Gotta Love Them Guvs

"Who knows if she misremembered, misspoke, exaggerated, whatever...It makes the case for Senator Obama that all this experience she’s been talking about is at least partly her imagination."

I love you Mike Allen.

Seems to me that if past, and present, sexual history is now fair game, there are some Republican senators who are cheating on their beards^H^H^H^H^H^H*wives with, um, men, may deserve a little coverage.

-----------------------
*Back in the days when one got online using an acoustic coupler, and there was no html, a ctrl-h was a backspace/delete command. In those days of plain text on 80x24 screens (because there were 80 columns on the IBM punch card), this was how we indicated a strikethrough. It would be nice if that tag were supported here.

PS - I love Politico today -

When asked why she'd appoint Alan Greenspan to a working group of financial leaders to design a response to the housing crisis, Clinton told the Philadelphia Daily News:

"Not only that, but the Fed didn't act while he was there. But he has a calming influence still to this day on Wall Street --

don't ask me why because I never understand what he's saying

-- but nevertheless people respond to that Delphic oracle approach. I think it would be wise to include him. And recently he's come out and vert smartly so that we have to deal with housing and maybe we need to have some kind of buyout mechanism for mortgages. So he's moved on his understanding and depth of the problem -- but you know you could pick three others.

Can't wait to see Amy Poehler doing her Clinton impersonation in fatigues and carrying an M-16. Let the parodies begin!

If it sounds like I'm experiencing a little schadenfreude, well, yeah! For weeks Clinton's campaign has been making vacuous claims to her having passed some secret C-in-C test, stringing together one lie after another. The Bosnia affair may not be the worst of the lies, but it illustrates clearly just how vacuous these claims are.

While Swampland continues on it's usual junkfood diet of gossip, the Financial Times points out why John McCain would be a disaster as president:

"Reflecting the neo-conservative programme of spreading democracy by force, Mr McCain declared in 2000: “I’d institute a policy that I call ‘rogue state rollback’. I would arm, train, equip, both from without and from within, forces that would eventually overthrow the governments and install free and democratically elected governments.” Mr McCain advocates attacking Iran if necessary in order to prevent it developing nuclear weapons, and last year was filmed singing “Bomb, bomb Iran” to the tune of the Beach Boys’ “Barbara Ann”.

"Mr McCain suffers from more than the usual degree of US establishment hatred of Russia, coupled with a particular degree of sympathy for Georgia and the restoration of Georgian rule over Abkhazia and South Ossetia. He advocates the expulsion of Russia from the Group of Eight leading industrialised nations and, like Mr Scheunemann, is a strong supporter of early Nato membership for Georgia and Ukraine. Mr Scheunemann has accused even Condoleezza Rice, secretary of state, of “appeasement” of Russia. Nato expansion exemplifies the potential of a McCain presidency. Apart from the threat of Russian reprisals, if the Georgians thought that in a war they could rely on US support, they might be tempted to start one. A McCain presidency would give them good reason to have faith in US support."

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/1a47e1ac-f9b0-11dc-9b7c-000077b07658.html

Hey you know you're right STD (maybe you want to reconsider that moniker), that would be very funny. Clinton crawling under razor wire, tracer fire above grenade launcher in hand, to arrive.....at a little girl in white dress, wearing mary janes.

Is this all we're going to get from now until April 22nd?

@jayackroyd

I knew I should have gone with The Underminer. "I am always beneath you, but nothing is beneath me!"

This will all fall into place as soon as we have Senator Clinton "recalling" the duets she's sung with Mandy Patinkin.

Yeah, stuart, reading BoBo today in the DTNYT, I think they're really tired of this and want Clinton to quit so they can write about something else.

So is she flat-out contemptuous of her electorate's intelligence, or is she flat-out insane? It's one or the other.

Stuart, probably. Unless there's any clarifying policy positions left to discuss after 14 months and 20 debates. The choice is HRC's on how long this will continue. On that, Brooks actually has some pretty astute observations in the Times today.

As for the Gov., I'm sure I'm not the only one waiting for the other shoe to drop, so to speaks.

As for "Billary" Clinton, NO one should trust her!

http://osi-speaks.blogspot.com/2008/03/lying-billary-clinton-shows-why-she.html#links

Harry,

She's just desperate, trying to find *something* that will work.

If we had a REAL PRESS CORPS in the United States this blog might spend more than just an occasional Joe Klein post pointing out that John McCain is insane.

"For the first time, I have seen Osama bin Laden and General (David) Petraeus in agreement, and, that is, a central battleground in the battle against al-Qaida is in Iraq today. And that's what bin Laden was saying and that's what General Petraeus is saying and that's what I'm saying, my friends," McCain said.

I thought we were NOT supposed to do what bin Laden wants?

Unless it involves the U.S. spending $150 billion a year and thousands of troops each year in an endless quagmire.

But we don't have a press corps,

We have the "John McCain BBQ Club"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/03/25/mccain-says-us-succeeding_n_93251.html

"In other news, Hillary Clinton "misspoke" about dodging bullets in Bosnia."

Nice to see that one of the pillars of Hillary's foreign policy experience - the very foundation of her candidacy and #1 selling point - turns out to be fabricated. And yet here it receives no more than a passing mention.

It's hard to argue, I think, with notion that the media wants this dogfight to continue. Were Obama to lie so blatantly, the media would hound him for days. Here, however, it could be a huge blow to Hillary so it will be underplayed. The idea that Obama gets a free pass when it's clear the opposite is true and media still refuses to call her out on it (e.g., Northern Ireland "misspeakings").

She has said this repeatedly. She didn't just "misspeak". It is a deliberate lie she has used over and over and over again.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzDkTUtTGXU

Hillary spokesman Howard Wolfson claimed the following yesterday, per Olbermann: "It's possible she misspoke." Possible? Did she also misspeak the four other times she claimed the exact same story?

- In Dubuque, Iowa in December Hillary claimed that Bosnia was too dangerous for the president and that she ran across the tarmac.

- In late February, Hillary claimed during the White House 3 am phone ad roll-out that sniper fire forced the airport ceremony inside.

- In a March 17, 2008 press conference Hillary repeated the claims.

- In her March 17, 2008 prepared remarks - PREPARED remarks, i.e., these remarks were intentional - she said the same thing.

Add this Schip, NAFTA, etc.

She sure does "misspeak" a lot.

Hillary Clinton is Jon Lovitz's liar character.

I brought peace to Northern Ireland - yeah - THAT'S the ticket!

We were un-der, Uhhhhhhh SNIPER fire, yeah that's it! Sniper Fire! that's the ticket!

Underplayed part of the Bosnia story: HRC had ssid as an intro that when the place was too small or dangerous for Bill they sent Hillary, but apparently they sent their daughter, too. Did she remember that Chelsea was along? Does it even occur to her what she's saying about risking Chelsea if it was that dangerous a place?

Also read somewhere - the Page, I thought, but I don't find it now - that Chelsea remembered things the way her mother did. Was that the pre-mistatement or the post-mistatement memory?

Liar Liar Pants on Fire!!

It turns out that Clinton didn't "MISSPEAK"

She was READING her speech when she said:

"I remember landing under sniper fire. There was supposed to be some kind of a greeting ceremony at the airport, but instead we just ran with our heads down to get into the vehicles to get to our base"

Look at the speech on her website and you'll see that that LIE was in her prepared remarks!!!

How can you say you "MISSPOKE" if you are READING the lines?

If Hillary is MISS POKE, does that make Bill MR POKE?

The more I hear about our new governor the more I like the guy. Any blind guy who can snag such a hottie for a wife must have some serious game.

Who didn't do drugs in thier 20's. In fact, the legalization of marijuana should be a no brainer.

As for Senator Clinton, If this isn't the perfect illustration of how her claims of "experience and readiness to leed" are a complete sham I don't know what is. Since the media went cookoo for macaca this should be played ad nauseum as well to remind the country what a phony, serial liar this person is.

I do feel sorry for women in this country, particularly older woman who have had to endur real sexism in there lives. It is a shame that after an entire life of waiting for the first female president they are handed this sham.

The Serious Brooks, with today's petulance:

The better answer is that Clinton’s long rear-guard action is the logical extension of her relentlessly political life.

jayackroyd:

Remember, they've got a narrative to push: The Clintons are a soulless machine, driven simply by the instinct to endlessly battle political opponents--hence no resignation over the Lewinsky scandal. "For the good of everybody" the Clintons were supposed to have left the Beltway and its offended (read: terrified of further exposure) courtiers a decade ago, when David Broder gravely told them to. Democratic politicians who grandstandingly linger on in order to wage battles that they've been told have already been lost (like telecom amnesty, or timetables for withdrawal) always deserve the public contempt of Serious, Non-Partisan Beltway Intellectuals like David Brooks.

It's the narrative, again, no matter what the event or circumstance--always the narrative. David Brooks does the job for which is well-paid; he uses his rhetorical skill to wrap colorful papers and bows around a simple, endless, threatening proclamation of power on behalf of his fellow Villagers: "We control the story, not you, so give us what we want--or else."

I think there are two issues here. The first is that Senator Clinton has clearly described her trip to Bosnia incorrectly. Either she has deluded herself into believing the story about being shot at, or she has outright fabricated the story to make the trip sound more dangerous. Either way, this repeated misrepresentation is certainly an important fact and should lead to further investigation into her claimed experience. The second issue is that, sniper or no sniper, the purpose of the trip to Bosnia was to entertain the troops. It does not indicate any experience relevant to becoming Commender-in-Chief. It did not give her any insight into the turmoil of warfare, or the political landscape of Bosnia. It also calls into question the other 80 trips to foreign countries Senator Clinton has use to bolster her message of being "Ready on Day 1".

Well if your husband was boinking the heck out of the intern in the Oval Office, wouldn’t you want to have a few delusions of your own??

So far as the tax and spend liberal Democrats, now it is “Tax, Spend, and Bed them all”

If John McCain made false claims like Hillary, the Corporate media would give him a pass. After all, he's a straight talking, maverick who throws one heckuva barbecue.

"So far as the tax and spend liberal Democrats, now it is “Tax, Spend, and Bed them all”

I hereby present a motion that bans Republicans from accusing Democrats as "spenders," or as "sexual deviants." After setting records on budget size, budget deficits, and earmarks, "limited government" is just an election slogan they use to drum up the base, not an actual promise or policy. After having numerous sex scandals of their own, they have also forfeited the right to make personal attacks against democrats on sexual histories. Please, spare me your empty rhetoric; hypocrisy annoys me.

...as opposed to the "Borrow, Spend, and Bed them all" Republicans...

Stuart,

Do you have Post Impeachment Distress Syndrome?

It was ten years ago!

Rusty Dog and Larry Craig sitting in a Latrine

T-A-P-P-I-N-G

First came DOMA

Never Gay Marriage

Keep Foley away from the Baby Carriage!

Misspeak - verb

To lie through one's teeth in defiance of logic, human decency, and fact-checking.

Wouldn't it be nice if we were allowed to use the same dictionaries as the politicians?

And it's only D Brooks & co. that craft narratives, use rhetoric or otherwise insert their ideology into how they interpret politics? But some of us are capable of rising above the partisan fray, seeing reality in purely objective terms, not allowing how we feel about parties or pols to interfere with our clear-eyed analysis. Give me a break Stu. We all do it. The narratives and rhetoric you agree with would never come in for your above it all critique.

I am sorry...what foreign experience does Mr. Obama have? Where has he been? Aside of where he lived as a little boy and yes, the fact that he is biracial...By the way, I live in a country where 80% (if not more) of the population is biracial and that doesn't qualify most of them for any foreign affairs position or to be president.

The double standards here are just appalling. Yes she told a war story, she embellished. I don't think she "lied" and what is worse: saying you didn't know your pastor made incendiary racial comments while you went to his church for 20 years and had a personal relationship with him or the Bosnia incident? Yet one is forgiven and allowed to answer with a speech, and the other one is chastised and cornered into answering questions. You guess who is who.

I really didn't want to come here but its unnerving to see the media and the Obama followers just waiting for her to slip so that they can attack and give him a break, which he decides to take in the Caribbean, because their boy so deserves it after such a "harrowing" week. The problem people is that voters seem to be seeing through this and there are very definite sides being taken here by the camps of Clinton and Obama.

At this point both candidates will be weakened against McCain by this primary. What there is to consider is which of the two will have the stamina to bounce back after this is all over, the one that goes off to the Caribbean to charge batteries after a crisis or the one that is relentless and refuses to give up. Neither aspect is necessarily negative but it is a difference in attitudes and styles and fair enough to consider, don't you think?.

Where's Jihad Joe Klein today?

Battling the three remaining Brits in Basra, perhaps?

We are fortunate that all the Obama supporters are capable of total recall. When landing in a war zone helicopters leave their engines running. If you've ever watched anyone exiting one they almost always run with their heads down to avoid the blast of air from the rotors. The picture everyone sees shows her escorted by armed soldiers in full combat garb. If the location was perfectly safe why such precautions? After better than ten years is it not possible she might get the details mixed up? Why is always necessary to presume that everything she says and does has a sinister motive? Bosnia was a dangerous place and as first lady she had no obligations to be there. Give her a little credit. The mean spirited behavior of the Obama supporters is appalling.

RKA:

So you're a big Brooks fan--when he says the right thing about your candidate, that is.

Or are you going to tell us that you've always harbored a secret admiration for BoBo?

"I am sorry...what foreign experience does Mr. Obama have? Where has he been?"

Well, I'd say he has about the same level of experience as Clinton. Obama has made trips to various regions of Africa (e.g., Sudan, Kenya), and has been involved in diplomatic outreaches and sponsored bills addressing that region. Compared with Clinton's trips to Northern Ireland and Bosnia, I'd say it's a draw. In essence, the only additional experience I see Clinton having is through whatever she learned informally through Bill, WH staff, etc. That is hard to measure and hard to campaign on.

stu:

"Democratic politicians who grandstandingly linger on in order to wage battles that they've been told have already been lost. . ."

this is reminiscent of a james carville like loyalty to party above principle.

some other democrats that should pack it in:

la rep. william jefferson and detroit mayor kwame kilpatrick

The first two paragraphs of "First Lady of Danger: A Novel":

"It was a gloomy Thursday morning in Washington, and I was exhausted. The sun was beginning to rise over the Capitol, and I was just getting into bed in the White House after returning from a daring combat mission smuggling suitcase nukes out of Chechnya. Bill was snoring.

I took off my fatigues and cleaned the camouflage makeup off my face. My muscles ached. I hadn’t slept since Thursday, when I woke up in a dank sweaty fallout shelter in Kosovo next to guitarist Dan Fogelberg and prop comic Carrot Top."

Stuart,

I am a fan of few pundits. I like them when they are right, I don't like them when they are wrong. I neither hold grudges nor grant benefits of doubts. Every argument should be judged on its own merits aparts from the messenger making it.

What I am referring to is your tendency to bring up impeachment, that great effort to install Al Gore as president in such apocalyptic terms of victimhood whenever a pundit dares criticize the clintons.

I just think ten years later, after the '98 midterms, Gingrich and Livingston's downfalls, a senate seat, 2 memoirs making big bucks with juicy details, and a chance to end run the 22nd amendment that we really don't have to feel sorry for the Clintons about impeachment anymore.

The debt has been paid, don't you think?

If Bill Clinton can yuk it up with Richard Mellon Scaife and Chris Ruddy, surely you can move on as well....

Stuart,

Of course Brooks has a narrative. Everyone does and no one doesn't, as Oregon has already pointed out. Simply suggesting that someone is working from a narrative does not diminish the validity of the specifics in any way. What's important is whether or not the specifics embodied in the narrative have a correlation to an agreed upon set of facts. In this case, today, Brooks has raised some very valid points and raises an important question. Given Hillary's ever-shrinking odds of getting the nomination, and the damage she would do long term to the party to achieve her unlikely goal, why does she persist? He offers several answers, none of which are flattering, none of which are straw man arguments.

"Why does she go on like this? Does Clinton privately believe that Obama is so incompetent that only she can deliver the policies they both support? Is she simply selfish, and willing to put her party through agony for the sake of her slender chance? Are leading Democrats so narcissistic that they would create bitter stagnation even if they were granted one-party rule?"

Only then does he suggest that her behavior is about being "encased in the apparatus of political celebrity." Given his other alternative explanations, the final one is actually the most sympathetic. His argument does note really fit into the Clinton Rules Narrative (yes I meant to capitalize Narrative).

Here is my narrative. The longer Clinton stays in the race, the more she confirms that the Clinotn Rules may in fact be the best way to deal with her and Bill. The recent flap over Bosnia is all the more damaging because it is indicative of the general exaggerations she and her staff have propagated regarding her foreign policy experience and influence. That pattern is particularly damaging because it points to a serious character flaw. If Clinton is not simply dishonest, she is all too willing to live in a fantasy world and we simply can't afford to have anothe president who does that.

poh123

I am sorry...what foreign experience does Mr. Obama have? Where has he been?

-roughly the same experience as mrs. clinton. and for the record hillary is the candidate running on her experience. in law we call this shifting the burden of proof. obama is not running on being in washington for a long time or visiting lots of countries.

Aside of where he lived as a little boy and yes, the fact that he is biracial...By the way, I live in a country where 80% (if not more) of the population is biracial and that doesn't qualify most of them for any foreign affairs position or to be president.

-being married to a president doesn't qualify most first ladies for foreign affairs positions or being president either.

The double standards here are just appalling. Yes she told a war story, she embellished. I don't think she "lied"

-there is certainly a double standard. curious, is 'war story' synonymous with a fish story? you don't thinkshe lied? or you don't want to believe she lied? there is a difference. and as a baseball fan it'd be nice to believe that the greatest home run hitter and pitcher of this era were not taking steroids -- but to believe it?! yeah, and someday oj will find the "real" killers.

and what is worse: saying you didn't know your pastor made incendiary racial comments while you went to his church for 20 years and had a personal relationship with him or the Bosnia incident? Yet one is forgiven and allowed to answer with a speech, and the other one is chastised and cornered into answering questions. You guess who is who.

-oh yes. pay no attention to my lie -- the other guy lies too! obama said he knew about reverend wright. he did say and it has yet to be proven otherwise that he was not in church on the particular day that rev. wright said the inflammatory comments that are being looped on fox news and right wing talk shows.

"bosnia incident" - nice one. if you got shot at by snipers and were running for your life with your daughter i'd think you'd remember it. . .if it happened. have you read a million little pieces? its a great book.

I really didn't want to come here but its unnerving to see the media and the Obama followers just waiting for her to slip so that they can attack and give him a break, which he decides to take in the Caribbean, because their boy so deserves it after such a "harrowing" week. The problem people is that voters seem to be seeing through this and there are very definite sides being taken here by the camps of Clinton and Obama.

-change subject, change subject, change subject, oh yeah look obama is on vacation! by the way is obama waiting for her to slip so her can attack or is it the other way around? because since he's in the lead of delegates it would seem that she's waiting for him to slip. its a little bit of semantics -- but one candidate is in the lead so a major slip is the only way she's going to get this nomination.

At this point both candidates will be weakened against McCain by this primary.

-mccain's actual war story versus hillary's fabricated one. you're right this is not good for her general election prospects.

What there is to consider is which of the two will have the stamina to bounce back after this is all over, the one that goes off to the Caribbean to charge batteries after a crisis or the one that is relentless and refuses to give up.

-lots of time btw now and the next primary. but we can't forget that vacation distraction. so news worthy. do you think the picture of obama on vacation will run in people magazine or us weekly? i concede hillary is relentless and won't give up.

Neither aspect is necessarily negative but it is a difference in attitudes and styles and fair enough to consider, don't you think?.

-"insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - albert einstein

"Well, I'd say he has about the same level of experience as Clinton. Obama has made trips to various regions of Africa (e.g., Sudan, Kenya), and has been involved in diplomatic outreaches and sponsored bills addressing that region. Compared with Clinton's trips to Northern Ireland and Bosnia, I'd say it's a draw. In essence, the only additional experience I see Clinton having is through whatever she learned informally through Bill, WH staff, etc. That is hard to measure and hard to campaign on."

Fair enough and valid. But it is one's choice to examine, study and determine which seems to be the most impressive to you, the voter, right? So no camp should be calling the other on this. I may be mistaken but wasn't she in the Armed Services committee which is a pretty impressive position to attain for a Junior Senator? May be wrong, but I believe this is what I have read.

RKA:

I see.

So David Brooks makes some declarative statements about something he couldn't possibly know with any certainty, you feel good about them, and so you're then willing to trust the judgment of the man who said:

(From Stepping Out of the Tar Pit, February 1, 2005)

The journey back from where these people have been is not a straight shot, which we can readily understand. In Washington, senators make facile arguments about improving the training of Iraqi troops, trying to reduce problems of motivation to problems of technique. Ted Kennedy gave a speech last week blithely insisting that the terrorists are winning the war for the hearts and minds of Iraqis. Brent Scowcroft warned of incipient civil war, denigrating the Iraqis' ability to manage their own tensions. In fact, these are a people who voted at higher rates in the face of death than we do in the face of inconvenience. These are a people who have used the campaign as a process of therapy and self-education. These people have just built the most democratic government in the Arab world.

Right.

I don't have sympathy for the Clintons--only you would bring up that old, tired, so-pre-South-Carolina Obama campaign talking point, but I do happen to harbor compassionate regret for my country (and myself) that we had to forgo solving national problems ten years ago in favor of our pundit class's horrified public hanky-waving at something that goes on in DC all the time (ask AMC). If that had been the end of it, maybe the criminal conduct of our press corps could be swept under the rug for a few decades, but then they managed to lie W into office by telling endless character-assassinating fabrications about candidate Gore, and then they topped that one off by cheerleading a tragic war on and on, as the quote from Brooks typifies.

I know that for the moment (until June, at least) you're in the habit of propping up the collapsed credibility of anybody who says anything bad in the press about the Clintons, RKA, but who's negative opinions about Hillary's character won't you step away from? Limbaugh's? Hannity's?

Who do you think that David Brooks will editorialize in favor of come November, RKA? Barack Obama?

If you can believe for a moment that Brooks is some apolitical wise old owl who just happens to be hooting out some Serious Insider Knowledge about the Clintons (again), then shake yourself out of your Oprah-watching trance and read this piece from Greenwald last year on Brooks' flagrant intellectual dishonesty:

Brooks' column today -- praising Democrats for ignoring radical anti-war bloggers and instead embracing "Centrism" -- is a perfect showcase for both of these dishonest tactics. His column is devoted to the argument that the Democratic Party hates its blogger and anti-war activist base, is committed to hawkish military policies, and that it is doing the Right Thing in this regard because Most Americans want a hawkish military policy. That is "centrism."

Thus, ignoring bloggers' demands for greater confrontation with Bush and remaining in the "center" (i.e., adhering to Brooks' political beliefs) is the only way Democrats can win elections (Brooks, of course, cares deeply about the health of the Democratic Party and wants only what is best for it). This is his argument:

In the beginning of August, liberal bloggers met at the YearlyKos convention while centrist Democrats met at the Democratic Leadership Council's National Conversation. Almost every Democratic presidential candidate attended YearlyKos, and none visited the D.L.C.

At the time, that seemed a sign that the left was gaining the upper hand in its perpetual struggle with the center over the soul of the Democratic Party. But now it's clear that was only cosmetic.

Now it's evident that if you want to understand the future of the Democratic Party you can learn almost nothing from the bloggers, billionaires and activists on the left who make up the "netroots." You can learn most of what you need to know by paying attention to two different groups -- high school educated women in the Midwest, and the old Clinton establishment in Washington.

So the real Heart and Soul of the Democratic Party is not bloggers, but those "high school educated women in the Midwest" whom Brooks condescendingly idealizes. And there is, of course, no overlap between those two groups. Bloggers are rabid elitists freaks from the coasts, while "high school educated women in the Midwest" are the saintly salt of the American earth who don't know what blogs are.

And how do we learn what the true political beliefs are of the all-important "high school educated women in the Midwest"? Do we consult polls or the outcome of elections? No, there is no need for any of that. We can just ask David Brooks, because he profoundly understands them, and they always think as he does. Like David Broder and the rest of the Beltway class, David Brooks speaks for Them. Thus, Democrats can only win elections if they adopt the views of David Brooks, because those are the views which are adored in the Heartland.

To "prove" this claim, Brooks all but declares Hillary Clinton the nominee of the Democratic Party, and then points to her winning foreign policy views which, he claims, repudiate the anti-war radicalism of the Leftist bloggers and instead embraces the ongoing Middle East hawkishness which "most Americans" want:

On "This Week With George Stephanopoulos," Clinton could have vowed to vacate Iraq. Instead, she delivered hawkish mini-speeches that few Republicans would object to. She listed a series of threats and interests in the region and made it clear that she'd be willing to keep U.S. troops there to handle them.
The fact is, many Democratic politicians privately detest the netroots' self-righteousness and bullying. They also know their party has a historic opportunity to pick up disaffected Republicans and moderates, so long as they don't blow it by drifting into cuckoo land. They also know that a Democratic president is going to face challenges from Iran and elsewhere that are going to require hard-line, hawkish responses.

Finally, these Democrats understand their victory formula is not brain surgery. You have to be moderate on social issues, activist but not statist on domestic issues and hawkish on foreign policy. This time they're not going to self-destructively deviate from that.

So what "most Americans" want is hawkishness on Iraq and Iran and the Middle East generally. In other words, they all embrace Bill Kristol and Dick Cheney's foreign policy views. What a coincidence! As always, what the "high school educated women in the Midwest" all believe happens to be exactly what David Brooks wants! By contrast, anyone who rejects those views resides in "cuckoo land."

Thus, Democrats can win elections only by repudiating those rabid anti-war bloggers who hold Fringe Views (such as favoring an end to the Iraq War and opposition to a war with Iran) and instead vow to remain in the Middle East more or less forever, ruling the region militarily. Because that's what "high school educated women in the Midwest" women want.

Of course, Brooks' entire column is factually false. That's why he does not cite any polling data, because it shows the exact opposite of everything he says....

Mewton:

I will say something that may not sit well with many people on this blog but I will say it: any American that has traveled to more than 5 countries in their lifetime is impressive. Any American that has an interest in a culture that goes beyond your own is impressive. The fact that Senator Clinton traveled, whether she was the wife of President Clinton or not, to more than 80 countries should be impressive and whatever you want to call her I will tell you this: she came to my country and was able to define it better than we have been able to define it ourselves. So yes, I think her experience as first lady is valid, especially if when you speak for your country you impress the country that is hosting you. How can one forget her speech in China about human rights. It is easy to forget this woman's intelligence and sharpness. I am surprised her camp doesn't emphasize those extraordinary moments of her as a first lady.

I insist that if the Bosnia story is investigated thoroughly there will be more truth there than what the press will care to present. It is no big deal. Bosnia was not a safe country in 1996. But who cared then, and who cares now, right?

poh123. . .

traveled to more than 5 countries.
(check)

interest in a culture beyond your own.
(check)

by your estimation i'm halfway on my way to being president of the united states!

for the record i'm not completely dismissing her experience as first lady. what i do dismiss are the myths told by her camp of the experience.

i am equally surprised that her camp instead of emphasizing the actual things she did as first lady (her speech in china being one of the highlights) but has instead chosen to embellish and in this bosina case flat out lie. watch the clip at the top of this post. now, who are you going to believe me or your lying eyes?

the fact that the bosnia story was caught on video should just lead to more scrutiny of some other whoppers she's told about her experience. making peace in macedonia?! northern ireland? she had tea!! she never had a security clearance. she's never particapted in any high level diplomatic talks.

read this link from factcheck.org and tell me how her experience argument is credible on its face.

the fact is on the major foreign policy decision of the last twenty years (iraq) she was wrong and barack was right. and he was right despite being less "experienced".

"traveled to more than 5 countries.
(check)

interest in a culture beyond your own.
(check)

by your estimation i'm halfway on my way to being president of the united states!"

No. Unless you delivered brilliant speeches that made your country look rather well. A rarity these days.

Regarding Northern Ireland. You choose to see it that way but there are
conflicting stories and some seem to think she was important.

I am sorry: Iraq? A no brainer especially if you are not in the thick of things and you know it's popular to say you are against the war. I was against the war as were millions of people around the world and in the United States. So that makes us geniuses and capable of running for a presidential office? Wow! I guess I could be president too.

It is useless. Barack Obama is a saint and Hillary Clinton is the devil. And that is the bottom line, no matter how sophisticated you write about it all.

Obama's advantage: he's been out there a lot less than she has and that does tie any rival's hands behind his/her back. He has a very short history, a thin record as they say. But if the American public is willing for him to learn on the job, so be it. The rest of the world must continue to brace itself for a few more years of instability (to say the least) if he is elected president. McCain is no push over.

"traveled to more than 5 countries.
(check)

interest in a culture beyond your own.
(check)

by your estimation i'm halfway on my way to being president of the united states!"

No. Unless you delivered brilliant speeches that made your country look rather well. A rarity these days.

Regarding Northern Ireland. You choose to see it that way but there are
conflicting stories and some seem to think she was important.

I am sorry: Iraq? A no brainer especially if you are not in the thick of things and you know it's popular to say you are against the war. I was against the war as were millions of people around the world and in the United States. So that makes us geniuses and capable of running for a presidential office? Wow! I guess I could be president too.

It is useless. Barack Obama is a saint and Hillary Clinton is the devil. And that is the bottom line, no matter how sophisticated you write about it all.

Obama's advantage: he's been out there a lot less than she has and that does tie any rival's hands behind his/her back. He has a very short history, a thin record as they say. But if the American public is willing for him to learn on the job, so be it. The rest of the world must continue to brace itself for a few more years of instability (to say the least) if he is elected president. McCain is no push over.

You know, Stuart...I think we approach the issue of the media differently.

You (and most others) are focused in on the individuals.

I am much more interested in systems and incentives.

You are focused in on the opiions of opinion mongers.

I get much more riled up about fasle memes that percolate into the low information voter universe at the hands of supposed "straight news reporters"

Neither approach is inherently wrong, but obviously different things bother you as bother me.

I really can't get that worked up about any single pundit. I tend to see them as clowns, not as villains. I see the theatre as evil, not necessarily the actors on the stage.

"It is useless. Barack Obama is a saint and Hillary Clinton is the devil. And that is the bottom line, no matter how sophisticated you write about it all."

I might have agreed with you on this point a couple of months ago. The media built up Hillary as the front runner, then gave Obama much more positive coverage. However, I think once Obama became the front runner, the tenor changed (Rev. Wright, middle name, photos of him in african garb, questions about flip-flopping on NAFTA and the Iraq War, etc.). Although the media made some unfair attacks against Hillary before, this one i believe is actually legitimate. Here's why:

Because Hillary campaigned on having more experience (and gave examples of that experience), it is only fair for the media to check on those claims to determine if they are valid. In this case, her claims of experience appear to be only partially valid, and she is open to criticism about why the facts don't really match her narrative. The media treated Obama similarly when facts about his discussions with the Canadians contradicted his campaign narrative on NAFTA.

I tend to see them as clowns, not as villains. I see the theatre as evil, not necessarily the actors on the stage.

RKA:

Interesting.

I guess that I see the fasle memes that percolate into the low information voter universe at the hands of supposed "straight news reporters" as the product of editors and editing that obtains or reinforces narrative cues from the likes of Brooks and the rest of the Village.

We have different theories as to how the narratives (and memes) are created, approved and distributed, and whose interests they ultimately serve, as you well know.

Neither approach is inherently wrong, but obviously different things bother you as bother me.

This is true. It bothers me to read people lauding this piece who, if this were any other topic than their candidate's Democratic primary opponent, would treat Brooks' column with the skepticism and suspicion that his record and ideology deserves from them.

We're being manipulated. There's ultimately no difference between Brooks and Kristol, except that one belongs to the Centrist clique, which means attacking Democrats (some of whom you don't like) most of the time, and praising those that capitulate to Republicans some of the time, and one belongs to the Rightist clique, which means attacking Republicans who don't capitulate to even further Rightist Republicans some of the time, and attacking Democrats who aren't Joe Lieberman all of the time.

Cheering for either of them when they predict that the team you're not hoping wins the Super Bowl will lose is madness, if one hopes to influence the mainstream press corps toward greater credibility through our commentary. The purpose (in my mind) of interacting with our Swamplander-reporters (besides praising their wonderfully edifying posts) is to help them understand the rewards for stepping outside of the invisible circle of narrative-based political reporting, not to wave our pom-poms wildly when they simply agree with our partisan or ideological political views. That's why they believe that we're just dittoheads in different jerseys--because all they have to do to get reams of "Right on, brother!, Right on, sister!" commentary is to say what they think that we want to hear, and DailyKos bots with high-numbered userid's will bleat their uncritical approval. Meanwhile, nobody bothers to think about what narratives or memes were inserted--like Brooks' claim to some sort of clairvoyant insight into the character of politicians, or his scholarly references to "honest brokers" like liberal-hawk rag "The New Republic" and the tabloid clowns at Drudgico.
Everybody just forgets about their previous demands for accountability from these institutions, since the same people who were talking up Bush are now talking down Clinton.

No wonder they have no respect for us. That's what bothers me. The good guys vs. bad guys assumptions about the candidates that allow for low-threshold, relatively fact-free outrage-du-jour are the same assumptions that allow people to accept that Saddam Hussein must have had something to do with that anthrax delivery to the Capitol --after all, they reported that it was in a powder that contained chemicals that could totally have come from an Iraqi chemical plant, and you know how evil Saddam was! It doesn't matter that Saddam was evil, it's important that we never suspend our individual judgments and listen to confidence men like Brooks who exploit these good guys vs. bad guys tendencies for their own ends.

That's why it seems like I'm bending over backwards to give Hillary Clinton the benefit of the doubt in most cases that involve "character calls" the punditocracy loves to make for us rubes. When someone who praises the "remarkable candor and guts" of George W Bush suddenly calls it like you see it, they're almost always trying to jerk your chain, or assert their influence over the national conversation, neither of which are in our interests as news consumers or as citizens.

But think about this, Stuart....basing everything on the messenger can cut both ways.

When Al Gore stood up in 2002 and opposed the war, the beltway crowd dismissed the merits of the argument in favor of defining truth as told by he who has the highest approval rating - Bush.

I would argue that the problem is not that the pundits have too much of an axe to grind in one direction or another, its that they see the truth as fungible according to a) political trends at the time and b) the economic forces behind their business. I think their only real motivation is self-preservation and self-enrichment.

Ny point is that if we want to change villager behavior, we have to understand why they behave as they do. And merely casting the majority as inherently evil and duplicitous will not change things. As long as their is an audience for crap, they will put out crap. You'll never eradicate bad journalism lust like you'll never eradicate pronography...the demand is just way too high.

This is why I support Obama so strongly, Stuart. I think at his core he doesn't want to play these poltical games and that he wants government to be a serious, open instituation in which there is less sitcom and more progress. Will the media and the right wing allow him to do so completely? Of course not. But he'll take politics in the right direction and the media will be forced to follow. if for no other reason than Obama's genrational leadership and the corporate self-inerest of the media in not alienating the next generation of voters.

I agree with you about all the games the media has played with the clintons. I think the clintons have been complicit particiapnts in these games because they have both benefited from them. That's why I don't like the Clintons. I think when you put them and the media together in the political theater, a circus inevitably breaks out - and I think it is both of their faults. I am not anti-Hillary. I am anti-circus and that is why I am anti-clinton and anti-media.

It's as interesting to speak with you as ever, RKA.

Thanks for the discussion.

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