COLLECTIVE MADNESS


“Soft despotism is a term coined by Alexis de Tocqueville describing the state into which a country overrun by "a network of small complicated rules" might degrade. Soft despotism is different from despotism (also called 'hard despotism') in the sense that it is not obvious to the people."

Tuesday, January 08, 2008

Did the Inarticulator Do In Hillary?


Everything in life is context. Singular events happen and they do so as a result of the times or in a manner that changes them. JFK followed a tired and gray Dwight Eisenhower. Eisenhower was a great war time general and an adequate and competent President. He was not a good speaker. A young, handsome and witty, glib and polished, New Englander made a sharp contrast to old Ike. JFK glittered against the dull grayness of Eisenhower.

In an odd twist, Hillary is bedeviled by the stumbling prose of GWB. Had Bush been a fine speaker and governed the same, Obama's coinage would not appear to be so bright.

Could fate be so cruel that Hillary's context in time tripped her presidential ambitions on the twisted syntax and garble of George W. Bush? Cruelty and irony often shine in politics and Obama may very well bling his way to the Oval Office and that would be unfortunate for Clinton, Obama and us.

I hope Hillary fights on and has the mettle to take on Obama, not because I want her to win, but because I want either Obama or Hillary to be the best candidate to face the best Republican. That is our system like it or not.

A Candidacy's Prose and Cons

By E. J. Dionne Jr. Washington Post
Tuesday, January 8, 2008; Page A19

CONCORD, N.H. -- Hillary Clinton may have unintentionally written the obituary for the Iowa and New Hampshire phase of her presidential campaign, and perhaps her candidacy, when she told voters on Sunday: "You campaign in poetry, but you govern in prose."

Clinton has not heeded her own lesson. She is campaigning in prose and has left the poetry to Barack Obama. She has answers to hard policy questions, but he has the one answer that voters are hungering for: He offers himself as the vehicle for creating a new political movement that will break the country out of a sour, reactionary political era.

The most telling laugh line in Obama's stump speech is his description of the dreadful charge his opponents make against him. "Obama's talking about hope again," the candidate says, mimicking his foes. Then his tenor drops to a low, conspiratorial pitch: "He's a hope monger." His audiences roar.

There is a certain melancholy in watching Clinton do battle. Obviously aware that the bottom is falling out from under her, she choked up Monday during her last day of campaigning here. By way of proving her tenacity and the depth of her policy knowledge, she has subjected herself to unremitting rounds of questions from voters about every issue from health care to global warming.

Clinton knows her stuff and would pass the most rigorous test available under any "No Policy Left Behind" program for politicians. If we chose a president by examination rather than election, she would win. In Hampton on Sunday night, Maggie Wood Hassan, a prominent state senator, said of Clinton's savvy on health care: "There isn't a single piece of the puzzle she hasn't figured out." True, but voters right now are not thinking about intricate puzzles.

There is compassion in Clinton's wonkiness. At a rally in Penacook on Saturday, she spoke with energy about the struggles of foster parents and the suffering of foster children. She pledged to make their problems a priority of her presidency, even if there are no headlines in it. She sounded absolutely believable.

Yet if Clinton's answers come off as well-intended lectures, Obama is offering soaring sermons and generational opportunity. In 1960, the articulate Adlai Stevenson compared his own oratory unfavorably with John F. Kennedy's. "Do you remember," Stevenson said, "that in classical times when Cicero had finished speaking, the people said, 'How well he spoke,' but when Demosthenes had finished speaking, the people said, 'Let us march.' " At this hour, Obama is the Democrats' Demosthenes.

It is no accident that the two best preachers on the trail, Obama and Republican Mike Huckabee, broke through in Iowa -- even if Huckabee's prospects here and in the long run are dimmer than Obama's. And it has to be painful for Bill and Hillary Clinton, who saw themselves 16 years ago as the heirs to John and Robert Kennedy, to watch Obama march off as the champion of a vast band of young and practical idealists.

The Clinton campaign is rooted in the idea that "Experience Counts" -- ironically enough, Richard Nixon's slogan against John Kennedy in 1960. But it is Obama who may have precisely the right experience for the mood of the moment. As a community organizer early in his professional life, Obama understood his task as catalyzing citizens into building movements for change. Obama's speeches are about citizen action, assembling coalitions, forcing change through popular demand.

"I'm betting on you," Obama told a rapturous audience in Derry on Sunday afternoon. "I don't believe change comes from the top down. It comes from the bottom up." Change will come "if you believe," Obama declares.

"When you've got a working majority behind you," he says at another point, "you can't be stopped." Transformation is not about policy details but about altering the political and social calculus. Obama presents himself, in one of Karl Rove's favorite phrases, as a game-changer.

If Obama seems to have history's winds at his back, Clinton is carrying history's burdens. In trying to push her way back into the contest by Feb. 5, when nearly two dozen states vote, Clinton would have to press her sober case that, as good as Obama sounds, she's the one who is vetted and tested. "If you want to know which kind of change we will make," she pleaded to her Sunday night crowd, "look at what we've already done."

Here again, the echoes of the past are eerie. It was Hubert Humphrey, on the aging side of the generational divide in 1968, who declared: "Some people talk about change, others cause it." Hubert Humphrey was a great man. He did not become president.


103 comments:

  1. "In an odd twist, Hillary is bedeviled by the stumbling prose of GWB. Had Bush been a fine speaker and governed the same, Obama's coinage would not appear to be so bright."

    If Carter had not sucked so bad...

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  2. Had Bush not sucked so bad...

    Far worse that his prose was his corrupt politics and non-leadership.

    Pubs must run with a history of two terms worth of non-conservative stands, profligate spending, foolish presidential meddling in the war, and outlaw behavior and total disregard for his electorate wrt "immigration."

    Gee, maybe Obama should run on CHANGE?

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  3. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that Senator Barack Obama has opened a ten-percentage point victory over former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, 47% to 37% A
    month ago, they were tied at 43%.

    The survey also found Obama with a six-point lead over Mitt Romney, 45% to 39%. That’s a slight improvement for Obama who led Romney by four points a month ago.
    The numbers for the Obama-Giuliani match-up mark a significant change in the race. Prior to this latest poll, the candidates had been within two points of each other for four straight polls. (see trends and polling history).

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  4. Glenn Beck's Nightmare
    Hospitals Gone Bad.
    He could EASILY have died.
    My last stay in the Hospital (first here, as a matter of fact) was the exact opposite.
    They put him on a deadly cocktail of pain killers. Percocet alone makes both the wife and I sick.
    The original is almost Always the best:
    Moriphine!
    All I had to do was bitch enough, and they gave me enough for the pain, with the added benefit of getting a lot of sleep.
    I should write a letter of thanks, after reading Beck's alternate Universe Experience.
    Beck says the President of GE goes to that Hospital!
    Hard to imagine he'd be ignored while on the verge of Death! Glenn was.
    Wish he'd tell us what the operation was for.

    ReplyDelete
  5. He did tell yesterday morning, first thing, right off the bat to start the show off...it was 'roids surgery.

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  6. The only conclusion I have come to so far is that Obama is an empty suit. AQ has stepped it up in Iraq,
    pakistan and Afghanistan. We almost had an incident in Iran, so there is a good chance some external event will affect who people choose.

    Obama was involved is a slimy real estate deal in Chicago, he was a drug user and he has not demonstrated that he is qualified to be President. That people are all swarming to him does not surprise me.

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  7. Yeah, Druggie in Paradise.
    Wonder if he ever got his arse kicked here?
    Probly stuck with his rich kids at the private school so maybe not.
    Young Blacks have it pretty rough here, not from Haoles, but Tongans, Samoans, and Hawaiians.
    Our son's roommate is Half-Black like Barry, and he recently had a Samoan try to mix it up w/him.
    A Black kid from the Mainland came over for an intern program where son works, and son had to bail him out of Jail after HE got beat to shit by some Tongans!
    Son said it was obvious cops were prejudiced, but luckily he's the ultimate politician (or ass-kisser as the General where he works says!) so he got the kid out.
    Heck of an Aloha!
    Other than that, the kid had a good time, son said the kid ignored or didn't know well enough the Golden Rule in Hawaii:
    Don't Mess w/Tongans,
    ESP if you are Black!

    ReplyDelete
  8. I downplayed W's Drug problem when he was running, figured it was in the past.
    Now obvious that people that spent that same amount of time he did on Alcohol dealing with the real world obviously are more grounded, on average.
    We'd probly be better off if he was still on the bottle!
    How could it be worse than that arrogant, elitist, Tranzi A-Hole?

    ReplyDelete
  9. Born Again,
    Boner to the Bone.

    ReplyDelete
  10. 12 Weeks of burning A-Hole?
    Can't be good!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Most addicts have personalities that transfer addictions. Barack was a heavy chain smoke until a few months ago, probably still is.

    ReplyDelete
  12. The Real Story
    It's the story that everyone is trying to bury. It's the story that everyone is trying to spin. It's the story that the media doesn't want you to know.

    It's The Real Story:

    Open Borders, Big Profits
    In the last chapter of my new book "An Inconvenient Book" I basically make the case that special interest groups and big business are now in control of our immigration policy. I've been called crazy for believing that -- some even say it's nothing but a conspiracy theory -- but the Real Story is that I can now offer you an iron-clad, concrete example of exactly how the whole cycle works.

    Consider Western Union, the place where you used to go when you desperately needed your parents to wire you some cash. Well, believe it or not, a major portion of their billion dollar business is dependent on illegal immigration -- or, as they put it, "global migration." One study says that at least 40 percent of the Latin Americans who use money transfer companies like Western Union are illegal immigrants -- and these companies know it and they are exploiting it. Back in 1999, Western Union actually sponsored a lunch for detained illegal immigrants. They gave them t-shirts and bandanas and fliers, all with their 800 number on it. In fact, the second an illegal alien walks out of a detention facility these days, they're likely going to receive a marketing pitch from Western Union.

    Since any new laws, or, heaven forbid, fences would hurt their business, Western Union has taken up quite an interest in politics. They've donated thousands to groups that support open borders and pathways to citizenship and they oppose politicians who get in their way.
    --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    The Real Story Archive...

    ReplyDelete
  13. Yeah,
    I'm addicted to a F..... Place called the
    "Elephant Bar"

    Go Figure!

    ReplyDelete
  14. GLENN:
    Did you run into a lack of compassion at all in your experience in the healthcare system?

    GRACE: I did. Overall, well, especially when I was in the hospital up here in New York. You know, New York, the capital of the world, I thought everything would be top notch. It was not that way at all. In fact, frankly I credit the Northside hospital doctors for saving my life and the life of Lucy and John David. Yeah, I ran up against the very same thing you did.

    GLENN: You know what's amazing, Nancy, is I mean, that's where you're on the front lines of the immigration debate. It's almost like welcome to America; clean up this vomit. And to find somebody who spoke English without an accent was almost impossible.
    ---
    Here they have accents, but since illegals are just starting to move in, the accent does not equal incompetence, or worse.
    Just one of the local varieties.

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  15. Romney has a slight edge among Republicans who will participate but McCain leads by eleven among Independents. The final result will be determined primarily by how many Independent voters choose to take part in the GOP Primary. The higher that number, the better for McCain. A smaller percentage of Independents would be better for Romney.

    Ideologically, Romney leads by seven among conservatives but trails by nearly twenty points among political moderates.

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  16. New Hampshire "Moderates" = Liberals.

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  17. Accents, that's the Standard?
    Mind of Mencia -
    "Seven days to wetback English".

    You can learn to get a yob, too.

    Celebration that "omprehensive reform" failed.

    The Federals granting defacto amnesty, instead. Still no fence.
    There it is, in a nutshell.

    Against Obama and his "personal story" well that's an interesting matchup.
    McCain cannpt take him into the mud, they both have poor ethics and history of drug use or influence peddling about drug use.
    Corruption, Keating Five swamps buying ten feet of an ajoining lot in Obama's subdivision.

    Rudy is mobbed up, or can be made to appear so.

    Thompson has a K Street history, that does not spell change or hope.

    Mr Hunter, it's been decided, he is outside the lines of "serious"

    Ron Paul, it's been decided, he is outside the lines of "serious"

    Romney, is not a vote getter, is not a persuasive speaker, but appears as a snake oil salesman. Religion evens out, but to Obama's ultimate advantage, perhaps.

    That leaves the Huckster, as competitive. He though has got a dog skeleton in his sons' closet.

    The US swings like a penduleum do.

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  18. the good news for those of us "scoop jackson" dems?

    gays, blacks and college kids dont show up in November when it counts....

    Billary finally started to fight back, and the convention will be interesting...

    As for the iowa & NH, the results MIGHT have a backlash against to all the more "old school" states, this MAY scare the old folks, the democratic aarper's, to vote for billery....

    personally i think obama is a distraction... and will not last...

    just watch the world for the winds...

    as the world heats up, the more serious politicians will rise in popularity...

    today:

    hezbollah fired rockets into northern israel

    hamas used a man and women "couple" to attack an israel crossign

    iran: swift boat mock attack

    iran: no sanctions and iran is collecting nuke fuel

    china: lead paint, riots, layoffs & massive anger at fuel prices

    darfur & africa, as fuel prices rise, america exports less corn, thus bio-genocide claims (really opec's fault but who's counting)

    we have MONTHS of shit to sift through before we even get to the convention. Let alone the November election...

    I predict...

    Iran explosions

    Gaza explosions

    France explosions

    yep, last summer is going to be a tea party vrs this summer...

    hezbollah is rearmed and back on the southern border and is pissy...

    syria is pissy

    alqueda is pissy

    black rockers in spain, france, german are pissy

    pakis are pissy

    palios are pissy

    lol

    tons o fun...

    obama?

    what a fucking joke

    ReplyDelete
  19. Winter tornados in Arkansas!

    God or Gaia sending a message

    Wonder what it is?

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  20. The other side of that coin, wi"o"
    Bush goes to Israel, finds the "Peace Process" alive and moving forward. For US consumption, anyway

    Rocket attacks, ignored as without military signifigance, as the Iraq insurgency was.

    Iran, to tough to mess with, as exemplifed by those "fast boats". The US doing anything to avoid admission of provocation.

    If Israel is held to defensive lines, there is no war, there. Without Israel pre-emtion of aggression there is no signifigance to the attacks. Not in the US.
    No US arms shipment, no Israeli advance

    Our 2 million man mussulman Army prohibits offence to Islam, or we lose our allied proxies.
    Defacto failure of US policy that the US will not let happen, in the US media markets.

    If we do not admit it, it didn't happen. Gulf of Tonkin, in reverse.

    ReplyDelete
  21. "gays, blacks and college kids dont show up in November when it counts...."
    ---
    Good luck WIO (and the rest of us)
    Obamamania Conquers All!

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  22. Obama wins in New Hampshire, Michigan and South Carolina

    Then Florida, which could go to Billery

    Then Super Tuesday.
    She wins New York, they split California.
    The other States, Obama ekes out an advantage.

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  23. If they care enough to caucus or vote in the Primary, they'll come out to vote in November.

    Can Team Taft deliver Ohio for whomever the GOP puts forward?

    JFKerry had the second largest turnout in Ohio history, beaten only by Team Taft in 2004.
    How has Team Taft fared since then, wi"o", does Team Taft still have their mojo?

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  24. "If they care enough to caucus"
    ---
    Democrat Caucus took
    ALL FRIGGING DAY!

    ReplyDelete
  25. (Working Stiffs ain't got time or inclination.)

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  26. The first election won by groupies.
    (after W, of course)
    At least he's not a Patrician Boner Groupie Magnet.

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  27. They cared, doug
    In droves, they cared about the United States. Doing what they've been taught to do, take part in the process.

    Same as in football, if your team needs someone else to lose, to make it to the playoffs, your team is not a long term winner.
    Just marginally in the middle

    If France explodes, everyone that ate a "Freedon Fry" will cheer.
    Not bemoan that there was a blast.

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  28. Blogger 2164th said...

    The only conclusion I have come to so far is that Obama is an empty suit.


    I wonder if this is true. What led you to this conclusion? With Bush, when he was first running for President I came to the conclusion he was and empty suit. There was so much evidence to support it: from his failures in business to how and what he spoke. He had that corporate I'll run the presidency like a business. We were supposed to be reassured that he was surrounded by experience. Unfortunately, he is the decider and if he was presented with good advice he chose the bad.

    When I look at Obama I don't see the same indicators. He thinks on his feet, he gives speeches without notes. He seems like an intelligent guy who, hopefully, will select the good advice offered to him.

    Again, what led you to believe he is an empty suit?

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  29. Those that do not make the time, because they do not have the inclination, most likely to stay home, in November.

    Didn't care in the Primary, won't like the options in November.
    Most folk do not go to the polls to vote against a candidate as go to vote for one.

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  30. Barry confirms who they are.

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  31. The fruits of the labor.

    Been a long comin'

    The penduleum swings.

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  32. "Unfortunately, he is the decider and if he was presented with good advice he chose the bad."
    ---
    For once I agree w/Ash!
    And thanks again for that NYTimes Video on Bush/Wolfowitz vs Garner.

    Maybe someday Trish will admit the truth.
    ...don't hold your breath.

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  33. Like Ms Shearer, color blind.

    Their greatest failing, "to nice"

    Ms Shearer, from her profile, bet she did know that she was English and McCuin was Irish.

    Mortal foes by genealogy & heritage
    But not when you're born in the USA

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  34. doug,

    I'm glad I could come up with something you found interesting and useful.

    I still marvel at all the movies and how easy they are to view at that site you linked. Bit torrents ability to spread the distribution cost out makes sense to me. How a site like that can operate has me flummoxed.

    That is the future for TV on the web - free. We all want it for free and the web makes it possible. the owners of the copyrighted material are going to have to cope and develop a business model acknowledging that. I think they should migrate back to the future. Just like back in the day when they erected transmission towers and we mortals bent coat hangers and other suitable materials to suck in the signal paid for by the advertisers so too will the future evolve. Make the shows, put ads in them, and unleash the torrent on the world.

    ReplyDelete
  35. **all information yearns to be free**

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  36. Watched the Giuliani interview with Roger Simon and Claudia Rosett of Pajamas Media last night. Mike Huckbbe didn't even register on Giuliani's radar. Giuliani will outfox them all. My intuition tells me he's going to be President.

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  37. "He thinks on his feet, he gives speeches without notes. He seems like an intelligent guy.."

    My experience with this type is very different. Not that they're unintelligent, but they only know how to monkey rhetoric and superficialities. They lack the ability to discern deeper currents.

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  38. well, he seems to have nailed a deeper current, the desire for change, for hope.

    ReplyDelete
  39. 1/ It wasn't him.
    2/ That's not the deeper current.
    3/ My name isn't Doug.

    ReplyDelete
  40. Deliverance:
    Drowning the river..
    http://quicksilverscreen.com/watch?video=20640

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  41. CES 2008: Mitsubishi's 50" Laser TV Changes the High-Definition Game

    http://blog.wired.com/gadgets/2008/01/ces-2008-mitsub.html

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  42. I knew it was Bush's fault.

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  43. Who is the Party's chosen successor to Mr Bush, rufus?

    One of the primary duties of any leader is to plan, or at least take the lead in, the succession process.

    Especially true in the "corporate management" style that Mr Bush expoused.

    Where is the heir appearant?

    That there is not one, a failure of the Party leadership, who is the Party's leader?

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  44. Mr Bush has purposefully abdicated that leadership responsibility.

    Just as he purposefully abdicated action on border security

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  45. Mr Bush on 20 December, 2007 confirming the abdication of responsiblity to his Party and its' future

    Q I understand you do not want to discuss the presidential campaign --

    THE PRESIDENT: That's true --


    Q -- let me ask you a question about --

    THE PRESIDENT: -- so, therefore, why don't you ask me about the presidential campaign, I'll confirm it.

    Q Let me ask you about all presidential campaigns --

    THE PRESIDENT: Sure. (Laughter.)

    Q You've been in office for seven years now. You must have some pretty strong opinions about what it takes to sit in the Oval Office. What is important to you? Is experience in government important? Are a candidate's religious views important to you?

    THE PRESIDENT: It's a good attempt to get me in the race. (Laughter.)

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  46. hey, now there's an idea - one way the 'pubs have of stopping Obama is to get Bush to endorse him.

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  47. If there's a big turnout, and the headline says 'out of ballot' on the dem side, does that mean all the independents are voting for Obama, and its good for Romney on the Republican side? Any exit polls?

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  48. First, he'll need to beat Billary. You think he can do it, Ash?

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  49. The little town, bob, went for McCain & Obama at midnight. Don't mean nothin', though.

    If all the independents go for the Democrat primary, that'd be good for Romney. Pre-polling had it breaking at a 60% Dem - 40% GOP. We shall see, what we will see.

    If all the Indis go Democrat, that's really bad news for the GOP.
    No matter which GOPer wins, today.

    All Mr Bush had to do, ash, was select a viable candidate for VP in 2004, historicly, that's how succession is decided.

    Bush abdicated early and has stuck to his guns, on GOP succession.

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  50. Hillary ought to start an independent 'Woman's Party', run on that:)

    I lie awake at night and think about Hillary. This is about our country, our children, ourselves. Our future together.

    ReplyDelete
  51. You forgot the pizza, bob.

    Pizza is important to the people

    Thank you, all.

    ReplyDelete
  52. Ed Koch turns to Prayer still hoping for a Clinton/Obama ticket

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  53. "Ed Koch is an intelligent and caring person. His opinions are and always have been benchmarks for many decision makers."

    ReplyDelete
  54. yes, Mat, I definitely think Obama will beat Hillary (I think the same dynamic that front runner Michael Ignatieff encountered in the Liberal leadership race is Hillary's lot - she has a committed bunch supporting her but she is no ones second choice). I think Obama will win the presidency as well. Of course events and skeletons have a habit of changing the course of politics but my reading of the tea leaves and entrails is that Obama is going all the way.

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  55. Ed talked me into voting for Bush.

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  56. That's what I like to hear. Good.

    ReplyDelete
  57. A daughter's death, Guatemala's grim legacy

    "The death of Maria Isabel Franco is still talked about in Guatemala. In some ways it has come to symbolize the escalation in violence against women in the country. Last year, 591 women were slain, only 13 fewer than the previous year. That's the official figure. It doesn't include deaths that weren't reported or the deaths of women who died in hospital from injuries sustained in violent assaults.

    Human-rights organizations believe the real number of women who met a violent end last year is closer to 1,000.

    According to police, more than 80 per cent of the women were killed by firearms and others by knives or blunt objects. About 35 per cent of the cases were described as entailing "extreme violence" that was preceded by torture and strangling and, in more than 43 per cent of cases, rape. The last murders of women in 2007 included a woman who was five months pregnant.

    In 2002, the number of women murdered was 317. It rose to 383 the following year and to 497 the year after that. In 2005, it jumped slightly to 518.

    They have a name for the attacks on women here: femicide.

    Diana Russell, an American academic who coined the term more than 30 years ago, said violence against women in Guatemala and elsewhere in Central America is a "historical phenomenon that endures to perpetuate masculine power in a patriarchal society.""


    Should we mimic the analysis of many and arrive at the conclusion that Catholicism is the problem?

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  58. Is that your sales pitch, Ash? Killed in the name of Christ.

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  59. nope, the point is that there is a better slant then 'Islam is the problem'.

    ReplyDelete
  60. a "historical phenomenon that endures to perpetuate masculine power in a patriarchal society.""

    Good description of islam, if you ask me.

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  61. yes, bobal, those elements exist in many Islamic countries as well.

    Mats, one may believe that Jews are better then Christians, Muslims better then Jews, men better then women, but the problem primarily lies with those who kill comfortable in the righteousness of their beliefs.

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  62. May the most righteous killer win. Why is that a problem, Ash?

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  63. Because most claims to righteousness are ill founded. Defending oneself is fine but attacking with righteous vigor is not. America is better then Iraq but that does not justify America attacking Iraq.

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  64. "I'd sure like to know what Trish uses for a standard of comparision, cause if it's Trish..."

    Oh, heavens no. Trish is not a professional intellectual, only playing the bit amateur in her own home.

    "Pompous," you say?

    I get that a lot. Inoperable congenital defect.

    ReplyDelete
  65. WIO is whistling past the graveyard.

    Some of the best campaign blogging, from an admittedly Dem POV, is over at Talkingpointsmemo. FWIW.

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  66. "Because most claims to righteousness are ill founded."

    As I said, may the most righteous killer win. Why is that a problem, Ash?

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  67. "...foolish presidential meddling in the war..."

    I think that's called being Commander in Chief, Doug.

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  68. Since we are short on pipelines to an omniscient overseer who can adjudicate competing claims to the degree of righteousness then we are stuck with a human style of deciding things.

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  69. Guatemala had the highest murder rate in all of Latin America, with 70 homicides per 100,000 population

    Population:
    12,728,111 or 128 blocs of 100,000 which means that there were 8,890 murders, of which 518 were women.

    Does not sound like a epidemic of Femicide when there 8,372 men murdered or 16 times the number of women murdered.

    This in a country where there are:
    0.974 male(s)/female

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  70. There you go, Ash.

    We don't pipelines to an omniscient overseer, because we are the pipelines as we are omniscient overseer.

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  71. good point DR. Have you similar numbers for Muslim countries?

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  72. Not without research, gotta use the CIA factbook for population, gender ratios or religious denomination sizes and then find the murder rates independent of the CIA.

    They don't put that info in the CIA's public data base.

    Then believe that the murder rate numbers are reasonably accurate, which in many countries ...

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  73. which brings us full circle mat to each group trumpeting the righteousness of their cause and the really problematic ones are those so righteous that they feel they are entitled to kill others to perpetuate their world view.

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  74. Ash,

    Now that your "Islam is not the problem" sales pitch has lost its sparkle, can we now kill the Islamers?

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  75. It's those Irish cannibals, in Texas, that are the real problem.

    The threat to my young daughter
    The one close to home

    Not some idle threat, half a world away

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  76. If "we" is you and yours, mat, do as you wish.

    Gotta cut the strings and then refuse those easy table dancing sheckals, though.

    ReplyDelete
  77. dRat,

    I'd like to pump 20 rats out of her vagina. You wont mind, right?

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  78. A few years ago, I asked trupeers about the leftist love of victims. He gave me some reading suggestions, which I unfortunately never got to. Nonetheless, after a couple courses with a 'human rights activist' and some other reading I came to at least two motivations. First, was the rise of the intentional social deconstructivisists, personified by the writings of Antonio Gramsci and the eventual counter-culture movement. Above all, they hated modern society and aimed to tear it down (some wanted to remake it, others hadn't thought that far). Anyone who they could convince was marginalized was a footsoldier in that struggle.

    The second was this idea that if only everyone was nihilistic towards the benefits of their society, noone would lift a finger against anyone else. The solution was to bury everyone in collective guilt and cynicism. Tell them about how awful their institutions, history, and ideals were. This was especially true and necessary for those societies that had the most to be confident about.

    The irony of all this is that it comes from what is generally itself, a personally and collectively self-righteous group of crusaders, with their own hsitorical predilection for violence.

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  79. Come on by
    You could well die.

    Other than that, handle your problems yourself.

    Don't look for US to pull your nuts from the fire.

    Don't want to piss off any of the soldiers in our 2 million mussulman Army, that we've spent six years building.

    All our real allies, those that carry guns, in the interests of US.

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  81. Video of the Iranian Navy

    Midgets exemplified.

    To funny, to be so afraid of five 22' speed boats.

    Be afraid, so very afraid.

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  82. The wake boarders could be carrying pistols.

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  83. Now, dRat, let's not take it personally.
    Arabian horses. I hear they make good stallions.

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  84. they may be midgets wakeboarding but what could be in the boxes? A little late for Christmas.

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  85. mat was saying there are numerous Jewish New Years, ash, possibly a gift for one of them, I'm sure.

    Geld those Arabians, mat.
    We take their balls, then deep fry 'em.

    Umm umm good.

    But that's a bit much for the sons of Abraham, aye? Oh, that's right, all you guys are the sons of Abraham.

    Family Feud, you better call Richard Dawson. Then he can decide who wins, he has the answers, knows what the survey says.

    Any bets on what Mr Olmert gives up, when the puppetmaster arrives?
    The Golan Heights or those houses they were going to build in Jerusalem?

    Which is more important to Israel, it'll be one or the other.
    Those other illegal West Bank settlements, Olmert has already folded on. Gotta get on the Peace Train, it's rollin' down the Road Map.

    Depending upon the US Federals, we've got at a minimum, 2 million illegal alien felons in the US, and they will not help round 'em up and deport them.

    Not an issue for the Federals, to get those guys or seal the frontier. In the country of the Federals primary responsibility. Israel has made itself dependent upon that group for its' future.

    I bet they give up on those planned houses in Jerusalem.

    Funny stuff.

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  86. Ezekiel 25:17

    The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the inequities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he who, in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of the darkness. For he is truly his brother's keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know I am the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon you.

    :)

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  87. And you fact check that with Billary. :)

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  88. Hell, that's the quote from "Pulp Fiction"

    Got nothin' to do with rightousness.

    Just a nifty thing to say,
    before you kill 'em.

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  89. Countrywide stock plunges
    The struggling Calabasas-based mortgage lender says there is no truth to rumors that it plans to file for bankruptcy protection.

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  91. WIO is whistling past the graveyard.

    which graveyard?



    as for dr's constant denial about islam/arab cult of death....

    typical...

    not surprising...

    after all, ever since my great great great great great great grand pappy slept with the cleaning lady we have been dealing with the jackasses of ishmael, dr hardly ever even met one....

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  92. That's correct
    No mussulmen, no jews
    no problems between them, here

    That's the whole point.

    I do not care about France or the Levant.

    No reason to, neither on my travel schedule.
    It's the Mexican Mafia and crazy Irishmen that are the problems, here.

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