2008 Primaries Thread

hillary's 35 year fight against the death penalty & nafta have made me proud to be an american.

Maybe I'm wrong about what will resonate from tonight's debate. Still, I stand by what I said above. But we'll see.

holy shit i just got to see McCain "change" zing on Romney.

zing: A-
McCain's shit eating grin: A++++++++

http://images.huffingtonpost.com/gen/6965/thumbs/r-CLINTON-FUMES-AS-EDWARDS-TAKES-OBAMAS-SIDE-huge.jpg

who was it that said that o/ed were coming off like frat boys?

I want Gibson as moderator in every debate.

You mean Mr. "The-surge-is-working,-just-admit-it-you-cut-and-runners!"

McCain zing: http://youtube.com/watch?v=c6DR1Y3j_4k

Another zinger:

ROMNEY: I've been very firm about my position on the war.
HUCKABEE: Which one?

who was it that said that o/ed were coming off like frat boys?

Me. You disagree? (NP if you do; just curious).

I didn't see the debate, but in the image above they certainly look pretty chummy.

That Edwards/Obama photo isn't from tonight. It looks like they were on The Price is Right set!

dating game, morelike

it's a cheesy huffpo composite

They both jumped on HRC (tho it was the way they behaved that made them seem like frat boys). Still, when Edwards rejected HRC's overtures, and sided with Obama in attacking HRC, I felt like I was watching an old pro-wrestling skit (when a ''good guy'' suddendly kneecaps his friend and reveals himself to be in cahoots with the ''bad guys').

(I'm not saying Obama, Edwards and/or HRC are ''good guys'' or ''bad guys,'' btw; I'm just using shorthand to distinguish my hypothetical wrestling characters).

Given my dislike for HRC, those instances were the highlight of my night (even if I thought she actually gave a good performance). Within debate parameters, though, I thought Edwards kind of ran away with this one. If New Hampshirites were watching, it should probably give him a 3 to 5 point bump.

I thought Edwards was embarrassing tonight, particularly his invective against the "status quo." He had an opportunity to speak about his own ideas about health care, and instead he let loose with a string of transparently banal rhetoric. If HRC is for single-payer care, that's "change" by any measure. I think Edwards position papers are often stronger than those by the other candidates in the debate, but sometimes I wonder how much of their strength he even comprehends. Well, that, or his debate strategy is selling him way short. Because he came across like a lightweight.

(P.S. I couldn't read Obama's facial expression as delivered the droll, "You're likable enough.")

HRC's response to the idiotic question about her "likability" was quite strong, I thought, in reminding voters that Bush was often trumpeted as the "guy you'd want to have a beer with" (etc.). (My problem with her has more to do with my threshold for tolerating political cynicism. She's not the worst imaginable candidate by any stretch of the imagination, but her voting record reveals just enough cynical "positioning" to make her less palatable than Obama, who has indulged in his share as well.)

That Edwards/Obama photo isn't from tonight. It looks like they were on The Price is Right set!

-- Johnny Fever, Saturday, January 5, 2008 7:52 PM (37 minutes ago) Bookmark Link

it is from tonight

Obama to HRC: "the price is wrong, bitch!"

Ron Paul: "Because of INFLATION"

I have to admit, I was sitting there watching Ron Paul talk about the reason fuel prices are so high having to do with inflation and felt kind of enlightened all of the sudden. However, not enough to go see if what he's talking about has any merit.

lol kerm

test

Ron Paul: "Because of INFLATION"

he was hilarious. like, IVE WAITED MY WHOLE LIFE TO GET ON TV AND TELL PEOPLE ABOUT THE GOLD STANDARD AND BY GOD I'M GONNA DO IT. a good foil to huckabee's william jennings bryan routine.

Man this is confusing! I'm half listening to the radio, and they're saying something about the Georgia caucus, and then they say Saakashvili has won! Turns out, they said Georgia in the Caucasus. :-/

just getting around to watching the debates tonight on youtube, starting with the democratic debate (youtube username: yd2008 , if anyone's interested on where to find)

cheers thx. football took precedent today, only because my 'hawks are still in it.

You mean Mr. "The-surge-is-working,-just-admit-it-you-cut-and-runners!"

-- Pleasant Plains, Sunday, 6 January 2008 05:35 (6 hours ago) Link

yes

i mean christ im not looking for him to be 'right' i'm looking for him to ask tough questions and get the candidates to answer w/ some fucking convincing arguments

test

otm

Time.com -- 01.06.08

This is basically what I was saying above, i.e., HRC may have misanalyzed the electorate and this isn't her moment (I'm not claiming wisdom, tho; I thought HRC would bounce after last night's debate performance, and I now get the feeling she'll be pilloried for it). But the short article goes way beyond that, to suggest that the size of Obama's Iowa win has shaken HRC's campaign to the core.

You mean Mr. "The-surge-is-working,-just-admit-it-you-cut-and-runners!"

-- Pleasant Plains, Sunday, 6 January 2008 05:35 (6 hours ago) Link

Er, the "surge" is working; it's the political part that's shit.

er, as hrc said last night, the political part was the whole point of the surge

er, as hrc said last night, the political part was the whole point of the surge

My strong belief is that in six months time if not sooner Iraq will be a huge mess again on all fronts. I'd like that not to be true. But I'm willing to bet it will be.

well theres been a huge jump in the polls something like 30% to 48% in people who think the war is going well buuuuut the numbers on wanting the troops to come home and thinking the war was a mistake are actualy trending even further in the anti-war direction.

so the public mood on the war seems to be: right nice surge can we stop doing this now plz.

the comparison w/japan korea etc as far as continued troop presence is kinda absurd - thers no war going on in those places - we lose something like 0 troops a year there. is that the threshold? when do you think were going to hit those numbers in iraq?

Jhoshea has it right -- this isn't a 'surge is working, let's see it through,' it's a 'surge is working, let's go home' mood in general. NRO types etc. think otherwise, which is where it'll bite them in the butt soon enough.

its worth noting that iraq is still by pretty any measure one of the absolutely most fucked places in the world.

the comparison w/japan korea etc as far as continued troop presence is kinda absurd

"kinda"

I don't think anyone talking about "permanent" bases in Iraq is expecting even dozens of casualties a month in perpetuity.

i dont think anyone talking about "permanent" bases in iraq has any fucking idea what theyre talking abt

this isn't a 'surge is working, let's see it through,' it's a 'surge is working, let's go home' mood in general. NRO types etc. think otherwise, which is where it'll bite them in the butt soon enough.

^^^ This. For collective psychological reasons not completely clear to me, all pro-war arguments -- including the notion that the surge is working -- seem to be long past their "freshness date." Barring some dramatic event (e.g., a formal political treaty resolving Sunni-Shia differences in Iraq, a partitioning of the country, driving AQI completely out of Iraq in a very visible way), I don't see pro-war arguments becoming viable again.

Of course, that also doesn't mean scare tactics about what might happen if we leave Iraq (offered by the GOP nominee) won't be persuasive with voters.

I'm referring to stuff like McCain's 100 years comment.

Yes. That comment should be stuffed down his throat in the GE.

McCain's 100 Years in Iraq [Ramesh Ponnuru]

He defended his comment that he would be fine if US troops were in Iraq for 100 years, so long as they were not taking casualties. I think liberals are overestimating his vulnerability on this point. But the question I would like him to answer is how he thinks speculating about staying forever will go over in the region, and whether such speculation serves our interests there.

its really hard to overestimate mccains vulnerability on the war in a ge

He defended his comment that he would be fine if US troops were in Iraq for 100 years, so long as they were not taking casualties.

That's rhetorically defensible, but (a) it sounds completely manufactured, given his prior -- unqualified -- comment and (b) it's stupid (I'm all for having permanent bases established in Iran and North Korea, too, starting right now, so long as they wre not taking casualties; and so long as we're making a wish list, I want a pony).

does McCain like ponies?

It was probably unqualified before because its kind of obvious... He's talking about having a presence in Iraq after things settle down, which is a discussion worth having.

Hm. That's putting the cart before the pony, don't you think?

have the discussion after the "settling down" maybe.