Blue Mass Group

Reality-based commentary on politics.

Maybe Hillary Clinton Really Is a Soulless Opportunist

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Here is the current text of the beginning of the piece, just in case they change it:

Clinton Finds Way to Play Along With Drudge. By JIM RUTENBERG. Published: October 22, 2007

WASHINGTON, Oct. 21 – As Senator Barack Obama prepared to give a major speech on Iraq one morning a few weeks ago, a flashing red-siren alert went up on the Drudge Report Web site. It read, “Queen of the Quarter: Hillary Crushes Obama in Surprise Fund-Raising Surge,” and, “$27 Million, Sources Tell Drudge Report.”

Matt Drudge’s site made a mark when another Clinton dominated political news.

Within minutes, the Drudge site had injected Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton’s fund-raising success into the day’s political news on the Internet and cable television. It did not halt coverage of Mr. Obama’s speech or his criticism of her vote to authorize the war in 2002, but along the front lines of the campaign – the hourly, intensely fought effort to capture the news cycle or deny ownership of it to the other side – it was a telling assault.

Mrs. Clinton’s aides declined to discuss how the Drudge Report got access to her latest fund-raising figures nearly 20 minutes before the official announcement went to supporters. But it was a prime example of a development that has surprised much of the political world: Mrs. Clinton is learning to play nice with the Drudge Report and the powerful, elusive and conservative-leaning man behind it.

That man, Matt Drudge, came to national prominence a decade ago as a nemesis of the Clintons who used the Web to peddle, gleefully, the latest news and rumor generated by the Monica Lewinsky scandal….

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  2. Just my personal opinion but I think he would have been elected for a third term hands down. Drudge didn’t take Bill Clinton down – me thinks you are granting Drudge far too much preceived power.

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    As for Hillary, sounds like her campaign found a way to one-up Obama that didn’t involved an attack by a spouse.

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    It seems the more Senator Clinton gains in the polls, the further people have to reach to find any reason to come after her. In this case her campaign used Drudge and his need to be the “first” to report” a story by giving him a national press release 20- minutes early. A national press release – not an exclusive story. Yup, that qualifies her as “a Soulless Opportunist”.  

    • Clintons presidency wound up like the autumn leaves, dead and lifeless and blowing in the breeze. The 2000 election should have been a slam dunk for the dems and Al Gore except for the OBVIOUS fact at that time, which was that Al Gore needed to run as FAR AWAY from the Clintons as he could get.
      Unfortunatly he couldnt get enough space between himself and their b.s. so the typical dem response was to pontify the Clintons and blame a couple of thousand people in Florida that backed Ralph Nader.

          • He was ultimately denied the presidency by the supreme court, not the electoral college.  You did not know this?

            • The supreme court ruling stated that in the interest of the nation, a speedy transition of power was more important than the correct transition. How third world-ish is that ….  I bet in a hundred years that part is omited from all teachings.

            • He was ultimately denied the presidency by the supreme court, not the electoral college.  You did not know this?

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              No, I truly didn’t know that Gore won the electoral college vote.

              • We will never know who really won, wiil we?
                That is what recounts are supposed to determine and the lingering questions that still remain are a good reason why courts shouldnt jump in to stop them from deciding.

                • After spending hundreds of millions of dollars and all of that bandwith to run an election in our supposed democracy, the powers that be then decided that when it came time to figure out who actualy won …. they didnt have the time and wouldnt be bothered.
                  Ralph Nader said that there wasnt a dime of difference betwwen the two.
                  Once again I can look back on my vote without regret …
                  Which brings us to 2008 ….
                  Hmmm … they sure have gotten off to an early start throwing around the cash ….

                • …you apparently don’t know what “sophistry” means.  “Sophistry” accurately describes the US Supremes’ majority opinions in Bush v. Gore.

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                  The majority knew it, and that’s why they said that their opinions in that case were of no precedential value.  We’ll see about that in the future.  What goes around, really does come around.

              • but don't let reality get in the way of a good snark.

                 

                The November, 2001, New York Times article went on to document how,  in a statewide recount, there was no possible doubt that Al Gore won  Florida in 2000:

                “If all the ballots had been reviewed under any of seven  single standards [all the ones that were used by either party], and  combined with the results of an examination of overvotes, Mr. Gore  would have won, by a very narrow margin. For example, using the most  permissive ''dimpled chad'' standard, nearly 25,000 additional votes  would have been reaped, yielding 644 net new votes for Mr. Gore and  giving him a 107-vote victory margin. … 

                “Using the most restrictive standard — the fully punched ballot  card — 5,252 new votes would have been added to the Florida total,  producing a net gain of 652 votes for Mr. Gore, and a 115-vote  victory margin.

                 

                “All the other combinations likewise produced additional votes  for Mr. Gore, giving him a slight margin over Mr. Bush, when at  least two of the three coders agreed.”

                 

                 http://www.buzzflash…

                 

                • Was it Al Gore; the brilliant economist who brought us NAFTA and the WTO or was it Al Gore the renowned nobel winning physist who brings us the upcoming carbon tax?
                  I get them confused sometimes with AL Gore the political insider hack who didnt really invent the internet.

                • Any other unrelated topics you'd like to toss in?  Or did you intend to reply to a different comment?

                   

                • All this nostalgia was just causing me to pause and recollect on how much I realy admired Al. I actualy got talked into going to see his wonderful movie. Reminded me a lot of another actor I grew to be inspired by.

                • How he came up with an economic policy inspired by his incontinence is still a mystery to me.

                • I had no dog in that fight at the time.  At present, there seems to be a much more clear delination of who is in which corner.

                • “I had no dog in that fight at the time. “

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                  It is really still the same fight. We just move around our focus onto different aspects of it, but even the players are the same.

                • You missed my point about all of this being the same fight; ALL OF IT.
                  We were tossing around the immigration, h1B issues yesterday and people line up to proclaim this and that about beating the dead cat but its not dead and wont be until the BIG issue is resolved. The number one cause of population dislocation is bogus foreign leveraged trade deals. When you look at the old picture of Ross Perot sitting there debating NAFTA and talking about how “this is how the mexicans live outside the giant US factories down there” … Smug Al sits there knowing that this is how he sees our future, thats how he saw it then and thats how he sees it now, Maybe not him personaly, but certainly his handlers. Thats why we have to connect the dots and fight this at all levels and not get confused by the smoke and mirrors.

                • You're falling for the smoke and mirrors attacking Gore.  Not only is that not “in the here and now”, but you are using the perspective of the present and assuming that is how we always saw things.  Before the experiment was attempted, the nearest model we had to gage its potential was the EU.  (Note that the EU is doing relatively well nowadays.  The Euro is now worth $1.50) 

                  I think its worth taking a good look at the EU with an eye toward what they did right and where we went terribly wrong. 

                  Now that I've mentioned the EU raj will be chiming in in 10…9…8…

                • The EU was in its founding stages at about the same time that our lame leaders were hammering out this NA version. It was widely discussed at the time that the key difference between the two, the fact that the EU was a merging of equals while the NAU was anything but, would lead to total failure. It was Ross Perot’s theme on pie chart after pie chart. The fact that the dollar is now collapsing (whats it at today, break .7 yet?) attests to the wisdom of the Europeans in seeking balance and the short sighted idiocy of our own corporate shills in creating short term profits and longer term labor excess. Labor excess led to a declining real wage as in any other supply demand equation and falling wage would-should have led to reduced consumption and even lower demand except for the latest scam credit cycle which is now blowing up in our faces.
                  It didnt take a nobel prize winning economist to figure that out then or now. But try convincing most Democrats who for some odd reason insist on following the direct of their labor leaders who, despite having sold them out for decades, insist we stay the course.

                • That worked quite well 10-20 years ago. AIts irrelevant today.
                  He was also sexist and an egocentric. And he also spent 10 million of his own money putting out the message of exactly what a grave danger the NAU was to our way of life when no one in either party took the time to bother. That IMO makes him a patriot and I dont use the term often.

                • The guy must be like 100 years old by now anyhow… I doubt he has much if any interest in the day to day of the company that still bears his name …
                  I was just thinking how ironic it is, with the perspective we have today, how a guy like Perot wound up having his message discredited because the minions of the one who will heretofore be remebered as “cigar boy” succeeded in hanging him with the lable “sexist”.

                • The form of messaging you refer to is ubiquitous.  It's not even limited to politicians and campaigns.  Every tosser with an axe to grind does it.

                  The sun rose in the east today.  How ironic.  :^)

                   

                   

                   

                • The EU was in its founding stages at about the same time that our lame leaders were hammering out this NA version.

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                  Um, apparently you are unaware of the fact that the EU, and its precursors (under different names–EEC, EC–but largely similar policies) has been around since the mid-1950s.  NAFTA has not been around quite so long.

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                  Moreover, NAFTA has benefited certain segments of the US economy far more than it did the economies of Canada and Mexico, as I have described elsewhere here.  Primarily agribusiness.  To the detriment of indigenous agriculture in Mexico.  And that is why you are seeing the illegal immigration from Mexico.  You might not like to read that.  But the fact is that it isn’t original with me–I first read about that in the Wall Street Journal, of all places.

                • I think this is now widely accepted as being the primary contributor to mexican population displacement. I didn’t get this from the Tv though. I learned it by digging into and following the Obrador election fiasco.
                  I wonder though, now with all the corn subsidies being passed around under the pretext of ethanol production, if the situation in Mexicos breadbasket is stabilizing somewhat or if ADM is still running amuck. I hear mixed reviews, that in most ways the mexican people have lost the
                  land and the ability to produce and are now SUFFERING rather than benifiting from higher corn prices.
                  Its hard to get real news with all the chatter these days.

                • I wonder though, now with all the corn subsidies being passed around under the pretext of ethanol production, if the situation in Mexicos breadbasket is stabilizing somewhat or if ADM is still running amuck

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                  …I’ve read that cattle ranchers in the US are upset that corn that would otherwise be used for feed is being diverted to ethanol production, thereby raising priced for feed corn.

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                  This will probably ripple through virtually the entire food production industry, since so much food in the US contains high fructose corn syrup.  And there are significant limitations (quotas) on imports of sugar.  I suspect that prices of human foood will increase as well because of ethanol.

                • I was recently made aware of another sidebar.
                  Farmers, being businessmen, are naturaly induced to plant whatever crop is most profitable. This year, with all the subsidies involved, acrage that typicaly would be devoted to the production of other grains (wheat, barley, soy ect) is this year growing more corn. It is actualy creating shortages of these other grains. Recall that typicaly the US is a massive net exporter of grains, thus the shortages are being felt most widely in nations that have relied on the import of US grain.
                  When one considers the effect of straying from the typical pattern of crop rotation, the inevitable result will be soil depletion, as in the dust bowl redux. My guess is at some point the only response will be to replenish these soils through the use of petrolium based fertilizer thus completing the circle.
                  SSDD

                • …Actually, though, it’s probably worse than you suggest.  I suspect, but cannot prove, that corn requires more irrigation than grasses, such as wheat.  That means an accelerated depletion of the midwest acquifer.  The subsidance of Venice due to the depletion of the underlying acquifer shows what that may lead to.

                • You forget the Chinese factory building gold rush and their total exemptness from any carbon emission restrictions.  That way we get to buy lead paint childrens toys, contaminated tooth paste, dog food and even the new implantable mark of the beast microchips.

      • 2000 election was as close as it was precisely because Gore and his wrong-headed advisors ran away from Clinton.  If they hadn’t shut him out of the campaign, Gore would have won easily.

        • They also lost the Florida recount in part because he foolishly decided to push for recounts only in the counties that he and his advisers thought were most favorable to him, rather than push for a full state-wide recount.

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          Of course, the reason the vote was so close in the first place was because Jeb Bush approved the removal of thousands of minority voters likely to vote for Gore from the FL voting rolls.

  4. Can’t the term be applied to most politicians?  What scares me is the dystopian views of most of them.  While Hillary and “9/11 Rudy” lead that pack, the other major candidates bark close behind.

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    Maybe it’s my imagination, but Barack seems to have a little more respect for voters than most of the candidates. 

    • So far no administration has come as close to the dystopian ideals of the present administration.  Without any opposition to the loss of freedoms, dignity, rights, the politicians continue to push the envelope.  It’s easier to round up cattle than free people. 

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      Why should we expect more from the Democrats than the morally corrupt Republicans?  Maybe the best solution is to get in the Democratic party and work to change it from the inside out?  The Republicans at this stage just seem too rancid to change.

      • You echo my thoughts … almost

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        “Maybe the best solution is to get in the Democratic party and work to change it from the inside out? “

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        My latest tack is to try to help get Ron Paul some power inside the fractured GOP and from there hope to do the same thing. Maybe if we work at both angles simultaneously there will at least someday be a peoples voice in either-or party.

        • While both parties are filled with dangerous people, I think the Republicans have demonstrated the most blatant acts of raw power lately.  Certainly they have set the stage for police state rule.  So one must be careful.  You don’t want to wind up in an unexplained crash or suicide. 

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          I notice that a Republican blog  has banned any discussion of your candidate.  Perhaps your national party will follow suit next. Banning what one fears always works, maybe they’ll send out the fire department to burn pesky “freedom books” and documents at fahrenheit 451. 

          • Thanks for sharing that. The fear is becoming palpable. The NeoCons are losing control and they know it đŸ™‚
            They have tried to shut out Paul supporters for some time now but the national party is in a quandry, how can they justify shutting out a guy who is outraising their frontrunners and has already grown the party to the point where the “core” is feeling threatened. lol

  5. There’s nothing wrong with Clinton figuring out a clever means of disarming Drudge. In fact, if we can slow down, gum up, neutralize, or co-opt any part of the right-wing noise machine in any manner consistent with good ethics, that can only be a good thing. There really is no requirement that Senator Clinton condemn Drudge and his report in The Strongest Terms at every turn.

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