good Obama&others stuff here, and especially in the links
found this nice little cast photo from the first few seasons:
that’s a good link gabbneb but I’d say that the comments are even better than the embedded links.
We need a rolling “LOL OBAMA = terrist!” thread, for stuff like CNN’s Jeff Greenfield for broadcasting shit like this:
“...Is there any other major public figure who dresses the way [Obama] does? Why, yes. It is Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who, unlike most of his predecessors, seems to have skipped through enough copies of GQ to find the jacket-and-no-tie look agreeable. And maybe that’s not the comparison a possible presidential contender really wants to evoke.
[...]
Now, it is one thing to have a last name that sounds like Osama and a middle name, Hussein, that is probably less than helpful, but an outfit that reminds people of a charter member of the axis of evil, why, this could leave his presidential hopes hanging by a thread. Or is that threads?”
So how ’bout that University of California taser incident, huh? Anybody remember that?
Nobody got fired. People are still talking about Kramer, though.
Well Colin maybe if you and I hadn’t been such horrible trolls on that thread it would have gotten a sandbox revive
I’d be filled with shame if the students standing around and meekly filming had done a god damn bit of difference.
it’s funny cause ahmadinejad is such a shlub and obama is so slick and cause it’s a v common look and also because the trying to make obama seem terroristy is such a pitifully impotent attack.
I don’t really expect it, but I wouldn’t at all be surprised. While I believed Warner was getting out for the reasons he said, I’ve also wondered since not long thereafter if he thought he was peaking too early and wanted to stay lower-profile for a while (or—and this is at least somewhat in hindsight—to allow Obama to rise without doing so at his own expense).
love love love that all the ‘neb’s fave podpeople are pulling out.
what are you talking about, dude? my favorite guy (warner) got out weeks/months ago, and now might get back in. my second favorite guy (obama) is pretty clearly getting in. and my third favorite guy (edwards) is definitely getting in, and not a ‘pod person’. but i’m sure they’ll all lose in the end to Kucinich/Brodeur, amirite?
I wonder if Clark is a pod person.
also, if you meant Bayh, apparently you missed my references to the lethality of the boredom he induces
I didn’t know you thought well of Edwards, my mistake. He’s the only potential nominee (well, besides Obama — can you name 3 non-boilerplate positions he holds, btw?) I haven’t blackballed.
besides earmark disclosure? not off the top of my head. boilerplate is what wins elections. see, e.g., Bush, George W.
like most Dems, he likes single-payer, but favors alternative means to get to universal coverage because he thinks they’re more feasible. unlike some Dems, though, he’s willing to defend single payer on policy grounds (and supported it in Illinois).
also, can you name 3 non-boilerplate positions Edwards holds?
(hint: “poverty is bad” is not a position)
boilerplate is what wins elections
soooo inspiring. God, you are an android.
you can be inspirational and still hold boilerplate positions. and most voters in America may not be especially interested in the policies that might inspire you.
One of the reservations by the hand-wringers is that Obama hasn’t promoted some end-all/be-all legislation in his two years of being a low-ranking member of the minority party, but here’s a neat bit on the legislation he has done, which tends to be bi-partisian, non-flashy, and important
yeah, for what little time and seniority he’s had, he’s rather accomplished. and while ordinarily i might try to suppress my fondness for the legislative end of things in picking a president, he’s actually managed the trick of showing leadership qualities in a non-executive position.
at this point, i’m happy just to say fuggit and help out with his campaign, at least locally(not that greater Portland will be all that difficult a territory to win over, mind you...)
dreamt last night that i was hanging out w/obama and he was an 18 yr/o kid and i was kinda hmmm seems a little raw maybe 2012
gingrich is on such a roll right now: advocating the elimination of the 1st amendment, saying muslims should be arrested for looking like terrorists. i pray he runs.
I still think the religious right will come home to Romney when none of their other horses get far from the gate, but if he’s losing Wall St to McCain, I guess I have to give up on my belief that he’s the guy, even if Wall St /= business Republicans.
aw, but I thought Sam Brownback had the fundies locked up, and we’d have hijinx on the Bauer/Keyes level of amusement again
if a fucking venture capitalist can’t appeal to wall st maybe he just doesn’t have the juice.
will the media stay in love w/mccain or will they be finally forced to admit that he is not in fact a maverick but just another garden variety conservative hawk ass motherfucker w/the complexion of a well done pork chop?
I thought Sam Brownback had the fundies locked up
he might be their favorite, but he isn’t going anywhere
JOSH MARSHALL IS SQUEEZING MY MIND GRAPES
tho again, McCain is clearly spooked by Romney, even if this list coming out now ostensibly has more to do with Giuliani’s nyc fundraiser today
why is mccain supporting this big troop re-up? after all his craven compromising, this is the unpopular position he chooses to support? wtf
dude is psycho—i don’t get him.
Way I figured is that he can support a politically unsustainable solution and then point to it later during the campaign with a “see? I was right all along, and had they listened to me and done it the right way, we wouldn’t be in this mess.”
It’s kinda his version of “conservatism never fails; it is only failed.”
kingfish OTM, but McCain’s screwed anyway. Neither he nor Giuliani has a prayer.
but so many media types and beltway pundits hang on to their well-paid jobs by mouthing empty-headed platitudes and bullshit narratives that they ain’t gunna change anytime soon, so McCain will remain a “maverick”, despite his actions & actual voting record of the last 2+ years.
yeah but they’re actually going to do the troop double down, no?
i mean agreeing w/bush abt anything right now seems incredibly stupid.
McCain & Harry Reid: troop surge psychos-in-arms
Can anyone see there NOT being more troops sent? Who’s gonna stop W? Will the Masses actually put down the fucking remote and raise hell over it? Can’t see it.
see i’ve been thinking that mccain was fatally flawed all along, but i think that romney and guiliani are too. so who then? is it possible some one else emerges?
mccain = maverick status compromised by bush-licking, looks, sounds like psycho pork chop
guiliani = lisping gross megalomaniacal gay-roommating fornicator
romney = mormon flip-flopper
Expecting the worst (and I’m seldom ‘disappointed’ by the voters), McCain is nommed by default, and then elected.
could be, tho i don’t like the chances of someone who’s cuddled so close to bush, especially after he sinks to record popularity lows in the next two years.
romney seems more formidable in a general election, although this mormon thing is likely a huge liability. we’ll see if he can talk his way out of it.
my money’s on obama.
from: a virginian congressman
Thank you for your recent communication. When I raise my hand to take the oath on Swearing In Day, I will have the Bible in my other hand. I do not subscribe to using the Koran in any way.
The Muslim Representative from Minnesota was elected by the voters of that district and if American citizens don’t wake up and adopt the Virgil Goode position on immigration there will likely be many more Muslims elected to office and demanding the use of the Koran.
We need to stop illegal immigration totally and reduce legal immigration and end the diversity visas policy pushed hard by President Clinton and allowing many persons from the Middle East to come to this country.
I fear that in the next century we will have many more Muslims in the United States if we do not adopt the strict immigration policies that I believe are necessary to preserve the values and beliefs traditional to the United States of America and to prevent our resources from being swamped.
The Ten Commandments and “In God We Trust” are on the wall in my office. A Muslim student came by the office and asked why I did not have anything on my wall about the Koran. My response was clear, “As long as I have the honor of representing the citizens of the 5th District of Virginia in the United States House of Representatives, The Koran is not going to be on the wall of my office.”
Thank you again for your email and thoughts.
Sincerely yours,
Virgil H. Goode, Jr.
70 East Court Street
Suite 215
Rocky Mount, Virginia 24151
via glenn greenwald. ugh.
run-on sentences running wild
like greenwald said, my favorite part is where he confronts the muslim student. how courageous!
demanding
that’s the key word. You already get the feel that these guys are quakin’ in their boots, freaked out that them muslims are gunna start asking for their own restrooms, water fountains, ability to pray, etc
Remember that one story about Obama showing up to an event where one reporter thought the guy was totally cockblocking him?
Obama’s staffers found out, and Barack personally called the guy to apologize.
“Messin’ up your game” and all that.
Oh, wow. Bush finally budges half an inch.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/12/19/AR2006121900880.html
I predict that mccain has a health scare, covers it up, and then gets busted on the coverup. Hilary has a great beginning to her campaign and then gracefully accepts the vp slot before it goes sour.
Goofus is on the radio right now. Did he just say “Sadaamists”?
More on the OBAMA = OSAMA tip:
In a December 18 column headlined “Barack Hussein Obama: Once a Muslim, Always A Muslim” and posted on her website, right-wing pundit Debbie Schlussel argued that because Sen. Barack Obama’s (D-IL) middle name is Hussein, his late, estranged father was of Muslim descent, and he has shown interest in his father’s Kenyan heritage, Obama’s “loyalties” must be called into question as he emerges as a possible Democratic presidential candidate. In the column, Schlussel asked: “So, even if he identifies strongly as a Christian ... is a man who Muslims think is a Muslim, who feels some sort of psychological need to prove himself to his absent Muslim father, and who is now moving in the direction of his father’s heritage, a man we want as President when we are fighting the war of our lives against Islam? Where will his loyalties be?” She ended her column by asking if Obama becoming vice president instead would be acceptable. Answering her own question, she wrote: “NO WAY, JOSE ... Or, is that, HUSSEIN?”
Yup. War against Islam, fun for all round.
interesting how things change in two years
Dick Morris is now threatening to split the U.S. if Clinton/Obama wins, ‘coz “I do not want Hillary Clinton controlling the FBI and the IRS and the CIA and the DEA.”
Oh yeah, and apparently Hillary will win the nom, so the GOP will have to run Condi against her.
well, guess who just said that we need to win the iraq war by convering them all to christianity?
my congressman. robin hayes. the one who won his election with slightly over 300 votes. sigh.
well mickey, this IS a crusade, y’know
you’d certainly get that idea from listening to the right sources
The Republicans running Condi may be the only way for Hillary to win.
omg obama phonecall is grebt.
did anyone else read the Harper’s cover story on Obama and the Atlantic cover story on Hillary?
Gah. Am trying to arrange an interview with Keith Ellison (my local congressman elect) for a UK paper and this Goode bastard bigot probably just made things x100000 harder.
I really cannot wait to see more shit like this hitting the Hillary Fan.
[from TNR]
Village People
by Martin Peretz
Post date: 12.22.06
Issue date: 01.15.07
She’s not sure whether she is running for president. But she is certain that the time is right for a woman to try. Maybe Hillary Clinton thinks that Nancy Pelosi should be the Democratic candidate. OK, Hillary is not a candid person. This time—actually, the day that I write—she was not candid on NPR’s “Morning Edition.” Yesterday, it was on another platform. Tomorrow, she won’t be candid on still another one. So, what else is new? We’ve accommodated to her trying to figure all the angles. Hillary has been scheming for the presidency since the day her husband entered the White House, which is why she didn’t much take to Al Gore. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised if she conspired with James Baker—or is that just me?
One of the problems about figuring all the angles is that you can’t. And, believe me, Hillary tried. She has had an apparatus in place for just that chore for years. Not long enough ago to include Harold Ickes’s father, the other Harold Ickes, who schemed for FDR. But this Harold Ickes (who ran Eugene McCarthy’s campaign in New York), and Mandy Grunwald and John Podesta and Mark Penn and Tony Podesta and Susan Thomases, unless any of these have been unceremoniously pushed off the ship, much like Marian Wright Edelman—Hillary’s closest sister and ideological soulmate—was pushed, never to be let on board again. In its youth, the team was a band of idealists, self-styled. Now it’s made up of hardened cynics, no pretense otherwise. But the same folk.
Hillary and Co. prepared for Mark Warner and John Edwards, Bill Richardson and Joe Biden, Tom Vilsack and the really impossible—no, deluded—dreamer John Kerry. She probably had a strategy against Gore, too. She was confident and contemptuous. And then, suddenly, she found herself running against a latter-day Martin Luther King Jr.
There was no way to see Barack Obama coming. And, damn it, he is a picture of America’s future, black and white. African father. Columbia. Harvard Law School, where he was president of the Law Review, no slouch he. Taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago, greater evidence of his brilliance. Supple in mind and bearing, evoking energy and thoughtfulness. Ah, yes, his most important public quality: He is comfortable in his own skin. She is not. Oh, is she not! What could Hillary possibly say against him? In the Democratic Party, it is still difficult to honestly criticize an African American. You can’t even say a bad word about Al Sharpton, even though you can’t say a truthful good word about him, either. But what, for heaven’s sake, is there to criticize about Obama? Nothing.
Hillary is holding séances with Democratic politicians in New York. They can’t but be for her. Even though my old student Chuck Schumer is more popular than her and more respected. And certainly deeper. The same is true for Eliot Spitzer. If they actually endorse, their endorsements will be discounted. New Mexico Representative Tom Udall probably supports New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson. And that means exactly what? Nothing. On the other hand, maybe Hillary will be able to entice Eleanor Roosevelt into her corner.
I have a question I’ve been reluctant to ask. Do the Clintons have any friends who aren’t really rich? Maybe just a few, for old time’s sake. But, as I read the clips about them, they consort largely, and maybe only, with zillionaires and very high-pay Hollywood types. It is not an axiomatic vocational hazard of politicians. Let me take Gore as an instance. He and Tipper have musician friends and professor friends and artist friends and just plain worker friends and farmer friends, for sure. Not that they don’t mix with computer magnates, as well. But the Gores are rooted in ordinary life—in real, even quotidian activity. For example, he actually writes his own books. Believe it or not, it’s true. The indulgent wealth that surrounds Bill and Hillary is, I am sure, corrupting. And that corruption—of taste, of moderation, of what is essential—cripples the soul and distorts life itself.
No wonder that Bill Clinton flies with frequency to Dubai and other sand eruptions in the Gulf to speak at conference after conference on topics so orotund that no one reports what he says. But isn’t it a degradation of the presidency for this former president to shmooze, for money and money alone, with men (yes, only men) who want from him only his presence? But perhaps this sexism is a relief. The robed hosts do allow women to be among their foreign guests. At least they allow Madame Albright, who flatters them, also to address them. And Wesley Clark. But Clinton is the king of the Emirates Airline route. The indisputable king.
Which brings me back to Hillary. Does the American public really want her husband in the White House once again? And with nothing to do? Right now, what with George W. and Laura ensconced in the upstairs rooms, the return of the previous first couple may seem attractive, even alluring. But the hardened woman, who lost her health care proposal not to a GOP Congress but to a Democratic one, does not evoke the capacity to persuade, to compromise, to administer, to govern. Her coterie is too tight. Her mind too rigid. And her husband’s is too, well, loose.
Hillary started out in 1993 with “the politics of meaning,” that pretentious and portentous phrase that actually means nothing. She had leapt at it out of the mouth of a foolish “rabbi,” Michael Lerner, earnest and oleaginous (he the enthusiast of tikkun olam, a theology rooted nowhere so firmly as in a Peter, Paul, and Mary song). But she dropped it quickly when she discovered that the American people were on to her preacher-teacher’s banal words. Then she peddled It Takes A Village as book and slogan. It soon appeared too soft for her own entry into politics, and so she also sidetracked this theme. But now she is running for president. Tough-minded she was on Iraq, right up there with that junior senator from Massachusetts. A few days ago, she said that, had she known what she knows now, she wouldn’t have voted for the war. Then, today, she said she wished she had voted against the war, whatever. She has fumbled and disenchanted the left, and the left is not easily forgiving. Still, as a gesture to that flank of the party, Hillary has republished It Takes A Village. But what it really takes is a majority of the electoral college. Which I don’t see.
good article!
yeah
(did he call wes clark a girl?)
“scheming” + “figuring all the angles”.. How awful. that horrible, scheming, contriving woman. What, Peretz thinks St. Obama isn’t busy figuring all the angles right now, and for that matter, that he hasn’t been doing it for years and years? I hear it in every interview—Obama isn’t terribly candid either, he just plays it better, which is good enough—I don’t think he owes anyone complete candor.
Maybe Peretz doesn’t pay close attention or maybe Obama’s just too new to him, but there is definitely something odd going on with Obama’s habit of responding to all sorts of questions in the second person.. “Well, you do this, then you think this, and you don’t want to react this way” like he’s constantly observing his own behavior from somewhere offstage. Because he is. And there’s nothing wrong with that. And there’s nothing wrong with Hillary doing the same except that she isn’t as good at faking candor.
Right now, today, I’d prefer Edwards or Obama were nominated over Hillary but some folks’ views of her can border on the pathological
while it’s true that there’s often a sexist bent to the hillary hate, it’s also true that she’s really pretty much sux.
if you’d like some evidence that her scheming long ago went off the rails see: HER FUCKING DISGUSTING RECORD ON THE IRAQ WAR.
obama’s thing, shockingly, contains a large element of actual thoughtfulness.
I dunno, Daria, that second-person thing isn’t so bad—it is conversational. Does he use it in written English? If so, Bright Lights, Big City to thread...
what daria is referring to is Obama’s maintenance of ironic distance from his own politicizing, which I find ‘interesting’ too, but to which I assign no particular value, good or bad, necessarily. it ups his honesty but maybe lowers his authenticity such that I don’t quite get the ‘he really means it, man’ vibe that I did off of Warner. which might actually be a good thing from an electability perspective, if electability matters anymore given the change in the generic preference (which is a big part of why Hillary’s up in the polls, btw, much of the remainder lying in the fact that independents—having woken up to the fact that they don’t pay enough attention—may have come around to being interested in competence, plus the fact that her negatives are all already known so arguably there’s nowhere for her to go but up. however, i don’t necessarily see her staying the best-polling Dem as name-id rises for Obama, who’s already in her ballpark)
that Marty Peretz article has some points worth considering, but I tend to avoid anything expressing irrational-obsessive hatred of the Clintons from either side, especially when it’s often personal axe-grinding (like Dick Morris being forever remembered for his toe fetish). With Peretz it’s hard to figure out given that it’s a guy who both sided with Bush on the war as late as ’04 and was a big Gore fan. But I imagine it might have something to do with the impact the Clintons had on the Third Way and its import for TNR—maybe they weren’t centrist enough for him, or maybe they so embodied and Democratic-branded the movement that he lost his brand.
can’t say about his writing, I just noticed it as a peculiarity of his conversational style because he does it constantly—it does strike me that he is very precise and careful in what he reveals in interviews, even when he’s being funny he’s never being spontaneously funny. maybe just the sign of a guy who’s too smart for the kind of bullshit you’re supposed to deliver on the campaign trail—kerry was like this—probably obama has a witty, dry sense of humor that doesn’t play well through the national media filter
kerry is not too smart
book smart. not good political instincts, though.
xpost ARGH hate the book-smart concept as I believe impressionables who hear the phrase come to think reading would not improve life and become everything-stupid as a result.
The second person thing *might* also be an inclusive gesture, as if he is inviting the questioner to occupy his shoes and thus seems more reasonable as a result. Obama does ‘reasonable’ very well.
Kerry didn’t—and dry wit doesn’t play well in a politician outside of his/her core supporters.
i used to read a lot, and i don’t know that it improved my life any. a bas le bovarysme ! i should’ve played sports.
I pretty much hated Hillary from the minute she voted for the war, but Peretz’ guilt-by-association vitriol re: Michael Lerner (among other things) is rather unappealing.
there’s a lot about Peretz that is unappealing (moronic tidbits such as “I have a question I’ve been reluctant to ask. Do the Clintons have any friends who aren’t really rich?”) and I’m not even sure how relevant TNR is anymore. But beyond speculated personal axes to grind or other such spinnery, articles like this remind me of how colorful Her Majesty’s campaign will be.
xpost: oh yeah, i forgot about all the men she scares
“scares”
“weiner”
“awesome”
Air America last straw—top-of-hour Britishes newsreader pronounces ‘privacy’ wrong
i like the britishes newsreader.
marty peretz is the ed-in-chief of TNR, right? the one who kinda went unhinged due to summertime joementum?
yeah, he is. and all of TNR went unhinged after 9/11 and Iraq war disaster. they have lost absolutely all credibility. nothing TNR says is any more valuable than a claim by Matt Drudge.
probs that are insurmount?
ha
Romney and Edwards both officially in now (no surprises there)
so, what are the official entries now?
R:
Romney
Giuliani
Brownback(?)
D:
Edwards
Vilsack
Kucinich
John Edwards has coined a new phrase that is likely to resonate throughout the Presidential campaign: “The McCain Doctrine.” The phrase seeks to wrap the prospect of an escalation of the Iraq war as tightly as possible around the neck of John McCain, the most vocal proponent of a “surge” in troops
lol
good news and bad news with Condi:
bad news: Iraq is worth it, and never mind how much blood & treasure we waste on it.
good news: America is ready for a black president
I think that’s actually fairly clever on Edwards’ part (xpost)
totally. i may have underestimated him.
Ed Kilgore argues that there will be no “True Conservative” horse to show this time around, and I still think that this faction ultimately grudgingly comes around to Romney. But maybe there will be a Perot-sized Buchanan in ’08?
ugh Ginsberg sounds like a shitbag. So the non-Mormon Christian Right is cool with Mormons...?
well I may eternally underestimate that stuff—I wouldn’t really know—but I think that in the end they have to choose between McCain, Romney and maybe Giuliani and Romney will be the choice.
cute 6’3“ jedi chick
