Archive for April, 2007
April 14th, 2007
There has already been much comment on Imus and his racially-charged remarks concerning the Rutgers University women’s basketball team. I want to confine myself to Hillary Clinton and her shameless exploitation of this affair. On the official Hillary campaign website, for the past several days, the homepage has been led by a huge photo of the Rutgers team.
The Rutgers female basketball players are undoubtedly the only heroic figures in this sordid media episode. They have conducted themselves with dignity and a spirit of forgiveness, remarkable given the offense directed at them. All the more conniving of Hillary Clinton and her campaign to connect herself with these laudable women. Without a hint of embarrassment, she has wrapped herself around the aura of the Rutgers women, seeking to steal their thunder for her own political purposes.
The Rutgers appropriation by Hillary Clinton’s campaign machine is just another indication of the cynicism of Senator Clinton, and how far she will go in pursuit of the presidency.
April 12th, 2007
When the American Revolution triumphed more than two centuries ago, the founding fathers created what was, at the time, the most radical government on the face of the Earth; a constitutional republic.
Many seem to forget that when the United States was born, virtually the rest of the world was ruled by hereditary dynasties. There were kings and emperors, tsars and sultans, emirs and queens. But only one nation had a president selected by elections, not birthright. However, if Hillary Clinton is elected America’s 44th president, I think we can all say farewell to a consitutional republic in the U.S.A.
Consider the following. If Hillary is elected and serves two terms, this would mean that for seven consecutive presidential terms, or 28 years, the White House will have been dominated by only two families, selected from a nation of three hundred million souls. That, my friends, may be rule by celebrity, but definately not by democracy.
It gets even worse. Despite the majority view in America that George W. Bush has been a failure as president, there is already serious talk in Republican circles that if they are beaten in 2008, they will challenge Hillary in 2012 with Jeb Bush, brother of George W. Bush and son of George H. Bush. And if he succeeds, will his future challenger be Chelsea Clinton?
My book, “Hillary Clinton Nude,” presents two primary reasons to defeat Hillary Clinton in 2008. In the first place, she is unqualified to be America’s commander-in-chief. Secondly, her election would institutionalize hereditary family rule in the nation, which in the process will extinguish the Republic for which we still pronouce the pledge of allegiance.
April 10th, 2007
When you are a governor, past U.S. ambasador to the United Nations, and sometime negotiator with a country considered a major nuclear threat to American security-and you are running for president, but the media ignores you, what are you to do? Why, visit North Korea!
The Demorcratic frontrunners, Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama, are travelling all over the country in quest of their party’s presidential nomination. But there exists not even a snowball’s chance in hell that either Clinton or Obama will be adding the Hermit Kingdom to their list of campaign stops.
If it seems an act of desperation on the part of New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson that he must travel to North Korea, ostensibly to negotiate the return of remains of American soldiers from the Korean War, to garner even a sliver of media attention, it is. The national media, for the most part, is so wowed by the slippery superficiality of both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama, candidates such as Bill Richardson don’t have a glimmer of a chance.
Barack Obama has had barely two years in the Senate with no meaningful legislative accomplishments, no national security or economics expertise, but because of an image the media constructed on the basis of a book Obama has written about “hope,” the entertainment/journalistic crowd is wild about him. As for Bill Richardson, his clear record on national security, foreign affairs and managing a state’s budget is just too dull for the David Lettermans of the world.
From Hillary Clinton’s standpoint, however, having Barack Obama as her most competitive challenger is just dandy. Compared to Bill Richardson, Senator Obama’s paper-thin resume makes Hillary Clinton, who I maintain in my book, “Hillary Clinton Nude,” is unsuited for presidential leadership, look, well, “presidential.” It appears that Bill Richardson may need to make another trip to North Korea if he is going to escape the curse of obscurity in the 2008 presidential campaign.
April 9th, 2007
The media’s political experts are already drafting the campaign obituary for Hillary Clinton as presidential candidate. Supposedly Barack Obama’s impressive fundraising performace, which essentially matched Hillary Clinton’s money raising, knocks her off the pedestal as Democratic frontrunner. It all reminds me of four years ago, when Senator John Kerry lost his frontrunner status to Howard Dean. Is history repeating itself?
There was always going to be a strong contingent within the Democratic Party that subscribed to the ABH (anyone but Hillary) principle. However, looking at the consistancy of Hillary’s national poll numbers since she announced her presidential “exploration,” it seems that something more significant than Barack Obama’s dollar figures is happening: the opposition to Hillary Clinton’s nomination within the Democratic Party is being divided by two strong candidates, rather than being monopolized by John Edwards. Furthermore, while the media is focusing on dollars, Senator Clinton, while maintaining a very strong fundraising performace, has also been quietly assembling the infrastructure that will enable her to mobilize a large segment of the women’s vote on her hehalf. In the 2008 presidential election, women will form the single largest voting block. All the polls indicate that she is way ahead of all her opponents in support from female voters. However, corporate media is always about the bottom line, including its coverage of political campaigns. No wonder they are more impressed with what Obama is doing with his fundraising consultants, rather that the steps Hillary is taking behind the scenes to win the critical states primaries that are being run months earlier in this strange campaign season.
April 7th, 2007
Bill Clinton is going to be increasingly the center of attention within Hillary’s 2008 presidential campaign, in a manner that no opponent, Democrat or Republican, can match, at least until the nominating conventions. She is the only current candidate being endorsed by an American president.
It will be “President” Bill Clinton that is headlined at campaign events, stress on the word “President.” This will distinguish Hillary Clinton from the rockstar media infatuation with Barack Obama. While Hillary Clinton cannot match the charisma of Obama, they are both left in the wind by the towering celebrity status of President Bill Clinton. In effect, the Hillary Clinton campaign will resurrect the presidency of Bill Clinton, utilizing the pomp and circumstance that even a retired president can provide Senator Clinton’s campaign, for everything it is worth.
As for the Republican candidates, none of them will be endorsed by the sitting president during the primaries. Once the GOP have selected their standard bearer, of course he will receive the full backing of George W. Bush. However, given the low poll numbers for Bush, his endorsement may bring far more liabilities than assets. Which all means that “President” Bill Clinton’s emblematic affiliation with Hillary’s campaign will be sustained for the duration. The only issue which may arise in the minds of voters is which Clinton is actually running for president.
April 4th, 2007
Now that Barack Obama has announced his first quarter fundraising results fell only 1 million bucks behind the vaunted Clinton money-generating steamroller, you can be certain that there will be one nifty pow-wow occuring at the Clintonian abode in Chappaqua. There is nothing like a perceived threat to their shared egotistical goals to bring the Clinton couple together under the same roof for a change. I expect that the most important result will be that Bill Clinton will be devoting less time to his “humanitarian” pursuits, and focus more on the Clintonian return to the White House.
From history, we know that both Clintons take serious challenges as dire threats, and react accordingly. I don’t expect Hillary Clinton is in a panic mode, but is rather focusing on how to use her immense resources, which include potent political and media connections as well as access to money, to attenuate the challenge from Barack Obama. Without question, Bill Clinton is her number one trump card, and a new strategem for employing him as point man on Obama is set to unfold.
As I’ve indicated in prior commentary, the Obama factor does help the Clintons in a very fundamental way. His impressive fundraising success is sucking the oxygen out of far more experienced and substantive Democratic candidates. While Obama may appear as a formidable challenge to the Clintons, should they succeed in knocking him down a peg, she will have no meaningful opposition left in her quest for the nomination. Accordingly, expect both Bill and Hillary Clinton to start going after Barack Obama with total ruthlessness. It may even be that Hillary and Bill will play good cop/bad cop towards Senator Barack Hussein Obama.
April 3rd, 2007
Amid the media hysteria over Hillary Clinton’s staggering first quarter fundraising totals, as reported to the Federal Election Commission, a few judicious observers have pointed out some peculiarities that are manifestations of uniquely Clintonian mathematics.
Under the law, a donor can give only a maximum of $2,300 for the primaries and $2,300 for the general election. Hillary Clinton’s opponents have been providing a precise breakdown, showing that an overwhelming majority of their first quarter dollars are directed towards the primaries. Senator Clinton, however, has declined to disclose the breakdown in her revenue, though it is known that the Clintons agressively sought donations for both the primaries and the general election, so as to inflate their first quarter results for maximum media impact. It is even possible that Barack Obama may have raised more money in the first quarter for the upcoming primaries.
This is all part and parcel of the Clintonian political campaign machinations, as detailed in my book, “Hillary Clinton Nude: Naked Ambition, Hillary Clinton And America’s Demise.” Hillary Clinton, just as with her mentor and husband Bill Clinton, is all about image creation, devoid of any real substance. The manipulative manner in which she has orchestrated her fundraising numbers is just another illustration of how far Hillary will go in her reach for the presidency.
April 1st, 2007
The initial leaks on Hillary’s first quarter fundraising results are hinting that she has raised $26 million dollars. That figure, plus $10 million left over from her senate campaign, leaves her far ahead of her Democratic opponents in the cash collection contest. Just to put her dollar total in perspective, in the last presidential contest, the first quarter results from the top 4 Democratic candidates combined was only $23 million. Hillary Clinton has set a fundraising record. What does this mean in political terms?
For starters, I think Hillary Clinton’s “exploratory” phase will quickly end, and become an official campaign with all the bells and whistles. She will continue to win the race for hiring top political operators to staff her campaign, as well as collecting endorsements. Finally, and perhaps most important, the vast sums raised by Hillary Clinton in only three months suggest that she is likely to raise more money than any likely Republican challenger in the general election, an unprecedented development for a Democratic candidate.
There remains another question. Is the saturation of the political process with cash, the majority coming from large contributors, healthy for American democracy? I doubt either Hillary or Bill Clinton have any comment on that.
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