Monthly Archives: February 2008

Over the course of the past few months as I have been following the elections (and ultimately given my support to the Obama campaign), I have found Eugene Robinson’s op-ed pieces in the Washington Post to be very insightful and on point. In his latest piece for called “The Baggage Hillary Bears“, Robinson raises the critically important questions that need to be answered about Bill Clinton’s role in a potential Hillary White House. For example,

Why won’t the Clintons speed up the release of White House papers that would let us see what kind of authority Hillary Clinton enjoyed? Who donated how much to the Clinton presidential library, and might those donors expect anything from a Hillary Clinton administration? What business tycoons have snuggled up to the former president, and what — other than the chance to bask in the radiance of his wit — did they hope to get out of the exercise?

Would Bill return to his foundation and its high-profile international projects? If so, would that work be coordinated with Hillary’s foreign policy? Could donors be sure that the foundation’s priorities were still being set independently, in accord with what they were told when they wrote the check?

Just the other day a New York Times article revealed a shady Kazakh uranium deal, possible political favors, an unknown shell company suddenly becoming one of the world’s largest uranium companies, and ultimately a large donation to Clinton’s foundation. According the New York Times’ investigation:

Just months after the Kazakh pact was finalized, Mr. Clinton’s charitable foundation received its own windfall: a $31.3 million donation from Mr. Giustra that had remained a secret until he acknowledged it last month. The gift, combined with Mr. Giustra’s more recent and public pledge to give the William J. Clinton Foundation an additional $100 million, secured Mr. Giustra a place in Mr. Clinton’s inner circle, an exclusive club of wealthy entrepreneurs in which friendship with the former president has its privileges.

Richard Cohen of the Washington Post also has an excellent piece on why, in a similar vain, he is endorsing Obama over Hillary. Kudos to the Washington Post! In any event, here is Robinson’s entire story about the questions we should be asking: Continue reading →

I have already discussed how Bill Clinton crossed the line of appropriate ex presidential behavior in acting more like James Carville than an elder statesman. For the good of the Hillary campaign, he tried to stay quiet for about a week, but then he just couldn’t control himself in Arizona.

Frustrated because the Democratic Party is turning against him with key endorsements, Bill went back to sounding like Bubba and trashed Ted Kennedy. The problem was that Bubba’s attack was so absurd because, by doing so, he was actually also criticizing Hillary’s policies and endorsing Obama’s judgment. In his most Bubba I-condescend-to-thee voice, Bill gave the good people of Arizona a lesson:

I want you to think about this, and I have to say, this was a train wreck that was not intended. No Child Left Behind was supported by George Bush and Sen. Ted Kennedy and everybody in between. Why? Because they didn’t talk to enough teachers before they did that.

Who is everybody in between? Hillary, of course. She voted alongside Ted Kennedy on Bush’s No Child Left Behind initiative. Obama was a critic of the law.

James Carville can go around the country all he wants, yelling and screaming, speaking in funking accents. He can stretch the truth, play with numbers, and distort the facts. The ex president of the United States, a representative of the American people, should not. This is just another example of how Bubba is destroying his ex presidency.

I am not one hundred percent comfortable with videos of this type. They can seem a little too “Go Team Go” or populistic. They also may create too great of a burden on a presidential elect. I am also not much of a fan of listening to celebrities’ unqualified endorsements (unlike my own supremely informed one), as if what Barbara Streisand thinks about the election should somehow affect how I vote (it would probably actually have the opposite effect).

Nonetheless, I think that the momentum and postive energy that Obama supporters have shown this year is remarkable. We even have an enormous sector of those past Bill Clinton supporters turning to Obama. Almost every day we’re seeing another big Obama endorsement, for example, yesterday the L.A. Times and now London’s The Times. Were we to have a few more days, I think that Obama would definitely clinch this thing.

Thanks to Teo for the “heads up“.

In last week’s debate, the issue of immigration came up, and Hillary argued that her policy differed from Obama’s because she was for something called “comprehensive immigration reform”. Can anyone tell me what comprehensive immigration reform means? It would be nice to know exactly how she would like to reform things, as opposed to just saying that the present system needs to be reformed comprehensively. Could we get a little specificity please?

If Laura Bush can get her name on the ballot for U.S. Senator (I am not sure which state yet), by 2016, she’ll have the exact same track record and experience as Hillary Clinton. She can argue that we’ll need another Bush to clean up after another Clinton. Now wouldn’t that be precious?

Hillary is often criticized for her absolute inability to ever recognize when she has made a mistake. For example in last week’s CNN debate, Hillary refused to admit to an error in voting for the War in Iraq. According to Hillary, the blame rested solely with Bush’s abuse of the faith she had put in him.

Yesterday on Meet the Press, Mary Matalin had a good line in deciphering Hillary’s Iraq argument. If Hillary and the Democrats think that Bush is a village idiot and yet she argues that she was played by Bush, well, then frankly she was “Duped by a Dope”.

If you’re duped by a dope once, I suppose it is a pardonable offense. But if you gave Bush discretion once with Iraq and he abused that discretion, then why give him discretion again in Iran like Hillary did a few months ago? Where are all those years of experience, Hillary? I would also think that somebody as experienced as her would have dumped Bill years ago.

Just two days away from Super Tuesday, it looks like things are going to get very very close. On Saturday, Steven Hill wrote a very interesting piece in the Washington Post about how Super Tuesday and the way the primaries work are actually not working. The way the present system is set up, Hillary is at a definite advantage to Obama.

The past two days, I have run into two former colleagues who both expressed their desire for Hillary to be president (Obama was their second choice). I was shocked, almost as shocked as the man in Thus Spoke Zarathustra when he encounterd the lunatic who had still not heard that God was dead. Doesn’t anyone remember the 90s?

As one of its reasons for endorsing Obama today, the Los Angeles Times the pitfalls of another Clinton:

By contrast, Clinton’s return to the White House that she occupied for eight years as first lady would resurrect some of the triumph and argument of that era. Yes, Bill Clinton’s presidency was a period of growth and opportunity, and Democrats are justly nostalgic for it. But it also was a time of withering political fire, as the former president’s recent comments on the campaign trail reminded the nation. Hillary Clinton’s election also would drag into a third decade the post-Reagan political duel between two families, the Bushes and the Clintons. Obama is correct: It is time to turn the page.

What is interesting is how people really believe the false spin, and the greatest falsity in this election is that somehow Hillary, the candidate with the least amount of years in elected office, has the most experience and is the most prepared.

Could someone please tell me in detail what her experience was? And being first lady is not the answer. If that were the case, I think we should all vote for Laura Bush in 8 years. Her and/or Bill really need to finally be open with the American people and let us know what she did do at the White House and why, at the time, we were not informed of such.

Of course, avoiding a dynasty is not the only reason to vote for Obama, and the L.A. Times eloquently makes that argument: Continue reading →