Hillary’s Voice

Time’ Publishes Definitive Obama Puff Piece (The Onion)
NEW YORK—Hailed by media critics as the fluffiest, most toothless, and softest-hitting coverage of the presidential candidate to date, a story in this week’s Time magazine is being called the definitive Barack Obama puff piece.

“No news publication has dared to barely scratch the surface like this before,” columnist and campaign reporter Michael King wrote in The Washington Post Tuesday. “This profile sets a benchmark for mindless filler by which all other features about Sen. Obama will now be judged. Just impressive puff-journalism all around.”
FUNNY satire, you see, is based on truth.

Obama at breakfast with troops: ‘Food is excellent … company is even better’ (On Politics, USA Today)
The Associated Press has posted online two minutes’ worth of Defense Department raw video taken this morning as Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama had breakfast with U.S. troops in Kabul… [Click through to watch the video.] TV viewers will be seeing a lot of Obama in coming days, as he travels from Central Asia to the Middle East and Europe. Obama campaign spokesman Bill Burton says Obama will give two interviews to each of the major broadcast networks during the week, culminating with an appearance on NBC’s Meet the Press next Sunday. Burton said Obama will tape that interview Saturday in London, his last stop on the seven-nation tour before returning home to Chicago.
Do you suppose any of these so-called journalists will dare to ask the senator why he’s highlighting his complete lack of foreign policy experience by going on this boondoggle?  Silly question, I know.

Can anybody else remember a (presumptive) nominee taking a foreign tour? (by lambert at Corrente)
Maybe my memory is failing, but I can’t call to mind an example that’s similar to Obama’s foreign tour — especially to a war zone. Politics stops at the water’s edge, and all that. Did Kerry do this? Gore? Clinton? Bush? Dole? Bush? If it’s a new thing, and yet its newness is not even remarked upon… Well, that would be remarkable. Or not. NOTE Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s great the Obama’s finally visiting some other countries. Maybe he could hold some hearings when he gets back!

Iraqi PM disputes report on withdrawal plan
(CNN) — A German magazine quoted Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki as saying that he backed a proposal by presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Sen. Barack Obama to withdraw U.S. troops from Iraq within 16 months. “U.S. presidential candidate Barack Obama talks about 16 months,” he said in an interview with Der Spiegel that was released Saturday. “That, we think, would be the right time frame for a withdrawal, with the possibility of slight changes,” he said. But a spokesman for al-Maliki said his remarks “were misunderstood, mistranslated and not conveyed accurately.” Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the possibility of troop withdrawal was based on the continuance of security improvements, echoing statements that the White House made Friday after a meeting between al-Maliki and U.S. President Bush.

Obama Will Not Speak at Brandenburg Gate (Political Wire)
Sen. Barack Obama will give a speech at the Victory Column in Berlin next week, “avoiding the Brandenburg Gate after a political spat broke out over plans to speak there,” according to Berliner Zeitung. According to Bloomberg, “a stage will be set up at the column, a 19th-century fluted structure that lies at the opposite end of a tree-lined boulevard from the Brandenburg Gate… An appearance at the Victory Column, capped by its trademark gilded angel, will still give the Illinois senator the Brandenburg Gate as a backdrop in the distance. A political squabble erupted after Chancellor Angela Merkel expressed apprehension about the gate being used for electioneering.”

Obama Donor Base Shrivels, Campaign Blows $35 Million… (by J Brown at Politically Drunk on Power)
[T]he Obama campaign [raised] $52 million in June, along with DNC fundraising that added another $22 million to their coffers. That’s a total haul of $74 million for the Democrat party in the month of June. But Obama, whose campaign has been so proud to taught his 1.5 million donors during the months of February, March & April, changed it’s tone in [Thursday’s] campaign release…, “Hundreds of thousands of ordinary people contributed…”… Obama, while raising a record $52 million, saw his donor base cut in half in June… [T]he media failed to focus on the fact that Obama’s total was only half of what they projected…

Interest in the Obama campaign is also shriveling up online, where Obama’s website which once ranked near the top 500 according to Alexa Web Tracking, has seen a consistent downward trend in visits since reaching [its] pinnacle in early March…

More disturbing for the campaign is the … cash on hand scenario… Considering that the DNC and Obama campaign raised $74 Million in June and that the DNC only spent $2 million; that would mean that the Obama campaign burned thru $35 million during the month of June. An astonishing amount considering that the Summer months are typically the doldrums of the campaign season. Even more disconcerting are the polls that continue to show the Obama has failed to increase his support, with his favorability ratings dropping and unfavorable rising.

Why Obama Can Lose (by Jude Kean, writing at Savage Politics—no, not Michael Savage)
Barack Obama’s total bounce from his nomination, averaging all polls from June 3rd forward, was a 2% point gain, with Obama gaining 1% and McCain losing 1%. [T]here are 4 groups that can be described as critical to putting either candidate into a majority, and looking at these 4 groups, one can see definite room for McCain support to grow, and little evidence that the same can happen for Obama.

1. Undecideds - … 12% [have] chosen neither [Obama nor McCain] at this time. According to an analysis piece in Newsweek…, “85 percent of undecided voters are non-Hispanic whites and only 22 percent of those undecideds have a four-year college degree.” That demographic could be a challenge for Obama to win over.
2. Independents - That same Newsweek poll showed Obama lost 14 points in independent voters since June while McCain gained 5 points with independents and an additional 5 points with Republicans.
3. PUMA Democrats and the Just Say No Deal coalition - This group of Hillary Clinton supporters are outraged at the injustice of the DNC and the May 31 RBC decisions on Florida and Michigan that ensured that Barack Obama would wind up with more delegates, effectively giving him the nomination…
4. Barack’s base on the left - …For the same reason that Obama is losing support from Independents, he is also seeing a fracturing of enthusiastic support within his base, due to his recent and substantive shifts in policy…

PUMA Numbers from Pew (by campskunk at Alegre’s Corner)
There’s a new Pew Research poll up Thursday sampling womens’ preference in the general election, with breakdowns about how Hillary’s female supporters are reacting to the “you’ve got nowhere to go” choice between Obama and McCain. The crosstabs are interesting, because Hillary’s primary supporters are broken out. Fourteen percent of former Hillary supporters are supporting McCain, and 17 percent are undecided. That’s 31% of Hillary’s supporters still off the reservation, with the additional caveat for the unity pony/kumbaya wishful thinkers that support for the presumptuous Democratic nominee is 3% lower among Democratic women than it was in 2000. And we know how 2000 turned out. This is consistent with earlier polls showing 30-35% of former Hillary supporters not drinking the Kool-Aid. And it’s not just the women Hillary supporters, either - the numbers don’t change much when you add in the men.

Cell Phones Not Skewing Polls (Political Wire)
For a long time, pollster have wondered whether the increased use of cell phones over the last decade is skewing polling results and making them less reliable. A new Pew Research poll finds that Sen. Barack Obama holds a 48% to 40% lead over Sen. John McCain in their national sample that includes cell phones, and a 46% to 41% advantage in the landline sample. Furthermore, when the results are narrowed “to voters who are certain about their vote choice, there is almost no difference between the landline and combined samples: Obama has a 38%-28% advantage in the combined sample, while the margin is 38%-30% in the landline sample.”

Poll Finds Obama Isn’t Closing Divide on Race (New York Times)
Americans are sharply divided by race heading into the first election in which an African-American will be a major-party presidential nominee, with blacks and whites holding vastly different views of Senator Barack Obama…, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll… [which found that more] than 80 percent of black voters said they had a favorable opinion of Mr. Obama; about 30 percent of white voters said they had a favorable opinion of him.
Where’s all that transcendent mojo you promised us, Barack?

Paterson slaps down the race card. (by John: south of Melrose at Liberal Rapture)
Governor Paterson of New York [spoke] to the NAACP convention this week… [He implied] that opposing Obama is equivalent to supporting America’s history of racism… There are many, MANY reasons to oppose Obama. None of the reasons I currently oppose Obama have to do with his bi-racial heritage - and I resent, DEEPLY, any implication that my opposition is based on race. Obama IS NOT qualified by any reasonable standard. There is nothing he’s championed and nothing he’s succeeded in accomplishing that justifies elevation to the White House… In the final analysis the disconnect between the pro and anti obama conversation is one of reality. PUMA’s and others oppose him based on the reality of the actual person. Pods and fellow travelers defend him based on their imagined projection of who he is… Stop calling us racists.

Trembling with Rage (by FrenchDoc at Corrente)
I should have known better than click on that link that Lambert posted (I won’t reproduce it here). And I definitely should have known better than read the comments… “At the end of WWII, all the French whores who serviced the Germans were rounded up. Their heads were shaved, and they were tarred and feathered. At the end of a war, the victorious side settles its debts. If you helped, you get a reward. If you did not help, you are in serious trouble. Posted by dataguy”… Maybe it’s because I’m French and my grandparents were members of the resistance and AGAINST the head shaving disgrace. Most of the shaving was done by former collaborators who suddenly had turned resistant zealots when they felt the way the wind was blowing. But I guess ignorance of history is no problem. I never thought I’d say this: I hate these people.

Clinton Doesn’t Support Any Effort that would Hurt Obama (by Taylor Marsh)
Hillary’s best interests are tied to Barack. It’s that simple. She will not do anything to derail Senator Obama’s historic presidential bid.
What about Senator CLINTON’s historic presidential bid, Taylor?

Major Hillary Supporter Sends Stern Message to Holdouts (by Taylor Marsh)
Mark this week down. It’s the week Clintonites started hitting back on behalf of Hillary. Senator Clinton started it off, through one of her spokespeople, sending a stern message to one of her Hillraiser’s. During the week, independent of the campaign, I began taking on the people threatening to cause chaos at the convention. Now comes a harsh email from another hard core Clintonite Don Fowler, former DNC honcho, joined by Alice Germond. The message from everyone, starting with Senator Clinton, is clear: 2008 can be a huge Democratic year, but we need all hands on deck to get it done… Are you hearing us yet? Well, it’s not because we aren’t sending the message, which is the bottom line. Because the only thing that matters is that if Obama can’t make the case it wasn’t because we weren’t one-hundred percent behind him.
Obama is going to blame his loss on Hillary no matter what we do. He’s not going to get my vote unless he starts acting like a Democrat, instead of a right-wing tool. Period. No former Clinton supporters, nor Hillary herself, will change my mind on that, no matter how much they scold or threaten.

Dear Alice and Don, Please refund my tax dollars (by riverdaughter at The Confluence)
My state of NJ paid millions of dollars to have a primary.  I dutifully voted in that primary for Hillary Clinton…  And now you are telling me to shut up, sit down and support a candidate that did not win my state.  A candidate whose name will be placed in nomination over the person who *did* win my state.  A candidate who took the ill-gotten delegates from MI who were offered to him even though he earned none of them.  Who took delegates who belonged to his opponents.  A candidate who does not represent my sense of fairness and ethical behavior.  A candidate who failed to defend the fourth amendment during FISA legislation, who fails to comment on the Bush administration rule redefining birth control as an abortifacient, who grandstands in Europe…

You are saying to me that I forked over my tax money for a sham primary.  That is what your letter is saying.  Your party has perpetrated a fraud on the states that conducted primaries and voted decisively for Hillary Clinton.  The convention hasn’t been held yet but you have pre-determined the outcome and have stripped my vote of any meaning.  This is the message you are sending to me and others. Think very carefully if this is the message you meant.  God help you if you really mean it.

“I Am The One I’ve Been Waiting For” (by Uppity Woman at No Quarter)
After having Seized delegates that didn’t belong to him, and after having Seized The Nomination and the DNC, one would think that we ungrateful Americans would render unto “Seizer” that which is Rightfully His.

Welcome to Crawford, Howard Dean (Dallas Morning News)
Howard Dean might have gotten a bit more than he bargained for today when he jumped off his bus this morning in Crawford to launch a multi-state Democratic Party registration drive. The first person he met was Guila Jackson, who demanded that the party put Hillary Clinton’s name into nomination at this summer’s national party convention. “We want a nominee who’s elected, not selected,” she said, gripping Dean’s hand as he sought to get away. Jackson’s part of a pro-Hillary group, PUMA - Party Unity my Ass.

Protesters, police educate, gear up for convention (Rocky Mountain News)
Dozens of protest groups are planning a full schedule of classes, concerts, marches and other actions during the Democratic National Convention, hoping to capture the world’s attention and recruit new activists. They are both energized and organized, and most insist they are not looking for trouble. “We are completely peaceful,” said Rob Weiland, a 37-year-old courier from Denver and member of the group We Are Change Colorado. “We follow the ideals of Ghandi.” The organization will be videotaping other groups and police during the DNC, scheduled for Aug. 25 to 28. They’ll post the videos on YouTube.com or the group’s Web site so the public may see what’s happening without the filter of mainstream media, Weiland said.

People’s Law Project to Provide Free Representation at DNC (by Jeralyn at TalkLeft)
If you get arrested protesting at the Democratic National Convention in August, have no fear, the DNC People’s Law Project will have your back. “The People’s Law Project will provide pro-bono attorneys to help jailed protesters during the convention. The group will also staff a hotline where protesters can call for help and will field teams of neutral legal observers who will attend rallies and videotape protesters’ interaction with police.” 60 lawyers willing to volunteer their services met at the University of Denver … for a training session on how to defend arrested protesters.

Hillary Rising: Superdelegates Switch, Hillary Besting Obama Against McCain (by iam0nly1 at DONE - Democrats Over Nominating Elitists)
The tides are certainly turning. Hillary Rodham Clinton continues to gain support, and is, in fact, out pacing Obama in current polls against McCain. Senator Clinton is still a more formidable candidate for president than the presumptuous nominee, and she’s suspended her campaign. Rasmussen reports: “…McCain fares better against Obama than he does against two other prominent Democrats. New York Senator Hillary Clinton leads McCain by eight points, 50% to 42%. Former Vice President Al Gore…”… If you can’t out perform a candidate who has suspended her campaign and called for the Party to unite behind you, you simply can’t perform… There are only two options: Hillary or McCain ‘08.

Former Obama Supporters Jerry and Obamaniac have this to say (FormerObamaSupporters.com)
Senator Obama, we want our donation back.
Click through to watch the video.

‘Last Stand’ Email Initiative For Puma Democrats Against Obama (Politically Drunk on Power)
I Affirm My Immediate Support and Call Upon Leadership of the Democratic Party to firmly and publicly commit and call upon other members to assure that not only a Roll Call is carried out at our convention, but also that Hillary Clinton be placed upon the ballot and placed in “NOMINATION”. I affirm that I will not support a candidate or system which has clearly violated the principle of “equal representation” upon which this country was founded.
Click through to send your message to the SuperDs.

A Way Out of the Web (by Anna Belle at Alegre’s Corner)
Wow, our Cincinnati meeting was fantastic! So much energy, commiseration, and so many ideas! I’m sold on the local PUMA cell idea as a result, so much so that I went and signed up to organize the group in Louisville. If you’re interested in setting up something in your area, or joining something in your area, please visit 18 Million Voices today.

Democratic No More (by Lynne in Lakeland at Liberal Rapture)
I am so used to saying that I’m a Democrat that it’s strange to say I’m Independent. Now, according the Obamanation I’m a Republican. They just cannot understand that any Democrat (former or present) could possibly not support Obama. Unless I’m a racist or a Republican. Let me spell it out. This is not about Senator Clinton and the patronizing, sexist treatment of her during the primaries. This is about Obama… You see, to us, he’s not likable enough. Or experienced enough. Or knowledgeable enough. And the Democratic Party is not democratic enough. As it turns out, we care more for our country than we do for the party. Is that clear enough for you?

Progressive Blogosphere 1.0 Examines Its Navel, Finds No Hillary Lint Therein (by campskunk at Alegre’s Corner)
[T]here was a panel at netroots nation this afternoon posing the burning topic: “…moderator Chris Bowers will pose two questions-one about the Obama/Clinton conflict in the blogosphere community and the second looking at how blogs compare with other forms of social media…” [Among the comments at TalkLeft, from] “p lukasiak:… “What I find interesting is that Bowers didn’t see the need for a Clinton supporter when the only ‘question’ was the ‘meta” nonsense.   One of the most interesting ‘meta’ issues for the blogosphere was the creation of the ‘split’…. and the creation of a brand new ‘social network’ centered upon support for Clinton. To me, in terms of ‘meta’ issues, that was THE most interesting aspect of the last year — the way in which the ‘takeover’ of most of the progressive blogosphere by Obots created a need for a separate and distinct ‘pro-Hillary’ blogosphere, and how rapidly and successfully that need was met. The fact that Bowers did not recognize the significance of that in terms of his ‘non-Clinton’ question speaks volumes.”

New McCain ad hits Obama hard on foreign policy (War Room, Salon)
John McCain’s campaign has just released its latest ad… The spot targets Barack Obama on his foreign policy, especially regarding Iraq and Afghanistan. “Barack Obama never held a single Senate hearing on Afghanistan,” the ad’s narrator says. “He hasn’t been to Iraq in years… John McCain has always supported our troops, and the surge that’s working.”… Obama only chairs the relevant subcommittee, and the full committee has held enough hearings on Afghanistan to make a subcommittee hearing unnecessary. And, it turns out, McCain hasn’t even attended a single Senate hearing on Afghanistan, despite being the ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee.
Unfortunately for Obama, what matters about his own meetings, and about what McCain did or didn’t do is what people believe, not what is true.  Click through to watch the ad.

The Bomb of Pearl Harbor? (by Larry Johnson at No Quarter)
Dude. You were raised in Hawaii. Honolulu to be precise. Did you fail to visit Pearl Harbor? WTF??? I thought folks were ginning up an internet goof when word started circulating that you told an audience about “THE BOMB THAT FELL ON PEARL HARBOR.”
Hasn’t he even seen any movies about the attack?  There were THOUSANDS of bombs.  Click through to watch the video.

Obama Courts Business Leaders (Political Wire )
Sen. Barack Obama “has been meeting secretly with heavy industry CEOs in Washington to discuss issues that he would face as president,” according to Robert Novak. “On the campaign trail, Obama has been highly critical of corporate executives and promised them nothing but tougher regulation and higher taxes. But the unannounced, small evening sessions with them since he clinched the Democratic nomination have been nonconfrontational and cordial.”

Menstruation is Murder: Bush Seeks to Redefine Abortion, Hillary Fights, Obama M.I.A. (by iam0nly1 at DONE - Democrats Over Nominating Elitists)
Once again our rights are under attack, and again Hillary fights while Obama sits on the bench (at least this time he’s not playing for the other team). Senator Obama betrayed us and our Constitution on the FISA vote while Hillary stood firm. Now, Bush and HHS are, again, going after women’s reproductive health. “Under the regulation changes, the federal government would redefine abortion as: any of the various procedures … that results in the termination of the life of a human being in utero between conception and natural birth, whether before or after implantation…” This definition is akin to claims that menstruation is murder. The majority of fertilized eggs fail to implant and are sluffed out with the uterine lining during menstruation. Soon the government will be riffling through our trash once a month, testing tampons, sanitary napkins, pantie liners and scraps of tissue for evidence of rogue blastocysts.
Even the wording is dangerous.  It assumes that a fertilized egg is a human being.  Do you suppose they’ll also start inspecting sheets for spilled semen?  Probably not, since it’s a man’s prerogative to spill his semen as much as he wants to.  Women, however, must have no rights to their eggs.

McCain talks to auto workers hit hard by economy
WARREN, Mich. - Republican presidential candidate John McCain is seeking to bolster his appeal to voters on economic issues by speaking to some of those hardest hit in the recent downturn: auto workers.

Bob Barr endorses Accountability Now/Strange Bedfellows coalition (by Glenn Greenwald at Unclaimed Territory, Salon)
The widespread agreement between important factions of citizens on the Left and Right illustrates important facts about how our political establishment operates.

Sunstein’s Dangerous Advice to Obama (by Big Tent Democrat at TalkLeft)
Some folks are beginning to notice that Cass Sunstein is no defender of the rule of law… “Cass Sunstein, an adviser to Barack Obama from the University of Chicago Law School, cautioned against prosecuting criminal conduct from the current Administration. Prosecuting government officials risks a ‘cycle’ of criminalizing public service, he argued, and Democrats should avoid replicating retributive efforts like the impeachment of President Clinton–or even the ‘slight appearance’ of it.” What people do not realize is Cass Sunstein has been defending the Bush Administration’s illegal actions and the Bush Administration’s preposterous claims for many many years now. This is who he is. I think that any connection he has to Barack Obama is extremely troubling.

Political harmony v. the rule of law: an easy choice for the political establishment (by Glenn Greenwald at Unclaimed Territory, Salon)
[T]he idea that the Rule of Law is only for common people, but not for our political leaders and Washington elite, is pervasive among the political and pundit class, in both parties. While common Americans should be imprisoned in record numbers when they break the law, the worst that should happen to the political elite when they commit crimes is that they should be voted out of office. That’s the dominant mentality governing how our political system works… Why would we expect political officials to do anything other than break the law if we continuously tell them — as we’ve been doing — that they are exempt from consequences?

The Wrecking Crew (Political Wire)
Coming soon: The Wrecking Crew: How Conservatives Rule by Thomas Frank, the author of the bestselling and must-read book, What’s the Matter with Kansas? In his previous book, Frank explained why working America votes for politicians who seem to favor the rich. Now, in his new book, Frank “examines the blundering and corrupt Washington those politicians have given us,” according to the book jacket. “Casting back to the early days of the conservative revolution, Frank describes the rise of a ruling coalition dedicated to dismantling government. But rather than cutting down the big government they claim to hate, conservatives have simply sold it off, deregulating some industries, defunding others, but always turning public policy into a private-sector bidding war. Washington itself has been remade into a golden landscape of super-wealthy suburbs and gleaming lobbyist headquarters–the wages of government-by-entrepreneurship practiced so outrageously by figures such as Jack Abramoff.” The bottom line: “It is no coincidence that the same politicians who guffaw at the idea of effective government have installed a regime in which incompetence is the rule.”
And the Democrats have been complicit members of the wrecking crew.

It’s a Class War, Stupid (by Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone)
We’ve all seen the stats — median income has declined by almost $2,500 over the past seven years, we have a zero personal savings rate in America for the first time since the Great Depression, and 5 million people have slipped below the poverty level since the beginning of the decade… None of this is a secret. Here, however, is something that is a secret: that this is a class issue that is being intentionally downplayed by a political/media consensus bent on selling the public a version of reality where class resentments, or class distinctions even, do not exist…

These fantasy elections we’ve been having — overblown sports contests with great production values, decided by haircuts and sound bytes and high-tech mudslinging campaigns — those were sort of fun while they lasted, and were certainly useful in providing jerk-off pundit-dickheads like me with high-paying jobs. But we just can’t afford them anymore. We have officially spent and mismanaged our way out of la-la land and back to the ugly place where politics really lives — a depressingly serious and desperate argument about how to keep large numbers of us from starving and freezing to death. Or losing our homes, or having our cars repossessed. For a long time America has been too embarrassed to talk about class; we all liked to imagine ourselves in the wealthy column, or at least potentially so, flush enough to afford this pissing away of our political power on meaningless game-show debates once every four years. The reality is much different, and this might be the year we’re all forced to admit it.

Lots more really good stuff at MakeThemAccountable.com.

Carolyn Kay
MakeThemAccountable.com