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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
It's convenient for Edwards to forget that both him and Obama were attacking Clinton in November. Their 2-1 punch gave Obama the opportunity to really push his "change" message. It bothers me Hillary didn't point that out.
But really, Edwards is super-disingenuous when he claims Clinton is the status-quo (his tv appearances), while they are change.
Status-quo literally would mean, "unchanged from George W. Bush". Is he really comparing Hillary to Dubya? The dumbest, most moronic, most simple, most incompetent, most ideological president we've ever had?
Any of these candidates would be sweeping change to the White House. And Hillary better start pointing that out more emphatically. It doesn't serve her well to let Edwards and Obama define her that way, and shame on them for comparing her to the status-quo. That's despicable.
And another emphatic point she might make is that do we want a president who functions more like a TV-host, rather than a president? If we need someone to inspire, then let's get Ryan Seacrest as president. We've already had a president who stages PR stunts, who "inspired" us to kick arab ass. What is Dubya more at this point than a PR host, showing up for important events?
I want someone who can navigate the various agencies with intelligence and start multiple balls rolling to create an effective government again. What has Obama done in that manner? His experience is in giving speeches, in organizing lawyers and the Law Journal. All hat, and no cattle.
...agreed, pretty much, with your analysis...but, here's what I'd like to know; since you're from Chicago and use the cyber moniker, Shabbasgoy: Are you a Howard Chaykin/"American Flagg" fan?
ABC's moderator, Charlie Gibson, picked a pretty good format -- which allowed for real, fairly substantive back and forth.
Pretty clear where his sympathies lie: he hounded the Democrats on traditionally "Republican" issues, such as the threat of nuclear terrorism -- but he did no such hounding of the Republicans about Democratic issues such as global warming or energy policy, or health care, or education. In fact there was NO talk of education (meaning Gibson didn't ask a question about it), except when Richardson brought up that point.
Gibson also allowed Romney top basically become the moderator. Romney got to pipe in after every comment by anyone else. It allowed him to look like the alpha he was trying to be -- the chairman of the board. Too bad the board really looked like a board of egotistical dickheads, beating each other up over the chance to bully and belittle Ron Paul.
The most stunning was, during the Democratic debate, Gibson's confident assertion (during the WMUR politics editor's assault on Democrats' pledges to roll back Bush's tax cuts for the wealthy) that raising taxes on families with incomes above $200,000 would affect two-professor couples who work at Saint Anselm College.
The crowd laughed at him. At home, we two teachers -- one "part time" college professor, one middle school teacher -- slapped our foreheads. Then he tried to correct himself by asserting that, maybe, two public school teachers in New York City make over $200,000.
Yeah. Over the course of 2-3 years, maybe.
Gibson has a major, major case of head-up-ass disease.
This is the guy they get to ask the questions?
One was her "that hurts my feelings" line when asked about New Hampshire voters liking her experience but thinking that Obama is more likable. It got a big laugh out of the audience, and she followed it with a sardonic "but I'll try to go on" in an effort to make a reverse-sexist joke about the whole thing, but I don't know that it worked particularly well. She came across at first as a hurt schoolgirl, as too vulnerable. She revealed a bit too much in her response. Americans, by and large, don't want a leader whose feelings get hurt and who shows it. I know she was trying to humanize herself, but the "I'm just a girl" routine could really backfire on her. Unfair as it is, a female candidate for president is going to be under additional scrutiny as to toughness, and a small concession to sexist stereotypes--even if lighthearted and joking--could be a mistake. Case in point: her comment after a previous debate about all the "boys" ganging up on her. It got a lot of play in the press but I can't say that it helped her at all, and may have hurt her with some wavering undecided Democratic primary voters.
Her second misstep of the evening was her robust, indeed agitated lashing out at Obama and Edwards when change versus experience was being discussed, when she nearly bellowed that she wants change and fights for change and has 35 years of experience bringing change and blah blah. She was sitting at the edge of her seat, waving her arms in wide circles, with wide angry eyes and a voice that was too strained, too pinched, and in too high a register for the moment. To put it simply, she looked shrill and like she'd lost her cool. Not to overstress the point, but given her negatives among voters and the media (unlikable, cold, etc.) such moments will not help her at all. It's like she wanted to stand up center stage and berate all of America for making her fight hard for the nomination rather than allowing her to coast to a coronation instead. Looking back, I have no doubt that she'll regret that moment.
Aside from those two somewhat cringe-inducing moments for me, I thought she did well, but not so well as to separate her from Obama and Edwards in the minds of voters. Being one of three competent, capable, and successful performers in a debate is not where she needs to be right now. In fact, given that her strategy going into last night was almost certainly to score some major points against Obama and knock him down in the polls, while holding steady in a rearguard action against Edwards, one could argue that her debate performance was a failure, as Obama emerged essentially unscathed and Edwards successfully fought for more attention and press coverage. Now she finds herself in a very tight spot, with Obama taking the lead in NH in the newest MSNBC poll released today. She'll be forced to go negative between now and Tuesday and that will merely confirm the feelings about her in the minds of many voters. I wouldn't want to be in her shoes right now.
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
219 Democrats and one Republican join in favor of the legislation, which passed by a narrow margin
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