|
|
Post by jensaltmann on Jul 7, 2009 23:32:48 GMT -8
Plus, the office of White House Legal Counsel and the Department of Justice -- which are probably the organizations she's thinking of, not only wouldn't automatically throw them out, but they'd hit her harder than Alaska ever did. Clinton went tens of millions of dollars into debt hiring lawyers to defend against his own DOJ. And just about the second thing any new president learns, right after "don't even think about trying to ditch the Secret Service," is "never, ever forget the office of legal counsel does NOT work for YOU." I remember how tough they were to W & company. That doesn't make me think they'd be any worse to Palin. |
|
|
|
Post by hhbx on Jul 9, 2009 10:22:37 GMT -8
It's funny, but on the same day I read about Palin quitting here, this is the bumper sticker I see in the parking lot of my work place:  With this and Pawlenty announcing he's not running for a third term, I wouldn't be surprised to see more Republican "step downs" so they can get an early start in trying being the ones to lead the GOP out of the disarray they are currently in. |
|
|
|
Post by K-Box on Jul 9, 2009 14:47:29 GMT -8
"YOU CAN KEEP THE CHANGE"
... So, after four years of Obama as president, she's going to be running on an ANTI-change platform? Good know that she'll be supporting the INCUMBENT PRESIDENT, then!
I swear to fuck, people should be legally required to UNDERSTAND THEIR OWN FUCKING NATIVE LANGUAGE before they're allowed to SPEAK it.
|
|
|
|
Post by hhbx on Jul 9, 2009 20:14:52 GMT -8
Hey, don't give me that look, I figured it was playing to the, "everything is okay just don't look too closely or at all," types who thought we were going in the right direction with Bush. I can probably understand if maybe if was a strike back slogan against stimulus packages and such, but it just reminded me more and more of this:  |
|
|
|
Post by K-Box on Jul 9, 2009 20:52:13 GMT -8
The sad thing is, Killface is too good for the modern Republican party.
The first time Palin mangled the English language, he'd shoot her in the face.
|
|
|
|
Post by jessebaker on Jul 10, 2009 22:41:26 GMT -8
Oh how I miss Frisky Dingo....
As for Palin running for the Presidency, it's probably her best bet NOT TO run in 2012. Wait until 2016, when Obama's leaving office and the Democrats self-destruct trying to find a candidate to run as the heir apparent to Obama.
ESPECIALLY if we get a repeat of the Clinton/Gore transition, where whoever runs as Obama's successor ends up spending most of their time trying to distance themselves from Obama, to the point that you have shit like Lieberman somehow managing to wrangle the VP nod again by bullshitting that the Democrats need someone ultra-conservative on the ticket to appeal to the batshit crazies who, in Lieberman's bullshit world view, REALLY run things and that he's the only one who can do that.
Outside Hillary and MAYBE* Jim Webb, Obama doesn't have any sort of spiritual successor lined up and that will hurt the Democrats big time.
*I don't count Howard Dean in this, largely because he's too valuable where he currently is to try for the nomination.
|
|
|
|
Post by K-Box on Jul 11, 2009 2:00:59 GMT -8
The problem with this logic, Jesse, is that the reason that Democrats had to distance themselves from Clinton, while at the same time trying not to distance themselves from him too much, was because Clinton's personal life was a scandal-plagued mess, and yet, Clinton himself had enough personal charisma to maintain high approval ratings, so instead of taking it out on him, voters instead chose to resent the Democratic Party as a whole, and especially Al Gore, who suffered from the severe handicap of being one of the most ANTI-charismatic politicians this side of Richard Nixon, to the point that even those who AGREED with him were hard-pressed to disagree with everyone else's reasons for disliking him. There's a reason why the joke in 1999 was, "What happens when it rains on Bill Clinton? Al Gore gets wet," and it's the same reason why, when Gallup conducted a hypothetical three-way race poll between Clinton, Gore and Bush for 2000, they found that Clinton would have defeated both Bush and Gore (who would have split the remainder of the vote between them equally), and even won more than 50 percent of the vote (something he never actually managed to do).
And the reason why this is a problem for your analogy is because, aside from neing vaguely liberal two-term Democratic presidents, the only things Clinton and Obama have in common is that they're both carbon-based forms of life who require oxygen to survive. In terms of his personality and his personal life, Obama is literally the exact mathematical opposite of Clinton in every conceivable way, so there is no reason why the Democrats would need to distance themselves from Obama the way they tried to do from Clinton.
|
|
|
|
Post by paulpogue on Jul 11, 2009 3:19:48 GMT -8
Also, we're only six months into the guy's first term, one-sixteenth of the way through. I'll start getting worried in 2012 or so, but at the moment, "lack of spiritual successor" is not exactly on Obama's top ten or even top twenty-five problems.
Now, when 2006 rolled around and BUSH was without any obvious follow-up, that was bad.
Plus, we're in a situation right now that is going to give plenty of Democrats great chances to get the spotlight. Hell, half the time I think Evan Bayh has positioned himself as Obama's primary in-party opposition precisely so he can set up for 2012 or 2016. In the meantime, Republican would-be bright lights are being extinguished all over the place.
|
|
|
|
Post by K-Box on Jul 11, 2009 4:13:40 GMT -8
Seriously, if current trends continue - and yes, it's a mistake to assume that they'll do that, but let's do it anyway - the better model for predicting what 2016 will look like for the Democrats is not 2000, but 1988, when George H.W. Bush was basically able to get elected by being a warm body in a suit from the same party as the incumbent president, because the country really would have much rather reelected Reagan to a third term.
|
|
|
|
Post by paulpogue on Jul 11, 2009 6:36:07 GMT -8
I expect you're right, since the entirety of the Republican strategy for 2012 currently appears to be "hope and pray the recession is still going on in 2012 so we can thrash him then with a campaign of being Not Obama."
Never mind that by all predictable economic trends, the recession will largely be over by election time 2010, let alone 2012. There's some concern for 2010, because there's still a long way to go for this to be over, but even then, the Democrats are defending far fewer contested seats than the Republicans, and there's every chance the contested seats are going to go the Democrats' way. And as for 2012? Economic history indicates that things have NEVER stayed that bad for so long -- even the Great Depression has upswings in the middle of it, to the point that when it swept back down in 1937, it was considered a major disaster for Roosevelt.
Hell, we could have BUSH still in the Oval Office and cyclical economics still indicate we'd be doing a lot better in '12. So I think Obama is pretty safe on THAT front.
It must drive Republicans absolutely crazy that the Democratic standard-bearer is virtually a saint in his private life, while all their big guns can't keep it in their pants. During the Clinton years, when they were usually getting their butts kicked left and right, they could always count on Bill's penis to at least give them a momentary distraction. But Obama is such a polar opposite that they've never even tried to hint that he's not on the up-and-up, and in fact one of the bigger Washington to-dos as of late was based on Republicans whining that Obama was PAYING TOO MUCH ATTENTION to his wife.
God, I love politics these days. I keep waiting for Michael Steele to give a speech and say "Yeah, we knew we lost hard, so everything after that, we were just doing it for the lulz."
|
|
|
|
Post by K-Box on Jul 11, 2009 9:41:24 GMT -8
Here's how bad Obama's decency as a human being is for the Republicans:
SEVERAL conservative pundits have actually tried to Make Meme the suggestion that Obama's commitment to being a good father, and fidelity toward his wife, make it HARDER for the average American to relate to him, to the point that one or two right-wing wags even suggested that MARK SANFORD is a less alienating figure, because "he doesn't make us feel so inadequate about our own shortcomings, as husbands and as fathers. Being the perfect guy can become a bitter pill for others to swallow, sooner or later."
|
|
|
|
Post by jessebaker on Jul 11, 2009 16:50:58 GMT -8
Here's how bad Obama's decency as a human being is for the Republicans: SEVERAL conservative pundits have actually tried to Make Meme the suggestion that Obama's commitment to being a good father, and fidelity toward his wife, make it HARDER for the average American to relate to him, to the point that one or two right-wing wags even suggested that MARK SANFORD is a less alienating figure, because "he doesn't make us feel so inadequate about our own shortcomings, as husbands and as fathers. Being the perfect guy can become a bitter pill for others to swallow, sooner or later." Which is the double-standard bullshit of the religious right; only THEY can be horribly flawed people, who's sins are just so happened to be magically wiped away by merit of being born again Christians (or just being fundamentalist Christians who worship Jesus better/"the right way" unlike everyone else) while everyone else is a Godless abomination for any and all flaws they may have as human beings. Which in turn is, as you have said on several occasions, a hypocrisy that has pretty much DEFINED the modern conservative movement these last twenty years. ESPECIALLY amongst the fundies and other "family values" conservatives who seem to think they sin to their hearts content and behave in unfamily-like ways, but can torment/persecute anyone who doesn't follow the rigid and outdated "family model" that they want to impose onto everyone BUT themselves. |
|
|
|
Post by michaelpaciocco on Jul 14, 2009 7:24:04 GMT -8
|
|
|
|
Post by michaelpaciocco on Jul 21, 2009 17:25:09 GMT -8
|
|
|
|
Post by paulpogue on Jul 22, 2009 12:50:01 GMT -8
Here's how bad Obama's decency as a human being is for the Republicans: SEVERAL conservative pundits have actually tried to Make Meme the suggestion that Obama's commitment to being a good father, and fidelity toward his wife, make it HARDER for the average American to relate to him, to the point that one or two right-wing wags even suggested that MARK SANFORD is a less alienating figure, because "he doesn't make us feel so inadequate about our own shortcomings, as husbands and as fathers. Being the perfect guy can become a bitter pill for others to swallow, sooner or later." Which is the double-standard bullshit of the religious right; only THEY can be horribly flawed people, who's sins are just so happened to be magically wiped away by merit of being born again Christians (or just being fundamentalist Christians who worship Jesus better/"the right way" unlike everyone else) while everyone else is a Godless abomination for any and all flaws they may have as human beings. Which in turn is, as you have said on several occasions, a hypocrisy that has pretty much DEFINED the modern conservative movement these last twenty years. ESPECIALLY amongst the fundies and other "family values" conservatives who seem to think they sin to their hearts content and behave in unfamily-like ways, but can torment/persecute anyone who doesn't follow the rigid and outdated "family model" that they want to impose onto everyone BUT themselves. We all knew this to be true deep in their hearts where they'd never admit it openly, but even I was surprised to find that numerous powerful Republicans believe this to be true on a LITERAL, UP-FRONT LEVEL: www.salon.com/news/feature/2009/07/21/c_street/ |
|
