Liberal & Media Hatefest Of Hysterical Hypocrisy: The Mommy Wars

The Unbearable Class Snobbery of Privileged Elite, White Women in the Media and Democrat Party

SANDRA TSING LOH has an opinion piece in the NYTimes yesterday entitled "The Rantings of a P.T.A. Mom" asking why the other candidates couldn't send their kids to a public school like Sarah Palin did.

...it is with huge grief-filled disappointment that I discovered that the Obamas send their children to the University of Chicago Laboratory School (by 5th grade, tuition equals $20,286 a year). The school’s Web site quotes all that ridiculous John Dewey nonsense about developing character while, of course, isolating your children from the poor. A pox on them and, while we’re at it, a pox on John Dewey! I’m sick to death of those inspirational Dewey quotes littering the Web sites of $20,000-plus-a-year private schools, all those gentle duo-tone-photographed murmurings about “building critical thinking and fostering democratic citizenship” in their cherished students, living large on their $20,000-a-year island.

Meanwhile, Joseph Biden, the Amtrak senator, standing up boldly for the right to be a Roman Catholic, appears to have sent all three children to the lovely looking Archmere Academy in Delaware. Archmere’s Web site notes some public school districts allow Archmere students to use public school buses. Well, isn’t that great — your tax dollars at work in the great state of Delaware because with $18,000 a year in tuition, they can’t afford their own buses.


We should be asking:"How can we support and make policies and safety nets stronger and better for ALL moms, dads, parents, children and their families?"


Then again, a spot of happy news for the Democrats: not only did John McCain’s four children attend elite private schools in Arizona, but collective donations to their children’s private schools between 2001 and 2006, totaled $500,000.

And yes, I know I appear to be ranting on like a pit bull without lipstick, which brings me to the final nail in the coffin in this sorry election year. As a Democrat I am horrified that Sarah Palin is the one who snagged the deeply profound — and absolutely ignored by professional smart people — emotional real estate of “P.T.A. mother.” I too am, in fact, not just “my kids’ mom” but their Title I Los Angeles public school P.T.A. secretary. This unheard female howl is, for better or worse, what Ms. Palin has set out to tap into; it is real, and I am sick that we’ve let the Republicans charge this ground.

Sarah Palin’s children went to what looks like a humble little public school: Iditarod Elementary on Wasilla Fishhook Road. The school’s score on www.greatschools.net is a 4. That’s a lot of street cred, for a gun-totin’, snow-mobilin’ creationist-lovin’ lady.

Oh, I’m such a depressed, Democrat P.T.A. mother.

Amen. Thank you Sandra. Sending you healing, supportive energy on your journey. Thanks for bringing this touchy subject up. I'm no longer a democrat. I dumped them too and am now an independent.

While we're at it, the main reason for this entry: I'm totally disgusted with the progressives, leftists, self-described feminists and democrats who — with the blessings and instigations of the media and democrap party — immediately launched the mommy wars, attacking Palin for NOT staying home, for having the audacity to be ambitious and answer the call for the #2 slot in the WORLD, not just the nation.

HUH? !!!! WTF have we all been fighting for all these decades if not for women to make their own decisions, be able to SUPPORT their families as well develop our own professional, personal, creative and intellectual talents whether at home with the kids, volunteering in the community or out in the work-world.

It is hypocrisy of the WORST most disgusting kind; truly infuriating. The writers of the New York Times, Washington Post among the WORST. Sally Quinn (OMG is there a pointier, snootier more hypocritical nose in the D.C. arena? A complete joke. She pooh-poohed Hillary and Bill for not fitting in when they arrived in Washington to begin his first term. Did she do anything to HELP Hillary pass health care reform? HELL NO! She acted like the privileged, rich, adulterous, sniveling hypocrite she still is. Ruth Marcus -- Give Me A BREAK. Shame on you. All the poseurs at the Huffington Post? God has there ever been a more useless, reactive, narcissistic group (other than Daily Kos)? Nancy Pelosi? Nothing like putting party over principles.

And that Dowd woman: puhlease — all women are her enemies and competition. She's the ultimate male-identified college girl who won't grow up. All those democrats who riled against what happened to Hillary and are now making excuses for it because it's directed at Palin (who may be a republican, but she's also a Woman and Working Mom.

All those ridiculous 'liberal democrats' (faux feminists) showing that it is actually their social and class sensibilities — not feminist principles — that have been mortally wounded by a working class woman from Alaska who has enraptured the nation. I seem to remember a black dude politician who captured the imagination of millions not too long ago. Hysterical hypocrisy seems to fit pretty well.

Not only does Palin have a lot of street cred, but also tremendous natural potlical talent. Her entry into the campaign with her amazing story should have offered the perfect launching pad for a national discussion about STRENGTHENING family support systems, child care, family leave, living wages, health care, etc.

Instead, the elite, entitled WOMEN in the media acted (and the obamabots of both genders in the blogosphere) -- not out of feminism -- but out of snobbery and classism.

And it's the classic patriarchal trap and set up: Women destroying other women so that the patriarchal system can claim innocence. Males, male systems, dehumanizing thugs who hold the power and make policies that harm women, children and families once again escape unscathed. They get to stand at a distance, say and pretend: "This is not about us, it's all you silly women. See. We told you that women can't handle power."

Economic power, equality, equal opportunity for ALL women -- ESPECIALLY working class and poor women -- support for all women and their children REGARDLESS of political affiliation or belief system. That's what feminism is supposed to be about.

We should be asking: "How can we support this amazing and talented woman and helping her be the best she can be—as a mother, leader, woman, role-model? How can we encourage HER to be an advocate for all working mothers (the old saying: all mothers are working mothers) and their families (regardless of their political affiliation, etc). How can we support and make policies and safety nets stronger and better for ALL moms, dads, parents, children and their families?" (in all the many forms including foster and grandparents raising their grandchildren)

Why aren't those questions being posed, much less discussed?

The fact that the media owners/publishers have given so much print/page/digital/air time to the HYPOCRITICAL voices attacking Palin very much betrays their superficial reactive, non-grasp of the real issues affecting women, children and their families. They surely don't give a flip about what's best for women, children, families (which by the way, includes men/male relatives of some type in the overwhelming majority of them) or they would not have instigated and fueled this ridiculous bullshit in the first place.

I can't believe how quickly the leftists, democrats, feminists and others who are SUPPOSED to be advocates for women's rights so quickly and easily trashed their own street cred and descended into complete and utter hypocrisy.

Among the few women in the media whom I've heard refuse to jump in to the fray and who also defended Palin: Mika Brezenski of Morning Joe, Andrea Mitchell of NBC, Hillary Rosen (a democrat analyst who supported Hillary), Gail Collins of the New York Times, Joan Walsh of Salon.com and the always annoying but sometimes brilliant Camille Paglia, who has a recent piece in which she proclaims "the charismatic Sarah Palin, a powerful new feminist."

The only national feminist LEADER so far that I know of who hasn't joined the hatefest of hysterical hypocrisy: Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Sandra's complete piece is here.

Snobby democrat elites, youthful arrogant know-it-alls & media still don't get the power of American symbolism

election campaigns are primarily about the realities of voters' minds, which depend on how the candidates and the external realities are cognitively framed. They can be framed honestly or deceptively, effectively or clumsily. And they are always framed from the perspective of a worldview.

The Obama campaign has learned this. [Have they? Or have they already forgotten it?] The Republicans have long known it, and the choice of Sarah Palin as their vice presidential candidate reflects their expert understanding of the political mind and political marketing. Democrats who simply belittle the Palin choice are courting disaster. It must be taken with the utmost seriousness.

The Democratic responses so far reflect external realities: she is inexperienced, knowing little or nothing about foreign policy or national issues; she is really an anti-feminist, wanting the government to enter women's lives to block abortion, but not wanting the government to guarantee equal pay for equal work, or provide adequate child health coverage, or child care, or early childhood education; she shills for the oil and gas industry on drilling; she denies the scientific truths of global warming and evolution; she misuses her political authority; she opposes sex education and her daughter is pregnant; and, rather than being a maverick, she is on the whole a radical right-wing ideologue.

All true, so far as we can tell.

But such truths may nonetheless be largely irrelevant to this campaign. That is the lesson Democrats must learn. They must learn the reality of the political mind.

Palin is masterful at the Republican game of taking the Democrats' language and reframing it -- putting conservative frames to progressive words: Reform, prosperity, peace. She is also masterful at using the progressive narratives: she's from the working class, working her way up from hockey mom and the PTA to mayor, governor, and VP candidate. Her husband is a union member. She can say to the conservative populists that she is one of them -- all the things that Obama and Biden have been saying. Bottom-up, not top-down.

Yes, the McCain-Palin ticket is weak on the major realities. But it is strong on the symbolic dimension of politics that Republicans are so good at marketing. Just arguing the realities, the issues, the hard truths should be enough in times this bad, but the political mind and its response to symbolism cannot be ignored. The initial Democratic response to Palin -- the response based on realities alone -- indicates that many Democrats have not learned the lessons of the Reagan and Bush years.

They have not learned the nature of conservative populism. A great many working-class folks are what I call "bi-conceptual," that is, they are split between conservative and progressive modes of thought. Conservative on patriotism and certain social and family issues, which they have been led to see as "moral," progressive in loving the land, living in communities of care, and practical kitchen table issues like mortgages, health care, wages, retirement, and so on.

From George Lakoff's HuffPo post


George Lakoff is the author of The Political Mind: Why You Can't Understand 20th Century Politics With and 18th Century Brain.

The Final Tally: It's Practically a Tie

Congratulations to both Democrat Party Finalists!


Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by over 300,000 votes. Barack Obama won more pledged delegates but not enough to clinch the nomination; that came from the anti-democracy super delegates.

Here are the final pre-super delegate totals based on what I've read elsewhere:


POPULAR VOTE (all primaries and caucuses)

Hillary Clinton: 17,785,009

Barack Obama: 17,479,990

PLEDGED DELEGATES

Barack Obama: 1766.5

Hillary Clinton: 1639.5

Obama showed his Nixonian Side of Petty Insecurities

...while limping to the finish line.

Soaring rhetoric Blah blah blah. The talking heads and nattering nobob Obama-worshipers at it once more. Obama and his minions had to make sure he was the final territory claiming spotlight and once again unwittingly actually showed his weaknesses, insecurities and utter disrespect to Hillary Clinton (and her supporters).

How hard would it have been to tell his anti-democracy democrat party super delegates to WAIT one day to join the herd and put him in the 'official' nominee category?

How much more generous would it have been to give that speech one day later?

But no, like a dog peeing on a post, he could not restrain himself (much like his impulse-driven preacher friends and mentors).

I think it all ultimately says far more about him -- along with his pandering and lofty but extremely non-specific, oratory. And it's not flattering.

Nixonian and ungenerous indeed.

He and the democrat elites don't give a crap about 18 million voters. If he doesn't offer the Veep slot to Hillary, I'll be writing in Clinton in November.




Meanwhile: lots of reports, including from NoQuarter, that a video of Michelle Obama joining with Louis Farrakhan in a total blaming dis of whitey will be released tomorrow; others say the republicans will hold onto it for an October surprise.
http://www.redlasso.com/ClipPlayer.aspx?id=4129e9d3-586a-45dd-aeb9-294b819b7afa

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Write in Hillary, Michelle Obama, Farrakhan video

Colbert on The Democrats' Anti-Democratic Traditions

"

Alot of democrats still get all upset about the 2000 election in Florida just because it was a small group of people in a back room deciding who was going to be the next president of the United States ... isn't that what the super delegates are all about now? ... that's the democratic tradition!

"

— Stephen Colbert, May 14 , 2008 Colbert Report interview with Laura Dern regarding the new HBO film Recount

Too Much Democracy for the Democratic Party!

Jon Stewart consults his calendar to figure out when Hillary should drop out of the race

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Obama Now Has a Growing 'White Problem' Thanks to Pastor Wright

Poll shows Rev. Jeremiah Wright hurting Barack Obama

More proof that journalists have been lazy and overtly biased and caught up in Obamamania. The first tape in question about "God Damn America" has been in existence since September 2001.

Before going into hysterics: Anyone who stopped for a moment to think/empathize with the experiences of black folks in America and US history could understand how Wright could say what he said. And Obama has distanced himself (although you would think he would have had the judgment to understand this would be a problem when he first started to think about running for president.)

Given all that, I do sadly think Wright's anti-Hillary comments indicated an appalling lack of acknowledgment of and disregard for the effects of sexism in our culture, especially regarding what Hillary has endured for 15+ years. That's disappointing as well.

However, as they say, "With Friends Like These..."the republican and right-wing 527s are going to have a field day if Obama is the democratic nominee. That will very possibly lose him the election, if not the democratic nomination. I'll be interested to see how he handles it going forward. It's a big problem and it won't go away easily: that seems clear.

What also seems clear is that the old identity politics, politics of 'victimization', who's suffered more, politics of 'essentialism', are/is not going to sit well with the majority of voters, who happen to be white. That path can only benefit John McCain and the Republicans.

Regarding the Judgement/Judgment to be President issue: I also have to wonder why the Obama campaign didn't have the judgment to have seen this coming long before now.

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The Deeply Racialized Psycho Sexual Schizophrenic Anxieties of White Media Types

Wouldn't it be a fascinating psycho-sexual study to peer into those not-so-hidden anxieties that seem to be repressed on the one hand and expressed on the other, but certainly not evenly distributed according to their true source?

As I've stated to friends and family: I don't have a problem supporting and voting for Barack Obama if he wins and it is indeed looking good for him. I also agree that the super delegates should not be used to 'award' the nomination to Clinton if the popular vote has gone for Obama.

However, I do have a big problem with the (mainly white male) broadcast media's disparate treatment and coverage of the campaign as evidenced by the condescending personal attacks and snide, not very disguised remarks about Senator Clinton based on qualities related to her gender, not her record, not her policies, not her skills.

Obama happens to be the beneficiary of unequal treatment which is not in his control. And yeah, of course, that's mainly MSNBC's undisguised favoritism of him and demonization of her, but includes a former Washington Post has-been schlub, Carl Bernstein on CNN.

I have a theory that most of these entitled, privileged, rich, very white guys actually DO have a lot of very deep anxieties about having a Black Male President (even though he's biracial and was raised by his white mom and white grandparents, he identifies himself as African-American, and the world does too, because we're a culture obsessed with racializing and sexualizing and categorizing and labeling 'others' — those who are 'not us').

So Tweety Matthews and Joe 'bully-boy' Scumbag and Smirking Fat-boy Russert and Living on Past Glories Bernstein and Chameleon Shuster and all those guys know vaguely on some level outwardly expressing their fears about Obama's Blackness and about having a Powerful Black Man in charge, installed in the most powerful office in the nation (and world) is obviously bigoted and stupid. (At least they know that it is forbidden to express publicly anyway — except for truly stupid bigots like Bill O'Reilly and Glen Beck who don't have the sense to understand that everyone doesn't think — and I use that word lightly — like they do).

But after the 'Imus affair', those same guys who snickered during all the Imus jokey jokes about people of color and Hillary and women in general, finally found out that: Racism is out. Finally. May it burn in hell never to return. (I can wish and hope, can't I?)

But remember Rutgers: the main public and media outrage (as presented by the media itself) was over the outrageous Imus/McGuirk racism finally going too far, not the sexism.

"

He strides or stumbles about ... bifurcations ... often mapped onto the suspect divides between desire and anxiety ... between the body and perception ... [alternating between being] privileged or repressed ... the other often erupts through regardless of well-placed lines of defense*

"

Sexism is still in — alack and alas — as so many of the constant barrage of movies, songs, videos, games, magazines, tv shows continually prove every minute of every day. Sexism, misogyny, sexual objectification, sexual violence toward all things female/feminine are still acceptable and sanctioned, in fact required by our culture .... including through trite political commentary which is irrelevant and pointless, superficial, cruel, mean, petty, unequal, unjust, but highly effective at demonizing Clinton who represents powerful women, women with ambition, women with plans and determination who don't 'match' the social strictures which require women to be quiet, attractive, young, sexually objectified, non-threatening and not empowered. It's still the whore/madonna syndrome with newer, more sinister twists.

These smug, bloviating, sputtering, spitting, cowardly pundits are so unconscious about their own fears and biases and they have no where else to 'put it' (all that double whammy castration anxiety about powerful women and black men — we really are a repressed, sadistic, puritanical nation) — so they act out other culturally and socially acceptable forms of psychological (and political) violence that mirrors the relationship and stranger violence which occurs every day in the sexual assaults, beatings, sexual enslavement, rapes, murders of women, pregnant women, children and girls every day throughout this nation and the world (just watch the most recent trials and news stories about murdered pregnant women, missing daughters, wives and mothers — most of which are also dismissed as just more media obsession with pretty women, which may be part of the story, but the unconsciousness of what is really happening to women and girls in our culture is what I'm more interested in). Women of color are and have also historically been the targets of all the rage of their own cultures in addition to white culture; white women do not have a great history of supporting their struggles nor the struggles of men of color. Women of privilege and power don't always have a very good history of solidarity with or supporting other women for that matter. Patriarchy is unrelenting. Kind of like the Terminator character in the films and the new, apparently soon-to-be-dead TV series which features a couple of strong, powerful, intellectually and physically superior and determined female characters, coincidentally.).

About that Acting Out, as Robin Morgan has pointed out, if you substitute racist or anti-semitic slurs, terms, attitudes and ridicule, it would easily be identified as such and the outrage would be so loud and vociferous that it would not take 10 minutes for action to be taken amongst the outpouring of righteous indignation and public ire.

Meanwhile, just as also happens everywhere that all these atrocities and indignities occur (large and small), women often willingly participate or act as after-the-fact accomplices (Dowd, Mitchell, O'Donnell — Norah, not Rosie — and to an extent Maddow — what a major disappointment) or are silent (almost everyone else).

Even when you think there are some good guys (Olbermann), they eventually capitulate in order to 'fit in' and put 'good ole boy' loyalty — wanting to be 'one of the guys' above any remaining layer thin integrity and with their jello-filled backbones quickly jump right in to the group activities. I've never seen it fail to occur on some level when in the company of their cohorts. Never.

So when Hillary and others point out that you can't always count on 'the guys' (including Bill himself) to stand up for us, there's a reason and it's called history (or reality, take your pick). We have to hope Obama is different‚ and if he's not — it's up to us to hold him accountable for his promises. The work never ends. Voting is not democracy; it is one expression of a life-long process and responsibility to participatory democracy, and to preserving and extending our constitutional rights to freedom, equality, and civil rights (with rights come responsibilities).

Deep? Yeah, sure. But I'll be interested to read some historical analysis of this extremely 'hysterical' time in our nation's schizophrenic history as we get some distance. It saddens me that we're still such an immature (uncivilized) nation when it comes to women in power (so few) and empowering girls, but encourages me that we may make some major inroads on one of our collective historical sins, racism.

The drama of it all also kinda reminds me of The Graduate, especially the final scene when the two star-crossed lovers (Dustin Hoffman and Katharine Ross) end up together on that bus hurtling down the road. It's one thing to see that film in your youth, another to see it after you've grown up and matured for a while.

As I've noted numerous times before, we've never expected any male candidate to be 'perfect' (and they've never let us down in that regard) — including Obama — why do we expect Hillary to be the exception?

..................................

When it's all over, who might be able to provide some honest, clear-headed analysis? Whose book about this history-making time in our democracy's history would you want to read?

*VIRILIO, WAR, CINEMA, BODIES

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Because It Must Be Said...Written...Read...Considered...Acted Upon

For too long, the history of women has been a history of silence

Goodbye To All That (#2)

by Robin Morgan

February 2, 2008

Goodbye To All That” was my (in)famous 1970 essay breaking free from a politics of accommodation especially affecting women (for an online version, see http://blog.fair-use.org/category/chicago/).

During my decades in civil-rights, anti-war, and contemporary women’s movements, I’ve avoided writing another specific “Goodbye . . .” But not since the suffrage struggle have two communities—joint conscience-keepers of this country—been so set in competition, as the contest between Hillary Rodham Clinton (HRC) and Barack Obama (BO) unfurls. So.

Goodbye to the double standard . . .

—Hillary is too ballsy but too womanly, a Snow Maiden who’s emotional, and so much a politician as to be unfit for politics.

—She’s “ambitious” but he shows “fire in the belly.” (Ever had labor pains?)—When a sexist idiot screamed “Iron my shirt!” at HRC, it was considered amusing; if a racist idiot shouted “Shine my shoes!” at BO, it would’ve inspired hours of airtime and pages of newsprint analyzing our national dishonor.

—Young political Kennedys—Kathleen, Kerry, and Bobby Jr.—all endorsed Hillary. Senator Ted, age 76, endorsed Obama. If the situation were reversed, pundits would snort “See? Ted and establishment types back her, but the forward-looking generation backs him.” (Personally, I’m unimpressed with Caroline’s longing for the Return of the Fathers. Unlike the rest of the world, Americans have short memories. Me, I still recall Marilyn Monroe’s suicide, and a dead girl named Mary Jo Kopechne in Chappaquiddick.)

Goodbye to the toxic viciousness . . .

Carl Bernstein's disgust at Hillary’s “thick ankles.” Nixon-trickster Roger Stone’s new Hillary-hating 527 group, “Citizens United Not Timid” (check the capital letters). John McCain answering “How do we beat the bitch?" with “Excellent question!” Would he have dared reply similarly to “How do we beat the black bastard?” For shame.

Goodbye to the HRC nutcracker with metal spikes between splayed thighs. If it was a tap-dancing blackface doll, we would be righteously outraged—and they would not be selling it in airports. Shame.

Goodbye to the most intimately violent T-shirts in election history, including one with the murderous slogan “If Only Hillary had married O.J. Instead!” Shame.

Goodbye to Comedy Central’s “Southpark” featuring a storyline in which terrorists secrete a bomb in HRC’s vagina. I refuse to wrench my brain down into the gutter far enough to find a race-based comparison. For shame.

“Well-behaved women seldom make history.”

Goodbye to the sick, malicious idea that this is funny. This is not “Clinton hating,” not “Hillary hating.” This is sociopathic woman-hating. If it were about Jews, we would recognize it instantly as anti-Semitic propaganda; if about race, as KKK poison. Hell, PETA would go ballistic if such vomitous spew were directed at animals. Where is our sense of outrage—as citizens, voters, Americans?

Goodbye to the news-coverage target-practice . . .

The women’s movement and Media Matters wrung an apology from MSNBC’s Chris Matthews for relentless misogynistic comments (www.womensmediacenter.com). But what about NBC’s Tim Russert’s continual sexist asides and his all-white-male panels pontificating on race and gender? Or CNN’s Tony Harris chuckling at “the chromosome thing” while interviewing a woman from The White House Project? And that’s not even mentioning Fox News.

Goodbye to pretending the black community is entirely male and all women are white . . .

Surprise! Women exist in all opinions, pigmentations, ethnicities, abilities, sexual preferences, and ages—not only African American and European American but Latina and Native American, Asian American and Pacific Islanders, Arab American and—hey, every group, because a group wouldn’t exist if we hadn’t given birth to it. A few non-racist countries may exist—but sexism is everywhere. No matter how many ways a woman breaks free from other discriminations, she remains a female human being in a world still so patriarchal that it’s the “norm.”

So why should all women not be as justly proud of our womanhood and the centuries, even millennia, of struggle that got us this far, as black Americans, women and men, are justly proud of their struggles?

Goodbye to a campaign where he has to pass as white (which whites—especially wealthy ones—adore), while she has to pass as male (which both men and women demanded of her, and then found unforgivable). If she were blackor he were female we wouldn’t be having such problems, and I for one would be in heaven. But at present such a candidate wouldn’t stand a chance—even if she shared Condi Rice’s Bush-defending politics.

I was celebrating the pivotal power at last focused on African American women deciding on which of two candidates to bestow their vote—until a number of Hillary-supporting black feminists told me they’re being called “race traitors.”

Why should all women not be as justly proud of our womanhood and the centuries, even millennia, of struggle that got us this far, as black Americans, women and men, are justly proud of their struggles?

So goodbye to conversations about this nation’s deepest scar—slavery—which fail to acknowledge that labor- and sexual-slavery exist today in the U.S. and elsewhere on this planet, and the majority of those enslaved are women.

Women have endured sex/race/ethnic/religious hatred, rape and battery, invasion of spirit and flesh, forced pregnancy; being the majority of the poor, the illiterate, the disabled, of refugees, caregivers, the HIV/AIDS afflicted, the powerless. We have survived invisibility, ridicule, religious fundamentalisms, polygamy, teargas, forced feedings, jails, asylums, sati, purdah, female genital mutilation, witch burnings, stonings, and attempted gynocides. We have tried reason, persuasion, reassurances, and being extra-qualified, only to learn it never was about qualifications after all. We know that at this historical moment women experience the world differently from men—though not all the same as one another—and can govern differently, from Elizabeth Tudor to Michele Bachelet and Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

We remember when Shirley Chisholm and Patricia Schroeder ran for this high office and barely got past the gate—they showed too much passion, raised too little cash, were joke fodder. Goodbye to all that. (And goodbye to some feminists so famished for a female president they were even willing to abandon women’s rights in backing Elizabeth Dole.)

Goodbye, goodbye to . . .

—blaming anything Bill Clinton does on Hillary (even including his womanizing like the Kennedy guys—though unlike them, he got reported on). Let’s get real. If he hadn’t campaigned strongly for her everyone would cluck over what that meant. Enough of Bill and Teddy Kennedy locking their alpha male horns while Hillary pays for it.

—an era when parts of the populace feel so disaffected by politics that a comparative lack of knowledge, experience, and skill is actually seen as attractive, when celebrity-culture mania now infects our elections so that it’s “cooler” to glow with marquee charisma than to understand the vast global complexities of power on a nuclear, wounded planet.

—the notion that it’s fun to elect a handsome, cocky president who feels he can learn on the job, goodbye to George W. Bush and the destruction brought by his inexperience, ignorance, and arrogance. Goodbye to the accusation that HRC acts “entitled” when she’s worked intensely at everything she’s done—including being a nose-to-the-grindstone, first-rate senator from my state.

Goodbye to conversations about this nation’s deepest scar—slavery—which fail to acknowledge that labor- and sexual-slavery exist today in the U.S. and elsewhere on this planet, and the majority of those enslaved are women.

Goodbye to her being exploited as a Rorschach test by women who reduce her to a blank screen on which they project their own fears, failures, fantasies.

Goodbye to the phrase “polarizing figure” to describe someone who embodies the transitions women have made in the last century and are poised to make in this one. It was the women’s movement that quipped, “We are becoming the men we wanted to marry.” She heard us, and she has.

Goodbye to some women letting history pass by while wringing their hands, because Hillary isn’t as “likeable” as they’ve been warned they must be, or because she didn’t leave him, couldn’t “control” him, kept her family together and raised a smart, sane daughter. (Think of the blame if Chelsea had ever acted in the alcoholic, neurotic manner of the Bush twins!) Goodbye to some women pouting because she didn’t bake cookies or she did, sniping because she learned the rules and then bent or broke them. Grow the hell up. She is not running for Ms.-perfect-pure-queen-icon of the feminist movement. She’s running to be president of the United States.

Goodbye to the shocking American ignorance of our own and other countries’ history. Margaret Thatcher and Golda Meir rose through party ranks and war, positioning themselves as proto-male leaders. Almost all other female heads of government so far have been related to men of power—granddaughters, daughters, sisters, wives, widows: Gandhi, Bandaranike, Bhutto, Aquino, Chamorro, Wazed, Macapagal-Arroyo, Johnson Sirleaf, Bachelet, Kirchner, and more. Even in our “land of opportunity,” it’s mostly the first pathway “in” permitted to women: Representatives Doris Matsui and Mary Bono and Sala Burton; Senator Jean Carnahan . . . far too many to list here.

Goodbye to a misrepresented generational divide . . .

Goodbye to the so-called spontaneous “Obama Girl” flaunting her bikini-clad ass online—then confessing Oh yeah it wasn’t her idea after all, some guys got her to do it and dictated the clothes, which she said “made me feel like a dork.”

Goodbye to some young women eager to win male approval by showing they’re not feminists (at least not the kind who actually threaten thestatus quo), who can’t identify with a woman candidate because she is unafraid of eeueweeeu yucky power, who fear their boyfriends might look at them funny if they say something good about her. Goodbye to women of any age again feeling unworthy, sulking “what if she’s not electable?” or “maybe it’s post-feminism and whoooosh we’re already free.” Let a statement by the magnificent Harriet Tubman stand as reply. When asked how she managed to save hundreds of enslaved African Americans via the Underground Railroad during the Civil War, she replied bitterly, “I could have saved thousands—if only I’d been able to convince them they were slaves.”

I’d rather say a joyful Hello to all the glorious young women who do identifywith Hillary, and all the brave, smart men—of all ethnicities and any age—who get that it’s in their self-interest, too. She’s better qualified. (D’uh.) She’s a high-profile candidate with an enormous grasp of foreign- and domestic-policy nuance, dedication to detail, ability to absorb staggering insult and personal pain while retaining dignity, resolve, even humor, and keep on keeping on. (Also, yes, dammit, let’s hear it for her connections and funding and party-building background, too. Obama was awfully glad about those when she raised dough and campaigned for him to get to the Senate in the first place.)

I’d rather look forward to what a good president he might make in eight years, when his vision and spirit are seasoned by practical know-how—and he’ll be all of 54. Meanwhile, goodbye to turning him into a shining knight when actually he’s an astute, smooth pol with speechwriters who’ve worked with the Kennedys’ own speechwriter-courtier Ted Sorenson. If it’s only about ringing rhetoric, let speechwriters run. But isn’t it about getting the policies we want enacted?

And goodbye to the ageism . . .

How dare anyone unilaterally decide when to turn the page on history, papering over real inequities and suffering constituencies in the promise of a feel-good campaign? How dare anyone claim to unify while dividing, or think that to rouse U.S. youth from torpor it’s useful to triage the single largest demographic in this country’s history: the boomer generation—the majority of which is female?

Old woman are the one group that doesn’t grow more conservative with age—and we are the generation of radicals who said “Well-behaved women seldom make history.” Goodbye to going gently into any goodnight any man prescribes for us. We are the women who changed the reality of the United States. And though we never went away, brace yourselves: we’re back!

We are the women who brought this country equal credit, better pay, affirmative action, the concept of a family-focused workplace; the women who established rape-crisis centers and battery shelters, marital-rape and date-rape laws; the women who defended lesbian custody rights, who fought for prison reform, founded the peace and environmental movements; who insisted that medical research include female anatomy; who inspired men to become more nurturing parents; who created women’s studies and Title IX so we all could cheer the WNBA stars and Mia Hamm. We are the women who reclaimed sexuality from violent pornography, who put childcare on the national agenda, who transformed demographics, artistic expression, language itself. We are the women who forged a worldwide movement. We are the proud successors of women who, though it took more than 50 years, won us the vote.

We are the women who now comprise the majority of U.S. voters.

Hillary said she found her own voice in New Hampshire. There’s not a woman alive who, if she’s honest, doesn’t recognize what she means. Then HRC got drowned out by campaign experts, Bill, and media’s obsession with everything Bill.

So listen to her voice:

“For too long, the history of women has been a history of silence. Even today, there are those who are trying to silence our words.

“It is a violation of human rights when babies are denied food, or drowned, or suffocated, or their spines broken, simply because they are born girls. It is a violation of human rights when woman and girls are sold into the slavery of prostitution. It is a violation of human rights when women are doused with gasoline, set on fire and burned to death because their marriage dowries are deemed too small. It is a violation of human rights when individual women are raped in their own communities and when thousands of women are subjected to rape as a tactic or prize of war. It is a violation of human rights when a leading cause of death worldwide along women ages 14 to 44 is the violence they are subjected to in their own homes. It is a violation of human rights when women are denied the right to plan their own families, and that includes being forced to have abortions or being sterilized against their will.

“Women’s rights are human rights. Among those rights are the right to speak freely—and the right to be heard.”

That was Hillary Rodham Clinton defying the U.S. State Department and the Chinese Government at the 1995 UN World Conference on Women in Beijing (look here for the full, stunning speech).

And this voice, age 21, in “Commencement Remarks of Hillary D. Rodham, President of Wellesley College Government Association, Class of 1969.”

“We are, all of us, exploring a world none of us understands. . . . searching for a more immediate, ecstatic, and penetrating mode of living. . . . [for the] integrity, the courage to be whole, living in relation to one another in the full poetry of existence. The struggle for an integrated life existing in an atmosphere of communal trust and respect is one with desperately important political and social consequences. . . . Fear is always with us, but we just don't have time for it.”

She ended with the commitment “to practice, with all the skill of our being: the art of making possible.”

And for decades, she’s been learning how.

So goodbye to Hillary’s second-guessing herself. The real question is deeper than her re-finding her voice. Can we women find ours? Can we do this for ourselves?

“Our President, Ourselves!”

Time is short and the contest tightening. We need to rise in furious energy—as we did when Anita Hill was so vilely treated in the U.S. Senate, as we did when Rosie Jiminez was butchered by an illegal abortion, as we did and do for women globally who are condemned for trying to break through. We need to win, this time. Goodbye to supporting HRC tepidly, with ambivalent caveats and apologetic smiles. Time to volunteer, make phone calls, send emails, donate money, argue, rally, march, shout, vote.

Me? I support Hillary Rodham because she’s the best qualified of all candidates running in both parties. I support her because her progressive politics are as strong as her proven ability to withstand what will be a massive right-wing assault in the general election. I support her because she knows how to get us out of Iraq. I support her because she’s refreshingly thoughtful, and I’m bloodied from eight years of a jolly “uniter” with ejaculatory politics. I needn’t agree with her on every point. I agree with the 97 percent of her positions that are identical with Obama’s—and the few where hers are both more practical and to the left of his (like health care). I support her because she’s already smashed the first-lady stereotype and made history as a fine senator, because I believe she will continue to make history not only as the first US woman president, but as a great US president.

As for the “woman thing”?

Me, I’m voting for Hillary not because she’s a woman—but because I am.

From the Womens Media Center

Robin Morgan has published 21 books, including six of poetry, four of fiction, and the now-classic anthologies Sisterhood Is Powerful, Sisterhood Is Global, and Sisterhood Is Forever. Her work has been translated into 13 languages. A founder of contemporary U.S. feminism, she has also been a leader in the international women's movement for 25 years. Recent books include A Hot January: Poems 1996-1999; Saturday's Child: A Memoir; her best-selling The Demon Lover: The Roots of Terrorism, updated and reissued in 2001; and her novel, The Burning Time. Her nonfiction work, Fighting Words: A Took Kit for Combating the Religious Right, came out in September 2006.

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Sense & Sensibilities

Hope for What? Change to do What?
“Talk Is Cheap. Mistakes Are Expensive”

People who are being “swept along by the eloquence of Barack Obama's speeches“ forget that at one time, George W. Bush was seen as “charming“ and “inspirational“ ...


The beneficiary of this she’s-a-victim-so-we-must-expel-her logic is Barack Obama who doesn’t have to work hard at all. The media are doing it for him

E.J. Dionne asks: Who can beat John McCain? Polls today are a snapshot. Polls change, people change their minds. What the polls say today cannot be counted on tomorrow, or next month, or next fall. The polls had written off John McCain just a few weeks ago.

A Party Divided by Sensibility

By E. J. Dionne Jr.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008; Page A19

It's come down to this: Who can beat John McCain?

Winning that argument could allow Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton to reach beyond their respective demographic comfort zones. Only if one of them can build a clear majority will the party be saved from a descent into the mire of rules fights and backroom dealing. It will also take leadership to protect the Democratic village from chaos and recriminations.

For the moment, the world is moving Obama's way: He swept four states last weekend and is favored in today's primaries in the District of Columbia, Maryland and Virginia. Polling suggests that Obama can draw independents whom Clinton can't reach and can mobilize new and younger voters in a way Clinton never will.

Obama drove that perception by offering a brief against the politics of Clintonism: She “starts off with 47 percent of the country against her,“ he said in Alexandria on Sunday.

Meanwhile, as Professor Stanley Fish points out in his NYTimes column entitled "A Calumny* a Day To Keep Hillary Away", “Electability (a concept invoked often) is a code word that masks the fact that the result of such reasoning is to cede the political power to the ranters.“ One respondent to his earlier column on Hillary Hate wrote: “When Obama calls Hillary divisive he, of course, is pandering to these crazies...” Fish writes that “The beneficiary of this she’s-a-victim-so-we-must-expel-her logic is Barack Obama, and some respondents suspected him of fostering the divisiveness he rails against. Actually, Obama doesn’t have to work hard at all. The media ... are doing it for him. ... With unpaid employees on both sides of the media aisle, Obama doesn’t have to do anything but be his usual inspirational self. Unencumbered by the record of achievements and missteps that comes along with political longevity, he can present a clean slate to the electorate. Nothing hazarded equals nothing to be criticized for.”

“...There is another world in Democratic politics, a practical, mostly middle-aged and middle-class world that is immune to fervor and electricity. It is made up of people with long memories who are skeptical of fads and like their candidates tough, detail-oriented and -- to use a word Obama regularly mocks -- seasoned.”

...It's hard to imagine that she can “break out of the politics of the past 15 years.” The alternative: the antidepressant right there on the shelf in front of them. Its brand is Obama.

Yet there is another world in Democratic politics, a practical, mostly middle-aged and middle-class world that is immune to fervor and electricity. It is made up of people with long memories who are skeptical of fads and like their candidates tough, detail-oriented and -- to use a word Obama regularly mocks -- seasoned.

If Obama is passion, Clinton is bread and butter. If she needs more flourishes, he could afford to traffic a bit more in the staples.

These are the Hillary people, and they gathered in Manassas last weekend in significant numbers at the Grace E. Metz Middle School, cozy schools being a preferred venue for a Clinton campaign aware that mammoth rallies are normally beyond its reach.

She does not lack for loyalists. Paulie Abeles of Derwood, Md., held aloft a hand-printed sign that did not mince words: “Talk Is Cheap. Mistakes Are Expensive.”

Abeles explained that people who are being “swept along by the eloquence of Barack Obama's speeches” forget that at one time, George W. Bush was seen as “charming” and “inspirational.” And electability was on her mind. If President Bush raised the terror alert level four days before the election (“I happen to be very cynical,” she averred), the Democrats would want their most experienced candidate confronting McCain.

Clinton spoke directly to her audience's skepticism of good talkers -- ironic in light of her husband's oratorical gifts. “You're so specific,” she quoted people as telling her. “Why don't you just come and . . . give us one of those great rhetorical flourishes and get everybody all whooped up?” The crowd actually whooped at that. But eloquence, she said, is not the point, since the election “is not about me, it's about us.”

If Obama is passion, Clinton is bread and butter. If she needs more flourishes, he could afford to traffic a bit more in the staples.

Her speech is a well-crafted recitation of how government could ease the lives of those without health insurance, students burdened by college loans, homeowners facing foreclosure, veterans who have been abandoned, the working poor who deserve a hand up.

As she speaks, Doug Hattaway, one of her aides, notes that her practical litany is precisely what appeals to working-class and middle-class voters who respond to “tangible issues.” They also rebel against the idea that they are not part of the cool, privileged masses for Obama. One of the signs at the Manassas rally defiantly touted “Well Educated High Earners for Hillary.” This is a party divided not by ideology but by sensibility.

Meanwhile that old CIA-Agent-outing traitor, Bob Novak worries for the dems about racism and "The Bradley Effect" when he's never shown that concern regarding his own Greedy Old Party of Rich Racist White Men. He also conveniently fails to mention the overwhelming numbers and percentages of white voters Obama has decisively won in those (mostly white) states in which he was the primary or caucus winner. As Dionne gets right, it's much more about sensibility, history, and the life experiences of voters, not racism. If anything is hard at work overtly and covertly, it's sexism and misogyny**.

* calumny | cal•um•ny |ˈkaləmnē

noun ( pl. -nies)

the making of false and defamatory statements in order to damage someone's reputation; slander.

• a false and slanderous statement.


**misogyny | mi•sog•y•ny | məˈsäjənē|

noun

the hatred of women

Dionne's complete column here; Fish's is here.

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Stanley Fish, calumny, sexism, racism

Primaries 2008 Candidate Updates: Chart Compiled from Media Projections

Super Tuesday Projection Updates: Democrats
Clinton	Obama
Tennessee Arkansas Oklahoma Massachusetts New York New Jersey California*	Georgia Illinois Delaware Alabama Kansas (caucus, not primary) Connecticut Minnesota (caucus) North Dakota (caucus) Idaho (caucus) Colorado (caucus) Alaska (caucus)

A list of the democratic delegate counts and the type of Super Tuesday voting (primary or caucus) at wikipedia.

Note: If Hillary wins, I believe it's not about 'racism' (Obama is winning almost 50% of whites, including a higher percentage of white males who have a much deeper affinity toward racism historically). Nope -- it's (partly) about the women voters (and men) in this country having a keen sense of fairness.  There's a strong sense of injustice and unfairness in the media treatment of Hillary; of being sick of rich, white, privileged, elitist, hypocritical, smug, hateful, cruel, punitive, Hillary-obsessed males telling everyone who they must vote for ... combined with major concerns about: Healthcare (Hillary's plan covers everyone), Jobs & Economy (women are paid less, mature women treated poorly), Families, Equality, War -- 400 years of rich (white) men controlling everything and screwing over women (and people of color) a million times more than has ever been imagined or voiced.

I think if Obama wins, everyone who supports Hillary will get behind him gladly (polls released today show 71-72% of Democrats are happy with both candidates and could vote for either). 

But I know there simply are alot of us who are sick and tired of the vitriol and sexism by the overwhelmingly privileged, entitled male journalists, mainstream media (overwhelmingly white, male, bullies -- they are looking more stale by the day), disgustingly biased pundits and misogynist sexist smug bloviators like Chris Tweety Spitball Matthews and Joe Scumbag of MS/NBC (owned by the military industrial complex no-bid contract corporate giant, G.E./General Electric) and the equally disgusting and transparent (and talk about living in the past) Carl Buttstein of CNN/Time Warner -- ugh!

G.E., like Halliburton, is but one of many such war profiteering enterprises who fear Hillary much more than Obama. Why? Because she knows the intricacies of their systems after 15 years of studying it and being attacked by it, and they know she knows how to begin dismantling the machine and the repairing the (largely unknown) damage the rich republicans have done these past 15 years to our Nation (they were in control of Congress until last year). They fear her, they hate her, they know she will begin the deconstruction of their evil webs on day one. They prefer Obama because he'll be easier to defeat; but if he were to win, they know he will be chasing ghosts until he wises up, and that takes years. We don't have years.) Meanwhile, I think Women Boycott MS/NBC would be a good campaign to start after Hillary completes the campaign process.

If women aren't going to take a stand now, of all times in history, then when?

Quick Note: 12PM EST/9PMPST Clinton leading in CA. Obama is talking too long in IL (reminiscent of Bill Clinton's long-windedness?) Jeez. First time I've felt this way while listening to him;  I have to wonder if the more he does that, the more annoying it becomes, especially since there are so few details?

The good thing about the repugs: they're so divided (and divisive) that the half-way honest, everyday regular voters will surely be tired of the incompetence and lies of the repugs these past years (and decades).

*12:10-12:13PM EST/9:13PST Media/networks declare Clinton the winner of the California Primary (although the delegates will be distributed proportionally). Tweety the drooling bully must be truly humiliated! Yay!

Technorati Tags: primaries, primary, Super Tuesday, 2008 campaigns, 2008 election

NYTimes 08 Primary Endorsements: Clinton, McCain

Times Endorses Clinton, McCain in Primaries

Clinton is overall favorite

The editorial board touts Senator Clinton's "powerful intellect" and her genuine, needed ability to 'hit the ground running on day one' to solve the complex problems cause by the ineptness of George Bush (and the republicans).

Unlike the in-depth analysis of Clinton's strengths, what's interesting about the paper's endorsement of McCain is that more space is spent dismantling the other Republican candidates than on McCain, who wins their endorsement in the Republican primary mainly because he "promises to end the George Bush style of governing from and on behalf of a small, angry fringe. With a record of working across the aisle to develop sound bipartisan legislation, he would offer a choice to a broader range of Americans than the rest of the Republican field."

We have strong disagreements with all the Republicans running for president. The leading candidates have no plan for getting American troops out of Iraq. They are too wedded to discredited economic theories and unwilling even now to break with the legacy of President Bush. We disagree with them strongly on what makes a good Supreme Court justice.

As to why they're not endorsing the city's 'favorite son' (Giuliani):

The real Mr. Giuliani, whom many New Yorkers came to know and mistrust, is a narrow, obsessively secretive, vindictive man who saw no need to limit police power. Racial polarization was as much a legacy of his tenure as the rebirth of Times Square.

Mr. Giuliani’s arrogance and bad judgment are breathtaking. When he claims fiscal prudence, we remember how he ran through surpluses without a thought to the inevitable downturn and bequeathed huge deficits to his successor. He fired Police Commissioner William Bratton, the architect of the drop in crime, because he couldn’t share the limelight. He later gave the job to Bernard Kerik, who has now been indicted on fraud and corruption charges.

The Rudolph Giuliani of 2008 first shamelessly turned the horror of 9/11 into a lucrative business, with a secret client list, then exploited his city’s and the country’s nightmare to promote his presidential campaign.

Here is the entire Clinton endorsement and the reasoning behind it:

January 25, 2008
NYT EDITORIAL

Primary Choices: Hillary Clinton

This generally is the stage of a campaign when Democrats have to work hard to get excited about whichever candidate seems most likely to outlast an uninspiring pack. That is not remotely the case this year.

The early primaries produced two powerful main contenders: Hillary Clinton, the brilliant if at times harsh-sounding senator from New York; and Barack Obama, the incandescent if still undefined senator from Illinois. The remaining long shot, John Edwards, has enlivened the race with his own brand of raw populism.

As Democrats look ahead to the primaries in the biggest states on Feb. 5, The Times’s editorial board strongly recommends that they select Hillary Clinton as their nominee for the 2008 presidential election.

We have enjoyed hearing Mr. Edwards’s fiery oratory, but we cannot support his candidacy. The former senator from North Carolina has repudiated so many of his earlier positions, so many of his Senate votes, that we’re not sure where he stands. We certainly don’t buy the notion that he can hold back the tide of globalization.

By choosing Mrs. Clinton, we are not denying Mr. Obama’s appeal or his gifts. The idea of the first African-American nominee of a major party also is exhilarating, and so is the prospect of the first woman nominee. “Firstness” is not a reason to choose. The times that false choice has been raised, more often by Mrs. Clinton, have tarnished the campaign.

Mr. Obama and Mrs. Clinton would both help restore America’s global image, to which President Bush has done so much grievous harm. They are committed to changing America’s role in the world, not just its image. On the major issues, there is no real gulf separating the two. They promise an end to the war in Iraq, more equitable taxation, more effective government spending, more concern for social issues, a restoration of civil liberties and an end to the politics of division of George W. Bush and Karl Rove.

Mr. Obama has built an exciting campaign around the notion of change, but holds no monopoly on ideas that would repair the governing of America. Mrs. Clinton sometimes overstates the importance of résumé. Hearing her talk about the presidency, her policies and answers for America’s big problems, we are hugely impressed by the depth of her knowledge, by the force of her intellect and by the breadth of, yes, her experience.

It is unfair, especially after seven years of Mr. Bush’s inept leadership, but any Democrat will face tougher questioning about his or her fitness to be commander in chief. Mrs. Clinton has more than cleared that bar, using her years in the Senate well to immerse herself in national security issues, and has won the respect of world leaders and many in the American military. She would be a strong commander in chief.

Domestically, Mrs. Clinton has tackled complex policy issues, sometimes failing. She has shown a willingness to learn and change. Her current proposals on health insurance reflect a clear shift from her first, famously disastrous foray into the issue. She has learned that powerful interests cannot simply be left out of the meetings. She understands that all Americans must be covered — but must be allowed to choose their coverage, including keeping their current plans. Mr. Obama may also be capable of tackling such issues, but we have not yet seen it. Voters have to judge candidates not just on the promise they hold, but also on the here and now.

The sense of possibility, of a generational shift, rouses Mr. Obama’s audiences and not just through rhetorical flourishes. He shows voters that he understands how much they hunger for a break with the Bush years, for leadership and vision and true bipartisanship. We hunger for that, too. But we need more specifics to go with his amorphous promise of a new governing majority, a clearer sense of how he would govern.

The potential upside of a great Obama presidency is enticing, but this country faces huge problems, and will no doubt be facing more that we can’t foresee. The next president needs to start immediately on challenges that will require concrete solutions, resolve, and the ability to make government work. Mrs. Clinton is more qualified, right now, to be president.

We opposed President Bush’s decision to invade Iraq and we disagree with Mrs. Clinton’s vote for the resolution on the use of force. That’s not the issue now; it is how the war will be ended. Mrs. Clinton seems not only more aware than Mr. Obama of the consequences of withdrawal, but is already thinking through the diplomatic and military steps that will be required to contain Iraq’s chaos after American troops leave.

On domestic policy, both candidates would turn the government onto roughly the same course — shifting resources to help low-income and middle-class Americans, and broadening health coverage dramatically. Mrs. Clinton also has good ideas about fixing the dysfunction in Mr. Bush’s No Child Left Behind education program.

Mr. Obama talks more about the damage Mr. Bush has done to civil liberties, the rule of law and the balance of powers. Mrs. Clinton is equally dedicated to those issues, and more prepared for the Herculean task of figuring out exactly where, how and how often the government’s powers have been misused — and what must now be done to set things right.

As strongly as we back her candidacy, we urge Mrs. Clinton to take the lead in changing the tone of the campaign. It is not good for the country, the Democratic Party or for Mrs. Clinton, who is often tagged as divisive, in part because of bitter feeling about her husband’s administration and the so-called permanent campaign. (Indeed, Bill Clinton’s overheated comments are feeding those resentments, and could do long-term damage to her candidacy if he continues this way.)

We know that she is capable of both uniting and leading. We saw her going town by town through New York in 2000, including places where Clinton-bashing was a popular sport. She won over skeptical voters and then delivered on her promises and handily won re-election in 2006.

Mrs. Clinton must now do the same job with a broad range of America’s voters. She will have to let Americans see her power to listen and lead, but she won’t be able to do it town by town.

When we endorsed Mrs. Clinton in 2006, we were certain she would continue to be a great senator, but since her higher ambitions were evident, we wondered if she could present herself as a leader to the nation.

Her ideas, her comeback in New Hampshire and strong showing in Nevada, her new openness to explaining herself and not just her programs, and her abiding, powerful intellect show she is fully capable of doing just that. She is the best choice for the Democratic Party as it tries to regain the White House.

Clinton endorsement here; McCain here.

The Squandered Bickering of the Democratic Front-Runners = Schadenfreude for Right Wingers

Maybe I'll have some more personal insights as this ugly thing moves forward (or actually as it drags us backwards), but for now I wanted to quickly capture my current stream of consciousness (and fragmentation) about the latest drama of Hillary, Bill, Obama:

As an ex-republican, I have little doubt that Karl Rove, the republican presidential candidates, all the current republican members of congress and party officials, the swift-boat-type 527s gearing up since 2004, and all the evil brains and strategists of the republican party are smacking their lips, gleefully applauding this sand-box behavior by the democrats -- they simply couldn't be happier.

As a white anti-racist activist/educator who was born in and raised for the first 13 years in Mississippi, and who has lived in the Southwest and on both coasts: WTF were both Bill & Hillary thinking? Clearly not thinking things through carefully. As Oprah sometimes reminds us: "Words have meaning, words have energy, words have consequences."

As a white anti-racist, social justice, women's rights feminist/activist/educator: I know very well that racism "infects" us from birth in this country. I know that participating in the struggle to 'disappear' all forms of bigotry and racism from our culture, combined with my own internal struggle for personal integrity, combined with an ever-present awareness of the myriad, unconscious ways in which the ugly virus of racism spreads its infection, means that we always have work to do. That struggle to defeat the residual molecules inside us never ends just as it is clear the struggle outside -- out in the world, the community, the schools, the churches, etc -- must continue.

And so I ask myself: what is it about being American (especially WHITE and American) that we're so arrogant (and defensive) to presume that we have to be always right (and perfect)? I know part of the answer to that for myself and my culture, but it's for another day. So, Bill, Hillary: why don't you just apologize, acknowledge you're not perfect on this issue -- who is perfect on this ugly issue? -- and move forward, promising to be more aware, more thoughtful and more sensitive. A little authentic humility could go a long way. You have fanned the flames by your stubborn refusal to take responsibility for being unconscious and careless even though you clearly weren't intentionally doing so (and probably a lot tired and fuzzy-minded in addition to being defensive).

It makes me question whether I want leaders who can't admit they're not perfect or all-knowing who can't learn from mistakes and move on to not repeat those particular mistake(s) again.

As a lesbian woman (who has been a single-mom raising a son) and who knows full well the ugly combined effects of sexism and homophobia and their stubborn resistance to innoculation and healing, I'm still hurt that Obama has pandered to the ugly homophobia of the black and intolerant religious communities. It makes me question whether I want leaders who can't admit they're not perfect or all-knowing who can't learn from mistakes and move on to not repeat those particular mistake(s) again. Because of this well-known incident, it makes me reluctant to trust Senator Obama. Which makes me understand even more why my african-american brothers and sisters may feel very reluctant to trust Hillary again.

As a white southern woman from Mississippi with working class roots and my family's middle class aspirations and who was raised on much of the 'hidden' as well as overt racism of the South, this is exactly the kind of "P.C." (politically correct) crap -- arguing over who is more 'pure', who's more of a 'victim' -- known in identity politics and academia as 'essentialism' that becomes tiresome very quickly -- even moreso for folks who really aren't that keen about working on the 'inner demons' -- they just want people to get along and move on.

As an idealist: I especially gravitated to the fact that Obama had been using a more conscious, more sophisticated (and spiritual) language of inclusion, transformation -- with great potential for moving us past the old stale model that Hillary still knows and practices very well

As a pragmatist and realist: I realize that knowing how to negotiate that old stale model may be necessary with the ugly republicans and their ugly strategies that WILL occur once the nominees are chosen.

As a developmental humanist, life-long learner and educator: I believe the democratic party began a developmental, ultimately necessary, but very painful process during the 70s (which the Republicans used, manipulated, exploited to great effect during the 80s) that drove almost all white Southerners and countless other white working class voters from the democratic party (to the republicans and distressingly against their own economic interests).

As a competitive political activist and human being who wants things to change and especially sees the need for turning away from the rich-getting-richer to hell with everyone else Republicans: A return to the ugliest aspects of that process could quickly cement into a dead-stop roadblock of what has recently become a gathering downhill steamroll for the democratic party. The candidates and their campaigns better stop it NOW if they truly care about the country, the voters, the citizens, families and working people of this nation (and beyond).

As a southern woman raised to believe in 'good manners' and whose family knew well how to fight verbally and viciously to the bitter end (but not to make up and heal things over -- much less how to 'use your words' to avoid the ugly words in the first place): I viscerally recoil from and hate the ugly conflict and the public display of bad manners and family disputes. Conflict can usually be resolved, if both parties are willing participants -- but conflict can also have real consequences, often very NEGATIVE, long-term consequences. Some people have a higher tolerance for it and are more resilient, but not everyone.

Like good southern girls are raised to do, and because it's my authentic nature, I mostly try to avoid conflict when possible, especially the dishonest indirect manipulative, passive-agressive stuff that BOTH of these campaigns and candidates have been engaging in (and yes, I think it originated in the Clinton campaign). But please, if you're going to disagree, do it respectfully, peacefully, honestly, and directly. Those are communication and assertiveness skills I've worked hard to learn and master -=- admittedly with mixed results. But then again, they're all much more privileged, far richer, more educated, well-traveled and supposedly 'experienced' than most of the rest of us. How come they're acting worse than pouty, bratty children?

As an independent-minded progressive with a strong, core focus on the woeful economics of our country for working folks and families, and who is one of the 47 million without access to health care, who sees that these 'potential presidents' are squandering precious time, resources, creativity, brain power at a critical time, and whose friends, community, family members have lost ground financially especially since the Bush-Cheney rape and pillage of our country, and who knows that if people can't feed their families, don't have decent work or a place to live that NONE OF THIS CURRENT PEDANTIC SQUABBLING WILL MATTER if the Republicans continue to turn us into another third world country of plutocrats and elites ruling over the rest of us, another has-been former empire crumbling at the seams, with leaders and the power elites continuing to grow fat, rich, richer and fiddling while our own version of Rome burns, while we the people continue fighting over the 10% of the crumbs that the indifferent-to-the-suffering/plight-of-others upper 10 percent brush off their well-enriched, overflowing, privileged, mean tables, I ask myself: WTF are they doing? And I can't help but answer: John Edwards is looking pretty good right now. How ironic is that?

Frank Rich: Will the Democrats Betray Us?

Will the Democrats Betray Us?

FRANK RICH

OP-ED Columnist

NYTimes

Sunday, September 17, 2007

"SIR, I don't know, actually": The fact that America's surrogate commander in chief, David Petraeus, could not say whether the war in Iraq is making America safer was all you needed to take away from last week's festivities in Washington. Everything else was a verbal quagmire, as administration spin and senatorial preening fought to a numbing standoff.


Not that many Americans were watching. The country knew going in that the White House would win its latest campaign to stay its course of indefinitely shoveling our troops and treasure into the bottomless pit of Iraq. The only troops coming home alive or with their limbs intact in President Bush's troop "reduction" are those who were scheduled to be withdrawn by April anyway. Otherwise the president would have had to extend combat tours yet again, mobilize more reserves or bring back the draft.

On the sixth anniversary of the day that did not change everything, General Petraeus couldn't say we are safer because he knows we are not. Last Sunday, Michael Scheuer, the former chief of the C.I.A.'s Osama bin Laden unit, explained why. He wrote in The Daily News that Al Qaeda, under the de facto protection of Pervez Musharraf, is "on balance" more threatening today that it was on 9/11. And as goes Pakistan, so goes Afghanistan. On Tuesday, just as the Senate hearings began, Lisa Myers of NBC News reported on a Taliban camp near Kabul in an area nominally controlled by the Afghan government we installed. It is training bomb makers to attack America.

Little of this registered in or beyond the Beltway. New bin Laden tapes and the latest 9/11 memorial rites notwithstanding, we're back in a 9/10 mind-set. Bin Laden, said Frances Townsend, the top White House homeland security official, "is virtually impotent." Karen Hughes, the Bush crony in charge of America's P.R. in the jihadists' world, recently held a press conference anointing Cal Ripken Jr. our international "special sports envoy." We are once more sleepwalking through history, fiddling while the Qaeda not in Iraq prepares to burn.

This is why the parallels between Vietnam and Iraq, including those more accurate than Mr. Bush's recent false analogies, can take us only so far. Our situation is graver than it was during Vietnam.


Certainly there were some eerie symmetries between General Petraeus's sales pitch last week and its often-noted historical antecedent: Gen. William Westmoreland's similar mission for L.B.J. before Congress on April 28, 1967. Westmoreland, too, refused to acknowledge that our troops were caught in a civil war. He spoke as well of the "repeated successes" of the American-trained South Vietnamese military and ticked off its growing number of combat-ready battalions. "The strategy we're following at this time is the proper one," the general assured America, and "is producing results."

Those fabulous results delayed our final departure from Vietnam for another eight years — just short of the nine to 10 years General Petraeus has said may be needed for a counterinsurgency in Iraq. But there's a crucial difference between the Westmoreland show of 1967 and the 2007 revival by General Petraeus and Ambassador Ryan Crocker. Westmoreland played to a full and largely enthusiastic house. Most Americans still supported the war in Vietnam and trusted him; so did all but a few members of Congress, regardless of party. All three networks pre-empted their midday programming for Westmoreland's Congressional appearance.

Our Iraq commander, by contrast, appeared before a divided and stalemated Congress just as an ABC News-Washington Post poll found that most Americans believed he would overhype progress in Iraq. No network interrupted a soap opera for his testimony. On cable the hearings fought for coverage with Britney Spears's latest self-immolation and the fate of Madeleine McCann, our latest JonBenet Ramsey stand-in.

General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker could grab an hour of prime television time only by slinking into the safe foxhole of Fox News, where Brit Hume chaperoned them on a gloomy, bunkerlike set before an audience of merely 1.5 million true believers. Their "Briefing for America," as Fox titled it, was all too fittingly interrupted early on for a commercial promising pharmaceutical relief from erectile dysfunction.

Even if military "victory" were achievable in Iraq, America could not win a war abandoned by its own citizens. The evaporation of that support was ratified by voters last November. For that, they were rewarded with the "surge." Now their mood has turned darker. Americans have not merely abandoned the war; they don't want to hear anything that might remind them of it, or of war in general. Katie Couric's much-promoted weeklong visit to the front produced ratings matching the CBS newscast's all-time low. Angelina Jolie's movie about Daniel Pearl sank without a trace. Even Clint Eastwood's wildly acclaimed movies about World War II went begging. Over its latest season, "24" lost a third of its viewers, just as Mr. Bush did between January's prime-time address and last week's.

You can't blame the public for changing the channel. People realize that the president's real "plan for victory" is to let his successor clean up the mess. They don't want to see American troops dying for that cause, but what can be done? Americans voted the G.O.P. out of power in Congress; a clear majority consistently tell pollsters they want out of Iraq. And still every day is Groundhog Day. Our America, unlike Vietnam-era America, is more often resigned than angry. Though the latest New York Times-CBS News poll finds that only 5 percent trust the president to wrap up the war, the figure for the (barely) Democratic-controlled Congress, 21 percent, is an almost-as-resounding vote of no confidence.

Last week Democrats often earned that rating, especially those running for president. It is true that they do not have the votes to overcome a Bush veto of any war legislation. But that doesn't mean the Democrats have to go on holiday. Few used their time to cross-examine General Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker on their disingenuous talking points, choosing instead to regurgitate stump sentiments or ask uncoordinated, redundant questions. It's telling that the one question that drew blood — are we safer? — was asked by a Republican, John Warner, who is retiring from the Senate.

Americans are looking for leadership, somewhere, anywhere. At least one of the Democratic presidential contenders might have shown the guts to soundly slap the "General Betray-Us" headline on the ad placed by MoveOn.org in The Times, if only to deflate a counterproductive distraction. This left-wing brand of juvenile name-calling is as witless as the "Defeatocrats" and "cut and run" McCarthyism from the right; it at once undermined the serious charges against the data in the Petraeus progress report (including those charges in the same MoveOn ad) and allowed the war's cheerleaders to hyperventilate about a sideshow. "General Betray-Us" gave Republicans a furlough to avoid ownership of an Iraq policy that now has us supporting both sides of the Shiite-vs.-Sunni blood bath while simultaneously shutting America's doors on the millions of Iraqi refugees the blood bath has so far created.

It's also past time for the Democratic presidential candidates to stop getting bogged down in bickering about who has the faster timeline for withdrawal or the more enforceable deadline. Every one of these plans is academic anyway as long as Mr. Bush has a veto pen. The security of America is more important — dare one say it? — than trying to outpander one another in Iowa and New Hampshire.

The Democratic presidential candidates in the Senate need all the unity and focus they can muster to move this story forward, and that starts with the two marquee draws, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. It's essential to turn up the heat full time in Washington for any and every legislative roadblock to administration policy that they and their peers can induce principled or frightened Republicans to endorse.

They should summon the new chief of central command (and General Petraeus's boss), Adm. William Fallon, for tough questioning; he is reportedly concerned about our lapsed military readiness should trouble strike beyond Iraq. And why not grill the Joint Chiefs and those half-dozen or so generals who turned down the White House post of "war czar" last fall? The war should be front and center in Congress every day.

Mr. Bush, confident that he got away with repackaging the same bankrupt policies with a nonsensical new slogan ("Return on Success") Thursday night, is counting on the public's continued apathy as he kicks the can down the road and bides his time until Jan. 20, 2009; he, after all, has nothing more to lose. The job for real leaders is to wake up America to the urgent reality. We can't afford to punt until Inauguration Day in a war that each day drains America of resources and will. Our national security can't be held hostage indefinitely to a president's narcissistic need to compound his errors rather than admit them.

The enemy votes, too. Cataclysmic events on the ground in Iraq, including Thursday's murder of the Sunni tribal leader Mr. Bush embraced two weeks ago as a symbol of hope, have never arrived according to this administration's optimistic timetable. Nor have major Qaeda attacks in the West. It's national suicide to entertain the daydream that they will start doing so now.

Originally published: NYTimes

=========================

Rich fails to mention the actual (known) costs of at least $10 BILLION dollars per month. And almost 3,800 American service members killed, almost 28,000 maimed or seriously wounded, somewhere around 75,000 Iraqi citizens killed ... As Senator Chuck Hagel asked: "For What?"

Meanwhile the Dems fail to show leadership that matters and Republicans will do whatever it takes to once again divert both the media and the voters from holding Bush or their party accountable by pointing to superficial but 'emotionally salient' and largely irrelevant issues. Short attention spans easily tempted or distracted by gee gaws and shiny objects.

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Al Qaeda, Bin Laden

What's Wrong With America? Why Americans Should Not Elect ANY Republicans to ANY Office Again.

An Important Reminder About What's at Stake in 2008

AFL-CIO Democratic Debate, Aug. 7, 2007


A retired steelworker who was forced to retire due to a disability and who lost his pension and his health care coverage asks John Edwards what's wrong with America and what will you do to change it? Edwards responds with what he'd do and stresses the importance of unions and universal health care.

Run time: 02:44
direct link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BaBvGEklBvg

Clearly Edwards meant this gentleman is an example of the consequences of Republican policies including: Greed; Profits Before People; Accountability is for Suckers; American Voters are Suckers; Americans Vote Against Their Own Economic Interests in the Hysteria of Right-Wing Hate and Fear... and many others -- which ones come to mind for you?

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economic justice, economic stress, health insurance, inequality, injustice, John Edwards, presidential forum, uninsured, universal health care, voter responsibility, working families, Keith Olbermann, youtube