Fair-weather friends: The Clintons cut NH loose

REALLY, there are no permanent Friends of Bill. For the former President and his wife, a tandem of duplicity and ambition unrivaled in American history, there are only temporary alliances. New Hampshire is learning this now, as so many others have before.

Ever since Bill Clinton proclaimed himself "the Comeback Kid" for his second-place finish in the 1992 New Hampshire Democratic primary, he has portrayed himself as a stalwart defender of New Hampshire and its first-in-the-nation tradition. He championed this state's retail politics as a model for the nation and made sure he maintained his ties here in preparation for his wife's inevitable future presidential run.

Those relationships paid off handsomely in January, when Hillary Clinton, who had spent more than a year fawning over New Hampshire's great electoral traditions, won here with the strong backing of the Democratic Party establishment.

Now, having used New Hampshire as the launching pad for both of their presidential bids, the Clintons have no more use for us. And so it was that on Monday, Bill Clinton threw New Hampshire and our Democratic Secretary of State Bill Gardner under the proverbial bus.

To justify his claim that Florida and Michigan delegates should be seated at the Democratic National Convention, the former President said, "We let New Hampshire go out of turn. They had a Democratic secretary of state. The Florida voters are totally innocent. They asked to vote on time."

To the Clintons, rewriting history is as simple as repeating their own talking points until they become accepted as facts. But the truth is that the Clintons happily accepted the bumped-up New Hampshire primary at the time because they perceived it gave Hillary an advantage. Hillary Clinton even signed a pledge to not campaign or participate in the Michigan or Florida primaries. That pledge was meant to punish those two states for moving up their primary dates, and she knew it.

But it was not sincere. It was one point of the famous Clinton triangulation. And before you knew it, Sen. Clinton was participating in both the Michigan and Florida primaries, which, of course, she won by violating her pledge.

Now, needing those delegates, she and her husband innocently claim that it was the sneaky New Hampshire Secretary of State Bill Gardner who broke the DNC rules, victimizing poor, helpless Florida and Michigan. And the DNC let him get away with it only because he is a Democrat.

Never mind the historical record, which shows that Florida and Michigan moved up their primaries first, prompting New Hampshire to respond. If they stand in the way of the Clintons' march through history, the facts be damned.

And, if they stand in the way of the Clintons' march through history, their friends be damned, too.

http://www.theunionleader.com/article.as px?headline=Fair-weather+friends%3a+The+ Clintons+cut+NH+loose&articleId=a061 c399-bee3-4a1f-8c4f-86d8d7ae6a15

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/con tent/article/2008/03/27/AR2008032703618. html

EXCERPT

For the first time, Congress and the FCC are debating wide-reaching Web regulations and policies that would determine how much control cable and telecommunications companies would have over the Internet. The issue has given rise to a new political constituency raised on text messaging and social networking and relies on e-mail blasts and online video clips in its advocacy.

Although Free Press has generated buzz for its aggressive and sometimes controversial tactics online, its ringleader in Washington is an unlikely crusader. A soft-spoken 30-year-old PhD candidate, Ben Scott has become an operator in multibillion-dollar battles involving corporate titans, regulators and consumers debating policies over who controls the media and the Internet.

"There have been policy moments in the past when the market has been shaped by decisions made in Washington -- radio in the 1930s, television in the 1950s and cable in the 1980s. That moment is now for the Internet," said Scott, who runs a nine-member office.

I have to say I second keeping it positive.  However, I don't see it a simply a tactic for winning (though that's a good side effect to going positive).

What do we gain by sinking to the level of the Fox noise machine? Its like when Luke goes to the dark side in an attempt to beat Darth Vader, only to realize he's becoming part of what he tries to defeat.

The other day I was reading a little of Anne Coulter's hit piece about Obama's speech and Rev. Wright.  Of course, it was predictably inflammatory.  That didn't bother me.  The part that made me the most annoyed was the parroting of her talking points made in the comments section.  Everyone restated what they just heard or read like monkeys.  And they all thought they were sooo intellectual.  It was truly repulsive.

The next time I visited this blog I realized I'd been guilty of the same sort of parroting and I saw a good deal of other posts doing the same thing.  How would we be any different from that detestable right wing noise machine if we kept that up and won based on swiftboat attacks about McCain's 100 years of war and how he doesn't understand the economy.  Lets win based on having the most progressive/mainstream campaign that speaks to the most voters about what we all crucially need: peace and prosperity.

I guess it stems in part from realizing that I don't feel the violent negative energy I do about most Republicans when I think of McCain.  He's not all evil and I just don't want to be involved in a campaign where we bash the shit out of each other like we've done in this primary.  He's an okay guy, but he's at the helm of a corrupt party that doesn't speak to my ideals.

I think I'm gonna go listen to some Tina Turner, "I Don't Wanna Fight."  Maybe that should be the post-partisan anthem.

all the people who think he's "believable" go a runnin.

I keep seeing supporters being attacked as if they are actual surrogates of the campaigns. It's pretty foolish.

So I hope that when the new Obamites and Freepers stop getting paid by whoever puts them here, they will remain, but I dunno.

Do you really believe that the Obama supporters are being paid by someone to come here?  If you do you are a tinfoil hat case.  If you don't, you are a troll.

I'm a mellow, open-minded Obama supporter who came here to try to break my Daily Kos habit, because the tone at Daily Kos is starting to freak me out.

I find that I'm posting a lot here, and still posting some at Daily Kos, in an utterly futile effort to say, "Let's all be nice! Why can't we get along?"

I think I belong to some kind of new category of accidental troll. Such as, "an overwhelming sense of dread troll," or, "I am going to be Soylent Green after all, troll."

I just desperately, desperately want all Democrats on all sides to recognize that the real enemy is Florida falling into the ocean, climate change making all of our farms unfarmable, and maybe running out of the natural gas that we use to make our fertilizer. Not a messed up Tuzla anecdote, and not Wright preaching controversial sermons.

But, of course, I might as well just post ooga booga booga booga for all the effect my posts will have.

yeah that comment is a disgrace and McCranky will go to town with it and frankly he should