I have to comment that I get a big kick out of watching your inane political drama down there. Seriously, the frontrunners for the leadership of the frontrunning party are a white female and a black male. There is a high probability one of them will be president. So what are the criticisms about them? Well, the chick is not chicky enough and the black guy is not all that blacky.
What is this about? I have a suspicion this is part of Bush's legacy, that now people expect their president to be no better than them. And if your president is smarter or more successful than you, he/she is some sort of elitist snob. So you want your female president to talk mostly about what she's wearing, gush about her new shoes, and rate the hunkiness of various world leaders. And your black president should refer to the senate as "my homies", wear a Raiders hat and big gold chains all the time, and joke about how long his penis is.
I know they couldn't afford to do it, but I wish Obama or Clinton would answer one of these topics with a bit of ire. By rating the chickiness and blackiness of the candidates, it really keeps the discussion on the most meaningless of points. It wasn't quite on this point, but I was really happy that Edwards said what he did about not wanting the racist or sexist vote.
Extra point 1: Joe Biden gots balls! I loved when he called out that NRA whacko with his assault weapon "baby". I wish there was more honesty and less pandering as I think he gained more supporters than he alienated with that comment.
Extra point 2: I was actually impressed with CNN for once! I was convinced the Youtube idea was a front that allowed them to ask the candidates silly titillating questions without having to do the asking themselves. But they actually came through with pretty good questions.
Extra point 3: Hillary dropped the ball in the promo Youtube videos. I think her entire thing was anti-Bush, while I think all the other candidates had positive messages. Whoops!
jake [email] said at 12:12 PM 07-24-2007: This is only part of Bush's legacy in the sense that he has amplified and institutionalized some of the worst things about American politics. The criticism that a (blank) candidate isn't really (blank) enough is sometimes a response to the long history of traitorous tokens like Clarence Thomas, and sometimes it's a disingenuous, covert swipe at a genuinely threatening candidate by the opposition. I would like to think that the 70-some-odd percent of americans who no longer support our President are also disillusioned with his pretense of normalcy.
brandon [email] said at 12:42 PM 07-24-2007: I'd get a bigger kick out of the inane political drama, too, if, like other inane media spectacles it ended with a million dollar prize and a chance to record an album with Simon Cowell, and not the seemingly unlimited power to wage war and enrich your cronies.
Now it just makes me shake my head. Since Guiliani isn't going to be the Republican candidate, I'm probably going to vote for Clinton, if she's on the ticket. But I have a sneaking suspicion that in actuality, I'm actually going to be voting for Margaret Thatcher with a down-market accent.
rick [email] said at 1:56 PM 07-24-2007: There is no way I would ever vote for either Clinton or Giuliani, but I would like to say that Clinton is not much better than Giuliani and, at the very least, a vote for Giuliani as opposed to one for Clinton is not a vote for a two family constitutional monarchy.
kiche [email] said at 2:02 PM 07-24-2007: this would imply that the clintons are a multigenerational political aristocracy in the same fashion as the bush dynasty.
rick [email] said at 3:06 PM 07-24-2007: No, it implies that in the US, broad name recognition, a well-managed campaign and a few deft triangulations on policy are all that is needed to be elected.
brandon [email] said at 3:18 PM 07-24-2007: Well, exactly. You don't elect people because they're good leaders, have good ideas, or have good teams. You don't even know who their teams are going to be. What you do know, in a very limited way, is who knows how to make a good off the cuff quip, who knows how to verbally eviscerate someone else, who has the biggest bank account, who loves Jesus the most, who loves babies the most, who is just-folks, and who has the biggest metaphorical dick.
Our elections are that Mr. Show skit about the world running on a series of blowjobs. The only choice we can make is which PR campaign is less offensive. Otherwise, we are blind actors engaged in our own slavery.
rick [email] said at 3:20 PM 07-24-2007: "nowhere as bad" is an almost meaningless statement though.
Pretty much any of the candidates (with the posible exception of McCain) would be better than the current president. The point is, she, like most of the candidates, is unworthy of support. Given your vote does not matter anyway beyond a symbolic statement, I don't see the point in cast it on her behalf.
brandon [email] said at 2:40 PM 07-24-2007: Call me a bigot, but, I'd vote for a Scientologist before I would vote for a Mormon. And that leaves, who, Fred Thompson on the Republican side? No Thanks. His entire platform seems to be that he dislikes Michael Moore. John Mc(L)ain is a no-show moneywise, so that's not happening. Guiliani is pretty much it, and though he may be bought out up to his ass in business concerns, and he might sell us all down the river for a nickel, one thing that he's not, is sold out to the evangelicals. He may be sold out to some of the Catholics some of the time. But, he's not sold out to Pat Robertson, and that, sadly, is pretty much what makes him the current pearl on the sow's ear that is the Republican Party, no offense to pigs, who are clean, intelligent, and friendly animals compared to the GOP.
On the Democratic side, there are only three candidates of any importance. Edwards is the loser of these three. He just plain sucks, he's been unable to counter any kind of Republican PR, even from crazed shrews like Coulter. They've successfully painted him as a wimp who would spend his presidency changing his wife's colostomy bags, rather than presiding. He's cannot win the White House. He was a liability for Kerry, which is saying alot. And, well, he's still a liability. He's not very presidential. If a non-orange, Al Gore could rise up and avoid the temptation to vaccuum his wife's face, I could vote for him. Obama, I have a hard time figuring out what Obama wants to do. If all he wants to do is be the first black president - awesome! Great! We need a black President. Between Obama and George Clinton, Obama clearly is the better pick. But, unfortunately, my elect a black president urge is overshadowed by my, elect a President who will pretty much immediately end the war in Iraq, Fix Health Care, Produce Bin Laden's head on a pike, and throw up a lot of barriers to "free trade" that are currently destroying blue-collar and middle-americans.
At least with Hillary Clinton I know that she will not do any of these things. She will do the exact opposite. And it will cause stasis. And stasis is exactly what this country needs after 8 years of disastrous, autocratic rule. We need a president who will fuck up everything she/he touches, cause huge resentment and not get a single thing done. There is only once candidate who is GUARANTEED to do this - Obama could turn out to be incredibly competent - and that candidate is Hillary. It matters not, really to me, who is in the cat-bird seat at the white house for the next 4-8 years. All I want, is a president who will oversee the calamitous fall of that office's power. We need a president who will all but reduce to the president's status to nothing more than a power-broker, and an iffy one at that.
kiche [email] said at 3:29 PM 07-24-2007: ron paul thinks abortion should be illegal and supports removing federal constitutional protections for gay people (the legal status being left to the states).
rick [email] said at 3:36 PM 07-24-2007: I don't agree with everything he says but nonetheless, he fits me better than the rest.
You can find a questionable position on every candidate. Will you withhold support for Clinton given she wants to outlaw flag burning, regulate naughty video games, voted for the Patriot Act and renew it as well? You were and are very opposed to the Iraq War. Hillary Clinton voted for it and has not moved in any meaningful way to end it.
Is she a better candidate because she made all the wrong votes for all the right reasons?
kiche [email] said at 3:46 PM 07-24-2007: is supporting the wrong thing for the right reason better than supporting the wrong thing for the wrong reason?
in my book yes.
i'm no hillary supporter (i'm for kucinich); but come on! paul is worse.
and you have no excuse, with kucinich AND gravel in the race. it's not like it's an empty field.
rick [email] said at 4:33 PM 07-24-2007: I have more problems with some of the things Kucinich says. And, by the way, Kiche, he was pro-life as well until about 2004.
I actually would be enthusiastic about a Paul/Gravel fusion candidacy but that will never happen.
As for Hillary Clinton being worse than Ron Paul, I totally and utterly disagree with that statement on several levels. I would take Dr. No over Hillary any day of the week and twice on a Sunday.
I don't see why you are making a fuss though; as I have said before, Hillary Clinton will be our next president.
kiche [email] said at 4:50 PM 07-24-2007: hey, it ain't 2004 it's 2007.
but i don't understand the extent of your hillary hatred. sure i don't like her. and she voted for the iraq disaster. and her record is pretty bad. but i am sensing more hostillity towards her from you than you had towards kerry (which she is no worse than).
and paul just blows. you are being to squishy on him.
rick [email] said at 5:19 PM 07-24-2007: I don't hate her or for that matter dislike her any more than Kerry. I don't even dislike her most among the candidates of this race ( McCain and Edwards take that spot). I just don't believe there is any reason for her to be president. She'll be better than Bush but that says very little.
Dr. Paul may blow harder than Katrina but at the end of the day, he was against much of the truly awful stuff that Bushco has perpetuated. When the US needed someone to stand against the handwringing and fearmongering of the post-9/11 millieu, he, at least, was willing to do so. Everyone else wrote Dubyuh a blank cheque and then complained when he spent it on some of the worst decisions ever.
I will be honest and say I don't like the idea of close relatives of former presidents becoming presidents. It seems too reminiscient of those South Asian democracies that elect the son or the wife of a former leader. The US already did that with Dubyuh; has the US learned nothing in the last seven years?
kiche [email] said at 6:16 PM 07-24-2007: the level of scorn you heap on hillary is more deserved of some one like chris dodd (hillary deserves scorn but you go too far).
also, you need to take another look at the field my friend.
of just shit awful candidates running dodd (who pretty much personally forced through bankruptcy legislation written for the credit card companies) along with tancredo, brownback and huckabee are pretty freaking awful. just as awful as bush or mccain.
edwards just doesn't have enough spine. that's pretty far from being awful.
kiche [email] said at 6:18 PM 07-24-2007: also, gravel and kucinich DID NOT write bush a blank check. and they are much better than paul.
hell, gravel makes paul look like a pansy. gravel personally ended the draft by stopping all congressional business and carrying out the longest filibuster in america's history.
if only he had been in the senate back in 2002/2003.
rick [email] said at 1:54 PM 07-24-2007: Extra point 1: Joe Biden gots balls! I loved when he called out that NRA whacko with his assault weapon "baby". I wish there was more honesty and less pandering as I think he gained more supporters than he alienated with that comment.
I disagree with this. Because this was at a debate and there was an overwhelmingly positive reaction from the crowd, persons wary of gun control will be less motivated to vote Democrat. Moreover, a lot of persons in "the Heartland" may interpret this as a sign of scorn from "the bicoastal elite" towards them.
woody [email] said at 4:19 PM 07-24-2007: Are NRA liberals really a big demographic though? That's my point. Moderate gun control ( like assault weapons bans) only "alienate" hardcore NRA and the dems weren't getting those votes anyway. So he doesn't alienate the vast bulk of dems, but he consolidates the existing dems for whom this is a big issue. It's a small net loss for the party, a big net gain for Biden's campaign.
rick [email] said at 4:36 PM 07-24-2007: The donkeys lost a lot of the blue collar vote in 2000 over the gun issue. Bill Clinton himself has said this. Remember those hunting trips Kerry went on? Did you hear about how Romney tried to claim he used to be an avid hunter? The reason for that is because there are many people in the US who own guns and are sensitive about their ownership and yet nonetheless are independent enough to have their vote up for grabs.
I had actually thought that the Democrats had given up making it an issue but I guess I was wrong.
brandon [email] said at 4:41 PM 07-24-2007: It depends on where you are. Chicago Democrats seemed to be pretty anti-gun. I don't meet a lot of West Coast Dems that are very enthusiastic about private gun ownership. Down here, most Dems I know are gun owners and enthusiastic hunters. Michael Moore, famously, is an NRA or former NRA member and gun owner. It's not the biggest issue, but it can put people off. Especially if they think home-protection or hunting rights are threatened.
neilbert said at 7:41 PM 07-24-2007: The is no chance in hell that Biden is going to snag the nomination, so I think his deflection of the topic of gun control to make fun of a "nutter" was to be expected.
I don't see why Edwards, Biden, or McCain even bother; they know that there is no snoball's chance in hell that they are going to pick up the nomination. Furthermore, if any other democratic candidate picks up the nomination besides Clinton or Obama, the dems will most certainly lose.
Personally, I think the whole Presidency is a farce; it just boils down to has the best hair and who is the richest.
Now politics are just pissing matches; both parties try to destroy each other and are only looking out for themselves and are certainly not a representative of the people's wishes.
