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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
Doncha just love talking about Hillary?
What is Hillary wearing today?
Does Hillary like rap music?
Will Hillary be the Secretary of State?
Enquiring minds want to know!
Forget issues, let's talk about inside baseball, personalities, and Hillary!
I have it on good authority that Hillary is down with the Wu! Ok, maybe I dont, but your post still cracked a brotha up...
David Broder is a lot of things..."far left" isn't one of them. Neither is Hitchens, Bernard, or Matthews. Your overall point is well-taken, but dont just lump everyone who thinks Hillary may be more drama than she's worth into one basket, particularly if it's the wrong basket.
Maybe the brotha just wants to send her on some long trips so he doesnt have to deal with her drama. If so, then we have yet further proof that Barack is a genius.
I tried to tell you that NewYorkNY was bringing a couple of trunkfuls of baggage to this party, but you didnt wanna listen...
way to check your brain at the door like the rest of the Obama supporters!
First of all you did a magnificent job on Hardball yesterday. You were passionate and well-reasoned and forceful. You were obviously the one in control; a veritable Tweety-tamer. Now a few important issue-oriented questions to guide me in my quest to become a serious political analyst/journalist:
To what do you credit the strange hold you have over Matthews? It's been obvious in the past but yesterday he threw caution to the wind and sublimated himself to you on the air. You have many obvious and compelling charms. Which of those do you think Mr. Matthews himself finds most irresistible? Can you palpably sense, even via remote, when you give him a thrill up his leg?
If Matthews were President and you were Secretary of State do you think, in a reverse of the Condi/Dubya "misspeak", President Matthews might refer to you at a dinner party as "my wife, er, I mean Madame Secretary."? Is it my mis-perception or are Chris' lips extra-moist when you're a guest?
If I wanted to become a "political analyst", would it be better preparation for me to watch reruns of Entertainment Tonight or study clips of Michelle Bernard?
Would I be more likely to get a job as "political analyst" if I emulated Michelle Bernard or drooled like a Saint Bernard? What, in your opinion, is the major difference between the two?
Why is there such obvious enmity between you and Ms. Bernard? Do you think Matthews, knowing how much you two hate each other, books you together because he's forming his "Team of Rivals"?
If that's the case, do you consider Chris Matthews the Abraham Lincoln of punditry? Do you think Michelle Bernard considers herself the emancipated Sally Hemings of Chris Matthews' Monticello? Are you the Marilyn Monroe of the Hardball Camelot?
Do you think that since the cutting edge of jounalism now includes projecting the phantasms of ones imagination onto the subject and then "analyzing" those projections as if they were fact, that "old school" media figures such as yourself will become anachronisms?
Do you consider yourself too old to change and adapt to the future? Is that what Ms. Bernard was referring to when she said you were "over the hill"? (I don't actually have a link for that, but I'm sure I read it somewhere, probably in the NYT.)
Anyway, Joan, thanks for helping me out. Maybe someday soon we'll be on the same panel, but be warned -- as a political analyst I won't be able to cut you any slack.
There are three great reasons why Hillary should not be Secretary of State.
The first is simple. More than ever before, in the next eight years we will lead a liberal leader in the senate to advocate for government programs in health, welfare and family support (domestic violence, child care, paid family leave). While Obama is good on these issues, he is government lite, as are most of his advisors from the Bill Clinton years. Even if Ted Kennedy were likely to remain active, which it is not, Hillary is the only left of center leader we have. And we need her there.
The second reason is that Hillary will make a great President in 2016 and is far and away the only potential liberal leader who would do so. No Secretary of State has become President in almost 200 years. And, because the position requires continual travel and obedience to party line, there is almost no chance Hillary would emerge from this process in a position to run.
The third reason is that Hillary would make a lousy Secretary of State compared to alternatives such as Bill Richardson with real foreign policy expertise. Hillary is a great spokesperson. She is a forceful and principled negotiator. But she does not have either the knowledge base of a Rice or a Kissinger or the diplomacy skills of Hull or Marshall. Secretaries of State need to be quiet, eternally patient, strategic and able to suffer fools with apparent grace-- Hillary has none of these characteristics.
I can think of few political mistakes that would be greater than for Hillary to take this step.
Well, y'all can keep babblin on about Hillary, but I just opened up Politico this morning, and saw that Janet Napolitano has been selected to head up DHS. I LOVE that choice! B-Rock!!!
Haters just envy the mad skillz!!!
So why am I mainly happy with the way Obama's handled the presidential transition, when so many early swooners, especially in the blogosphere and mainstream media, are so critical?
Because the early swooners are by and large political purists, and too politically naive - with grandiose expectations of p9oliticos. Which, in the end, Obama is - never mind the window dressing.
I too was a latecomer, and I often held Obama's early airy- fairy speeches - which seemed more suited to the oratory stratosphere- as deficient. They appealed too much to emotions and not enough to practicalities. Thus, his early floaty oratory grabbed the early swooning immature purists.
The mostly initial cynics like me were gradually won over as we watched him make his speechifying more concrete, and especially his responses in the debates.
We now behold an even more pragmatic politician especially after his appointement of Rahm as CoS and now Eric Holder as AG. Eric deserves this more than anything, and I hope no repukes give him any grief in his confirmation hearings. He is the son of proud Barbadian parents who now must be bursting with pride, as indeed all Bajans are.
The apppointment of Hillary as Secretary of State would top off this supremely competent Obama cabinet and staff. It is the right move to make, and Hillary deserves it, never mind the scraming meemies and purist whiners who saturate the Left blogosphere. Or is it, bloviosphere?
I hope these early swooner whiners will not punk out now when the Obama administration needs their energy the most. That would be a tragedy.
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
Once seen as a lunatic fringe, reactionary anti-women groups are courting respectability
Salon headlines in your mailbox
