Surprise, surprise...
'[Hillary] Clinton dropped out of the race four months ago, but her presence looms large at tonight’s final McCain-Obama debate being held, appropriately enough, in her adopted state of New York.
Clinton was arguably the first candidate in either party to grasp the transformative political effect of the economic crisis, and her onetime rivals have been borrowing — liberally — from her policy and rhetorical playbooks.'
Here's a quote from a pollster...
“Everything in this election is being washed away by this stock market and economic stuff ... and she was the one who came out first with specific policies to deal with this, so she’s clearly having an influence on both of them.”
...from a Clinton aide...
”She was the first one to really pay attention to people’s anxieties, and both Obama and McCain have been playing catch-up ever since.”
...from a McCain aide...
“McCain said he had been motivated by [her proposal to have the federal government buy up bad mortgages and renegotiate terms more favorable to homeowners on verge of default]...he was very complimentary about what she had proposed and wanted to know more.”
...from an Obama aide...
...oops...
An Obama spokesman had no comment.
That may be because he's already chewing on his comments and they're not at all tasty.
On Monday, Obama told a crowd in hard-hit Toledo, Ohio, that he wanted to impose a 90-day freeze on foreclosures by banks that partake in the $700 billion rescue plan.
When Clinton proposed a package that contained a similar measure in January, Obama nixed it. At the time, his staff posted news stories denouncing the freeze on his campaign Web site, including a Fortune magazine story that tagged it “perhaps the dumbest solution to the current mortgage mess.”
And that's all I have to say about that.
Showing posts with label Democratic Nomination. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Democratic Nomination. Show all posts
18 September 2008
Get Thee Behind Us, Woman!
This one's for you, Gram.
When I was a little girl, I got to sit at my first real desk, stamping and sealing envelopes. I was proudly introduced to all who passed, and I was even more proud to claim the tall, red-haired business woman beside me as my gram.
Her name was Opal Else Free Kotson. She was an executive at Montgomery Ward. She worked her way up from the bottom with acumen, tenacity and smarts. She did it all on an eighth grade education and sheer determination. Because you see, even with all those names after her given name, she lived a single life caring for two children without help. If she couldn't cut it, they didn't eat.
It wasn't until I was in my twenties and she'd retired that I learned the cold, hard facts about her career. She had made it to the top echelon of management in Montgomery Ward. There were three positions higher than hers. I asked why she hadn't tried for those.
She had.
That was when she was told there would be no further movement in her career. Women were not allowed in the top three management slots.
I remember looking aghast at my gram. And I remember to a tee what I felt...ineffable sorrow that this vital, intelligent woman had spent so many years of her life gazing through that glass ceiling while giving that company every iota of her effort and allegiance...and heartfelt relief that society was past that horrible hurdle—it wasn't going to cripple me, nor any daughters I would have.
Well, I did have a daughter, and when she was eight months old, my gram had just about finished her walk through this world. I raced home with my son and my daughter from where we were living in Germany, but to no avail. She departed our grasp while we were somewhere over the North Atlantic.
So my daughter never got to know her great-gram, though I'd like to think she carries a bit of Opal Else's spirit within her. But certainly, my daughter would travel an equal road with her male counterparts, thanks to the painful trails my gram, and so many like her, blazed.
Au contraire.
Just like my gram, women have reached the plateau of top management in politics. And just like her, so woefully many decades ago, women are being told, unequivocally, that's quite far enough...
'Uh, uh, uh! Not so fast! You can hang with us up here, but don't be thinking you get to be our boss. No way, no how, not gonna happen. And if you persist in your efforts to run the show, we'll send you packing. And it ain't gonna be pretty. So be nice, back off, and
...get thee behind us, woman.'
When I was a little girl, I got to sit at my first real desk, stamping and sealing envelopes. I was proudly introduced to all who passed, and I was even more proud to claim the tall, red-haired business woman beside me as my gram.
Her name was Opal Else Free Kotson. She was an executive at Montgomery Ward. She worked her way up from the bottom with acumen, tenacity and smarts. She did it all on an eighth grade education and sheer determination. Because you see, even with all those names after her given name, she lived a single life caring for two children without help. If she couldn't cut it, they didn't eat.
It wasn't until I was in my twenties and she'd retired that I learned the cold, hard facts about her career. She had made it to the top echelon of management in Montgomery Ward. There were three positions higher than hers. I asked why she hadn't tried for those.
She had.
That was when she was told there would be no further movement in her career. Women were not allowed in the top three management slots.
I remember looking aghast at my gram. And I remember to a tee what I felt...ineffable sorrow that this vital, intelligent woman had spent so many years of her life gazing through that glass ceiling while giving that company every iota of her effort and allegiance...and heartfelt relief that society was past that horrible hurdle—it wasn't going to cripple me, nor any daughters I would have.
Well, I did have a daughter, and when she was eight months old, my gram had just about finished her walk through this world. I raced home with my son and my daughter from where we were living in Germany, but to no avail. She departed our grasp while we were somewhere over the North Atlantic.
So my daughter never got to know her great-gram, though I'd like to think she carries a bit of Opal Else's spirit within her. But certainly, my daughter would travel an equal road with her male counterparts, thanks to the painful trails my gram, and so many like her, blazed.
Au contraire.
Just like my gram, women have reached the plateau of top management in politics. And just like her, so woefully many decades ago, women are being told, unequivocally, that's quite far enough...
'Uh, uh, uh! Not so fast! You can hang with us up here, but don't be thinking you get to be our boss. No way, no how, not gonna happen. And if you persist in your efforts to run the show, we'll send you packing. And it ain't gonna be pretty. So be nice, back off, and
...get thee behind us, woman.'
28 August 2008
What Really Awaits You If You Vote For McCain
Let's tackle this incendiary question of a vote for McCain.
The democrats are painting such a vote as one for Lucifer himself. Heck, they're prophesying the end of civilization as we know it. Surely, if McCain is elected president, heaven and earth will tremble in the final throes of a decimation begun almost a decade ago and all we hold dear will finally disappear....poof!
Poppycock.
First of all, we still have three branches of government. The next president is not the be all and end all of our republic. A president can do a lot of damage—witness Bush—but Bush couldn't have wrought a tenth of his misery without the overwhelming, sycophantic aid of Congress.
And McCain won't be able to do so, either. Not if we have a decent Congress. THAT is where all the hoopla and pleas and threats should be focused. Why is it continually lost on the populace that we have THREE branches? That they do a sort of wobbly balancing act? That it is critical to vote in senators and representatives to whom integrity is integral? Instead of the attention draped ad nauseum over the presidential election, what if we heard from each of the individuals running for almost 470 seats this election? Imagine the downright democracy that would flow from that.
Secondly, McCain is not Bush. No matter how vehemently the democrats want you to believe that. (I fervently hope NO ONE is EVER like Bush. This man is one sorry ass mistake of the human race.) Nor is McCain propped up on all sides by the likes of Cheney, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, Rice, Mukasey, and Ridge. (Perhaps he'd offer an array worse than that, but I can't imagine anything quite so horrifying.)
Before I continue, let me set one thing very straight here. I don't like McCain. I don't agree with him on most things and I really disagree with his war stance. I don't even know if I'd call him an honorable man, though he was unquestionably an honorable soldier.
(Aside: I was shocked and infuriated yesterday when I heard Mike Malloy on Air America rip into McCain. He said, 'yes, he was a POW but did you also know he was rat? Yeah, he ratted out everyone including his mother'. Then Malloy launched into a grammar school attack on physical McCain, 'he has cancer on his face and he can't raise those useless little arms...' All I can say is, better useless arms than a hateful, awful soul, Mr. Malloy.)
But the question is whether McCain is Bush, and all that entails. And I do not believe that to be so. For many reasons. But that's another blog, perhaps.
Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, the Democratic Party is mincemeat. Funny, all the prognosticators claimed the Republican Party was slowly expiring, having reached its apex and squandered it. But from where I sit, I can barely hear the heart of the Democratic Party.
It started fluttering in 2007 when the dems voted more money to kill people in Iraq. It went into respiratory jolts each time the democrats demurred from doing anything to stop the Bush Humvee obliteration of rights, lives, joys. But it checked into the cardiac ward in January 2008. That's when it became apparent that our party, the one we've worn like a badge next to our kids' pictures, had already decreed the presidential nominee. Everyone else was dirt.
We didn't know it, though. We all thought we were still in a game with rules and sidelines and goals and cheering sections. But as the game went on, slowly, many of us started to realize our voices were being silenced. The fix was already in. Dorky us.
The party we'd loved had moved on without us. At least all of us who didn't jump on the designated nominee bandwagon. Not only were we cast aside, but all the rules and regulations and cheering sections were jettisoned, too (I miss those cheering sections! It was a good thing being a part of a party that was going to fix the world, instead of using and misusing it...)
So, back to my point. Our party is mincemeat. And as a particularly astute commenter on my blog pointed out, if John McCain wins this year, we can 'ensure that the current Democratic party dies, and along with it all those who took our democratic system and flushed it away'.
That about says it all.
Getting pretty dark here. It will be at its darkest when I vote for McCain. That'll be just before the dawn.
The democrats are painting such a vote as one for Lucifer himself. Heck, they're prophesying the end of civilization as we know it. Surely, if McCain is elected president, heaven and earth will tremble in the final throes of a decimation begun almost a decade ago and all we hold dear will finally disappear....poof!
Poppycock.
First of all, we still have three branches of government. The next president is not the be all and end all of our republic. A president can do a lot of damage—witness Bush—but Bush couldn't have wrought a tenth of his misery without the overwhelming, sycophantic aid of Congress.
And McCain won't be able to do so, either. Not if we have a decent Congress. THAT is where all the hoopla and pleas and threats should be focused. Why is it continually lost on the populace that we have THREE branches? That they do a sort of wobbly balancing act? That it is critical to vote in senators and representatives to whom integrity is integral? Instead of the attention draped ad nauseum over the presidential election, what if we heard from each of the individuals running for almost 470 seats this election? Imagine the downright democracy that would flow from that.
Secondly, McCain is not Bush. No matter how vehemently the democrats want you to believe that. (I fervently hope NO ONE is EVER like Bush. This man is one sorry ass mistake of the human race.) Nor is McCain propped up on all sides by the likes of Cheney, Rumsfeld, Ashcroft, Rice, Mukasey, and Ridge. (Perhaps he'd offer an array worse than that, but I can't imagine anything quite so horrifying.)
Before I continue, let me set one thing very straight here. I don't like McCain. I don't agree with him on most things and I really disagree with his war stance. I don't even know if I'd call him an honorable man, though he was unquestionably an honorable soldier.
(Aside: I was shocked and infuriated yesterday when I heard Mike Malloy on Air America rip into McCain. He said, 'yes, he was a POW but did you also know he was rat? Yeah, he ratted out everyone including his mother'. Then Malloy launched into a grammar school attack on physical McCain, 'he has cancer on his face and he can't raise those useless little arms...' All I can say is, better useless arms than a hateful, awful soul, Mr. Malloy.)
But the question is whether McCain is Bush, and all that entails. And I do not believe that to be so. For many reasons. But that's another blog, perhaps.
Thirdly, and perhaps most importantly, the Democratic Party is mincemeat. Funny, all the prognosticators claimed the Republican Party was slowly expiring, having reached its apex and squandered it. But from where I sit, I can barely hear the heart of the Democratic Party.
It started fluttering in 2007 when the dems voted more money to kill people in Iraq. It went into respiratory jolts each time the democrats demurred from doing anything to stop the Bush Humvee obliteration of rights, lives, joys. But it checked into the cardiac ward in January 2008. That's when it became apparent that our party, the one we've worn like a badge next to our kids' pictures, had already decreed the presidential nominee. Everyone else was dirt.
We didn't know it, though. We all thought we were still in a game with rules and sidelines and goals and cheering sections. But as the game went on, slowly, many of us started to realize our voices were being silenced. The fix was already in. Dorky us.
The party we'd loved had moved on without us. At least all of us who didn't jump on the designated nominee bandwagon. Not only were we cast aside, but all the rules and regulations and cheering sections were jettisoned, too (I miss those cheering sections! It was a good thing being a part of a party that was going to fix the world, instead of using and misusing it...)
So, back to my point. Our party is mincemeat. And as a particularly astute commenter on my blog pointed out, if John McCain wins this year, we can 'ensure that the current Democratic party dies, and along with it all those who took our democratic system and flushed it away'.
That about says it all.
Getting pretty dark here. It will be at its darkest when I vote for McCain. That'll be just before the dawn.
07 August 2008
A Link to a Worthy Article
This is a phenomenal article. Do go to this site and read it.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/08/hillarys_growing_shadow.html
Contrary to the hopes of the ruling democratic echelon, Senator Clinton's shadow truly is lengthening.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2008/08/hillarys_growing_shadow.html
Contrary to the hopes of the ruling democratic echelon, Senator Clinton's shadow truly is lengthening.
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