Supplemental: Yglesias tells a discouraging tale!

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 20, 2015

Sadly, we think he’s correct:
Our years of effort with respect to Matthew Yglesias have finally begun to pay off.

At Vox, he tells a discouraging tale. Sadly, we think he’s on target.

Yglessias tells a gloomy tale about the Democratic Party’s big-picture prospects. Gloomily but correctly, Yglesias starts as shown below.

We include his gloomy headline:
YGLESIAS (10/19/15): Democrats are in denial. Their party is actually in deep trouble.

The Democratic Party is in much greater peril than its leaders or supporters recognize,
and it has no plan to save itself.

Yes, Barack Obama is taking a victory lap in his seventh year in office. Yes, Republicans can’t find a credible candidate to so much as run for speaker of the House. Yes, the GOP presidential field is led by a megalomaniacal reality TV star. All this is true—but rather than lay the foundation for enduring Democratic success, all it’s done is breed a wrongheaded atmosphere of complacence.
Let us quickly add one point. If you still think that the “megalomaniacal reality TV star” in question can’t get elected next November, you may be living inside that “wrongheaded atmosphere of complacence” Yglesias skillfully names.

In our view, Candidate Trump could beat Candidate Clinton next year. To us, that possibility became even clearer when we watched excerpts from Clinton’s speech in Alabama on the Maddow Show last night.

People who watch Maddow clown each night may not understand that fact. But then, the strongest point in Yglesias’ piece in his constant return to the liberal world’s “atmosphere of complacence.”

Yglesias stresses the weakness of Democratic performance and prospects on the state and local levels. We’ll suggest that you read his piece to review the discouraging numbers.

As Yglesias notes, liberals and Democrats have built-in disadvantages at all levels of American governance, except perhaps for the race for the White House. But so what? We keep telling ourselves pretty stories even about these obstacles.

No, Virginia! In the main, the built-in Republican tilt in the House isn’t caused by gerrymandering, which our side engages in too. But so what! If you read the Yglesias piece, you will see him return, again and again, to our tribe's fatal flaw:
YGLESIAS: In some ways, the Democrats' biggest disadvantage is simply their current smugness. A party that controls such a small share of elected offices around the country is a party that should be engaged in vigorous debate about how to improve its fortunes. Much of the current Republican infighting—embarrassing and counterproductive though it may be at times—reflects the healthy impulse to recognize that the party lacks the full measure of power that it desires, and needs to argue about optimal strategies for obtaining it.

On the Democratic side, the personal political success of Barack Obama has created an atmosphere of complacency and overconfidence. If a black guy with the middle name Hussein can win the White House, the thinking seems to be, then anything is possible. Consequently, the party is marching steadily to the left on its issue positions…even though existing issue positions seem incompatible with a House majority or any meaningful degree of success in state politics.
“If a black guy with the middle name Hussein can win the White House, then anything is possible?”

We’d better hope that’s true! Candidate Clinton may end up running with a guy named Castro! Our party can’t even catch a break when it comes to our leaders’ names!

At any rate, there was Yglesias, speaking about complacency, overconfidence and smugness again. These are the qualities we’ll be discussing all week in our own primary posts, which will largely concern our tribe’s fealty to the twin gods, Snark and Snide.

Snark and Snide—and their trusted pseudo-liberal companion, Moral Overconfidence.

By the end of his gloomy piece, Yglesias is gloomily picturing the liberal tribe hitting rock bottom. Dude is riding with Cassandra by the end of his piece:
YGLESIAS (continuing directly): Whatever you make of this agenda substantively, there's no way to actually enact it without first achieving a considerably higher level of down-ballot electoral success than Democrats currently enjoy.

But instead of a dialogue about how to obtain that success, Democrats are currently engaged in a slightly bizarre bidding war between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders to see whether Congress in 2017 will reject a legislative agenda that is somewhat to the left of Obama's or drastically to its left. The differences between them are real, of course, and at least somewhat important.

But the much more significant question facing the party isn't about the White House—it's about all the other offices in the land. The problem is that control of the presidency seems to have blinded progressive activists to the possibility of even having an argument about what to do about all of them. That will change if and when the GOP seizes the White House, too, and Democrats bottom out. But the truly striking thing is how close to bottom the party is already and how blind it seems to be to that fact.
Our tribe is complacent, smug and uncomprehending, Yglesias just keeps saying. “That will change if and when the GOP seizes the White House, too, and Democrats bottom out.”

Candidate Trump could win the White House next year. We’re not predicting that he will. But with every week that passes, it becomes more clear that he could.

In the meantime, if you doubt the claim that our self-adoring tribe is dumb and smug and complacent, just watch the ludicrous Maddow some night. As you drown in the silly campaign trivia, listen to Snark and Snide roar!

A tribe which tolerates clowning like hers is a tribe on its way to the bottom. On the brighter side, the money’s good for the tribe’s big stars.

The money’s good all the way down.

Isquith on Yglesias: Isquith thinks he’s on target too. To ruminate, just click here.

88 comments:

  1. Let me see.

    Hillary can lose to Trump because Democrats are smug. How do we know Democrats are smug? Because Somerby says so, and Yglesias agrees. Without providing a single scrap of real evidence beyond the fact that Democrats lose elections in "red" states.

    Meanwhile, we are supposed to believe that the alleged and unproven smugness of other Democrats that exists in the heads of Somerby and Yglesias will cost Hillary an election to the King of Smug?

    I guess Bob operates by the old "It's OK If You Are Republican" rule.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. No it is the Sam and Cokie rule: But the Democrats.....

      "No, Virginia! In the main, the built-in Republican tilt in the House isn’t caused by gerrymandering, which our side engages in too."

      Delete
    2. Irish, you were not supposed to believe anything. Do your own research and draw your own conclusions.

      Delete
  2. Burn both corporate parties to the ground.
    And replace them with a party for liberals.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. @2:29

      Or you could just move to Sanders favorite country, Demark. When can we expect your transplant to the land of liquorice beer?

      Delete
    2. Done.
      When will cicero rev up the time machine to the gilded age?

      Delete
    3. @10:31

      Bernie Sanders honeymooned in the Soviet Union in 1988. Sanders concept of the gilded age was before the fall of the Berlin Wall and Communism fail in Russia.

      Delete
    4. Ronald Reagan was President of the US in 1988. Maybe Sanders saw the writing on the wall that the GOP would be careening the nation back to the late 1800s.
      I know I did.

      Delete
    5. My dad took a vacation in USSR in 1989. He must be a freakin' commie!

      Delete
    6. If someone were a socialist and visited the Soviet Union in 1988, he would see first-hand the failures and pitfalls of taking socialism too far. That would be exactly the right person to implement democratic socialism in a way that avoided the flaws but maximized the strengths of economic change. Sort of like visiting the schools in Finland to pick up hints about what to do or not do in the USA.

      Delete
    7. @12:29

      Sanders should have read the writing on the west side of the Berlin Wall before honeymooning in Communist Yaroslavl. At least he finally figured it out after his visit. Do you still reminisce about living in the former Soviet Union than in the USA?

      "After receiving a rundown of central planning, Soviet-style, from Yaroslavl’s mayor, Alexander Riabkov, Sanders notes how the quality of both housing and health care in America appeared to be ‘significantly better’ than in the communist state. ‘However,’ he added, ‘the cost of both services is much, much, higher in the United States.’ "

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    8. @12:29

      Did you dad extoll the virtues of Castro, Chavez, Erich Honecker, and Daniel Ortega? If no, than he really has nothing in common with Sanders. Visiting countries that were behind the Iron Curtain doesn't make you a Communist. Bernie says he is a democratic socialist. Does your pop self describe his politics similarly?

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    9. "Bernie says he is a democratic socialist. Does your pop self describe his politics similarly?"

      Yeah, does your Dad care more about American citizens and not just the elites?

      Delete
  3. Biden takes page out of HRC playbook where being for/against something before they were for/against it is de rigueur for Dem POTUS candidates.

    "Joe Biden changes story on Osama bin Laden raid "

    "We walked out of the room and walked up stairs," Biden said. "I told him my opinion: I thought he should go, but to follow his own instincts."

    "The new account is a significant departure from what he said at a Democratic retreat in January 2012.

    "Mr. President, my suggestion is, 'Don't go,'" Biden said, according to an ABC News report from that time."


    http://www.cnn.com/2015/10/20/politics/joe-biden-osama-bin-laden-raid/

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. The Republican House will soon be for raising the debt ceiling, mere weeks after being against it.

      Delete
  4. Yes, in order to win the presidential election one must refrain from being smug. Trump could win next year.

    Cognitive dissonance

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Remember when our stupidity was going to guarantee President Walker?

      Ah, those were the good old days for Bob.

      Delete
    2. You left out the more recent President Rubio replacement.

      You become more Maddowesque in your misleading omissions
      ever day.

      Delete
    3. Bob's President Walker warnings remind me of the President Pawlenty predicitons and prediliction of Larry O'Donnell.

      Irish of a lace spin yarn together.

      Delete
  5. The sooner that Debbie Wasserman Schultz is replaced the better it will be for the Democratic party. The party needs, has needed, someone who understands what Bob and Yglesias say.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. @Horace

      DWS is noisome, shrill. and feckless. The perfect choice to represent the Democratic Party. Why get off a winner?

      Delete
    2. You shouldn't use words without knowing what they mean. Noisome doesn't mean noisy. It means smelly, something you cannot experience via the internet. Calling any woman smelly is the kind of crudeness we've come to expect from you.

      Delete
    3. @ 11:45

      Outside of the fact that noisome means disgusting, you shouldn't underestimate the power DWS's malodorous qualities. Did you imagine that libs had a monopoly on crudeness?

      Delete
    4. It doesn't mean disgusting. It means giving an unpleasant sensation, as in smelly. Look it up. If you didn't get your language skills from a thesaurus instead of reading, you would understand it is a poor word choice to apply to a human being. Because of that it makes you sound like more of a jerk than you probably are. It also identifies you as young. My advice is to put off your college entrance exams as long as possible and read a good book instead of trying to memorize word lists.

      Delete
    5. You comment identifies you as old.

      Words often associated with old: overused, banal. worn out, hackneyed, senile, Somerby.

      Delete
    6. "Calling any woman smelly is the kind of crudeness we've come to expect from you."

      That was an oily, oligeanous put down worthy of the blogger himself.

      Delete
    7. This comment has been removed by the author.

      Delete
    8. @9:40

      Words have more than one meaning. Follow your own advice and look it up. Since you are the product of the American public school system, I'll hasten your learning experience by providing the links.

      adjective noi·some \ˈnȯi-səm\

      : very unpleasant or disgusting

      http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/noisome

      Can you admit your fail that the use of noisome was not mistaken for noisy? The application of the word works in describing DWS as malodorous and or disgusting. No charge.

      Delete
    9. Nice try 9:40, but cicero is impervious to facts.

      Delete
    10. From Cicero's own dictionary of choice:

      "Full Definition of NOISOME


      1

      : noxious, harmful

      2

      a : offensive to the senses and especially to the sense of smell

      b : highly obnoxious or objectionable
      — noi·some·ly adverb

      — noi·some·ness noun


      See noisome defined for English-language learners 


      See noisome defined for kids"

      Here is the point Cicero ignores:

      Part of language is usage. People use this as a modifier only in certain contexts. When someone uses it in an odd context, as cicero did, it not only flags him as a beginning language user (or non-native speaker) but it comes across as odd or even inappropriate (as here).

      I can see complaining about a politician as shrill or weak and ineffectual (although feckless is another odd word choice for that), but noisome makes no sense, especially as the first word listed. It is the kind of mistake a computer would make in a program auto-generating poetry or a Turing test. Technically correct but very odd.

      So, what does that say about Cicero? I think he is a kid trying to sound intelligent by misusing his thesaurus -- but he got caught, just as he would be by any competent high school English teacher. I think we are arguing with a 14 year old who doesn't read books for pleasure but gets a kick out of interacting with adults in hostile ways -- is mommy too harsh about bedtime?

      Delete
    11. @1:06

      That's a lot of wasted bandwidth to admit you made a fool of yourself when that was apparent from your initial post. That DWS is the chair of the DNC is technically correct, but she is very odd.

      Delete
    12. You double down when you're wrong, just like Carly.

      Delete
  6. Three points:

    1. The Dem's electoral failures at the state level are why they have no ideal Presidential candidate. Hillary and Biden are somewhat too old. Bernic Sanders is much too old. (P.S. to Irishguy: Sanders was my classmate at the University of Chicago.)

    2. Media bias is a key. Barack Obama favorable degree of media treatment has been unprecedented, both as candidate and as President. I expect the next Democratic Presidential candidate to receive only the normal amount of favorable media bias. IMHO part of the smugness Yglesias talks about is overlooking just how extrordinary Mr. Obama's media treatment has been.

    3. Have the country and/or the parties moved left or right? Sanders and Hillary are campaigning as if the country moved left. IMHO the Democrats' policies moved left faster than the country did. Democrats passed ObamaCare and weakened America's military presence abroad. Furthermore, these radical changes don't seem to be working that all well. I think Republican successes at the state and local levels are reactions to these policies.

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  7. Yes, media bias is such an important key and the media has been so extraordinary and unprecented in its favoritism to Obama that both houses of Congress are in the hands of Republicans.

    And not just any Republicans, either.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. @3:42

      The main stream media, Hollywood, and as well as the preponderance of teachers, administrators and university faculty champion all things liberal. These combined efforts pulled out all the stops to get Obama elected, twice. Considering they double-crossed HRC in 08, they will swing in knotted ropes to rescue her from a Biden challenge.

      Delete
    2. I have no idea how you would know what a single member of a university faculty champions, let alone a preponderance.

      Delete
    3. cicero's facts:
      The mainstream media is run by corporations.
      These corporations, which rule all their businesses, only defer to the workers in the mainstream media industry (despite their propaganda microphone).
      Poore businesses, when will they ever learn.

      Now, you might look at the above and realize it's a bunch of nonsense, pushed by someone who is a liar, moron, or both.
      BTW, cicero says "both".

      Delete
    4. @10:36

      Did you really mean "poore" as in the Indian word for cunt?

      Instead of your usual 2nd verse same as the first, how about actually providing proof that corporation ownership of liberal media has affected the stories liberal media covers and reports with their usual liberal bias.

      Delete
    5. Ironically, Somerby has provided some of that proof, in his post on the homes of the MSNBC stars.

      Delete
    6. I liked the posts on Michael Moore and Al Gore's big houses myself.

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    7. @9:33 & 10:36

      Stories about the lifestyle of famous/infamous wealthy libs undermines liberal ideology? Even the Socialist Sanders has a net worth of over $750,000. Is that supposed to be a secret?

      Delete
    8. cicero was for successful businesses (like Hollywood), before he was against them.
      cicero would make a perfect Democratic Party Leader according to the "logic" some know-nothing dipshit named cicero used up-post.

      Delete
    9. If Michael Moore and Al Gore spent their time serving the interests of the plutocrats, their house sizes might matter.

      You focus on the house size and not the quid pro quo that has enabled those millionaire journalists to acquire wealth in exchange for keeping their readers/viewers ignorant (or worse, misled).

      Delete
    10. cicero at 12:46,
      Phil Donahue was fired by MSNBC, the liberal bogeyman of the (corporate-owned) mainstream media, because he questioned GWB's great Iraq clusterfuck despite the fact he had highest rated show on the network.

      BTW, are you still a supporter of GWB's great Iraq clusterfuck (because you're conservative who despises government waste--LOL) or have you changed your mind?

      *

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    11. I sometimes wonder what a world where conservatives were really against big government and wasteful spending would look like, but it's too big of a fantasy to really imagine.

      Delete
    12. I'm guessing even Stephen King doesn't have that strong an imagination.

      Delete
    13. @ 1: 06 & 1:29

      Odd. Why do libs despise the Tea Party contingent in the GOP even more than they do Bush 43? Are libs faking their animosity towards the TP because libs believe the TP isn't sincere? Ok.


      Some of their non-negotiable core beliefs:

      6. Government must be downsized.
      7. The national budget must be balanced
      8. Deficit spending must end.

      The global warmers sky is falling scenario provoked POTUS Obama to channel H.G. Wells.

      “I am here today to say that climate change constitutes a serious threat to global security, an immediate risk to our national security, and, make no mistake, it will impact how our military defends our country,” the president told graduates of the Coast Guard Academy.

      “And so we need to act, and we need to act now,” Obama urged graduating cadets.

      Delete
    14. @12:58

      More like sulking Phil was canned because of slipping ratings due to his rants and moonbat line up of liberal 9/11 truthers as well as the maneuvers of Chris Matthews. But MSNBC veered further to the left after Phil went back to "That Girl." The guy was on TV for nearly 30 years. He espoused only liberal ideology during that time on the air. How is it the corporate world kept renewing The Donahue Show all that time if his opinions threatened the corporate stranglehold of media?

      "Donahue's] show debuted with the highest ratings ever for an MSNBC program, attracting more than a million viewers in its first night. But within a month, the audience was cut in half. At the same time, executives expressed increasing unease about his vocal opposition to the looming war in Iraq. At a time when red-meat patriotism prevailed, Donahue booked antiwar guests like Michael Moore, Rosie O’Donnell, Susan Sarandon, and Tim Robbins. Soon the Donahue problem threatened Phil Griffin’s job.

      "Donahue’s problems only increased when Chris Matthews let it be known that he wanted Donahue off the air. Matthews was a rising force at the network, with a reported salary of $5 million. He cultivated former G.E. CEO Jack Welch and had the ear of NBC CEO Bob Wright (the two summered together on Nantucket). Matthews saw himself as MSNBC’s biggest star, and he was upset that the network was pumping significant resources into Donahue’s show. In the fall of 2002, U.S. News & World Report ran a gossip item that had Matthews saying over lunch in Washington that if Donahue stays on the air, he could bring down the network."

      Delete
    15. "...the Tea Party contingent in the GOP"

      cicero,
      Are you the last person on Earth to realize the Tea Party isn't a contingent of the GOP, but is actually the GOP itself?
      Talk about slow on the uptake.

      How are their non-negotiable core beliefs in any way different than GOP core beliefs dating back to 1980?
      (Hint: they aren't.)

      The "liberal" (Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha) media just agreed to call them the Tea Party and make believe they were somehow different than the GOP (despite them being the same people, funded by the same backers, with the same failed ideology).

      Delete
    16. @12:23

      If the Tea Party made up the lion's share of the GOP how is it that they back outsiders Trump & Carsen for POTUS while the power brokers of the GOP dismiss Trump as not a credible candidate?

      The liberal media is liberal whether you can bring yourself to acknowledge the fact or not. The Tea Party has been around for only 6 years. If the GOP was behaving the way the Tea Party demanded they do, why would they have created their political organization in 2009 to affect future state and federal elections? You should have some grasp of the facts rather than just posting Media Matters propaganda.

      Delete
    17. The Republican Party used to say they had those same non-negotiable core beliefs.

      I'm with cicero and his 100% agreement with liberals going back to the Reagan Revolution*. Republicans never believed any of the shit Reagan and the rest of the GOP were spouting for the past 30 years. cicero, like liberals, KNOW that.

      *That's what is fun about conservatives. Give them 30+ years and they'll come around to what liberals have been telling them for decades.
      I look forward to the year 2025, when conservatives admit the GOP never really cared about small business, and it was all just schtick.

      Delete
  8. I'm sorry. What does a blogger's ruminations about the state of the Democratic party have to do with the mainstream media?

    Did Yglesias lay any of the problems he outlined at the feet of the press? Does Somerby?

    And aside from suggesting the problem is stupidity and laziness, which are character problems of individuals which aren't exactly addressed through group solutions, what, other than "wake the F*&K Up!" are these two wise gentlemen proposing? The last time liberals woke up ( I believe they were somewhere in the woods when they did) Somerby seemed unhappy with the result.

    But Bob is not a journalist. He writes about journalism and critical thinking. So I look forward to a multi-part series in which Bob points out the way for the media to solve this problem,

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dude's allowed to have an opinion. But fact is, this IS media criticism - of the constructive kind. And anyone can be a journalist, douchebag.

      Delete
    2. According to most readers with an opinion (which they are entitled to have as dudes and dudettes) Bob is not a journalist. Your opinion differs. But fact is, this IS allowed. And any douchebag can be a journalist. Just not Bob.

      Delete
  9. When last Bob left youngish Matt Yglesias he was engaged in liberal samizdat!, a muffled account of astoundingly important events. This was the guy whose formative political event was the Presidential campaign of 2000 according to what he wrote about it for the first time in 2015.

    In between, I are sure Yglesias actually got involved in political campaigns as either a participant or a reporter covering them. Which is why he is so astute now that he wrote something Bob agrees with.

    Note to Bob readers. Bob once wrote a glowing account of Rachel Maddow a week before vowing to treat her with contempt. A vow he has kept for seven years.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Such erudition. You must love Maddow! Your passion is showing! Tell us how great she is. Is she on your side?

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    2. You must love Somerby! Most of his fans always think criticism of him implies support for someone he criticizes. Maddow for me was a convenient example of how quickly Somerby turns on those he praises.

      Delete
    3. how quickly Somerby turns on those he praises...

      ...but who can blame him when they produce laughable, awful work, as Maddow constantly does.

      Delete
    4. Yes, who can blame him when so much of his life is devoted to watching and writing about Rachel Maddow.

      Delete
    5. If Baby Bear Yglesias wrote nothing about the 2000 campaign
      for 15 years and Papa Bear Somerby wrote about nothing else, shouldn't their combined coverage be just right.

      Delete
  10. Isquith is in his fourth year out of Bard. Like many of the youngsters at Salon, he seemed completely clueless about this particular topic.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It would be interesting to hear either what evidences Isquith's supposed cluelessness, or how your "parody" is supposed to be remotely amusing.

      Wait. No, it wouldn't.

      Delete
    2. Isquith seemed completely unaware of the poisonous effect of the twin Gods, Snark and Snide—and their trusted pseudo-liberal companion, Moral Overconfidence.

      After repeating Yglesias he stated a generic complaint, labor is weak. And paid a generic compliment, Bernie Sanders is working on the problem.

      Delete
    3. Our guess, @ 9:01: your final sentence is part and parcel of all three elements, snark, snide, and moral overconfidence.

      Plug your ears you lazy, dumb liberal.

      Delete
  11. They made fun of GWB's speaking skills like he was stupid. Most of us liberals still don't get that Cheney as bad cop VP was genius and that together they got more done than anyone since LBJ. They totally rolled the Democrats, over and over.

    ReplyDelete

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    ReplyDelete
  13. Gerrymandering is a huge part of the GOP's House advantage. To take one example, NC. It is basically a 50/50 state with maybe a slight GOP edge. Our House delegation is 10-3 and will be no matter if we win the Congressional vote as we did in 2012, or lose it like we did in 2014. We would have to win the Congressional vote here by about 7 or 8 to get even a few more seats.

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  14. Oh, I agree. Dubya and Dick sure got a lot done.

    They turned record surpluses into record deficits in no time. They eroded civil liberties through warrantless wiretaps. They invaded a country totally without reason. They completely abandoned the hunt for Osama bin Laden. And they let their buddies on Wall Street run wild and nearly crash the world economy.

    And let's not forget the "heckuva" job they did in New Orleans and the rest of the Gulf coast.

    ReplyDelete
  15. Oh yeah, and there were also millions more people without jobs when they left office than when they came in.

    What a record!

    ReplyDelete

  16. When President Obama took office on Jan. 20, 2009, the total federal debt was $10,626,877,048,913.08.

    Now it's $18,152,809,942,589+

    Way to go POTUS Obama!

    But Obama did give order for SEALs to take out Bin Laden. Still not clear if VP Biden and Secretary HRC were for or against the mission.

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  17. Biden and Clinton both voted for the Iraq war. That is a measure of how thoroughly Bush and Cheney forced the hands of the Democrats. That is political dominance. They followed their vision and they rewarded their own, and the Democrats can only whine and not even admit that they got their asses handed to them. Come on! Damn progressives spend half their time knocking the Clintons down when they are the only ones that really know how to beat the Bushes.

    ReplyDelete
  18. Wow, that's an increase of just under 80%. Let's compare that to the Bush years. When W took office the debt was $5.8 trillion. When he left it was $10.6 trillion. Which was increase of over 80%..oops.

    Now let's compare deficits. When Obama took office he was handed the largest deficit in US history (thanks Bush!). That deficit has gone down every year since.

    Bush too was handed a deficit when he took office (a relatively mild one), what happened over the next 8 years?

    [humming the Jeopardy theme]



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  19. Mark C. Hillary has only won two elections in her life, running against no-name GOPers in strongly democratic NYS. She also lost a campaign against a one term senator with no name recognition in 2008.

    Why do you think she knows how to beat the "Bushes."

    Oh, and most democrats voted against the authorization for the Iraq war.

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  20. "They eroded civil liberties through warrantless wiretaps. They invaded a country totally without reason. "

    No fair. They only did these two things because the GOP are for small government and against wasteful spending.
    As far as cicero knows.

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  21. IIRC only 25 Democrats voted against the Iraq war "authorization." As presented, it was not to authorize war but to place war on the table in order to strengthen Bush's hand during negotiations. He was supposed to exhaust all diplomatic approaches with war as a last resort. Bush's bad faith was that he had no interest in negotiating and planned war from the outset, something he did not tell Congress. The mistake was to trust that Bush didn't want war -- we are all wiser now.

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  22. 12:54. Actually there were 21 Dem nays in the senate and and 29 yeas. In the house there were 126 Dem nays and 82 yeas.

    The dems voted "nay" by an enormous margin.

    ReplyDelete
  23. @12:54

    Try reading the action resolution. It most definitely gave Bush 43 the go ahead to use the U.S. armed forces in Iraq. Or did you imagine HRC though the military were going to Iraq to spread the word of Noam Chomsky?

    H.J.Res. 114 (107th): Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution of 2002

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  24. @1:08

    And included in the 21 Dems that voted YEA were both of Obama's Secretary of State and his Vice President. The YEA vote certainly put you in good stead with Obama.

    ReplyDelete
  25. @12:44 I give people credit for their experience and that includes family experience.
    GWB was deeply involved in his father's presidency, and HRC was even more deeply involved in her husband's. She knows how to handle the media or else she would never have survived this long. She is far cooler than people give her credit for.
    GWB has about 4 generations of dealing with power politics. He knows more about economics and political power at a far deeper level than your normal person does. This would be true of any occupation-a 4th generation farmer means alot for example.
    Likewise, HRC was a partner with Bill Clinton from very early on. She knows politics. She knows southern politics. Like GWB, she has been in the White House, she knows how it works.
    Another thing for me is-if it should be necessary,Hilary could easily out-trump Trump. Culturally, she is a huge. She'll make him look like nothing.

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  26. cicero,
    Since we are on the "the other side is just as bad" trip, remember when GWB made Condaleeza Rice his Sec. of State after she lied to the 911* Commission?
    Good times!

    You remember 9/11, don't you? I know it wasn't as big a deal as Benghazi, due to conservative math (i.e. 4 deaths >>>2900+ deaths), but it was in all the papers--probably due to that damn "liberal" media.

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  27. @2:55

    "Yes, George W. Bush received a Presidential Daily Brief on Aug. 6, 2001, and yes, that brief was headlined, "Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S." But Rice and other administration officials have long maintained that no one could have predicted that terrorists would hijack a plane and try to use it as a weapon. "I don't think anybody could have predicted . . . that they would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile," Rice said at a press briefing in May 2002.

    Well, that's not quite true. Someone could have predicted it, and someone actually did. As we mentioned last night, today's New York Times brings news of a previously undisclosed report from the 9/11 Commission. According to the Times, the report says that the Federal Aviation Administration "had indeed considered the possibility that terrorists would hijack a plane and use it as a weapon," and that it actually warned U.S. airports in 2001 that terrorists might hijack an airplane in order to "commit suicide in a spectacular explosion."

    FDR was warned about a possible Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Do you blame him for the 2,117 American dead that day or the Japanese?

    If only Bush 43 and Dr. Rice could have blamed 9/11 on a video.

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  28. cicero,
    I noticed you didn't mention Ms. Rice's Grade Point Average at Stanford in your reply. Too bad, because that could have been another point that had nothing to do with her lying to the 9/11 Commission.
    Her lie wasn't that she sid no one could imagine when they certainly did.
    It was this lie to the 91 Commission.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdwRiihwhpk

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  29. And let's not lose sight of the fact that Bush made her his Secretary of State after she lied to the Commission looking into 9/11.
    Maybe because, like Benghazi, 9/11 isn't really important.

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  30. I, for one, appreciate the GOP exploiting the deaths of 4 Americans rather than 2900 Americans, for political gain.

    Who says I'm so tribal I can't say anything nice about the GOP?

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  31. @12:53

    In case you misssed the actual scandal of Benghazi, it was HRC and POTUS Obama manufacting the reason why 4 American were killed for political agrandizment instead of being truthful with the American people. All doubt was removed when HRC's email to Chelsea and the Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Kandil was revealed during HRC's testimony to committe Thursday.

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  32. The 'actual scandal of Benghazi" is the GOP showing they don't mind pissing on American dead bodies, if it means they can pass more tax cuts for the elites.

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