Hillary will rise again!

ann ...

i was just thinking about heading out to pick up the ny times, read it online a lot but there is something to be said for reading a paper in print....

loved the huge picture of obama and biden in yesterdays times, they looked so confident and at peace with themselves...

i will be in nyc for a day in two weeks, pretty much just to have dinner with our daughter who just started her last year of law school at fordham and fly back to the left coast.

we will be in boston for a week prior to that ...

imo, these are exciting times for the democrat party, i think that hillary is going to play a significant role in american government in the years to come...i am loving the barack and biden ticket...

i see her stepping in to ted kennedy's shoes and moving healthcare forward ... i think her incredible speech at the convention has won her lots of street cred amongst her doubters and has cemented her a party elder position...

just my sunday morning, one cup of coffee thoughts...lol...

have a great day!

laura

September 2, 2008

Obama Gains Among Former Clinton Supporters

Obama gains on other dimensions, including terrorism and leadership

• by Frank Newport

PRINCETON, NJ -- The Democratic convention appears to have helped solidify support for Barack Obama among former Hillary Clinton supporters, with the percent saying they will vote for Obama in November moving from 70% pre-convention to 81% after the convention, and the percent certain to vote for Obama jumping from 47% to 65%.

Last updated September 2, 2008 3:48 p.m. PT

By MARIANNE MEANS
SYNDICATED COLUMNIST

WASHINGTON -- It's ironic -- really tragic, actually -- that Barack Obama's rejection of his chief party rival, Hilary Clinton, has resulted in a surprise Republican counter-push with GOP nominee John McCain's insulting pick of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, who is Clinton's polar opposite on most social issues of importance to women.

Palin is a retrofitted Phyllis Schlafly, who helped to spearhead the male-chauvinist defeat of the Equal Rights Amendment (remember the much-trumpeted fear of unisex toilets, as though men and women were expected to use them at the same time?).

She has championed a raft of right-wing causes, including the demand that abstinence-only policies be taught in school to the exclusion of family planning and birth control, from which it turns out Palin's pregnant unwed teenage daughter might have benefited.

McCain's decision was made hastily, after his party's right-wing evangelical leaders threatened to rebel if he named his two favorites -- Sen. Joe Lieberman and former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge, who happen to be pro-choice.

Picking Palin was dramatic, all right. Whether it was well considered is another matter.

McCain's gamble reminds me of Walter Mondale's choice of Rep. Geraldine Ferraro in 1984, when the polls told him he was too far behind sunny President Reagan unless he could pull off a big stunt.

But, as with Palin, he didn't give her the serious consideration she deserved. His vetters had spent three days pouring over every inch of California Sen. Dianne Feinstein's life and finances, particularly those of her wealthy businessman husband David Blum. Feinstein came up clean.

But at the last minute a clubby group of Democratic House women petitioned Mondale to look at Ferraro instead. They argued she had a better image as a housewife from Queens, N.Y., than Feinstein, a princess type from nutty San Francisco.

Mondale, in his haste, forgot to give Ferraro's husband the same close scrutiny his vetters had given Blum. But he bought the Ferraro image and took a gamble on her.

It was a terrible error; there were some murky dealings in her husband's background, and it got her nomination off to a rocky start. The ticket never really had a chance anyway. It was not her fault that Mondale lost to Reagan in a landslide, but it created the impression that a woman on the ticket would be of no help.

That seems to be Obama's thinking in passing over Clinton, although it boggles the mind that he could be so obtuse two decades later. Instead McCain has tossed him a gender grenade.

If Obama's VP pick, Sen. Joe Biden, adopts the patronizing tone the Obama campaign used frequently toward Clinton, it could backfire and help the McCain-Palin ticket win female converts out of sympathy.

On the other hand, a rousing but respectful exchange of political issues ought to be enough to help her or do her in, if she is as inexperienced on national and international affairs as advertised.

For her part, Clinton's troops are repeating that she will campaign energetically for Obama, as she has said all along.

Since Clinton has no official campaign role, she will concentrate on McCain and not serve as Obama's attack dog against Palin. That is the job of the man he picked as vice presidential nominee. Obama made his choice, and he gets to live with the consequences.

So now he is sounding noble about keeping his own family off limits to the press, even though he has just paraded them around in public at the Democratic National Convention. Where is it written that families get to be displayed on a candidate's terms in flattering ways but not exposed in a more personal, less structured environment that might be more realistic?

Hillary Clinton, it is reported, is appalled at the notion that Palin might be regarded as her political heir, simply on the basis of their mutual gender. Clinton worked hard for those 18 million votes and Palin is mocking them by claiming to deserve the rewards that Clinton, and Clinton alone, had earned, by supporting policies Palin opposes.

Politics has its odd corners. The GOP has been dealt a lousy hand with the hurricane interruption. Gustav also reduced, for the time being, the controversy over Palin -- an ethics investigation involving the dismissal of her state trooper brother-in-law, her 17-year-old daughter's pregnancy, her lack of world experience. (The latter didn't stop George W. Bush from becoming president, but think of the mess he's made of things.)

Her choice apparently boosted McCain's monthly take from the evangelical right to $47 million, nearly matching Obama's own contributions.

But how will she play in the wider world outside the insular GOP convention? As a woman, I would like to wish her well, but her policy positions are so offensive I would choke on the words.

Frankly, I had hoped for something more forward thinking and substantive from McCain. Women don't vote on gender alone, although sometimes it helps. When you have been relegated to second-class status for so long, you get grateful for any pat on the shoulder. This time, it isn't enough.

I agree with you.  Hilary should return any call at 3 AM (and only let it ring once).  He can deal with his own poop piles.

Shoulda-Coulda-Woulda

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Joe Biden, via e-mail, from MSNBC earlier: 

DAVID SHUSTER:  we have a town hall going on with joe biden talking about hillary clinton and said she might have made a better vice presidential pick. 

SEN. JOE BIDEN:  hillary clinton is as qualified or more than i am to be vice president of the united states of america. she is say close personal friend and qualified to be president of the united states of america. she is easily qualified to be vice president of the united states of america and quite frankly it might have been a better pick than me, but she is first-rate. i mean that sincerely.

Bill Clinton to campaign, predicts handy Obama win

36 minutes ago

NEW YORK (AFP) - Former president Bill Clinton predicted Thursday Barack Obama would beat John McCain "handily" in November's election as he prepared to campaign on behalf of his successor as Democratic leader.

Obama and Clinton sat down for a fence-mending lunch after months of mutual sniping during the Democratic nominating race between the Illinois senator and the former president's wife Hillary.

While Hillary Clinton has held several rallies on Obama's behalf, her husband has yet to join the general election campaign trail, but he said that would soon change.

"I've agreed to do a substantial number of things. Whatever I'm asked to do," Clinton told reporters before sitting down to a meal of sandwiches, flatbread pizza and salad with Obama at his foundation headquarters here.

Asked about the state of the race between Obama and Republican contender McCain, the ex-president said: "I predict that Senator Obama will win and win handily."

Obama said: "There you go. You can take it from the president of the United States. He knows a little something about politics."

Clinton, who remains a powerful draw among the kinds of blue-collar Democrats whom Obama has struggled to win over, indicated he would start campaigning after upcoming meetings of the Clinton Global Initiative.

The CGI, an offshoot of Clinton's foundation which brings together leaders in government, business and charity, holds its fourth annual meeting in New York on September 23-26.

"We're putting him to work," said Obama, who poured lavish praise on Clinton during an appearance on the "Late Show with David Letterman" Wednesday.

Clinton is said to have been fuming over Hillary's defeat by Obama in the Democratic primaries, but went a long way toward burying the hatchet with a barnstorming speech at the party's Denver convention late last month.

Women Against Sarah Palin Speak Out

September 11, 2008 6:12 PM

ABC News' Julia Hoppock reports: With recent polls suggesting that women are flocking to the McCain/Palin ticket, there is a growing chorus of female voices who want to put a stop to this trend, and fast. 

Two women in New York felt so strongly that Palin was the wrong choice they created a blog called "Women Against Sarah Palin" and are using the site to post emails from women who write in from all over the country about why they think Palin is the wrong choice as for Vice President and the wrong choice for American women.

"We felt as though McCain's choice was this kind of way to automatically grab female voters and we found that assumption was very insulting to our intelligence as female voters in America," said Lyra Kilston, a 31 year old art magazine editor in New York who helped create the blog.

Shortly after Palin's selection, Kilston and her co-worker Quinn Latimer, citing what they saw as 'mounting disbelief, fury and dread' among their female friends over the selection of Sarah Palin, sent out an email to forty of their friends soliciting reaction the Alaska Governor's nomination for their blog.  The women also asked the recipients to forward the email to everyone they knew so that others could do the same.

Within a week they received up to 80,000 responses from women from Alaska to Florida, and now estimate they are receiving response emails at a rate of three per second.

"I don't think either of us thought it would get this large or it would reach this many people," said Latimer.

While the Kilston's and Latimer's blog has gained a lot of traction, polls reflect that Palin is viewed favorably by those in her peer group. A recent ABC News Washington Post poll found that 67 percent of white women viewed Palin favorably.

The two women take issue with Palin's stance on abortion rights, (she is anti-abortion rights) her and views on climate change, (Palin has said she does not believe that global warming is man made) and what they perceive as a lack of experience.

"Palin's political views are in every way a slap in the face to the accomplishments that our mothers and grandmothers and great-grandmothers have fiercely fought for," they wrote in their email .

While the women strongly believe that Palin is not qualified to be vice president, they also don't want their blog to be a smear website.  They hope voters, the media, and contributors to their website focus on Sarah Palin's record rather than her biography. Latimer thinks that the election discourse has taken an ugly turn since Palin's selection. 

"I think it has changed the election from something that was rigorous and intellectual and demanding on the people who were following it, said Latimer.  "McCain has changed that by bringing [Palin] on board.  Suddenly its 'Us Weekly. Suddenly its 'People Magazine' as opposed to a serious election on serious issues."

Hillary Won't Go Quietly

By Norm Cukras | Highlands Today

Published: September 12, 2008

By having Barack Obama elected the Democratic presidential candidate by acclamation, Hillary, in a well-orchestrated maneuver, arguably elevated herself to the position of the most powerful woman in the United States. More so than Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi. More so even than Oprah. Although the jury is still out on Sarah.

I look for Hillary to be one of the next Senate floor leaders: either Majority or Minority, depending on the outcome of November's election.

The Clintons are capable of making the best of any less than satisfactory situation. They are not people who follow paths to obscurity like Al Gore or John Kerry. They do not fade away like old soldiers.

Should Obama win the election I can hear feminists in coffee shops and beauty parlors across the country asking each other, following any major presidential action, "What would Hillary have done?" In fact if the president's, whichever is elected, popularity wanes enough you might even see bumper stickers asking that very question. The fact that a member of the sisterhood might be presiding over the Senate will have little to do with it. Hillary was their choice. Sarah was McCain's. But McCain, following his brilliant vice presidential choice, will be able to shrug off the challenges of the Hillary supporters. Obama will not.

And Now The Fun Begins

With the McCain/Palin ticket now officially established we have two months of intense political posturing to endure. Two months of he said/she said and he or she did or didn't do. The sad thing is: a large percentage of voters already have their minds made up. So all of the folderol that we have to put up with is aimed at a small group of voters who can't make up their minds.

And it always appears that voters are waiting to see which candidate pulls the biggest boner before deciding to vote for the other one. And the media guys are the worst. They keep trying to sensationalize their stories by digging up any dirt on the political hopefuls that they can.

There has got to be a better way.

Maybe someday mathematicians will be able to develop a formula to assess a candidate's worthiness for office. Included in the calculations will be a subset that divides what is promised by at least a factor of three.

The Blinders Are On

I cannot believe college officials across the country want to lower the drinking age to18 because they are unable to deal with underage drinking at their institutions. Supposedly college students are a little more responsible for their actions than the rest of their age group; although watching reruns of the movie "Animal House" would leave one to suspect the wisdom of that conclusion.

Anyway, drinking laws cannot be written to favor any specific group. Laws are usually all encompassing. A lower drinking age would also apply to 18-year-olds who are still in high school. Students who could buy alcoholic beverages for their classmates - or would they be mature enough not do something so irresponsible? Would that teenager coming out of a bar know enough not to try and drive home?

"We can vote, why can't we drink alcohol?" is a teenager's catchphrase. But how many of those eligible actually vote? And when was the last time a vote led to injury of an individual or another person?

"We can fight in a war, why can't we drink?" is another catchphrase. A tough question to answer, except to say that laws apply to everyone: fair or unfair. The question to consider is, in general is teenage drinking more likely to cause harm to others? Our lawmakers think it will even though teenagers themselves and a group of college administrators do not agree.

Overheard

Overheard at the checkout counter: When was the last time a presidential hopeful hugged his running mate?

Well, I've taken myself off the Hillay e-mail list so this info is new to be but I'm not surprised. (I've closd that door and cannot accept any new info from her at this time as I'm still pissed)

At this point I don't think there is anything I can do about anthing political until this current presidential election is over.

I do believe (unfortunately) that I've given up and there is no hope.

I SO believed (and still do!) that Hillary really could make a difference but since she's no longer and option to become our 'leader' then I just have to wait and see what happens in November and then go from there.

Now, AS, before you call me  "quitter" (which sometimes I feel like) I have to say that I used to work for Greenpeace, canvassed door-to-door, and told people that their voice DID matter, that calling and writing to their senators and representaives and local gov't officials DID make a difference. And, to a certain extent, it still does. But, I've given up on Hillary for now and I basically have my head in the sand (again, please be kind!) until November.

FYI (perhaps I should post this elsewhere):

Every time I'm in Europe the U.S. (re: the election, Bush) is in the news. Now, I don't always catch what they're reporting as it's not always in English but the 'mortgage crisis' and the Presidential election are definitely covered, to a certain extent, here (I'm in Paris now). The U.S. still has a BIG effect on other countries believe it or not. Today Bush's face was on tv a lot more than I wantd it to be - and thankfully (???) he looked as stupid/bewildred/clueless as usual. The sad par in all of this is that he'll come out ahead, no matter what. (grrrrrrr!!!)

I will officially go on record (again?) that I NEVER voted for EITHER Bush!