This is National Headache Awareness Week. Show us what gives you a headache.
Warning: this may also give you a headache.
It’s been interesting watching the MSM dissect the Clinton campaign with a whole range of experts saying why she will not be the Democratic Party nominee for the presidency. I would venture to say these are the same experts predicting a Hillary Clinton win a year ago.
It’s that which I have found remarkable today as Sen. Barack Obama becomes the presumptive nominee for the Democratic Party, rather than the very strong likelihood that Sen. Obama has won.
For months, the mainstream media have been promoting Sen. Obama heavily. One reason is that he is newsworthy to the left. More often than not, his race is used as the reason behind that promotion. In essence, most New Zealanders, and I would say most non-Americans who watched the news from the US, were left in little doubt that he would take the Democratic Party contest.
Image sells in American politics, and probably politics in many western countries. George W. Bush got people used to thinking about a Republican president in 2000 by forming his cabinet while lawyers battled Florida. When he did win, only diehard Democrats tried to tell the American people they had been hoodwinked. Everyone else awaited the January 20, 2001 swearing-in. Go back a few years and Tony Blair, too, gave an inevitable image of a Labour victory in 1997.
This time, Sen. Obama has done the same, and it has been a well thought-out campaign: his book, writing from a humanist perspective and admitting any faults that his rivals were likely to dig up; a consistent branding scheme (the use of the Gotham typeface, for example); and vagueness (to give his opponents less of a target).
On some of these aspects, Sen. Obama has fielded a very different campaign. Only vagueness seems to be the common thread with other winners. A pre-campaign book was clever as well as admitting to things no other potential presidential nominee would, such as his having tried cocaine.
In fact, when he began getting specific after a challenge by Sen. Clinton, he actually lost traction.
I do not pretend to like all of Sen. Obama’s policies if I were to look at his voting record in the Senate, any more than I find myself in accord with Sens. Clinton and McCain.
As a minority, I am glad that a racial barrier has been broken in American politics. Even though Sen. Obama is biracial, he has been branded an African–American through his father’s homeland, showing just how people are habitual pigeonholers. If by the quirk of genetics he had his mother’s skin colour, would his race have become such an issue?
That one matter shows how far his campaign has come, in a country that would not have fathomed a “black” president other than in fiction, in the form of Morgan Freeman or Dennis Haysbert.
We can accept God being played by Morgan Freeman, but a black president?
While having huge African–American support, I totally understand the campaign Sen. Obama ran in terms of race: he plain didn’t mention it.
I wouldn’t.
Any member of any minority in the world, whether that minority is black, yellow, brown or white, who has been brought up on the idea of hard work and dignity, would not make race an issue—with perhaps the exception of others making race an issue for him or her.
I think that earned Sen. Obama brownie points among many of the United States’ immigrants and people descended relatively recently from immigrants.
It finally proves so many of those lessons from our parents right: that if you work hard, you can become a leader.
Once upon a time, parents said that but knew that it would take a miracle for a minority to get there, whether we are talking about the US or New Zealand.
Barack Obama is proof not only of his own abilities, but he represents the hope that the presidency is no longer governed by skin colour, but by sheer hard work. That speaks to a large part of the electorate, including Caucasian–Americans.
In some ways this has allowed his policies to be overlooked, which is actually unhealthy for democracy. Americans need to be voting on who can bring them true honour and meaning. But just as Sen. Obama began attacking Sen. John McCain’s policies as he presumed himself the Democratic nominee, it will be up to Sen. McCain to reveal his opponent’s policy shortcomings.
However, it was not always in the bag.
Those same MSM experts seem to forget that Sen. Clinton, using a campaign that broke the rules on branding (a confused message and confused visual communications) got so close to Sen. Obama that it actually was a miracle she survived and gained as many votes as she did. Writing in a country that has had two successive female prime ministers and, at one point, women in the Governor-General’s and Chief Justice’s role as well, the gender difference means far less to me. What I saw was a clumsy campaign that had more traction than logic would allow me to admit.
Sen. Clinton’s progress was nothing short of amazing considering she did not play from the rulebook, and we brand consultants will have to at least acknowledge her case and say: anomalies exist in marketing strategy.
The question is now whether there is a Clinton vice-presidency, but Obama aides are dead set against it. Equally, Clinton aides would not want their senator cosying up with Sen. Obama.
If the Clinton image of “will say and do anything for the top job” is accurate, and as Sen. Clinton herself mentioned the possibility of assassination, I would not consider the senator from New York to be a vice-presidential nominee if I were Barack Obama. I might get “Arkancided” in the hope of her succession.
But right now, Sen. Obama has a Democratic Party to reunite and invigorate, something that Sen. McCain may have difficulty doing for an uninspired GOP. Sen. Obama has media visibility on his side, reaching internal as well as external audiences.
This is National Headache Awareness Week. Show us what gives you a headache.
Warning: this may also give you a headache.
I guess rules and signing pledges mean nothing to Sen. Hillary Clinton. And if she takes such a callous approach to her own party’s rules, will she have much respect for the US, its Constitution and its laws?
This is not a new news item, but it does echo the flip-flop nature of Sen. Clinton and her deafening insistence now that Florida and Michigan be seated at the Democratic convention. You know, those states that she said earlier didn’t need to be seated?
She’s only louder now because we know Sen. Obama is gaining among white voters.
A lot of people call George W. Bush a dumbass, because they say he is ignorant about foreign policy and the names of leaders.
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton says she is smart and experienced, even if she has memory and “misspeaking” problems caused by sleep deprivation.
Here’s the latest one that made the front page here in Wellington, New Zealand, in the Australian-owned Dominion Post newspaper. Sen. Clinton called Helen Clark the ‘former prime minister of New Zealand’ even though she’s still in office.
If she gets in, Americans are still going to get comments about a dumbass, ignorant president from us. So much for restoring America’s international prestige—when she makes mistakes like this.
No doubt it was caused by sleep deprivation again.
If you can read the article, the latest Clinton “misstatement” managed to remind the New Zealand press about her gaffe that she was named after Sir Edmund Hillary, something later revealed to be complete fiction. The Bosnian sniper-fire incident is also in there.
She’ll say anything, it seems—and in my book, that’s not presidential. The anti-Bush types say that if the world could have voted a US president, he would not have got in. It seems that if New Zealanders could vote in anyone into the White House from here, Hillary Clinton doesn’t look like our pick.
I always enjoyed seeing Johnny Carson on late night TV. I didn’t know he was still alive.
Oh, wait! It’s John McCain!
Forwarded to me by a friend, an article that shows Sen. Clinton’s lying goes way back, before she was a politician. Excerpts:
Jerry Zeifman, a lifelong Democrat, supervised the work of 27-year-old Hillary Rodham on the [House Judiciary Committee]. Hillary got a job working on the investigation at the behest of her former law professor, Burke Marshall, who was also Sen. Ted Kennedy’s chief counsel in the Chappaquiddick affair. When the investigation was over, Zeifman fired Hillary from the committee staff and refused to give her a letter of recommendation—one of only three people who earned that dubious distinction in Zeifman’s 17-year career.
Why?
“Because she was a liar,” Zeifman said in an interview last week. “She was an unethical, dishonest lawyer. She conspired to violate the Constitution, the rules of the House, the rules of the committee and the rules of confidentiality.”
Read the remainder of the article at http://www.northstarwriters.com/dc163.htm.
]]>From the Associated Press:
Former President Clinton says Democrats concerned about what the deadlocked presidential contest between his wife and Barack Obama may be doing to the party should just “chill out” and let the race run its course.
Not great advice: ‘Chill out about my wife’s lying.’ This is effectively the idea.
Sorry, Bill, been there before.
In 1992 and 1996 we were told by then-Governor and President Clinton to ignore his past and focus on the future. Well, we all know what ignoring the past gave us: a controversial president distracted by the Lewinsky scandal, making him an easy target for the Republican Party.
The trouble is, they all seem pretty controversial.
But Americans should not forget a candidate’s background and choose not from one who can play the people or promise the earth. That past will impact on how (s)he does the job.
Of course Mr Clinton has to ask us to forget in order for his wife to be in with a chance. I just would not be surprised if this becomes Sen. Obama’s catchcry if any controversies stick to him.
My advice, nevertheless, will remain the same. Never forget, America. Not about your values, your freedoms, and certainly not about 9-11.
American Infidel posted an excellent piece from Cross Action News on how the US political system has been compromised, by Carl Parnell. Some excerpts:
However, as seen in these different opinions, politicians have been blamed for the failure of America’s political system. But, one respondent to the survey voiced a strong opinion that put the blame on average Americans. Her opinion was:
Our Constitution frames the best form of government on the planet. The balance of powers and the system of checks and balances provided a framework that allowed our young country to grow and develop and remain despot free for the last 220 years. The government itself is not what I have lost faith in. “We the People” is what I have lost faith in.
And advice for the electorate follows (my emphasis), and I have to agree with it as I have never, in the elections I have participated in, voted for personal gain. Even for those who do not believe in God or in prayer, the remaining advice is still useful:
“Of the people, by the people, for the people” means the people should educate themselves and elect leaders at all levels that work for them. The people should watch what those elected officials do and boot them out of office when they no longer work for the people. The caliber of citizens and politicians has declined in the last 220 years.
Therefore, America’s political system is at a crossroads in 2008. When the American electorate votes for the President of the United States and for any members of Congress in November 2008, they must absolutely know the true facts about each candidate. Citizens of the United States must not permit the race, gender, or political party of the candidate be a determining factor in who wins the election. Citizens of the United States must not let personal economic gain become the deciding factor in which candidate they vote for in any election. Citizens of the United States must vote for candidates who have the true qualities of great leaders, such as those possessed by America’s forefathers. Some of these qualities would be honesty, integrity, morality, faith in the nation they serve, faith in the people they serve, having the character of a statesman instead of the character of many modern-day politicians. Of course, true representative leaders of the United States should always pray to God before voting on any legislation that affects the greatest nation in the world.
However, if America continues to elect people to office that assume the role of a politician instead of a statesman, America may lose more than just the faith of its citizens toward its political system. America may possibly lose its status as the greatest nation in the world.
There is still support for the US around the world—but they need a beacon to look up to rather than to criticize. In November, vote to make America great again—not just in economic terms, but in terms of the true leadership and morality that it can stand for.
]]>There you have it: Hillary Clinton says that sleep deprivation caused her to lie about being under sniper fire in Bosnia. Guess she isn’t the sort of president we would want answering phones at 3 a.m.
But as Andrew Sullivan reports, Sen. Clinton actually made the same claim back in February and now wonders if she was sleep-deprived then.
He also digs in to Sen. Clinton’s quotation, ‘Occasionally, I am a human being like everybody else … For the first time in 12 or so years I misspoke.’
Sullivan writes in The Atlantic (original emphasis):
Occasionally, I am a human being like everybody else. This is close to clinical delusions of grandeur. Does she really think that most of the time she is above being human? Do you know any human being who hasn’t misspoken in the last twelve years once? Or would ever claim such a thing? I sure couldn’t. And this from a candidate whose most famous campaign ad rests on her ability to make national security judgments at 3 am!
He continues, and I have to agree increasingly more:
Bill Safire was right: she is and has for a long time been a congenital liar. I don’t mean by that that she deliberately and pre-meditatedly decides to deceive people. I mean she has long since forgotten the difference between truth and untruth (enabling addicts can do that to people). I mean that by seeking power and self-advancement for so many years, at the expense of any other human values, she has lost all sense of what the difference between truth and falsehood is, who she is, what really matters or any fundamental sense of perspective.
In closing: ‘She is a lost and dangerous soul, as her husband still is. She is, in my view, unfit to be president. Truly, deeply unfit.’
And you thought I had it in for the senator from New York.
The reasons I haven’t been fully supportive of John McCain have largely been from GOP-voting friends who have met him. They speak of a man who seems empty with a cold handshake. McCain supporters might say that that is a sign of a man who hates political functions and prefers getting on with the job. I guess it could be seen both ways.
He has been the butt of my own jokes. On television a couple of years ago, I asked the audience, ‘So what party is this guy with again? I can never tell.’ There has been a perception of McCain being not conservative enough and even in the lead-up to his party’s nomination for the presidency there were members of the religious right who felt the senator from Arizona could not possibly be their guy. Hence, former Gov. Mike Huckabee looked more palatable to them; while the technocrats could not fathom anyone like Huckabee getting the nomination.
Examine McCain’s record and he’s a pretty consistent conservative, from his time in Congress (where he was a supporter of Ronald Reagan), so this perception may have been an invention of the media and his opponents. Remember, when he and George W. Bush were battling it out in 2000, things got dirty as both ran attack ads. McCain came off pretty terribly.
In fact, when I looked at McCain’s record today I am not too sure why there may be some liberal support for him, although he might be able to use that to his advantage with the voting public. Unless people like George W. Bush have been even more staunchly conservative and have offended those liberals.
While voting for the War on Terror Sen. McCain also had amendments to bills added, such as ensuring that the US did not engage in illegal torture of its PoWs. That is easily explained: if you were beaten up and tortured yourself over a five-and-a-half year period, you’d be pretty averse to seeing another human being go through the same thing.
I write of him now not because I have suddenly picked up a GOP baton and figured he’s the best choice for President, but because he hasn’t really had any time in the limelight.
The media are chanting either Obama or Clinton, although more seem to be wondering why Hillary Clinton is still in the race. She must either know she’s a fading cause célèbre, or the Clinton fear-mongering tentacles of Arkancide run deeper in the MSM than we can give them credit. Unless she has a genuine chance, prepared to come on stream if something happens to Obama.
I have written about Barack Obama on this blog because being a minority I want to redress the balance of some of the racist tendencies of some MSM coverage. Politically I do not agree with him any more than I agree with many of the contenders for their parties’ nominations. From memory most of the candidates have a 60 to 70 per cent similarity with my views, which makes you wonder if they are just all saying the right things.
I feel similarly when I defend John McCain. He is the subject of less media coverage (which is the bias here), and he is the subject of ageism as America goes around with this notion that only a younger person can be a dynamic president.
This is not just a US phenomenon: the west loves the idea of a young, glamorous leader.
The US’s finest hours have come from experienced, wise presidents, backed up by strong and wise first ladies. JFK did not live long enough, in my view, to have given the country a “finest hour” in his presidency, though he was inspiring; historical presidents such as Adams, Lincoln, Hoover and FDR were hardly young men.
In this election, Americans need to consider not just the candidate’s stated position but what their past says about their characters—not what the MSM, attack ads and campaign lies say.
They need to strip away the biases of age, race and gender as each principal candidate has suffered from prejudice of one sort or the other.
They need to examine McCain’s 27 years in elected office, without the rhetoric, just as they need to examine Obama’s 12 and Clinton’s eight. (If Obama is inexperienced, according to Clinton, then what does that make her?) And if we are to consider Clinton’s time as First Lady of the country and of Arkansas as she wishes us to, then the record of Lt Cmdr McCain and later Capt McCain needs to be considered, too.
Because the next four years are not about trying to restore Camelot in the White House: they are about putting a person in the White House that can only preach honour but has shown it.
Whether you are a Republican or a Democrat, what we foreigners want to see is trustworthy leadership. Honour begins at home, and who do you want saying, ‘The buck stops here’?
If voters dislike spin then who has offered the least spin, the candidate on whom you can rely most? Or that other countries can rely on most: that America’s enemies will know their days are numbered, that America’s allies will know they have a real friend, and that those who fell out with America know that the nation will in fact consistently and genuinely stand for freedom and liberty?
Men like me were brought up to admire the US for its service to humanity and freedom, and its opposition to Communism, and we want to admire it again. It should not be a country perceived as slogan-heavy and substance-free, yet the perception has shifted toward this since the 1960s. A candidate who resorts to such techniques does not necessarily fit in the 2008 scene and, sadly, that is how I perceive Sen. Clinton. If McCain is really a maverick, then he might shake things up as much as people hope Obama will.
This should be a race between McCain and Obama, and the next months, hopefully, will reveal it is just that.