This is the end? (Hillary)

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Ming


Are your lady friends religious freeks... because that was who I was talking about

She's an acquitance of mine; not a friend. So I do not know her religious background.

[Aeson]

McCain ~4 years ago
McCain ~today

(Based solely on the nature of his The Daily Show appearances.)

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Clearly it's backwards day in Rufusland; I just called something Fred Barnes said interesting, and now I'm going to quote with great approval a whole, nicely snarky George Will column (with a damned interesting concluding paragraph):

Yankee Fan Go Home

By George F. Will
Thursday, May 8, 2008; A23



Hillary Clinton, 60, Illinois native and Arkansas lawyer, became, retroactively, a lifelong Yankee fan at age 52 when, shopping for a U.S. Senate seat, she adopted New York state as home sweet home. She may think, or at least would argue, that when she was 12 her Yankees really won the 1960 World Series, by standards of "fairness," because they trounced the Pirates in runs scored, 55-27, over seven games, so there.

Unfortunately, baseball's rules -- pesky nuisances, rules -- say it matters how runs are distributed during a World Series. The Pirates won four games, which is the point of the exercise, by a total margin of seven runs, while the Yankees were winning three by a total of 35 runs. You can look it up.

After Tuesday's split decisions in Indiana and North Carolina, Clinton, the Yankee Clipperette, can, and hence eventually will, creatively argue that she is really ahead of Barack Obama, or at any rate she is sort of tied, mathematically or morally or something, in popular votes, or delegates, or some combination of the two, as determined by Fermat's Last Theorem, or something, in states whose names begin with vowels, or maybe consonants, or perhaps some mixture of the two as determined by listening to a recording of the Beach Boys' "Help Me, Rhonda" played backward, or whatever other formula is most helpful to her, and counting the votes she received in Michigan, where hers was the only contending name on the ballot (her chief rivals, quaintly obeying their party's rules, boycotted the state, which had violated the party's rules for scheduling primaries), and counting the votes she received in Florida, which, like Michigan, was a scofflaw and where no one campaigned, and dividing Obama's delegate advantage in caucus states by pi multiplied by the square root of Yankee Stadium's Zip code.

Or perhaps she wins if Obama's popular vote total is, well, adjusted by counting each African American vote as only three-fifths of a vote. There is precedent, of sorts, for that arithmetic (see the Constitution, Article I, Section 2, before the 14th Amendment).

"We," says Geoff Garin, a Clinton strategist who possesses the audacity of hopelessness required in that role, "don't think this is just going to be about some numerical metric." Mere numbers? Heaven forfend. That is how people speak when numerical metrics -- numbers of popular votes and delegates -- are inconvenient.

Gen. Douglas MacArthur said that every military defeat can be explained by two words: "too late." Too late in anticipating danger, too late in preparing for it, too late in taking action. Clinton's political defeat can be similarly explained -- too late in recognizing that the electorate does not acknowledge her entitlement to the presidency, too late in understanding that she had a serious challenger, too late in anticipating that she would not dispatch Barack Obama by Super Tuesday (Feb. 5), too late in planning for the special challenges of caucus states, too late in channeling her inner shot-and-a-beer hard hat.

Most of all, she was too late in understanding how much the Democratic Party's mania for "fairness," as mandated by liberals like her, has, by forbidding winner-take-all primaries, made it nearly impossible for her to overcome Obama's early lead in delegates. If Democrats, who genuflect at the altar of "diversity," allowed more of it in their delegate selection process, things might look very different. If even, say, Texas, California and Ohio were permitted to have winner-take-all primaries (as 48 states have winner-take-all allocation of their electoral votes), Clinton would have been more than 400 delegates ahead of Obama before Tuesday and today would be at her ancestral home in New York planning to return some of its furniture to the White House next January.

Tuesday night must have been almost as much fun for John McCain as for Obama. The Republican brand has been badly smudged by recent foreign and domestic policies, which are the only kinds there are, so McCain's hopes rest on the still-unattached cohort called "Reagan Democrats," who still seem somewhat resistant to Obama.

McCain's problem might turn out to be the fact that Obama is the Democrats' Reagan. Obama's rhetorical cotton candy lacks Reagan's ideological nourishment, but he is Reaganesque in two important senses: People like listening to him, and his manner lulls his adversaries into underestimating his sheer toughness -- the tempered steel beneath the sleek suits.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Or perhaps she wins if Obama's popular vote total is, well, adjusted by counting each African American vote as only three-fifths of a vote. There is precedent, of sorts, for that arithmetic (see the Constitution, Article I, Section 2, before the 14th Amendment).

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Aeson
McCain ~4 years ago
McCain ~today

Why does everyone assume he's not just pandering to the base temporarily, like every other politician under the sun? I'm still not getting it...

Originally posted by Darius871

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly
McCain, if he wins, is going to owe that win to the GOP stalwarts

I still fail to see why this is such a universal assumption, notwithstanding Carter. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if McCain would pander to the base to get into the White House, and after that just act however his demonstrably divergent conscience dictates no matter how much they whine. What the hell could they do to stop him?

Obviously not impeachment, and even the extent to which they could retaliate by jamming up his legislative initiatives isn't that much considering that A) even the most embittered far-right rep/senators can't escape voting for bills their own constituents do support, and B) for other bills McCain could replace whatever far-right reps/senators he loses by reaching across the aisle as he's done before. I just fail to see how the right would completely have McCain over a barrel once he's already given four guaranteed years in the bully pulpit.

The only way he'd have no choice but to toe the line is if he's absolutely deadset on a second term, but he's given no indication of that and given his age it's less likely than for most, plus even with an alienated base it's hard to picture any GOP figure who could snuff out an incumbent in the 2012 primary. When was the last time in U.S. history an incumbent was even booted by his own party anyway?

[Aeson]

Originally posted by Darius871
Why does everyone assume he's not just pandering to the base temporarily, like every other politician under the sun? I'm still not getting it...

Why do you assume I don't realize he's pandering for votes?

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Aeson
Why do you assume I don't realize he's pandering for votes?

You omitted the "temporarily" part, which is really the crux. What he's saying now has little bearing on what he'd do in the White House.

[Aeson]

I dislike politicians. The whole false-front institution. McCain was a bit of a maverick on the first appearance, willing to speak out against his own party, and that's what I liked about him.

Also you pretend that pandering to special interests is something you can just drop whenever you want after getting what you want from them. Not all special interests are so weak as to be walked all over and not get what they're after.

He's in debt to people now. Repayment will come due. He'll have to repay at least some of them.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by Aeson
He's in debt to people now. Repayment will come due. He'll have to repay at least some of them.

Or else what? That's what I was asking before, and there still hasn't been an answer. I need something more than vague assumptions like "that's how Washington works" etc.

Tell me precisely why a President can't do whatever the hell he damn well pleases within the bounds of his Constitutional authority, assuming he's not overly concerned about a second term.

[snoopy369]

1. He will repay them, if he is an honorable man. If he isn't, I don't want him as president.

2. If he does not repay them, he won't be an effective president, as his own party will act against him (congress).

3. Pandering is annoying in general, whether temporary or not. If he's pandering now, who's to say he's not also pandering to me??

[Aeson]

Originally posted by Darius871
Tell me precisely why a President can't do whatever the hell he damn well pleases within the bounds of his Constitutional authority, assuming he's not overly concerned about a second term.

"Assuming he's not overly concerned about a second term"?



Another one is keeping support of your own party to get things done in Congress.

[Darius871]

Originally posted by snoopy369
1. He will repay them, if he is an honorable man. If he isn't, I don't want him as president.

3. Pandering is annoying in general, whether temporary or not. If he's pandering now, who's to say he's not also pandering to me??

That's silly when it's already a given that no politician is honorable. All that matters is which candidate is substantially more likely to ultimately enact policies one supports.

Originally posted by snoopy369
2. If he does not repay them, he won't be an effective president, as his own party will act against him (congress).

Originally posted by Aeson
Another one is keeping support of your own party to get things done in Congress.

Already preempted, just tell me why I'm wrong:

Originally posted by Darius871
...even the extent to which they could retaliate by jamming up his legislative initiatives isn't that much considering that A) even the most embittered far-right rep/senators can't escape voting for bills their own constituents do support, and B) for other bills McCain could replace whatever far-right reps/senators he loses by reaching across the aisle as he's done before.

Originally posted by Aeson
"Assuming he's not overly concerned about a second term"?

Already preempted, just tell me why I'm wrong:

Originally posted by Darius871
The only way he'd have no choice but to toe the line is if he's absolutely deadset on a second term, but he's given no indication of that and given his age it's less likely than for most, plus even with an alienated base it's hard to picture any GOP figure who could snuff out an incumbent in the 2012 primary. When was the last time in U.S. history an incumbent was even booted by his own party anyway?

[Aeson]

...even the extent to which they could retaliate by jamming up his legislative initiatives isn't that much considering that A) even the most embittered far-right rep/senators can't escape voting for bills their own constituents do support, and B) for other bills McCain could replace whatever far-right reps/senators he loses by reaching across the aisle as he's done before.

You're forgetting that the "constituents" are those that were pandered to.

You also forget that the other party has it in their own best interests not to jump ship and work with the President of the other party.

Are you really trying to pretend that pols are not partisan at all once they get in office?

The only way he'd have no choice but to toe the line is if he's absolutely deadset on a second term, but he's given no indication of that and given his age it's less likely than for most, plus even with an alienated base it's hard to picture any GOP figure who could snuff out an incumbent in the 2012 primary. When was the last time in U.S. history an incumbent was even booted by his own party anyway?

When's the last time an incumbent ever told their party to **** off during his first term? When's the last time an incumbent didn't run for a second term?

[Ben Kenobi]

You liked that George Will article? I thought was very poorly done.

Hillary has actually squeaked by and won the bigger games, where Obama's run count is higher.

[snoopy369]

1. There are (mostly) honorable politicians, in that they stick with their friends. They may lie to the public, but many politicians stick with their friends. That is important, to me (as it makes them a) better people and b) more reliable. I want consistent lies, damnit!)

2. You're just flat out wrong here... Presidents without the support of their parties are very ineffective. They cannot do most important things without senate and/or house approval. Further, remember that what we're really talking about here is McCain straying from the party line. How do you think he's going to successfully stray from the party line, without the support of significant numbers of party members (that he's lost by not following through on promises)?