I was struck by this rare useful portion of the NYT’s coverage of last night’s debate:
“She has gone through this,” he said. “You know, I recall when back in 1992, when she made a statement about how, ‘what do you expect, should I be at home baking cookies?’ And people attacked her for being elitist and this and that. And I remember watching that on TV and saying, well, that’s not who she is; that’s not what she believes; that’s not what she meant. And I’m sure that that’s how she felt as well.”
But Mrs. Clinton tersely rejected Mr. Obama’s explanation. “I can see why people would be taken aback and offended by the remarks,” Mrs. Clinton said, adding, “It wasn’t just me responding to them, it was people who heard them, people who felt as though they were aimed at their values, their quality of life, the decisions that they have made.”
To me, this is new and constructive politics by Obama. He sought to transcend the politics of the moment and concentrate on issues (and, of course, less heroically, change the subject from “bitterness” to “cookies”). By batting down the offering, however, Clinton showed she is committed to old-style politics: she didn’t want to talk about ideas, she wanted to stick to the subject of Obama’s personal offensiveness.
Thus, I see this exchange as an opportunity lost by Senator Clinton. She is clinging to the old style of politics: sticking shivs when she would do better to discuss ideas. After more than a decade of, first, shenanigans and lies by both President Clinton and the GOP and, second, W. Bush’s deceptions about Iraq, torture and misuse of the DoJ for political purposes among other subjects, people want to focus on solving problems, which we have plenty of, not sticking shivs. This is a big part of the reason why Senator Clinton, unless lighting strikes and she wins PA by over 20 points or something, lost the nominating contest. What do you think?
However, she has no clear ground to gain by debating the issues. The two are very close on policy and so the differences are more philosophical. She and the “old style of politics” can only succeed by tearing down the new wave of progressive politics. That’s what we’re seeing.
putting Bill Clinton’s decision to have sex secretly outside of marriage and lying about it in the same category with “Bush’s deceptions about Iraq, torture and misuse of the DoJ for political purposes” is a stretch. As we all know, when Bill lied, no one died.
<
p>Though you make a good point about how she missed an opportunity.
I completely agree that the consequences of Clinton’s lies and Bush’s lies are so different as not to be comparable. I also agree that the motivations for the lies were so different as not to be comparable. In a philosophical sense, however — trust between leader and people — which is what I meant, I am not so sure. They both violated the trust placed in them in a quite thoroughgoing way.
<
p>In any event, my point was that people are sick of this — not whether the lies were comparable. Many voters, it seems to me, want a different approach, and the way Clinton handled this matter struck me as very old style — although I submit that reasonable people might differ, which is why I solicited opinions at the end.
What do you say to the civilian victims of our unjustified bombing campaigns in Serbia, Kosovo, Sudan, or Iraq?
<
p>Certainly those did not have the long term consequences of our foray into Iraq, or the massive casualties that cost thousands of American lives and hundreds of thousands of civilian lives, but clearly those were all attempts to boost his popularity after the investigation and they did cost hundreds to thousands of civilian lives so they are just as immoral.
<
p>People did die Joel, they just didn’t happen to be American but it does not excuse the abuse of presidential power or the immorality of either Presidential action.
<
p>Not to mention he did lie under oath, break the law, and attempt to cover it up. To me any Presidential abuse of power is unjustified whether it be lying about a war and covering it up, lying about sex and covering it up etc.
<
p>When Nixon lied nobody died, but he still deserved to be impeached.
Or the Tom DeLay perspective?
<
p>You might want to check out Safe Area Gorazde by Joe Sacco. It’s a quick read.
Several basic facts:
<
p>1) You cannot cripple a paramilitary organization with airpower
<
p>It failed in Vietnam, it failed two summers ago in Lebanon, and contrary to the MSM and CW it failed in Kosovo.
<
p>The US completely failed to stop any ethnic cleansing from the Serbian paramilitary organizations in Kosovo, also there was never any conclusive proof that those organizations were backed by the Serbian government. To be fair Milosevec was a war criminal for actions taken in the first two Balkan wars earlier in the decade, but the evidence linking him to abuses in Kosovo was a little flimsy, and the war crime prosecutors didn’t even bother charging him with those crimes.
<
p>2)US failed in every strategic objective
<
p>a)Stop ethnic cleansing
<
p>Failed. We in fact advanced Kosovar reprisals on Serbians so we ethnic cleansed people for them, we were too late to stop the big massacres by the paramilitary Serbs on the Kosovars, and since we were unwilling to put in ground troops we failed to stop the ones that occured DURING the campaign.
<
p>b) Decapitate Milosevec
<
p>His own people drove him from power a year later, we failed at every turn to decapitate his regime, this is conclusively documented in Boming to Win, by Bob Pape.
<
p>c) Bring Peace to Balkans
<
p>We completely alienated the Serbian population, intentionally targetted civilian targets such as broadcasting stations, power stations, bridges, and even homes. We dropped a ton of DU weapons causing cancer and other lasting medical effects even today. And we alienated the Serbians making them unwilling partners with the UN and US, even today when they are democratic they have attacked us in Kosovo and elsewhere.
<
p>3) Crippled US-Russo Political Military Relations
<
p>Russians are three things notoriously pan-Slavic, paranoid, and never forgetful.
<
p>We violated NATOs own charter and waged an offensive war against a Slavic nation, we nearly fought Russian troops over Pristina, and the Russians have never forgotten or forgiven us.
<
p>Case in point they have consistently opposed NATO expansion ever since, oppose missile defense, and have actively tried to depose pro-Western governments in Eastern Europe. This breakdown has more to do with Putins policies but the Russians have consistently been angered with us over in the Balkans and its something two Southern governors turned Presidents never quite understood.
<
p>4) Killed Massive numbers of civilians
<
p>We killed thousands Joel for absolutely no reason. They had done nothing against the ethnic Albanians and in light of the utter failures Ive mentioned above their sacrifice has not furthered humanitarian goals.
<
p>5) Put an Islamist government in power
<
p>The KLA has been armed and financed by Al Qaeda and has known connections to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. WE put this people in power in a European state. Bad move. Not to mention they launched massacres and reprisal killings against Serbs as soon as they knew the US was giving them air support.
to show a bit of class and focus on her own strengths. But, at this point, given that she has essentially lost, she can only try to rip him down and pile on the reverend, the bitter stuff, the weathermen. She basically figures that well if not many people like me, by the time I’m through they ain’t gonna like him either. Then I can steal the thing in Denver. That sucks. It has little chance of working and would be a nightmare but will certainly bring up Obama’s negatives over coming months, even if he does pull it out.
<
p>Let us pray that the good people of Pennsylvania – bitter and non-bitter alike – don’t give Clinton a big win there. Let us pray that Mr. Obama weathers this storm, wins in Indiana and ends this thing.
Both candidates pretty much maintained expectations. Barring a stumble, it would be hard to do otherwise.
<
p>I don’t much like the way she is running her campaign, but the idea that either candidate is interested in debating issues is laughable. Nobody is stopping them and there are many pundit-free zones that would be delighted to host such a thing. Sadly there is not a whole lot of upside to that strategy in modern politics.
<
p>Clinton and Obama are tied because they are both strong candidates. Whoever loses–and I still expect it to be her–will do so by a very narrow margin. In that case it will be possible to attribute the loss to almost anything, but I don’t see what that teaches us.
How does Obama transcend politics when he probably had some political operative dig up Clinton’s statement for him?
<
p>Do we believe he accurately recalls every statement that Clinton has made throughout her career, especially one from over 15 years ago that seems so apropos?
but in 1992 bakingcookiesgate was a “major” campaign story on the order of stumblegate. (It also provided a kind of template for Hillary haters going forward.)
<
p>See, the MSM is quite capable of doing this stuff even without the blogs.
<
p>My point is that it would not take an in-house forensic historian to make that comparison, especially because it is so apt.