2008 Primaries Thread

from Mark Halperin's The Way to Win:

When Clinton's team anticipates a challenge from a critic, it assumes that the attacker inevitably will make a mistake that can be exploited. Then, when the accuser has been forced to lose control of his or her public image, there are benefits to reap. (Bush's team has followed this same strategy.)

First, the Old Media begins to see the critic as some combination of goofy and extreme, and everything the person does, says, or writes is viewed skeptically. Rove's operation, for instance, used derisive humor, scornful Internet videos, and tirelessly repetitive talking points to turn liberal icons such as MoveOn.org, Al Gore, and Howard Dean into wild, left-wing caricatures. rue, not everyone in the Old Media was swayed, but the opinions of many Old Media-ites could be colored this way.

...

A second benefit of counterattack: The activists on the same political side as the disfigured accuser are demoralized and defanged. Ed Klein's over-reaching gave anti-Hillary Clinton reporting a bad name, just as CBS News's bogus piece on Bush's draft record served to put that topic off-limits. Pros on both sides who understand the game (such as Morris) realize that the capacity to criticize, on any topic, is undermined after such a well-publicized misfire.

...

Finally, demoralizing the other team and polluting your accusers are great ways to rev up your own base. Every new embarrassing error exposed or outlandish statement uttered just makes your base more committed. Each additional Old Media reinforcement of a foe's negative image gets the base jazzed up, because sophisticated supporters rightly see such coverage as a victory.

hence
Obama-ites: Clinton's weak, defensive, angry, and not someone people like or feel easy around; we don't need that shit
Clinton-ites: thatssexist.jpg

Obama-ites: we could be map-changing game-changers like Reagan; she's never gonna get past 50+1
Clinton-ites: lol, you love Reagan

Obama-ites: thatsracist.jpg
Clinton-ites: Obama's the black candidate; I'm the candidate for everybody

You're satirizing yourself now, right?

Bill Clinton enacted more of Reagan's agenda than any prez ever had or will, the triangulating stone-liar motherfucker

i know that you withdraw from engaging in all this analysis, Tracer, but are you actually challenging the notion that Obama is a better politician than Al Gore?

Al Gore was a good enough politician to get re-elected three times as my Tennessee senator and good enough to be asked to be vice president of the United States. I'd say that's pretty good. My point wasn't to compare Obama and Gore's "goodness" as politicians but to compare how one gesture can be interpreted by a dysfunctional press corps as revealing the sick soul of a man they hate, on the one hand, and (correctly) as totally irrelevant on the other.

A staggering number of pre-war lies on the 'Iraq threat.'. I wonder how much traction this issue will still have in the General Election? (Obv., can't know for sure until nominees are selected, but still . . .).

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/23/us/politics/23campaign.html?hp

If any of these guys get elected, our economy is truly fucked.

It's a race to see who will be the next Hoover.

“Every time I’ve seen things really get scary and the markets really collapse, I put aside my fear and say — aha, this is a buying opportunity,”

Yeah, me too Mitt, I can totally identify with that (????????????)

I mean who the fuck is this CEO motherfucker - somebody should ask him how much a gallon of milk costs

Do I have to read that report to find out if they're counting every "I have no doubt Saddam has WMD" as a "lie"?

Al Gore was a good enough politician to get re-elected three times as my Tennessee senator

he had his Daddy's name like a fair number of Senators before and after him. you remember how well he did there in the big show.

and good enough to be asked to be vice president of the United States

quite possibly because he was considered a pushover who wouldn't get in hillary's way

The Iraqi regime possesses biological and chemical weapons, is rebuilding the facilities to make more and, according to the British government, could launch a biological or chemical attack in as little as 45 minutes after the order is given," Bush said.

"This regime is seeking a nuclear bomb, and with fissile material could build one within a year.

^^^ best president ever

For a second I thought he had said that today and I'm all, "Okay..."

I'm confused by this. Is Edwards helping Clinton by spreading insinuations about this Whitewateresque Rezko non-scandal? Or is he helping Obama by letting us all know that Clinton is going full-steam-ahead with running a disgustingly negative campaign against Obama?

did everyone catch the Observer endorsing Obama - http://www.observer.com/2008/february-5-obama?

I mean who the fuck is this CEO motherfucker - somebody should ask him how much a gallon of milk costs

-- Tracer Hand, Wednesday, January 23, 2008 10:36 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark Link

http://www.cbc.ca/arts/images/pics/arrested.jpg

"How much could a banana cost? Ten dollars?"

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2008/01/post_6.html#more

If the frequency of the use of the phrase "race card" continues at its current pace in amateur interweb political commentary I will take two shits and die before the general election.

Bill Clinton continues angry self-righteous bozo act

article implies that he 'gets upset' - that seemed extremely calculated

But, he's right. Comparing him to Lee Atwater? Obama's people saying that and CNN running with it? Come on. That's worth getting pissed about.

I'm starting to wonder if the Clintons can do no wrong in your eyes, daria

I mean Bill is clearly being Hillary's attack dog, is making up stuff, issuing angry, inaccurate statements, disparaging her opponents, defending highly dubious lawsuits, etc. That is total Lee Atwater shit.

Plus Bill plays sax about as well as Atwater played blues guitar.

http://www.allhatnocattle.net/hw%20bush%20atwater.jpg

always loved this photo

kinda wished he'd died onstage right then and there

classic!

George H.Dubya Bush doin' the G.E. Smith Guitar God Gargoyle Grimace.

I thought Atwater was Dana Carvey for a second.

They look like Mystics from Dark Crystal.

nah they're clearly Skeksi material

http://www.bookmice.net/darkchilde/dark/skeksis2.jpg

More on McCain and Economics.

http://www.tpmmuckraker.com/archives/005124.php

I'm starting to wonder if the Clintons can do no wrong in your eyes, daria

-- Shakey Mo Collier, Wednesday, January 23, 2008 4:59 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

"starting"

Yeah all that I need to know about McCain on economics is that he thinks that slashing corporate taxes by ten points and dramatically reducing government spending while fighting an expensive war indefinitely qualifies as a stimulus package.

The stuff that's been going on is politics, I mostly see it as, the Obama people thinking the Clintons are crossing the line, and vice versa if you're on the other side. If the Clintons are pushing the story about Obama's comments on the GOP and Reagan for political gain, well, Obama made the comments in the first place for political gain, because he certainly wouldn't have brought them up in that way if he weren't using this post-partisan, above the fray campaign strategy. But it's still a strategy, and not even a new one. I've been wondering if the Clintons could do any right in your eyes.

you gotta be kidding me

The ad plays a portion of his interview with the Reno Journal-Gazette in which Obama said in part, "The Republicans were the party of ideas for a pretty long chunk of time there over the last 10, 15 years."

The ad's narrator asks, "Really? Aren't those the ideas that got us into the economic mess we're in today? Ideas like special tax breaks for Wall Street?"

The narrator goes on to say, "Running up a $9 trillion debt. Refusing to raise the minimum wage or deal with the housing crisis. Are those the ideas Barack Obama's talking about?"

yeah, two sides of the same coin there daria

shh!! it's all about pragmatism!

Daria, I've given you the benefit of the doubt as a play hard/play fair/nobody hurt partisan in this thread up to now, but you done gone batshit. Obama's comments on Reagan and the GOP were right on the money*, and the Clinton camp has distorted them because they know it's impossible to underestimate the stupidity of the general public, and they think the public will accept their distortion.

*he just forgot to add that the ideas that the GOP were the party of were bad ideas

It was pretty foolish to say something like that during the primaries. Of course his opponents will distort his meaning. Lefties were freaking out before Edwards or Clinton made anything of it.

I say this as an Obama supporter who is frickin' pissed about how people are reacting.

The Reagan comment was a soft pitch to his opponents. Edwards made a comment about the Reagan thing, too. Having said that, I'd like to note that there is an appreciable difference between how Edwards and Clinton reacted. Clinton actually lied about what Obama said, too his face, while smiling. The Clintons are sharks. They creep me out.

I meant that it's impossible to overestimate the stupidity of the general public.

Yeah, if I have to vote for Clinton to put a Dem in the WH in November, I'm going to put my finger down my throat afterwards. I didn't think that until the last couple of days.

WE HOLD THESE TRUTHS TO BE SELF-EVIDENT: REAGAN WAS FUCKING GOOD AT DELIVERING SPEECHES. EVERYONE MOVE ON ALREADY.

New Florida Poll: Romney Rising (Giuliani Falling), with -- Ugh -- McCain Still Leading.

Methinks the Clintons took the timespan invoked a little personally in that Reagan comment.

i wanted giuliani to darkhorse that shit and pull out florida. clusterfuck would be fun to watch.

Huckabee should be torn limb-from-limb by a pack of badgers. If he splits the anti-McCain vote with Romney, allowing McCain to win here, I'll f----g scream.

Daria-g, I hope you're right that HRC can beat McCain.

some florida GOP voter on NPR today was saying he hopes it goes all the way to the convention and they have to choose a candidate there, apparently because he hopes they would choose rudy. best thing for the Dems ever.