MICHAEL O. ALLEN

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Bill Clinton

An important question

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I will admit that I grew to dislike Hillary Clinton during the year and found how she ran her campaign as well as the contest with Sen. Barack Obama more than disgraceful. I don’t want her as secretary of state. The president-elect is a lot smarter man than I’ll ever be so, if he wants her in this role, more power to him. He was elected to make decisions like this.

The New York Times published an opinion-editorial, What’s So Special About a Team of Rivals?, by JAMES OAKES that I think is important to read.

Oakes’ piece corrects some of the gauzy history around Abraham Lincoln, fostered largely by Pulitzer-winning historian Doris Kearns Goodwin and her book, Team of Rivals: The Political Genius of Abraham Lincoln, that this was such a monumentally wise idea.

Rather than it being a stroke of genius, Lincoln’s decision to appoint his main rivals for the Republican nomination into his cabinet was rather routine and mundane:

INSPIRED by the wisdom of Abraham Lincoln, President-elect Barack Obama is considering appointing a “team of rivals” to his cabinet — if rumors about the nomination of Hillary Clinton to be secretary of state are true. But there’s more mythology than history in the idea that Lincoln showed exceptional political skill in offering cabinet positions to the men he had beaten in the race for the 1860 Republican nomination.

For one thing, there was nothing new in what Lincoln did. By tradition, presidents-elect reserved a cabinet position, often secretary of state, for the leading rival in their party. John Quincy Adams inaugurated the practice by appointing one of his presidential rivals, Henry Clay, to that post. It was a controversial move in 1824; enemies of Adams denounced the appointment as a corrupt bargain.

By the 1850s, the practice had become a tradition. In that decade, Presidents Millard Fillmore, Franklin Pierce and James Buchanan installed in their cabinets men who had been major rivals for their party’s nomination. Daniel Webster, who lost the Whig Party nod in 1848, became Fillmore’s secretary of state. William Marcy, after failing to win the 1852 Democratic nomination, took the same position in Pierce’s cabinet. Lewis Cass, the Democratic nominee in 1848 and a man whose presidential dreams never diminished, was appointed Buchanan’s secretary of state in 1857. These were not notably successful administrations. Most historians agree that Pierce and Buchanan rank among the worst presidents in American history. There was nothing particularly unusual, or even impressive, when Lincoln followed this well-established practice.

All we’ve heard from the chattering class is “team of rivals”, “team of rivals”, “team of rivals” since news first came out (leaked by the Clintons) that HRC is under consideration by Obama.

The Clintons, Bill and Hillary, are a special dose of poison. They suck up so much of the oxygen in the room whenever they’re involved in anything that, I think, it is best to leave them aside if you do not have to deal with them. I think this is such a time.

The president-elect will have many opportunities to make mistakes. Does he have to start with this one?

Bill, again

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You know, I–I love this, and I thank you, but we have important work to do tonight. I am here first to support Barack Obama. And second — and second, I’m here to warm up the crowd for Joe Biden, though as you will soon see, he doesn’t need any help from me. I love Joe Biden, and America will too.

What a year we Democrats have had. The primary began with an all-star line up and it came down to two remarkable Americans locked in a hard fought contest right to the very end. The campaign generated so much heat it increased global warming.

Now, in the end, my candidate didn’t win. But I’m really proud of the campaign she ran: I am proud that she never quit on the people she stood up for, on the changes she pushed for, on the future she wants for all our children. And I’m grateful for the chance Chelsea and I had to go all over America to tell people about the person we know and love.

Now, I am not so grateful for the chance to speak in the wake of Hillary’s magnificent address last night. But I’ll do my best.

Last night, Hillary told us in no uncertain terms that she is going to do everything she can to elect Barack Obama.

That makes two of us.

Actually that makes 18 million of us – because, like Hillary, I want all of you who supported her to vote for Barack Obama in November.

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October surprise *

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Trey Ellis in HuffPo thinks we should be afraid, very afraid of what Republicans might have up their sleeves for October:

We taxpayers already have shelled out $100 billion on contractors in Iraq since 2003. They have 180,000 employees in country now building what they had assumed would be permanent bases for a permanent occupation of an oil-rich land.

Does anyone really believe that Cheney/Halliburton/Blackwater will relinquish the keys to the American treasury without the nastiest of fights?

For six years Cheney has unleashed a gusher of obscene profiteering with little or no oversight of his petro/reconstruction/military contracting cohorts. You don’t have to be a conspiracy-addicted fan of Jack Bauer’s to understand that they won’t just quietly retire to their yachts in the Gulf of Mexico after regime change and their operations in Iraq are forcibly ended. They understand that not only will they be out of business, but that they could also go to jail — if Democrats hold hearings into war profiteering, just as Truman did as a Senator in 1943.

Remember, when Halliburton et al. first entered Iraq, Republicans had a virtual one-party lock on governance. Democrats acted like frightened little forest animals. The contractors didn’t have to cover their tracks because the vice president of the United States, the de facto ruler of the free world, was their capo.

Me? I sometimes subscribe to the pessimism that the writer voices here. Other times, I am euphoric over Sen. Barack Obama’s chances of winning the presidency. Practically everyone I know supports Obama. My town, which not long ago was a Republican town, is now festooned with “Obama for President” lawn signs.

Yet, this is America we’re talking about. It is at the root of Bill Clinton’s restlessness. Republicans are counting on that thing that Bill feels inately. Bill knows. He has always known this country better than anyone. That’s why he was able to tap what was darkest in the heart of America into two terms in the presidency. Anymore than he wants his wife to win the presidency, he knows that Hillary, warts-and-all, would be easier for Americans to swallow than the pristine Mr. Obama.

Damn Bill!

Bill Clinton’s Shameful Demise

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Unfortunately, all the good Bill Clinton did as president, the goodwill he won with African Americans and the great relationships he forged over the course of his political, he’s not intent on frittering away in bitterness. He’s affronted by Sen. Barack Obama’s political ascent and he’s not going to let it go, promising now to speak his mind next year.

Next year?

Give it a rest, Mr. Clinton. The nation has more pressing matter to attend to than the swamp in your mind.

Clinton Embraces Return to Ambassador Role: After the Bitter Primaries, He Calls Charity ‘My Life’ By Anne E. Kornblut, Washington Post Staff Writer, Sunday, August 3, 2008; A01

KIGALI, Rwanda, Aug. 2 — There will be no Clinton restoration — not this year, at least. But the rehabilitation of Bill Clinton has begun.

The former president in many ways ended the Democratic primary campaign more isolated than his wife, with his own friends and allies unhappy with his flashes of anger and ill-chosen words and blaming him in part for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton’s defeat. With a negligible relationship with Sen. Barack Obama — he has spoken to him just once since the primaries — Clinton has been shut out of the Obama campaign almost entirely and does not know even basic things, such as the role he will play at the Democratic convention.

It is uncharted territory for the most successful Democratic politician of his generation, and part of the reason he was in Kigali on Saturday, the latest stop in a grueling journey across Africa to visit some of the places where his charitable foundation has been active — and in the process re-establish his role as a global elder statesman. At the same time, Clinton began, slowly, to discuss the bruising Democratic primary season that ended two months earlier.

In his first extended interview since his wife exited the campaign in defeat, Clinton said he was glad to be back doing international foundation work. “This is my life now, and I was eager to get back to it, and I couldn’t be happier,” Clinton said in a hotel suite, with three aides looking on.

In a session that lasted more than 45 minutes, Clinton described his role in the 2008 campaign as “a privilege, an honor,” and said, “I loved it,” but he declined to discuss any of his own possible mistakes, describing them as a distraction. “Next year, you and I and everybody else will be freer and have more space to say what we believe to be the truth” about the primaries, he said.

Clinton volunteered very little praise of Obama, beyond describing him as “smart” and “a good politician” when asked about him toward the end of the interview. He did, however, muse at length about the role that race could play in the general election — the issue that some of his former black allies angrily accused him of introducing in the Democratic primaries — as a factor, if not a decisive one.

More like the Hindenburg

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Hillary Rodham Clinton biographer Carl Bernstein has a fascinating post at cnn.com about her plan to land the vice-presidential spot on the Obama ticket. Titled Could Clinton land the VP nomination?, her plan to end her campaign and win the vice presidential spot is to blackmail and threaten Obama:

Take me on as your vice president, or I’ll destroy you and the Democratic Party.

Bernstein wrote that HRC’s minions are still, remarkably, trolling for dirt to destroy the Obama campaign with, even as they vigorously seek the second spot on the ticket:

A person close to her, with whom her campaign staff has counseled at various points, said this week, “I think the following will happen: Obama will be in a position where the party declares him the nominee by the first week in June. She’ll still be fighting with everybody — the Rules Committee, the party leaders — and arguing, ‘I’m winning these key states; I’ve got almost half the delegates. I have a whole constituency he hasn’t reached. I’ve got real differences on approach to how we win this election, and I’m going to press the hell out of this guy. … Relief for the middle class, universal health care, etc.; I’m Ms. Blue Collar, and I’m going to press my fight, because he can’t win without my being on the ticket.’ “

Another major Democratic Party figure, who supports her for president, agreed: “It’s not going to be a quiet exit. … Obama has got a terrible situation. He marches to a different drummer. He won’t want to take her on the ticket. But he might have to, even though the idea of Vice President Hillary with Bill in the background at the White House is not something — especially after what [the Clintons] have thrown at him that he relishes. I believe she’ll go for it.”

However, several important Democrats aligned with Obama predicted that he — and Michelle Obama — will vigorously resist any Clinton effort to get on the ticket. Rather, Obama is more likely to try to convince Clinton to either stay in the Senate or accept another position in an Obama administration, should he win the presidency.

Several Clinton associates say there is still a ray of hope among some in her campaign: that a “catastrophic” revelation about Obama might make it possible for her to win the presidential nomination. But barring that, Hillary and Bill Clinton recognize that her candidacy is being abandoned and rejected by superdelegates whom she once expected to win over and that, even if she were to win the popular vote in combined primary states, she will almost certainly be denied the nomination.

This is mind boggling. HRC has lost and her ship is losing water. Yet she is still making threats. There are other people who help Obama, if he even needs this help, with the so-called blue collar, “hard-working” white voters. Jim Webb, as I’ve stated on a number of occasions, for instance.

HRC is a disaster. Bill Clinton has turned out to be a disaster for Democrats. They both need to go away. The sooner the better.

What groove?

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How Bill Clinton Got His Groove Back says the headline to an Adam Nagourney piece of hagiography on the website of The New York Times (I don’t know if it ran in the paper, or is slated to run tomorrow). My question is this: Did the former president get his groove back, or is the Times news pages continue a pattern of trying to prop up the Hillary Rodham Clinton campaign by overstating things?

I cannot really say when it started but, recently, the news pages has been turning itself into pretzel spinning any news development into something positive for HRC.

They’ve, meanwhile, done the opposite for Sen. Barack Obama, covering his campaign as a constant crisis.

Just when the paper’s editorial pages was beginning to recognize its error in backing HRC and beginning to take a more even-handed tack to the campaign, the news pages has gone in the opposite direction by becoming more subjective.

This primary battle will end one day. The Times, as it almost always does, will regain its bearings. I cannot wait for either day.

Laughin' so hard it hurts

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Dick Gregory at State of Black Union ’08

The veteran comedian/civil rights activist long ago made a practice of packing his humor with a stiletto scalpel that cuts so quick you sometimes don’t know whether to laugh, or cry. This late February 2008 event was no different:

Tricking Bill (Clinton)

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Cold comfort

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Transcript:
“It’s 3am and your children are safe and asleep.
But there’ s a phone in the White House and it is ringing.
something is happening in the world
your vote will decide who answers that call.
whether it is someone who already knows the world’s leaders,
knows the military
someone tested and ready to lead in a dangerous world.
its 3am and your children are safe and asleep.
Who do you want answering that phone?”


This is inadvertent but former Pres. Bill Clinton just showed why his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, (D-NY), is not only not the person you want answering the phone, she might not even answer it if she gets the opportunity.
Mrs. Clinton has mentioned often in this campaign her “35 years of experience,” which she says has put her “across the threshold” to be commander-in-chief. Well, the phone rang in 1994 regarding Rwanda. It rang. And rang. And rang. And rang. No one answered.
Bill Clinton spared no effort trying to stop genocide in the former Yugoslavia republics. This was admirable. But close to a million people were killed in the genocide when Hutus decided to kill Tutsis in that African nation.
Bill Clinton said his wife had urged him to take military action to stop that genocide. History will record that, even if it is true that Mrs. Clinton did offer that advice, and there is no record whatsoever to prove she did, she was in ineffectual. Mrs. Clinton was just as ineffectual trying to ram a health care overhaul through the U.S. Congress.
That was when she became a full-time touring first lady. She visited many countries. This is part of the experience that she says qualifies her to be president and commander-in-chief. It is the lifetime of experiences that she says qualifies her and Sen. John McCain, (R-AZ), to be president but not Sen. Barack Obama, (D-IL).
If we know anything at all about Bill Clinton, besides the fact that he’s a political animal, it is that he is an inveterate and pathological liar. This advice that he remembers Mrs. Clinton giving him is clearly a political memory that he’s fantasizing now to help his wife’s candidacy.
Sen. Clinton, in her many statements lately, is also showing herself to be power-hungry.Not only did Sen. Clinton cross a threshold that qualifies her to be president, whatever that means, but she broke a golden rule of politics when she gave Republicans ammunition to use against Sen. Obama, should he be the party’s nominee.

Revolution, or an election?

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Senators Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton debating in Texas on Thursday. (Photo by Deborah Cannon)

Washington Post Columnist Robert J. Samuelson wrote a column on Wednesday questioning the Barack Obama phenomenon. We will see more pieces like this, especially if Sen. Obama, (D-IL), becomes the Democratic Party nominee.

Let me attempt to refute some of his more salient points.

I don’t want to say Samuelson’s column is ridiculous. He does raise some interesting questions about Obama. He says in The Obama Delusion that he came away from an encounter with Obama at the 2004 Democratic Party Convention “deeply impressed by his intelligence, his forceful language and his apparent willingness to take positions that seemed to rise above narrow partisanship.”

Obama has become the Democratic presidential front-runner precisely because countless millions have formed a similar opinion. It is, I now think, mistaken.

As a journalist, I harbor serious doubt about each of the most likely nominees. But with Sens. Hillary Clinton and John McCain, I feel that I’m dealing with known quantities. They’ve been in the public arena for years; their views, values and temperaments have received enormous scrutiny. By contrast, newcomer Obama is largely a stage presence defined mostly by his powerful rhetoric. The trouble, at least for me, is the huge and deceptive gap between his captivating oratory and his actual views.

By Samuelson’s standard, only people who have held national office and are well known should put themselves forward as candidates for President of the United States. Although George W. Bush came from a prominent family and was governor of a state, not much was known about him (we still don’t know about his going AWOL from his Air National Guard units during the Vietnam War; his drug use during much of his adult life; and other criminal behavior and activities before he allegedly found religion). His entire adult life (besides drinking and drugging) was spent as his father’s enforcer in the deep background.

Hillary Clinton is known to the whole world, which is both her strength and weakness. Many voters are rejecting her precisely because they know her so well. Obama, besides being a community organizer and a civil rights lawyer, was a state legislator for eight years.

Samuelson criticized the plans that Obama has put forth about what he would like to do in office.

If you examine his agenda, it is completely ordinary, highly partisan, not candid and mostly unresponsive to many pressing national problems.

He is right. Obama’s ideas are quite pedestrian. But Mrs. Clinton’s plans are only slightly less so. Obama’s supporters either cannot see, or refuse to see, the conventional politician right before them. They think it’s a revolution when, in fact, all it is is an election and a man running as hard as he can to win an office.

But, that said, I don’t believe it’s Obama’s job to lay out a plan on what he intends to do as president. That’s not part of the job description. I think most people trot out these plans because they think it’s required of them.

Did Bush talk about ‘unitary executive’ doctrine when he ran for President? No. He talked about being a ‘compassionate conservative’ and ‘a uniter, not a divider.’ We know now that both tropes are blatant lies.

A lot of people remember now Bill Clinton’s presidency fondly (willingly forgetting the impeachment and other assorted sordid goings on during those eight years) but what plans did he run on and did he implement them?

One of the things that a leader has to do is inspire and any other year I would have been inspired by Mrs. Clinton. Next to Obama, however, she depresses me.

I think Obama will be a better president and part of the reason is that he’s new and fresh and does not carry the scars and baggage of two decades of warring with Republicans. With Mrs. Clinton, we’re going to have to refight all the old fights.

And it helps that Obama is an inspirational leader.

Please, don’t get me started on McCain. As you all know by now, I think Sen. John McCain is a corrupt and immoral hypocrite.