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Monday, May 19, 2008 KATHLEEN PARKER: GAY-BAITING TO SAVE OUR SONS? Some people might argue that the gay-baiting column Kathleen Parker published in yesterday's Washington Post was especially inappropriate given the title of the book she's publishing next month: Save the Males. You probably know what was in the column: Well, at least they didn't kiss. I was bracing myself for the lip lock Wednesday when John Edwards endorsed Barack Obama.... Obama and Edwards make an attractive picture -- Ultra Brite cover boys of youth and glamour united against old men (and women) who worship the status quo. Obama [is] the man who makes Chris Matthews feel a thrill up his leg.... Obama and Edwards look and talk pretty, but Clinton, unflinching and steely, exudes pure brawn. When the time comes to sit across from the likes of Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, a chill in the heart may beat a thrill up the leg. Now here's an excerpt from the publisher's description of Save the Males: ...Save the Males is a shrewd, amusing, and sure-to-be-controversial look at how men, maleness, and fatherhood have been under siege in American culture for decades. Kathleen Parker argues that the feminist movement veered off course from it’s original aim of helping women achieve equality and ended up making enemies of men. With piercing wit, this nationally syndicated columnist shows us how the pendulum has swung from the reasonable middle to a place where men have been ridiculed in the public square.... The real losers, should we continue on our present course, are not just grown men and women but our children.... As I say, some people might argue that, if you're worried about doing harm on impressionable male youths, you might not want to bash adult men for being, in your estimation, inadequately manly. But Parker, I'm sure, would argue that she's doing the boys a favor -- she'll telling them to man up and stop being sniveling little girls. The culture, she'd say, actually encourages them to be sniveling little girls, so she's doing them a favor by smacking them around and telling them not to be such faggots. **** Parker, of course, published something far more odious last week, a Buchananesque (Duke-like?) syndicated column defending a West Virginian who told a reporter recently that Barack Obama isn't "a full-blooded American." Parker wrote, ...We love to boast that we are a nation of immigrants. But there's a different sense of America among those who trace their bloodlines back through generations of sacrifice. ...What they know is that their forefathers fought and died for an America that has worked pretty well for more than 200 years. What they sense is that their heritage is being swept under the carpet while multiculturalism becomes the new national narrative.... My paternal grandparents were Italian immigrants. They sent two sons to World War II. My father made it back. My uncle didn't. My immigrant grandmother was a gold star mother. Now, I don't know the answer to this, so I'm not jumping to conclusions, but I see that Kathleen Parker has three sons. I wonder how many are of age to be in the military. And I wonder how many have signed up. **** UPDATE: Aimai reviews the literary history of male-saving. posted by Steve M. | 2:21 PM | KRISTOL THE HACK TRIES TO DECEIVE US AGAIN William Kristol, in his New York Times column today: On Tuesday night, while the G.O.P. Congressional candidate was losing in a Mississippi district George Bush carried in 2004 by 25 points, Barack Obama was being trounced in the West Virginia Democratic primary -- by 41 points. I can't find a single recent instance of a candidate who ultimately became his party's nominee losing a primary by this kind of margin. Er, John McCain lost this year's Arkansas primary to Mike Huckabee by 41 points. Oh, and Jimmy Carter lost the 1976 California primary to Jerry Brown by 39 points. And on March 7, 2000, John McCain beat George W. Bush in Massachusetts by 32 points, in Rhode Island by 33, and in Vermont by 35. I guess Kristol just somehow couldn't "find" these. Or, more likely, he used the weasel-phrase "I can't find" (rather than "There hasn't been") because he'd uncovered the facts but had no intention of letting them prevent him from catapulting the Obama's-a-loser propaganda, his plan being, once he was caught, to simply say, "Whoops! My bad! I guess I missed that in my painstaking research!" Hackwork at its worst. **** UPDATE: Whoops -- I skipped this year's Utah GOP primary: Romney over McCain by 85 points. posted by Steve M. | 10:10 AM | THE STUPID TEACHING THE STUPID From a Washington Post article on Democrats who prefer one presidential candidate and really, really don't like the other one: ...To Veronica Tonay, 48, a psychology professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz and a Clinton supporter, Obama has become a pop star, the contestant on "American Idol" who wins votes because he's cute, while the best singer is eliminated. "We are electing the leader of the free world, and that person has a finger on the nuclear launch code," she said. "It's not about likability." Her stance was cemented when a young woman in one of her classes declared that she wouldn't vote for Clinton because "she is not a beautiful woman." If a student really said that, I weep for my country. But now here's that student's genius of a professor: If Obama is the nominee, Tonay said, McCain will be just fine with her. "In the end, I won't vote for Obama because I don't know who he is, and I don't trust him," she said. "If McCain gets in, he would have a weak presidency, and we would have a Democratic Congress anyway. Obama could do more damage." ... Yeah, because a president whose party doesn't control Congress is always weakened and unable to do much harm. Like, y'know, that Nixon guy. posted by Steve M. | 7:38 AM | Sunday, May 18, 2008 THERE'LL BE OTHER HILLARYS I'll never persuade anyone with this post, but as one of those horrible men who abandoned Hillary Clinton to throw in his lot with Barack Obama, I have to say I simply don't agree with the gloomiest things said in this New York Times article about possible female presidents other than Hillary. This, for instance: ...for many women, whether or not they support Mrs. Clinton, the long primary campaign has left them with a question: why would any woman run? Many feel dispirited by what they see as bias against Mrs. Clinton in the media -- the "Fatal Attraction" comparisons and locker-room chortling on television panels. "Who would dare to run?" said Karen O'Connor, the director of the Women and Politics Institute at American University. "The media is set up against you, and if you have the money problem to begin with, why would anyone put their families through this, why would anyone put themselves through this?" For this reason, she said, she doesn't expect a serious contender anytime soon. "I think it's going to be generations." ... The argument becomes nonsensical at a certain point: We're this close to electing Hillary Clinton president (she nearly beat Obama, and she leads McCain in the polls), yet we're too sexist to elect any other woman president for forty, sixty, eighty years? How can both of these things be possible? And where are, say, Condoleezza's Rice's "Fatal Attraction comparisons"? Where is the "locker-room chortling on television panels" about her? Rice is a national figure, an architect of the worst foreign-policy disaster in living memory, a top aide to possibly the most hated president ever -- where's her nutcracker? A lot of us keep saying this and it falls on deaf ears, but here I go again: Quite a bit of the nastiness that's uttered about Hillary Clinton is uttered specifically because she's Hillary Clinton (even if it relies on readymade sexist tropes) -- or because she's Bill Clinton's wife. (Remember, the people who helped paint the negative portrait of Hillary in the 1990s were painting one of Bill at the same time.) There'll be a woman in the relatively near future who hasn't been portrayed as a monster for fifteen-plus years -- it simply won't be the same for her. She'll face sexism, yes -- but the Times article has an interesting set of statistics: In December, a Gallup poll found that 86 percent of Americans said they would vote for a well-qualified candidate who was a woman (of course, that percentage has been in the 80s for much of the last three decades). Ninety-three percent said the same of a well-qualified candidate who was black; 93 percent of a Catholic candidate; and 91 percent of a Jewish one. Why do I single out the Catholic number? Because we already elected a Catholic president -- nearly half a century ago -- and still 7 percent of the country won't vote for one. So you don't need to be in a group that's at 100% acceptance to win. You can face hate and still prevail. I don't buy this, either: ..."No woman with Obama's resume could run," said Dee Dee Myers, the first woman to be White House press secretary, under Bill Clinton, and the author of "Why Women Should Rule the World." "No woman could have gotten out of the gate." Women are still held to a double-standard, and they tend to buy into it themselves. They do not have what Debbie Walsh, the director of the Rutgers center, says she used to call the John Edwards phenomenon and now calls the Barack Obama phenomenon: having never held elective office, they run for Senate, then before finishing a first term decide they should be president.... I just don't believe that will be true for much longer. Even now, I could easily imagine a Carly Fiorina, or someone like her, running for Senate or the presidency, based on achievements outside politics. And if this seems unimaginable to you now, I don't think it will for long. I think we're seeing more and more young women amassing records of achievement all through high school and college, then heading into the work world full of energy and confidence (along with, if the kids in my office are any indication, quite a bit of "girliness," which stupid men need to see so they won't fear for the safety of their testicles). What's going to happen is that these young women are going to help us form an image of what a very accomplished post-post-feminist young woman looks like, and we're going to get increasingly comfortable with that image. The peers and near-peers of these young women aren't going to know what it was like not to have such women around. A female Obama would probably have to have an interesting, unusual backstory, plus charisma, plus political savvy. I can't believe that combination won't emerge. And I can't believe, once most of the electorate is born after, say, 1964 or 1970, it will seem in any way bizarre. Whether it's an Obama-style phenom or just a political pro, there'll be another woman -- probably a lot more than one -- ready for the big job soon. Trust me. (A female George W. Bush? A lazy, ignorant trust-fund incompetent with no qualifications apart from swagger? That will probably take generations.) posted by Steve M. | 11:23 AM | Saturday, May 17, 2008 DEMOCRATS TAKE OWN SIDE IN ARGUMENT; REPUBLICANS CRY, "NO FAIR!" You know that old saying: A liberal (or a Democrat) is someone who's too polite to take his own side in an argument. Well, the presumptive Democratic nominee for president clearly isn't following that script, and he's getting backup from fellow party members. The right-wing response? "Hey, that's against the rules!" Here's the extremely self-important right-wing pundit Mark Steyn discussing the response by Barack Obama (and other Democrats) to President Bush's decision to use a speech at the Knesset to score cheap domestic political points: "That's enough. That -- that's a show of disrespect to me." That was Barack Obama, a couple of weeks back, explaining why he was casting the Rev. Jeremiah Wright into outer darkness. It's one thing to wallow in "adolescent grandiosity" (as Scott Johnson of the Powerline Web site called it) when it's a family dispute between you and your pastor of 20 years. It's quite another to do so when it's the 60th anniversary celebrations of one of America's closest allies. President Bush was in Israel the other day and gave a speech to the Knesset.... Sen. Obama was not mentioned in the text. No Democrat was mentioned, save for President Truman, in the context of his recognition of the new state of Israel when it was a mere 11 minutes old. Nonetheless, Barack Obama decided that the president's speech was really about him, and he didn't care for it. He didn't put it quite as bluntly as he did with the Rev. Wright, but the message was the same: "That's enough. That's a show of disrespect to me." And, taking their cue from the soon-to-be nominee's weirdly petty narcissism, Nancy Pelosi, John Kerry, Joe Biden and Co. piled on to deplore Bush's outrageous, unacceptable, unpresidential, outrageously unacceptable and unacceptably unpresidential behavior. Honestly. What a bunch of self-absorbed ninnies.... First, the question of what Bush meant. I suspect right-wingers may be reading, so, to compensate for their slow learning curve, I'll try to use small words. CNN, just after the speech was given, told us: The president did not name Obama or any other Democrat, but White House aides privately acknowledged the remarks were aimed at the presidential candidate and others in his party. On Hardball just after the speech, right-wing radio host Kevin James, just before he showed his complete ignorance of history, had this exchange with Chris Matthews: JAMES: Well, I don't know who [Bush] was talking about for sure, Chris -- MATTHEWS: Take a wild guess. JAMES: --but if he wasn't talking about Barack Obama, he should have been talking about Barack Obama. I hope he was talking about Barack Obama. MATTHEWS: Do you think there was any doubt he was? Was there any doubt he was, though, sir? JAMES: Not in my mind. MATTHEWS: Is there any doubt? JAMES: No. Not in my mind. And Steyn himself does a wee bit of damage to his own thesis that the speech wasn't about Obama and other Democrats when he points out that, in fact, it was about Obama and other Democrats: It says something for Democrat touchiness that the minute a guy makes a generalized observation about folks who appease terrorists and dictators the Dems assume: Hey, they're talking about me. Actually, he wasn't -- or, to be more precise, he wasn't talking only about you. Steyn says Bush was also talking about other people -- among them ... er ... "the leader of Canada's New Democratic Party." Yeah, that's it -- that's the ticket! Silly Obama for thinking, in an election year, that he might be in the center of the bull's-eye! What about that Canadian over there? But this a red herring. What's really bugging the right is that hit jobs like this on Democrats are always supposed to work -- Democrats are supposed to say, "Yessir! Hit me again, sir! I'm a miserable worm, sir!" Obama seems calm and non-combative, but he fooled these guys. He gets his back up. He defends himself. And that last word needs to be stressed -- he defends himself. It's not narcissism. It's not arrogance (Karl Rove's favorite charge; talk about pots and kettles). It's just something internal that makes him believe that, even on hot-button issues, he can mount a defense of his own position. It's self-respect. I like it. I like it that Republicans are fuming -- ineffectually. Among Democrats, maybe it can catch on. posted by Steve M. | 10:45 AM | Friday, May 16, 2008 I CALL BULLSHIT The increasingly unhinged Clinton-or-death absolutist Larry Johnson "reports": I now have it from I could wind up with egg on my face, but sorry, Larry -- I don't believe it. You don't telegraph something like this and then hold it for months -- you either get it out there or you hide it and then spring it. And you know what? This white guy doesn't care. Even with Sly and the Family Stone's equivalence lyrics now going through my head (Don't call me nigger, whitey / Don't call me whitey, nigger), I've never felt deeply abused or diminished by the word "whitey." It isn't an equivalent; it just doesn't represent the power of societal dominance. And hell, we pale folk nickname some of our own Whitey.   Larry, let it go. To her credit, Clinton herself has been pulling her punches and giving Obama backup in response to Bush and McCain's appeasement-baiting. You're trying to be more Catholic than the Pope. posted by Steve M. | 3:35 PM | ONCE AGAIN, MURDOCH'S POST FAILS TO PUT THE BOOT IN Did somebody switch New York tabloids on me when I was sleeping? Or did they somehow revert to the positions they held on the political spectrum a couple of generations ago? Here are the front pages of New York's two big tabloids:   The putative Democratic nominee for president is being charged with weakness, wimpiness, and threatening the security of the United States and Murdoch doesn't think it's front-page-worthy? That's kind of a change. And which paper has the boldface headline "Why Terror Thugs Like Barack" featured prominently on its home page right now? Not the Post. It's a link to a News opinion column by Michael Goodwin (full title: "Middle Name Hussein Is Only One Reason Terror Thugs Like Barack Obama"). The Post has just refreshed its home page as I've been typing, with this:  That almost seems to be dignifying him, and the AP story to which it links hasn't had its headline rewritten for maximum partisan impact. The News home page still has this:  As I said earlier in the week, I think Murdoch thinks Obama can win, and so he doesn't want to hit him too hard, purely for business reasons. **** (Nevertheless, I'm still pleased that Cablevision rather than Murdoch is purchasing Newsday.) posted by Steve M. | 1:42 PM | HEAR ME (AND A HUGE GROUP OF SUPPORTERS WHO'LL BE ALONG ANY MINUTE NOW, REALLY) ROAR Well, this, from ABC, makes me roll my eyes: ...Just talked to a 55-year-old Columbus, Ohio resident named Cynthia Ruccia, a spokesperson and organizer for a group calling itself "Clinton Supporters Count Too." She said the group -- numbering in the hundreds, and organized in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, and Michigan -- stands ready to boycott the Democratic Party if Clinton doesn't win the nomination, and will work against superdelegates who support Obama over Clinton as a means of registering their displeasure with the party. "We have a plan to campaign against the Democratic nominee," the group said in a press release Thursday. "We have the (wo)manpower and the money to make our threat real. And there are millions of supporters who will back us up in the swing states. If you don't listen to our voice now, you will hear from us later." Ruccia tells ABC News that she believes "millions" of women share her group's views, though they have only begun to make contact with like-minded women.... "We're just at the boiling point," Ruccia said. "Women will sit back and be quiet about things for a while, but we've had enough. Unless Hillary Clinton is our nominee, we are not going to support the nominee." ... There's definitely some fence-mending for Obama to do, but the notion that this group "numbering in the hundreds" represents "'millions' of women" is a crock -- according to the latest Quinnipiac poll, in head-to-head matchups against McCain, Clinton polls only two points better than Obama among women (Clinton 51%, McCain 36%; Obama 49%, McCain 36%). But Ruccia clearly knows how to use the media as a force multiplier -- ABC's writing about her, and here are Politico's Ben Smith and Beth Frerking writing about an appearance on Bill O'Reilly's show on Fox News. Well, of course she knows how to work the press -- she's not just "a 55-year-old Columbus, Ohio resident," as the ABC story puts it. She's a former Democratic congressional candidate who once tried to unseat GOP congressman John Kasich by gay-baiting him: ...For almost 14 years it had passed without comment that the local Congressman, John Kasich, the powerful chairman of the House Budget Committee, stretches his paycheck by sharing a Virginia town house for the two or three nights a week that Congress is in session. His housemate? His male chief of staff. Last month Cynthia Ruccia, Kasich's Democratic challenger, called for a Justice Department investigation of what she said was "a serious appearance of impropriety" because Kasich, who is divorced, lived with someone whose government salary he controls. That was the official question. What it unofficially implied was that the two men might be otherwise involved. Though Ruccia denies that she intended to leave that impression, Kasich's office inevitably found itself having to deny that either man is gay. No federal investigation is likely. (To begin with, the Justice Department does not examine "appearances.") As it happens, Ruccia had long been a high-profile supporter of gay rights and Kasich an occasional ally at best. (He voted yes on AIDS funding, no on gay marriage.) But by raising the issue, she stands to benefit from whatever doubt she creates in the minds of voters hostile to gays. Even Democrats were crying foul. "It was the worst sort of gutter politics and gay baiting," says Bob Fitrakis, Kasich's 1992 Democratic opponent. And the gay community in Kasich's congressional district also sensed an invitation to gay baiting. "It's disappointing to see it from a party that has been the most progressive on the issues," says Phil Martin, president of Stonewall Union, Ohio's largest gay-rights organization, which counts Ruccia as a member.... Whatever your thoughts about this attempted outing, note that it (a) alienated allies, (b) got bad press, and (c) didn't work -- Ruccia lost. Ruccia went on to work as a Democratic motivational speaker delivering what she called "Wanna Win? Seminars," but in her big race, she didn't win, and her seminar company UPDATE: Sorry, no -- it appears not to be defunct at all, but it doesn't exactly seem like the most sophisticated operation:  So I think this is a Potemkin protest movement -- unless Fox et al. decide to turn her and her backers into the Swift Boat group of '08. **** UPDATE: Barbara at the Mahablog has the best post I've read debunking the argument that opposition to Clinton is a sexist injustice -- even though she sees quite a bit of sexism out there. Go read it. posted by Steve M. | 8:58 AM | Thursday, May 15, 2008 Q: GAY MARRIAGE = McCAIN WIN? A: NO. Instapundit: CALIFORNIA'S SUPREME COURT STRIKES DOWN the state's ban on gay marriages. Did it just hand the state to McCain? ... What, you mean the way overturning the Massachusetts ban handed the state to Bush in '04? Kerry: 1,803,800 62% Bush (Incumbent): 1,071,109 37% (Yeah, I know: A local boy was on the ticket for the Dems in '04. Well, a local boy was on the ticket in '88, too, and Kerry's margin of victory was 17 percentage points higher than Dukakis's.) *** Via Instaputz. posted by Steve M. | 7:37 PM | EEEK! Calif. high court overturns ban on gay marriage Oh, my God! That's 2 states out of 50! As a heterosexual, I used to feel 2% less married than I felt before Massachusetts, but now I feel 4% less married! Eeek! Eeek! posted by Steve M. | 6:59 PM | GEORGE W. BUSH IS ANN COULTER Because he's still, by law, the president of the United States and the de facto leader of his party, we're all supposed to take seriously the fact that Bush just compared Obama's foreign policy to appeasement of Hitler. I dunno -- my first reaction was, "What, him again? His approval rating is 28 percent. Everybody hates him except Joe Lieberman [who, of course, seconded what Bush said]. Does anybody else even care what Bush thinks?" It was the same reaction I had last month when Ann Coulter compared Obama's first book to Mein Kampf. A righty blogger said, "Ann Coulter's gonna get yelled at again." I replied (correctly): No, she isn't. Over here on the left, we just see her as a pathetic has-been shouting, "Why aren't you paying attention to me anymore?" This just seems like a Godwin's Law Hail Mary thrown in the forlorn hope that it will get her back into the public eye. I don't know about other lefties, but I sure don't intend to help her do that. Paying no attention would be the ideal reaction to Bush's statement. In fact, that is going to be the reaction, except among Beltway journalists and those of us in the fever swamp of the political blogosphere. Who the hell in the real world takes George W. Bush's pronouncements even remotely seriously anymore? What is he but a male Coulter, a has-been wingnut provocateur, an arrested-development case who's overstayed his welcome? posted by Steve M. | 3:39 PM | THE ENEMIES LIST CHANGES; THE FIGHTING CONTINUES In the last 24 hours, as you know from an earlier post, I've ventured into the world of the Clinton absolutists -- people who claim to be Democrats but whose comments about Barack Obama and anyone who supports him rely to a great extent on tropes I would expect from Free Republic and Lucianne.com (e.g., Obama's a corrupt crypto-Black Panther; Edwards is a wussy loser who lives in a big house and gets fancy haircuts). I read this and then see that John McCain wants to give the back of his hand to congressional Republicans, whom he sees as millstones (even though he's one of them), while there's still quite a bit of evidence that many Republicans still aren't thrilled with McCain yet, either. The Democrats nominated the guy who wants an end to partisan squabbling. The Republicans nominated the guy who wants to be known as a maverick. And practically everyone hates Bush now. We should be inching toward that moment when we all sing "Kumbaya" around the campfire, right? Instead, the amount of fighting hasn't decreased -- it's just that it's increasingly intramural. Was that inevitable? I'm starting to think it was. I feel as if we're so used to fighting that we can't not fight, that we can't possibly have anyone as a winner without the sense among those who backed the wrong horse that the winner is the embodiment of evil in the universe, just because we're so accustomed to girding our lines against that kind of absolute evil. I don't know where I'm going with this, but I think we're very resistant right now to the notion that we can be healed by anyone who wasn't our choice in the first place. Maybe that would change with an improved economy or an end to the war, but for now we seem to be in a political war of each against all. posted by Steve M. | 2:44 PM | MAYBE THE REPUBLICANS ARE IN TROUBLE FOR 2014, TOO (UPDATE: Oops -- I meant 2010, didn't I? Math is hard!) We get a peek into right-wing thinking from Hot Air, which links a clip from New York radio talker Mark Levin. Levin accepts the notion that McCain is a "maverick" and -- ignoring the fact that the press is selling the public that line and it's basically working (McCain's numbers against either Democrat are about 20 points better than Bush's approval ratings) -- he makes the familiar but always startling argument that Republicans have been losing congressional elections because they're not conservative enough. Well, let me give my two cents' worth to conservatives running under the Republican banner this year. If I were you, I would cut your ties to the Republican National Committee, cut your ties with the McCain campaign, because he's basically running a one-man race anyway, and run on your principles, come up with some creative policy ideas that promote your principles -- it's the only chance you have. Don't tie yourselves to a pre-Reagan, Gerald Ford-type philosophy in which you will lose. That is the lesson from the three House seats that have been lost. It's also common sense. When have you ever tied yourself to moderates, mavericks, and independents? They're unreliable. There will be no coattails in this presidential election. There'll be the opposite effect. Positive advice to our conservative friends who are running as Republicans? Run as conservatives, under the Republican banner, because it is our party, but distance yourselves from the -- I don't know what to call them. The mush Republicans? Or the Repubeicans, as I do like to call them from time to time. Distance yourself from the Repubeicans at the RNC, the Repubeicans around McCain and McCain himself. Do what's right, do what's in your soul and your conscience, and you'll have a shot. If you follow -- if you follow these other Republicans, you will go down. Just advi-- hey, look, take it or leave it, that's just Mark's opinion, and not only that, it's more honorable, isn't it? Why compromise your principles for -- well, for what, as a matter of fact? For nothing. Please, Mark -- keep saying this. If it's a bloodbath for the congressional GOP in November, say it even louder. In fact, I hope all your right-wing colleagues say this. I hope it continues to be conventional wisdom on the right. I hope all other explanations are ignored and you all agree on this one. And then let's make a date to do this again two years from now, OK? **** UPDATE: Today's New York Times suggests that Levin will get his wish: ...Mr. McCain's advisers said the Mississippi race underlined his intention to distance himself as much as possible from Congressional Republicans.... So this may be a case of "You can't break up with me, I'm breaking up with you" on Levin's part. posted by Steve M. | 9:03 AM | Wednesday, May 14, 2008 JOHN EDWARDS IS AN ASSASSIN AND A GANG RAPIST ...according to the Democrats I quote in the update to this post. posted by Steve M. | 8:25 PM | RE: WHITE PEOPLE, UNIVERSALITY OF According to the latest Quinnipiac poll, yes, it's true -- Obama loses the white vote to McCain. (We're doomed! We're doomed!) But wait -- Clinton loses the white vote to McCain, too. In fact, among whites, it's: McCain 48%, Clinton 41% McCain 47%, Obama 40% But, astonishingly, both Obama and Clinton beat McCain overall -- because guess what? It turns out America isn't an all-white country! Yeah, I know -- who knew? Either one of the two Democratic contenders, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama or New York Sen. Hillary Clinton, leads the likely Republican presidential nominee, Arizona Sen. John McCain, according to a Quinnipiac University national poll released today. Sen. Obama leads Sen. McCain 47 - 40 percent while Sen. Clinton is up 46 - 41 percent. Next up: Most Americans actually don't live in Appalachia! **** Also see "Obama's Strength with White Voters" at Newshoggers. posted by Steve M. | 4:57 PM | IT'S NOT ABOUT 2012. IT'S ABOUT NOW -- AND 2012. Charles Hurt on Hillary Clinton, in the New York Post: ... After last night's victory, she is free to quit. Or she could see her way next week through Kentucky, which she'll also win handily. Or, she could sprint all the way to the end on June 3. ...She expects Obama to lose in November precisely because of the weaknesses she exposed in this primary: He'll have trouble winning blue collar Democrats in swing states. That opens the door to her return in four years as the party's prodigal daughter, saying: "As you recall, my worst fears came true. Now, it is my turn." I don't buy that she's just going to walk away after the last primary. Not when I see Ed Rendell urging Obama to pick her as VP. I think she's going to keep fighting, quite literally all the way to the convention, unless she gets the #2 slot. I just don't believe the Clintons will walk away. They desperately need to be vindicated -- but what if Obama wins without Hillary on the ticket? They would find that unendurable. But if she's on the ticket, it's win-win for them: They'll give themselves the credit if Obama beats McCain, and if Obama loses, it'll be his fault. posted by Steve M. | 2:32 PM | BACK TO THE FUTURE? (Updated with Clinton absolutists' reactions to the Edwards endorsement) Would this just seem like a stale rerun, or is it possible that Taegan Goddard is on to something when he suggests a Barack Obama/John Edwards ticket? ...Here's the case for picking Edwards: 1. He's already been tested on the national stage and not likely to cause a distracting scandal. Maybe I'm just wishing that it could work, because it would annoy so many annoying people. There might actually be talk that "reasonable" pundits would describe as (gasp!) "class warfare." The winners would be "Obambi" and "the Breck Girl" (aka "the Silky Pony," the guy whose haircuts Beltway journalists can't stop talking about), so a victory would infuriate both the Lucianne.com crowd and Maureen Dowd. And it would be a Clinton-free ticket. (I don't believe point #5.) In some early polls, Edwards outperformed other Democrats against McCain and other Republicans. He got 7% of the vote in West Virginia yesterday. It would be nice, of course, to have Elizabeth Edwards on board -- a Democratic heroine who's strongly hinted that she favors Hillary's health-care plan. If she's cool with a ticket like this (hmmm, can she be the running mate?), that sends a lot of signals. Is this a not complete crazy idea? Or am I just suggestible today? **** UPDATE: John Edwards endorses Obama. Which makes him a pariah (as well as an assassin and a gang-rapist, and a fool for not recognizing Hillary's inevitability) in Clinton-or-Death Country: All aboard! All aboard this sinking ship! **** I think that Edwards... knows that the Obama ship is going down... and his endorsement is in exchange for Obama's support for the nomination when SDs start deserting Obama, and rather than face ignomineous defeat, bows out "for the good of the party" and endorses edwards. **** He thinks he's endorsing the winner. **** John Edwards, like so many others, has taken the route to endorsement that brings the most attention to himself. **** I was for Edwards, but I'm also from NC and the thing that always bothered me about him was his ill-disguised ambition. **** I guess Hillary's crushing win yesterday has everyone running scared. I mean, we just can't let this supremely qualified -- and popular-vote leading -- candidate compete. That is just too scary! **** Have they all been bought? It looks like it. **** Last night must have rattled the Washington establishment that supports Obama. And no doubt - Edwards got the memo - the working class has to be STOPPED from voting for Hillary. **** Guess Edwards is like the rest of them - don't really have any principles. **** With even NARAL stepping into the primary season, I'm feeling like one thrown-under-the-bus Democrat. It's a travesty that we've reduced a truly historic race to a virtual gang rape. **** So John Plays Brutus in this scene **** Et tu, John? **** Hillary must have turned him down. Possibly the huge multi-million dollar house and $400 haircuts were just too much hypocrisy for her to stomach. **** How many knives does HRC have in her back at this point? She's looking like a pincushion from where I sit. **** this seems like it's all the guys ganging up on the girl, being directed by the DNC. **** Now he's joined the ranks of "White Male Loser Presidential and Vice Presidential Candidates for Obama". They should make themselves tee-shirts. Is Hillary really that bad or does the white boyz club simply hate uppity women? Yikes. **** UPDATE: This one's even worse. Samples: ….you like that black bastard so much then go see what pick up game he’s playing tonight and shoot some hoops with him….in other words, get the hell out of here…you creep! **** Shrug. They think Obama is going to float to the oval office and skip a general election. The Republicans are all going to stay home too. And they are going to spot Barry some Affirmative Action points. **** I will never vote for him. He is the scum of the earth. The dirty gum on the bottom of my shoes. Dog shit that gets stuck in the pattern of my sneakers. Unworthy of a vote. **** speaking for myself, i absolutely believe obama is a figure head of some very radical, self serving, powerful individuals, with an agenda. an agenda that does not work for me… when i was young during the late 60’s i ran with people like this, panthers were from oakland, and we were all trying to be, radical in those days… blacks brown red and white… these people are no joke, i respect that they have a point of view, i just think it dont belong in the white house… all these cute little white college kids, and starry eyed old ladies with their meditaion candles, are in for a rude awakening. **** All Obama supporters are sexist. The main thrust of this thread is that Obama and Edwards are abandoning loyal Democrats and that the only appropriate response is to go out and vote for (and campaign or) McCain (as, presumably, a sign of loyalty to the Democratic Party). Oh, and the post that inspires the comments tells us that Hillary Clinton "would be the best president we've had in at least the past century." Yeah, screw that FDR guy! posted by Steve M. | 1:39 PM | MURDOCH DOESN'T THINK OBAMA'S A LOSER So how did Rupert Murdoch, who hosted a Hillary Clinton fund-raiser a while back, commemorate her big West Virginia victory in his New York Post?  A cabdriver and a local news anchor who uttered cusswords -- both bigger stories to Rupe than Hill's win. Primary? What primary? Not much more at the top of the page at nypost.com -- just a tiny headline under "News Alerts," and it's "Clinton's W.Va. victory does little to slow Obama." Murdoch isn't playing Operation Chaos games. He knows Hillary Clinton won't be the next president, and he knows Barack Obama very well could be. How he treats Obama in the future will depend on how likely, in Murdoch's estimation, Obama is to win in November, but right now it looks as if Rupe firmly believes Obama has a real shot, and is worth treating reasonably well (for business reasons, of course). Check out, for instance, the cool, flattering Obama-as-pool-shark picture accompanying this Post story (headline: OBAMA AIMS FOR NOV.: HILL HINTS SHE'S SET TO PULL THE PLUG). Oh, and did I mention this headline from today? MOUNTAIN LANDSLIDE FOR HOPE-LESS HILL W.VA. WIN IS MEANINGLESS You'll hear a lot of people saying today that the West Virginia results mean that Obama is doomed as a general-election candidate, and you'll hear a few saying he could still lose the nomination. Rupert Murdoch doesn't think so. And Rupert Murdoch, however loathsome he may be, is a very smart guy. And he sure as hell isn't some "liberal media" guy who's "in the tank" for Obama out of a sense that they share a worldview. posted by Steve M. | 10:15 AM | Tuesday, May 13, 2008 SO? I just want to remind you that 80.3% of Americans live in metropolitan areas. Hillary Clinton just won a blowout in the second most rural state in America. Sorry, folks -- Hillary's America may be made up exclusively of white people in overalls, but the real America isn't. **** My favorite statistic from the CNN exit poll (page 2): 35% of West Virginia voters said Hillary Clinton was not "honest and trustworthy" -- but 32% of that 35% (or 11% of the total electorate) voted for her anyway. ("Yeah, but she's white.") posted by Steve M. | 11:16 PM | DELIBERATELY APPEALING TO THE WORST IN PEOPLE ABC on the West Virginia exit polls: Racially motivated voting appeared to be running higher than usual: Two in 10 whites said the race of the candidate was a factor in their vote, second only to Mississippi. And only a third of those voters said they'd support Obama as the nominee against Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.... Ross Perot, nutty as he may have been, used to say, "If you hate people, I don't want your vote." I'm waiting to hear Hillary Clinton say that. posted by Steve M. | 7:30 PM | GROUP SLANDER: OUR BETTERS INSTRUCT US ON WHEN IT IS AND ISN'T APPROPRIATE There have been a couple of stories today about overtly racist opposition to Barack Obama -- several incidents are described in this Washington Post story, and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution tells us about a bar in Georgia that's selling T-shirts with "OBAMA in '08" printed under a picture of Curious George eating a banana. In response to the WaPo story, we are informed by Carol Platt Liebau of the right-wing site Townhall.com that yes, racism is wrong, but we shouldn't leap to conclusions: There's a lurking danger in these kinds of narratives, as well. When stories like these go into wide circulation, it's a sure bet that some on the left are going to start asserting -- not that America is a great country with (unfortunately) some racists (all of which is true) -- but that America is a predominantly racist country with some great people (i.e., those who support Barack Obama). If Barack loses in the fall, the USA will officially be labeled a racist country by many of its left-wing citizens. This is one paragraph after Liebau tells us: These incidents are deplorable, awful and totally wrong. Anyone who is refusing to vote for Barack Obama just because he's black is a racist, and should be ashamed. (And how shocking to learn that this is going on in a Democratic primary ... haven't we always been instructed that the Democrat Party is the party of the enlightened?!). So it's wrong to look at these incidents and say the United States is lousy with racism. But apparently it's perfectly fine to look at these incidents and say that about the Democratic Party. Thanks for clearing that up, Carol. posted by Steve M. | 3:47 PM | OK, ONE MORE AND I'LL STOP Jeralyn Merritt again: ...As for the speculation that Obama would convince Hillary's supporters to vote for him if he picks another female VP candidate like Napolitano or McCaskill, I highly doubt it. There is only one Hillary Clinton. Women are not interchangeable.... I think there's some truth to that. But you could also say that picking Janet Napolitano or Claire McCaskill would be Obama's way of saying that women aren't interchangeable -- and he's picking one who hasn't said, in a hundred different ways on a daily basis over the course of several months, that he's unfit to be president, rather than one who has. posted by Steve M. | 2:34 PM | NO, ANDREW, RESSENTIMENT IS NOT INEVITABLE Andrew Romano, blogging for Newsweek, on why not ending the race is good for Democrats: ...If Clinton were to follow the peanut gallery's instructions now, the Democrats would wind up more--not less--divided as a result. The reason? It takes two. With their man at the helm, Obamaniacs are more than ready to "unite" with Clintonistas. But the reverse still isn't true. As Kenneth P. Vogel wrote yesterday in the Politico, "the legions of Clinton backers still investing their cash, energy and emotion into her faltering bid for the Democratic presidential nomination seem driven not by the reasonable expectation that she can beat Barack Obama, but by the emotional desire to see her through to the end of voting and stick it to those who have already written her off." Unless Clinton lets the race run its course ... many of her supporters will blame the media, the DNC, Obama and anyone else within spitting distance for pushing her out prematurely. And that means they'll be less inclined to "come together" than they are now--not more.... But this wouldn't be true if Hillary seemed to be leading the movement toward reconciliation. If she said, "OK, it's time now -- thank you, everyone, but we should all unite around our nominee," if she said everyone had fought the good fight but he'd won fair and square, if she said he was a good man and would be a great president -- if, in short, she said she'd lost the fight, but she wasn't being shafted -- the ressentiment would dissipate. I'll repeat what I've been saying about the Clintons: yes, they have power, and if only they'd use it for good. Romano is right about the Clinton voters' feelings, but the Clintons can change that. posted by Steve M. | 11:43 AM | A SONG IN RETURN FOR JERALYN'S SONG Barack Obama said this in West Virginia: One of the saddest episodes in our history was the degree to which returning vets from Vietnam were shunned, demonized and neglected by some because they served in an unpopular war. Too many of those who opposed the war in Vietnam chose to blame not only the leaders who ordered the mission, but the young men who simply answered their country's call. Four decades later, the sting of that injustice is a wound that has never fully healed, and one that should never be repeated. Jeralyn Merritt responds with a post titled "Obama Disses Boomers Who Opposed Vietnam War": In other words, Obama intends to battle the war-hero McCain by throwing us under the bus. Hilzoy responds: Um: no. Not unless you were one of the people who did, in fact, shun, demonize, and neglect soldiers who served in an unpopular war. Merritt adds to her denunciation of bus-throwing by quoting a Jackson Browne song -- but since her point seems to be that no one in the antiwar movement ever "chose to blame ... the young men who simply answered their country's call," I'll quote a 1960s Buffy Sainte-Marie song back to her: He's five feet two and he's six feet four He fights with missiles and with spears He's all of 31 and he's only 17 He's been a soldier for a thousand years ...And he's fighting for Canada, he's fighting for France, he's fighting for the USA, and he's fighting for the Russians and he's fighting for Japan, and he thinks we'll put an end to war this way ...But without him how would Hitler have condemned him at Dachau Without him Caesar would have stood alone He's the one who gives his body as a weapon to a war and without him all this killing can't go on He's the universal soldier and he really is to blame His orders come from far away no more They come from him, and you, and me and brothers can't you see this is not the way we put an end to war. Yup -- war is every individual's fault. The powerful don't have more power than we do. The fish doesn't stink from the head. I'm also reminded of a line from a story a friend wrote for our high school literary magazine in 1974, in which the narrator, an anti-war high school kid, imagines the conversation of the Vietnam vet brother of a drinking buddy: Hey, Ed, I ever tell you about the time, heehee, over in Nam, we pushed the three gooks out of the helicopter? That was how a lot of people saw the soldiers then. Wishing that fact away won't work. And criticizing that misapplied blame is not the same as criticize opposition to that war. **** UPDATE: There's a heated discussion going on in comments. (Hey, where were you all yesterday when I wasn't saying stuff that was ticking you off? I felt like a standup comic who was bombing.) Seeing some of what's being said there, as well as this Corrente post with its reference to dolchstosslegende (the "stab in the back" theory), I want to ask one thing: Where in that Obama quote do you see him saying the antiwar movement caused us to lose the war? Show me the words. **** Incidentally, while we're having a lovely little internecine squabble, I have to say I love being accused of backing right-wing frames by someone (see the link directly above) who then goes on to say that people who want Hillary Clinton to drop out are just part of the, er, "creative class" of TV pundits. Yup, it appears to me that I'm being accused of embracing right-wing frames by someone who's borrowing lines of attack from Spiro Agnew and Dan Quayle. posted by Steve M. | 9:07 AM | |
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