidacy failed. The Hillary hole is real, palpable. More so when we continue to look outward. Even to watch the reaction to Hillary when she does get into the fire on her trips overseas. Like when she bristled in Africa at a question she was asked about her husband’s opinion, replying, “My husband is not the Secretary of State, I am.” Kornblut, typically, if ironically, chimed in with a schizophrenic analysis that reveals, at least one reason, why women rising to the top job in the U.S. is still so difficult:
KORNBLUT: [W]e reported out that there was no mistranslation. That she was asked about her husband. The reporters who were there said it was very hot. She was very tired. So maybe her demeanor is not the one she would have wanted, but that the underlining sentiment that she’s the secretary of state is one that she intended to convey, especially in a region of the world that is so male dominated.
But the incident is kind of bigger than that. It’s sort of the perfect encapsulation of the burden of being Hillary Clinton. That you are seen in relation to your husband wherever you go, not just by the media, but by the world and asked questions about him. And it reminded me a lot of the campaign, when she was seen in relation to him and having to respond and trying to be her own person. But it also raises the question of what kind of secretary of state she is going to be. And if she is going to be able to harness the celebrity, which of course is the reason we’re all talking about it, in a – to a larger purpose. Some people, when this whole incident happened said to me, you know, she looks kind of like a first lady on this trip. She’s out there. She’s been gone for 11 days, 7 countries. She’s away from the center of action here. So I expect we may see some shorter trips from her, ones where she’s not going to get as tired when she’s on the road. But at the end of the day, I think her, again the underlining sentiment is one that certainly the White House and she defend that she had the right to say that.
New media headlines doing a disservice to Hillary as well, ready to exalt her husband at the Secretary’s expense.
Maybe this explains, in part, why all the usual Hillary haters have been so complimentary of Sect. Clinton during her run at State. Because after all, it’s not like the Secretary of State can pick an open fight with Pres. Obama, or that Hillary ever would, at least not publicly, as that’s not her style. But she is effectively neutered at State, leaving her critics to mumble their total approval of Sect. Clinton, even Chris Matthews lauding her work. Since the election season and her diplomatic, a-political ascendance, a compliment for Sect. Clinton offered almost as a bridge over the competing sides of the 2008 election season. A wound that has still not healed, which has been proven recently when the Obama bubble burst, with his fans finally coming down to earth and swallowing the reality that he is simply another politician. Egads! Not that. Obama agnostics infuriated that warnings went unheeded.
Certainly, Hillary has given remarkable speeches, traveled to the Congo war zone, a first, continued talking about women, her work laudable by any standard of statecraft. Her latest warnings about an Iranian dictatorship, due to the Revolutionary Guard’s prowess, now making world headlines. Hillary Clinton always impressive, her travels and commitment to women’s issues unmatched. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as dynamic a diplomat as Obama could have hoped to have, even as John Kerry and others wait in the wings to possibly follow her. But last time I looked Afghanistan’s Pres. Karzai still supported the “rape law,” so what good it does for the U.S. to huff and puff is certainly in question, as we cannot change reality.
There is nothing that Clinton can actually do anywhere.
“I know people are disappointed that we have not yet achieved a breakthrough,” Clinton said of the six-decade Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “This is hard work.“
But who ever thought we’d hear Hillary Rodham Clinton reduced to quoting George W. Bush?
Sarah Palin is no Hillary Clinton, Taylor (or Admin), as much as you would like for her to be. If that pentecostal nut becomes president in 2012, I don’t know how I can stay in the country. That is a quadrennial threat from us liberals, but I think I mean it this time. I am counting on a 68-year old Hillary saving us in 2016 (or 2012 if that empty suit in the White House has a complete meltdown).
I am completely out of the hyper-partisan game at this point, RR, leaving the world of advocacy behind after 2008.
That said, I remain a liberal, so your claim that I supposedly want Sarah Palin to be Hillary continues down the mind numbing road that there is no larger picture involved, which is clearly present in the essay above.
Women remain out of the top job loop, with the Hillary hole one of the reasons Palin is rising, though certainly not the only one.
Palin’s story is compelling, because beyond Hillary, what female on the Democratic side has a chance of getting the good old boys to sign on? The Republicans also having Kay Bailey Hutchinson, as well as Liz Cheney, who has yet to enter.
The Democrats have no one. I’d like to change the law for Granholm, but don’t see that happening, as it would open the door for Arnold, who might actually be able to beat all other GOP comers.
The electorate is hungry for a female president. At present, there is no evidence whatsoever that HRC will ever run for office again. She’s lost the taste for partisan blood after so much was spilled in 2008.
If not Hillary, then who on the Democratic side? From a party that preens to represent women, it’s a sad state of affairs.
rickroberts
Taylor certainly does not think (imo) that Palin is up to Hillary standards in any way. I think Taylor is referencing the vacuum left by Hillary. Taylor is acknowledging that Palin is attracting a lot of attention and thereby clout. It is not a suggestion that Palin is deserving in reality or that Palin truly any less vapid than you and I and many others think she is. Kind of an acknowledgment the “you betcha” just may be the new “yes, we can.”
Precisely, djjl.
That last line from djjl comes from Joe Klein, whom I quoted recently, an article very much worth reading.
http://www.time.com/time/politics/article/0,8599,1963564,00.html
“Oh, you betcha,” she said — and one might even argue that you betcha is American for “Yes, we can.”
… So how’s that hopey-changey stuff working out for you? The Obama presidency certainly hasn’t ushered in an era of comity and prosperity. In the end, though, Palin is offering the opposite of hope and change: despair and stasis. The despair is histrionic and purposefully distorted; the stasis proved disastrous during the Bush Administration. But is Sarah Palin the favorite to win the Republican presidential nomination and therefore someone to be taken absolutely seriously? You betcha.
Why Hillary is a zero. Either by her own making or in the role assigned to her. Today she says “Iran has violated its international obligation to use nuclear technology only for useful purposes.” How and when did Iran do that? Does Hillary make this crazy accusation because Iran enriched some of its uranium from 3.5% to 20%? I’m sure that she knows that weapons grade uranium must be enriched to 85% before it can be used to make bombs? Then on her way to Saudi Arabia she says “Women’s rights are an issue of singular importance to me personally and as secretary of state.” Will Hillary demand that the Saudis at long last at least permit their women to drive a car alone? Perhaps Hillary could suggest that the Saudis take an example from the Iranians who the UN recently awarded for dramatically equalizing the status of men and women in their society? No, its clear that Hillary will be as hypocritical as she is told to be because, like Palin, she is a good soldier with no spine, or thought, of her own. (Just ask Penn.) Peace
I was pondering the name of the desk Obama sits at -The Resolute – and wondering if it could mean something to him as he considers leading this nation.
I also, wonder, if Kerry ever considers the foolishness of his comments that Obama’s experience was on par with JFK’s when reaching for the Presidency. The desk reminded me of the paperweight Kennedy had made:
‘John Kennedy did use the Resolute, and his desk included a very special coconut paperweight. While he was serving in WW2 as commander of the PT109, his boat was hit by a Japanese destroyer and his crew was stranded in the Solomon Islands. Lieutenant John F. Kennedy carved this Coconut shell with a message and gave it to two natives to deliver to the PT base at Rendova so he and his crew would be rescued. He later had the coconut shell encased in wood and plastic and used it as a paperweight on his desk in the Oval Office. The message carved on coconut shell reads “NAURO ISL…COMMANDER…NATIVE KNOWS POS’IT…HE CAN PILOT…11 ALIVE…NEED SMALL BOAT…KENNEDY”.’
Equivalent in leadership? Obviously not – at least not before some on the job training that we all hope Obama is up to.
Imhotep says:
15 February 2010 at 11:18 am
You’ve finally been caught in your own pretzel logic, which was inevitable.
HRC can’t be responsible for everything in Obama’s foreign policy, from an AIPAC strategy and the reason for Afghanistan, general warmongering, etc., but ALSO be “as hypocritical as she is told to be because, like Palin, she is a good soldier with no spine…”
But keep trying.
Clueless in Imhotepattle.
The Bayh story a *perfect* example of Hillary being stuck at state. What began as a day where Hillary was top of the heap in news has been obliterated by Evan Bayh’s retirement news. This country is not a foreign policy engaged nation, unless it revolves around fearmongering and jihadists. Americans don’t do nuance.
See In the News on the Bayh development:
http://www.taylormarsh.com/2010/02/15/breaking-news-evan-bayh-to-announce-retirement/
I so wish Hillary had stayed in the Senate.I was happy for her to join the Obama Adminstration because I thought he needed her but we need her more,in a powerful position,standing up to some of the foolishness.Those old goats in the senate would have smiled their insincere smiles and welcomed her back because she would have maintained her power base, her ability to raise money and she might have shed some of her forbearance of their stupidity.
Too late now Lake Lady. While I did not think Obama had the credentials to run for the POTUS much less deserve to be the Democratic nominee selected, I don’t think many of us thought that Obama could have been this ineffective.
djjl says:
15 February 2010 at 11:20 am
“I was pondering the name of the desk Obama sits at -The Resolute – and wondering if it could mean something to him as he considers leading this nation.”
Bless your heart.
…and so dependent on his small corrupt circle of advisors.
Taylor, now that I’ve come over to your side and agreed with you that Hillary is only a non-thinking pawn carrying out Obama’s orders, you attack me for finally aligning myself with your position? Talk about “pretzel logic.” Which is it? Is Hillary a hypocritical cog doing Obama’s bidding or is she a dolt working on her own and screwing up our foreign policy all by herself? Peace
Hillary does not get to determine what the policy is,her job is to carry it out.
Obama likely chose the desk – JFK’s – to further the notion of “similarities” between himself and JFK.
There were none – there are none.
Lake Lady, so she’s a hypocrite? That’s a person who pretends to be something other than they really are for personal gain. Generally a corrupt person. Peace
No she is not. The only thing corrupt is your method of “thinking.”
Being from the great state of New York, I was distressed when Hillary became SOS, proud, yes; but terribly distressed because I felt this was the Obama Administration’s way of keeping her mouth shut. And I still wanted her in the Senate to represent me. That she is so totally out of the legislative loop distresses me even more today because I don’t think health care reform would be in the mess it is had she been in the Senate, which by the way is where I truly believe she belongs.
Taylor – great great piece today! I loved all the buttons you hit.
djjl, please re-educate me. Or must I attend one of your re-education camps to accomplish that? The way I think is no better and no worse than the way you think. My conclusions, given the facts, are quite different than yours. Does that make me wrong and you right? Peace
poo poo little brother I’m not engaging on this one,waste of time
Imhotep says:
15 February 2010 at 11:42 am
Again, when she joined the Obama administration as Secretary of State HRC assumed the responsibility of taking orders from the boss, which just so happens to be the PRESIDENT. It’s what you do when you take a Cabinet appointment.
What *you* have continually argued is that while being Obama’s SoS, SHE was actually the all powerful warmongering Oz, which you proved today by further twisting yourself into knots over your Hillary hatred is impossible to be both.
Jane Austen says:
15 February 2010 at 11:56 am
Interesting. When Obama chose Hillary for SOS, it confirmed something I suspected about him. He cannot stand to be disliked. Abuse him, and he’ll do anything to curry your favor — to woo you and bring you back on his side. He could not stand the idea of the Clintons hating him.
This is why the more the Republicans dump on him the more he keeps going back for more; while the poor progressives who adore him no matter what always get dumped upon.
Jane Austen says:
15 February 2010 at 11:56 am
Thanks so much, and considering RickRoberts’ comment, whom I appreciate chiming in, I succeeded in hitting ALL of them.
Time for a little Show and Tell about what it is to be a hypocrite, Perhaps check the actual meaning of the word:
1. Joe “You Lie” Wilson voted against the stimulus but then “elbowed his way into the rush for federal stimulus cash” in a letter he sent to Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack.
“We know their endeavor will provide jobs and investment,” Wilson said on behalf of some hometown candidates for stimulus funds.
2. “On Feb. 13, 2009, Sen. Robert F. Bennett, Utah Republican, issued a statement criticizing the stimulus–but two days earlier, he privately forwarded to Mr. Vilsack a list of projects seeking stimulus money. “I believe the addition of federal funds to these projects would maximize the stimulative effect of these projects on the local economy,” he wrote.
3. Kit Bond
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/feb/09/stimulus-foes-see-value-in-seeking-cash/
4. Rep. Pat Tiberi, Ohio same link above
5. Sen. Mike Johanns, Neb “the money would simply never reach the economy.”
A secretary of agriculture under President George W. Bush, Mr. Johanns later told the Grand Island, Neb., Independent newspaper that “it would be hard for me to imagine that we are going to be creating many jobs here.” Yet he saw the prospect of at least a few dozen jobs in a letter he later sent to Mr. Vilsack for a home-state project, records show.
“The proposed project would create 38 new jobs and bring broadband to eight hospitals, five colleges, 16 libraries and 161 K-12 schools,” Mr. Johanns wrote.
6. Sen. Lamar Alexander, Tennessee Republican “This is spending, not stimulus.”
…..applying for stimulus money, Mr. Alexander noted, “It is anticipated that the project will create over 200 jobs in the first year and at least another 40 new jobs in the following years.”
“Sen. Alexander voted against the stimulus because it was too much spending and too much debt for too little benefit to the economy,”
Here’s the same take expressed yesterday by Rep Aaron Schock, Ill from Alexander’s spokesman – Mr. Jeffries said. “Republicans lost that fight and the money will be spent, and because Tennessee taxpayers will end up footing part of the bill, they have a right to apply for the funds.”
Pete Sepp, vice president of the National Taxpayers Union, called that philosophy troubling.
“It’s hard to expect lawmakers to behave like angels when this much money is being airdropped all over the country,” Mr. Sepp said. “But the more strident the rhetoric, the worse it looks. For me, with these grants where they’re saying a project is going to create a certain number of jobs, it makes you wonder: Do they really believe that? Or is it just part of a cynical cash grab?”
7. Rep. John Linder, Georgia Republican, posted a blog item on his Web site on Oct. 21, stating that recent unemployment figures “only reinforce the fact that the $787 billion ‘stimulus’ signed into law eight months ago has done nothing for job growth in this country.”
Two weeks earlier, Mr. Linder had sent a letter to Mr. Vilsack backing an application for stimulus money by the Elauwit Community Foundation, records show. With unemployment in Georgia topping 10 percent, “the employment opportunities created by this program would be quickly utilized,” Mr. Linder wrote.
8. Rep. Robert B. Aderholt, Alabama Republican, also voted against and criticized the stimulus.
“Rather than create jobs or stimulate the economy, this massive spending bill was a laundry list of programs that focused on states with big-city urban communities,” he wrote in the Oct. 4 edition of the Daily Mountain Eagle newspaper.
Three days later, Mr. Aderholt sent a letter to Mr. Vilsack on behalf of a foundation seeking stimulus money to expand broadband services in his district.
9. Sen. Lisa Murkowski, Alaska Republican, called the stimulus “excessive” and voted against it, though she noted that money in the legislation would benefit her state. She, too, wrote to the USDA to support Alaska projects seeking stimulus funds.
10. Sen. Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, voted against the stimulus and later backed applications for stimulus money in two lett ers to the Agriculture Department.
According to records, at least eight other Republicans lawmakers who voted against the stimulus later sent letters to the USDA backing various projects’ stimulus applications.
That, Imhotep is hypocrisy
These fellas make the Hipocrisy list too:
11. Former Sen Larry Craig, Iowa
12. Former Rep, Mark Foley, Fl
13, Governor Mark Sanford, Gov of South Carolina
14. Sen David Vitter, LA
15. Sen John Ensign, NV
16. Rep Mike Duvall, CA
17. Sen John Edwards, NC
18. Rudy Giuliani – former King of a Noun, a Verb, and 9/11
Almost forgot, let’s be sure
19. Aaron Shock, Rep Ill get’s his just duevia the delicious smack down by Maddow on MTP::
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/14/rachel-maddow-stuns-rep-a_n_461885.html
heh-heh… Game. On.
Doing one’s job and abiding the sworn oath to do represent that responsibility is not hypocrisy. It is representing your country with honor and fidelity to the Constitution of the United States.
Interesting post, Taylor. Kind of makes me sad but what’s done is done, so they say. I think your point about the vaccuum Hillary left is true. I always thought Obama should have been her VP and then President (he was young enough). That way, both of them could have been President. Frankly, at the age of 68 or 69 she probably won’t run again, although I wish she would. As much as I like President Obama, appreciaitng his historical achievement, and wish he would accomplish great things, I feel like that void you describe is there, too. Why is it other countries have had female leaders for years but we haven’t? Thanks for the post.
Claire McCaskill is currently in a tweet war with MO legislators over this issue. She called them out asking if they would like for her to recind the money and where exactly thay would make the cuts neccessary to abide by our state constitution.
LL
How can one follow the Tweet?
Found it.
rickroberts
Please stick around and post.
bbl
I have been following through a local website,Show Me Progress. But I think you can follow Claire by going to twitter and just putting in Claire’s name.
BTW, where’d Imhotep go?
Picture this:
http://2su.de/Hw8
I hope Hillary hurries to get herself unstuck from this thankless job at State. Then she can become relevant again. I never thought she should have taken the job given the fact I knew she would be working for the inexperienced, incompetent Obama.
I like Sarah Palin because she has her ear to the ground where the “common” man is concerned. She was very responsive to the concerns of Alaska citizens especially where energy issues were involved. But she is no Hillary Clinton and can never hope to be.
If she were President, Hillary would not be playing paddycakes with the likes of Ahmadinejad. With Obama in office, the Iranians don’t take us seriously (or anyone else for that matter). Geez, I really fear Obama really won’t know how to respond to one of those “3 o’clock calls” that I fear is coming. I don’t think hauling out the teleprompter is going to do the trick for that one.
HRC is keeping the seat at State warm until she gets put on the Supreme Court.
Sarah Palin is laughing all the way to the bank, and she’ll pimp herself out as a possible Presidential candidate for as long as it brings in the cash. But once the GOP takes back the congress (2010) her usefulness will be gone, as will the tea-party hacks.
They’ll run General Petraeus against Obama, game set match.
I think the Dem leadership made a huge error in supporting Obama over Clinton and the country will pay a price for that error.
I see absolutely nothing to like about Sarah Palin – nothing.
djjl says:
15 February 2010 at 2:18 pm
ditto
All I can do these days is shake my head and sigh. I am really starting to hate evangelical christians and conservatives americans and frankly would like to see the lot of them relocated somewhere…. I imagine the feelings are mutual.
No mention of Meghan McCain ?
Still totally on the sidelines – but perhaps just as influential as Liz Cheney (who btw, I’ve heard is the real reason for Dick’s face in the news – to beat a path for Liz)
djjl and Jane, Sarah Palin is actually Sarah the Parrot:
[squawk!]
Family Values !
[squawk!]
Pals with terrorists
[squawk!]
government-run health care
[squawk!]
attack Iran
[squawk!]
etc. etc. etc.
Sarah is an Andrew Jackson wannabe, the populist from the last frontier.
Except she is not a brilliant military leader.
Or much else but a Misleader.
Wasps nest poker.
Gods little bomber.
Everybody’s mama.
Although Jackson had many flaws, and was very wealthy, he had a real love of the common man that Sarah only pretends to possess. She only uses it for her own gain:
She is a Prostitician N.(prostitute+politician)
No Jackson, she. More like Filmore. Oh that she be gone as fast.
Hillary has always surprised me with her patience and insight.
The State Department should have as much funding as the CIA.
As Churchill said: “It is better to talk, talk, talk; than to war, war, war,”
Name a better Secretary of State. Well, there’s always somebody.
How about a Genuine Diplomat and Statesman or Stateswoman.
I thought there was an App(school) for that.
prostician….hummmm….lots of those around.
Jane, When Hillary quit the Senate I was reminded of how people used to say that Congress was the South’s revenge for losing the Civil War. Virginia used to be known as the “mother of Presidents;” think how many of the early ones came from there. Then after the Civil War, I don’t remember there being any Southern Presidents until… LBJ who got there not through election but through JFK’s assassination (OK, Wilson was born in VA but lived in NJ; Eisenhower came from TX but spend his life as a soldier and then in New York before running, neither of these could be considered “Southern” politicians). But in the meantime, Southern politicians made a point of patiently hanging around the House and Senate, building influence, getting chairmanships, and often blocking the progress of the flashy Northern Presidents. Longtime committee chairmen with secure bases in their home states get to be powerful for decades while Presidents come and go. With a third term under her belt, Hillary would have gotten there pretty soon, and been able to hold on for a good long time. SOS is a glamour job, for sure, but not it was a doubtful career move.
sunlight, the VP job will be wide open for 2012 (it won’t be Joe)
They must all have a social disease by now, with that bedfellows thing and such.
There are Demotutes, and Prosticans. And then there’s Joe L. the Call Boy.
We seem to be working with a Silent Majority and a cacophonous Super Minority. B-lock Oboma is not the President, Barack Obama is.
B-lock …huh?
B’lock
“But who ever thought we’d hear Hillary Rodham Clinton reduced to quoting George W. Bush? ”
Well I guess the main dif is HRC is talking about negotiating between parties that have been at politicol and diplomate logger heads for decades while Bush was talking about getting up and showing up in the Oval Office. That and trying to figure out how to open the bathroom door.
“I like Sarah Palin because she has her ear to the ground where the “common” man is concerned. She was very responsive to the concerns of Alaska citizens especially where energy issues were involved. But she is no Hillary Clinton and can never hope to be. ”
Other then outcherass where do you PULL this bilg?
While the theme of 2010 may be “Throw the Bums Out”, for me, the most interesting thing about 2012 will be Obama’s VP choice. This was one of the most stupid things (I know – it’s a long list) Bush did for his 2nd term. They should have replaced Cheney with the next ‘fresh face’, giving he/she four years of heavy exposure. Instead they were stuck with Grandpa McCain. I don’t think Obama’s people will be that ignorant. Joe will step down (gladly) and the Prez for 2016 will be moved into place at VP. Will it be Hillary ?
I’m thinking that’s 50-50 at best – but certainly a good bet.
“What *you* have continually argued is that while being Obama’s SoS, SHE was actually the all powerful warmongering Oz, which you proved today by further twisting yourself into knots over your Hillary hatred is impossible to be both.”
Ms. marsh, I lovez ya, ya KNOWZ I duz…but you MUST be smokin sumtin talkin REALITY to tha resident one trick pony!
Ha Ha Ha he’s knockin’, ‘who’s in there’ and its his holy throne.
I meant his throne, wholly.
Not an argument – just a different perspective. Eisenhower didn’t claim his birthplace, Texas, as his home – he claimed Kansas as his home. LBJ might have gotten to the Presidency in a tragic manner, but he was a Texan. Although in my experience, as born and raised Texan, the South doesn’t consider Texas “southern.” Jimmy Carter was from Georgia, Bill Clinton from Arkansas, Geo HW Bush spent his political life in Texas. Obviously W claimed Texas as did Texas claim him.
I’d say of those Presidents hailing from the south, only W would meet the standard set by the southern likes of Demint, Shelby, Lott, Helms, and other right wing conservative southerners who have been blocking progress.
You know djjl..I really think Buch was pretty much a blank slate when he got to DC and he let Cheney and the neocons fill it in.
I think Doonesbury’s caricature of W had it about right:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/8/87/Doonesbury-Bush.jpg
Kind of a different “unbearable lightness of being.”
Interesting take from Doonesbury on his Yale classmate George W Bush:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/5439743
he remembers Yale classmate George W. Bush as “just another sarcastic preppy who gave people nicknames and arranged for keg deliveries.”
Trudeau attended Yale University with Bush in the late 1960s and served with him on a dormitory social committee.
“Even then he had clearly awesome social skills,” Trudeau said. “He could also make you feel extremely uncomfortable … He was extremely skilled at controlling people and outcomes in that way. Little bits of perfectly placed humiliation.”
Trudeau said he penned his very first cartoon to illustrate an article in the Yale Daily News on Bush and allegations that his fraternity, DKE, had hazed incoming pledges by branding them with an iron.
A view of ‘torture’?
The article in the campus paper prompted The New York Times to interview Bush, who was a senior that year. Trudeau recalled that Bush told the Times “it was just a coat hanger, and … it didn’t hurt any more than a cigarette burn.”
Lake Lady says:
15 February 2010 at 6:31 pm
I think GWB was always a blank slate; still is today.
Ho, ho, ho JA.
Here’s how one Republican Utah state senator proposes to ease the education budget:
http://tinyurl.com/create.php
Utah considers dropping grade 12 from high schools to save money
But according to Trudeau as posted by djjl, he wasn’t exactly a blank slate regarding torture. I think GWB is amoral and without a conscience. That’s my opinion.
djjl – your tinyurl is not working right. Could you check it. I’ve got to give this one to hubby.
Try this JA:
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/posted/archive/2010
/02/15/utah-considers-cutting-grade-12-from-high-schools-to-
save-money.aspx
My husband came home tonight telling the story.
http://tinyurl.com/ya3q46j
or this one – I don’t know what I did to short cut it – but it is there.
Apparently he got so much flack that he backed off “dropping” the 12 grade for the those students who don’t do anything senior year anyway and suggested encouraging the – strongly – to finish in 11 years.
Jane~ How is hubby doing?
I never claimed that Hillary was “the all powerful warmongering Oz.” I have claimed, and still claim, that Hillary is a right wing, neocon warmonger who is prone to making stupid gaffes. Perhaps she’s a warmonger because she feels that she has to prove her manhood. Perhaps she’s a warmonger because she’s afraid of her own shadow. Perhaps she’s a warmonger because she likes violence. Perhaps she’s a warmonger because she doesn’t know any better. Perhaps she’s a warmonger for all of those reasons. Or for other reasons. But a warmonger she is. If Hillary doesn’t agree with Obama’s policies she could, should quit. By continuing at State one must assume that she agrees with the policies that Obama espouses. But only the worst hypocrite would say that “Women’s rights are an issue of singular importance to me personally and as secretary of state.” Then sit quietly speaking with the King of Saudi Arabia without raising the issue of women’s rights. Given the horrendous treatment of women in that country. A person with any self-respect would refuse to visit Saudi Arabia or meet with its King if they truely felt as strongly as she claims to about women’s rights. Hillary is just another self-serving politician. Just like her boss. Peace
To quote you secularhuman, “Blow me.” Peace
Lake Lady
He must be doing well if she’s gonna show him a piece about the “belt tightening” suggestion of dropping 12th grade to save money.
JA
Let him know we’ve been thinking of him.
djjl~ can you believe it? What is happening in this country?
We keep electing no nothings, fools and personality.
I can’t describe how sad and disillusioned I feel about the direction this country is taking.
djjl says:
15 February 2010 at 7:17 pm
this one worked.
Lady Lake, whatever it is it’s all good. The politicians are dropping like flies.
Peace
the hillary void is so true. something just aint right without her out there like in 08.
Lake Lady says:
15 February 2010 at 7:29 pm
came home yesterday afternoon. docs wouldn’t let him have his laptop (I call it his security blanket) and he pitched a fit. They upped his meds and told him that he must pull himself away from his desk and laptop. I think he’s under too much pressure right now. I feel it also because of the book deadline and I do all the editing and proofing. He had my daughter go out and buy me roses for Valentine’s Day because he never forgets even though I usually “bah humbug” Valentine’s Day. Secretly I love it.
And thank you for your prayers and concern. I don’t know what I’d do if anything happened to him.
FINALLY… Had the time to post on Bayh, with an analysis…
Maybe you could time him so he reduces his work hours and increases relax hours. I would think having a deadline and not being able to work at all would cause anxiety too.
” Imhotep says:
15 February 2010 at 7:33 pm”
WO, another cutting, timely, original…well NOT, comeback from imhopless!!!
I stand in awe! shucks