Lipstick on a Pig? We're Offended!

TPM has a nice piece ,complete with McBush/Palin graphic, on the inept attempt by the Rethugs to feint outrage (OUTRAGE!) at Obama's use of the "lipstick on a pig" phrase to describe the McBushies claiming the Mantle of Change. Or, as Hillary Clinton put it while campaigning in Florida on Monday:

"The Republicans are trying to convince us to give them 4 more years to clean up the mess they made. Choosing a Republican to clean up this mess is like asking an iceberg to save the Titanic."

Now that's some lipstick you can believe in!

The Ticket: Obama/ ?

W. Hackwhacker is pleased to announce his waaaay- out- on- a- limb, contrary- to- Village- Think pick for Obama's running mate: Joe Biden... no. Evan Bayh... no. Tim Kaine... no. Wesley Clark... maybe, but no. Kathleen Sebelius... getting warmer, but no. W. Hackwhacker (the younger, smarter and more attractive Hackwhacker, by the way) says... Hillary.

You saw it here first. Unless it's someone else, and then, as with the post immediately following, this will automatically self-destruct.

UPDATE: The estimable fivethirtyeight says what we're thinking.

Cuckoo for Clinton

WaPo syndicated columnist Marie "Cuckoo for Clinton" Cocco has an op-ed today, "The 'Not Clinton' Excuse." Cocco argues that "no woman on the political horizon possesses the portfolio that Clinton brought to this campaign." Yes, Marie, all other women are ants compared to the towering, sniper-avoiding, race insinuating, McBush-honoring, Rove-imitating, gas tax pandering heroine of her piece. This is not the first time the Clintonistas have fallen back on the sexism excuse for the results produced by their candidate's miserably conceived and managed campaign of arrogant inevitability. Cocco, who is so completely in the tank for HRC that she needs nothing but Clinton Kool-Aid in her breathing apparatus (see Cocco, above left, in her deep analysis gear), asks at the end, "Is it something about Hillary, or something about us?" (i.e., that is holding her back from her well-deserved destiny as the First Woman American President). Answer: It's Hillary.

Spare Change?

The Los Angeles Times reports that the Clinton campaign is $20.88 million in debt, including over $9 million in unpaid bills and over $11 million she's loaned herself. There has been considerable speculation that one of the things Clinton will ask Sen. Obama for, as a condition for her support, is paying off her campaign debt. Obama's response should be, help get me elected and we'll help retire your debt after the election. Then again, she could pay off the debt from Bill Clinton's future speaking fees (possible topics: "Traveling The Back Roads Of West Virginia", or "I Want Another Chance - - Chelsea for President In 2020?").

(photo: Next time, don't buy a round of drinks for the house)

Looking Back On The Clinton Campaign

The New Republic's Michelle Cottle was able to get a number of Clinton campaign insiders to offer their anonymous opinions as to what went wrong in their campaign. Starting out as the presumed nominee on the way to a coronation in Denver, Clinton's campaign made serious errors especially up to Super Tuesday. Some blame former campaign director Patti Solis Doyle and strategist/pollster Mark Penn for not adjusting to and anticipating events before it was too late. Some blame former President Clinton for his intemperate and ill-timed outbursts, often tinged with racial meaning, with someone saying:

"She should have kept Bill chained in the basement at Whitehaven with a case of cheese curls and a stack of dirty movies."

If we had to pick the major deficiencies, they'd be 1) presuming that the nomination was hers, and that this was an election about a "resume" vs. "change", 2) failure to organize sufficiently in caucus states, and 3) relying on tapping wealthy contributors who were maxed out at the $2300 per person limit by February.

In any event, the end is approaching.

She Went There

There's been some significant commentary about Sen. Clinton's interview with USA Today, in which she responds to the reporter's question about how she can win the nomination:

". . .Senator Obama's support among working, hard-working Americans, white Americans, is weakening again and . . . whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."

Questions are being raised about what Senator Clinton's goal is, since she can't close the gap in elected delegates, and is continuing an aggressive, mostly negative campaign. The New York Times weighs in here. Her repeated reference to "white Americans" is striking some as an appeal to racial division. Some are suggesting that Clinton would prefer one term of Sen. McSame over two terms of Sen. Obama, notwithstanding her pledge to campaign for the Democratic nominee. This would give her another bite at the apple in 2012 if Obama is defeated in 2008.

"The Democrats' Reagan"

It's not often that we agree (to a great extent) with George "Where's My Powdered Wig?" Will, who one suspects was born 200 years too late. But his op/ed today gives a pretty fair picture of the Clinton campaign's "audacity of hopelessness," and, more interestingly, a brief assessment of the looming fight between Sen. McSame and Sen. Obama:

"McCain's problem might turn out to be the fact that Obama is the Democrats' Reagan...he is Reaganesque in two important senses: People like listening to him, and his manner lulls his adversaries into underestimating his sheer toughness -- the tempered steel beneath the sleek suits." [edited slightly to remove Will's requisite over-estimation of St. Ronnie R]

Time For Them To Go?

With yesterday's primaries returns in North Carolina and Indiana, nearly all pundits and political analysts are giving Sen. Clinton no chance of winning the Democratic nomination. North Carolina (the 10th biggest state) gave Sen. Obama a 14% margin of victory, and he lost Indiana by 1%; he gained a net of 15 delegates, widening his lead and adding over 200,000 to the popular vote lead. Some in the Clinton camp see the reality of the situation, which is creating deeper rifts in the party.

That still doesn't stop them from trying to move the goalposts. To them, it's not 2025 delegates now, it's 2,209 (including the Michigan and Florida primary delegates); to them, it's some notion that they'll convince the remaining superdelegates that Obama's not electable, etc. etc. The almost fanatic drive that the Clintons are exhibiting has demonstrated to many that this is all about a second chance for them, a political "mulligan", after blowing health care reform, and after the impeachment. They seem psychologically incapable of dealing with that, and want another go at it.

When Obama is the nominee and is up against Sen. McSameold, will the Clintons and their followers sit on their hands, hoping for yet another bite of the apple in 2012 if Obama loses? We'll see.

"It Is Past Time..."

Sen. Clinton's home state newspaper, the NY Times, had an editorial this morning about the price paid for the Democratic campaigning thus far: "It is past time for Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton to acknowledge that the negativity, for which she is mostly responsible, does nothing but harm to her, her opponent, her party and the 2008 election." Sen. Obama is also criticized, to a lesser extent, in the editorial.

Let's see if maybe we can enter the end game of the final primaries in a more positive, substantive mode, shall we?

"Hillary, Permanent Victim"

We're trying not to hammer this woman and her scurrilous campaign all the time... really. I, personally, will try to take the pledge like my brother Hackwhacker has done, to largely ignore this political black hole. A blogger we've come to admire, John Cole, is also trying to kick the habit. Wish us all well.

Give It A Rest, Big Dog

Realizing that there's no benefit in rehashing this incident, Sen. Hillary Clinton has asked her husband to stop commenting on the Bosnia sniper flap that set her campaign back recently. Former President Clinton claimed to an Indiana audience that his wife made the sniper claim once late at night when she was tired, and that she apologized for it. Not so. She made the claim several times in prepared speeches delivered over several days, and while she has said she "misspoke", it fell short of an actual apology. Senator Clinton has asked him to leave the questions about the Bosnia trip to her from now on.

Sen. Hillary Walter Mitty Clinton

"I was the first first lady taken into a war zone since Eleanor Roosevelt." Sen. Hillary Walter Mitty Clinton, March 25, 2008, news conference.

This is several days after Mitty Clinton's tale of taking hostile fire after executing a corkscrew landing at the Tuzla, Bosnia airport in 1996 was debunked by video showing her walking calmly off her plane, followed by her only child, and then taking time to leisurely greet a Bosnian schoolgirl and American troops on the tarmac. (Not this video, though.)

The truth about her latest claim? As reported in today's "The Fact Checker" in the WaPo, Pat Nixon flew into Saigon in July 1969 at the height of the war. And that "corkscrew" landing? Mitty Clinton's pilot, Col. William Changose (USAF-Ret.) said he undertook no evasive maneuver on landing in Tuzla, and that "Not only were there no bullets flying around, there wasn't a bumblebee flying around." Now there's a future commander-in-chief we can rely on!

Mitty Clinton has blamed her mistaken recollections on "sleep deprivation." Must be from being awakened by all those phone calls at 3 a.m.

Meanwhile, here's what all that lying and negative campaigning is doing.

Known By the Wingnuts You Use

Well, it seems the Clintons just can't get enough of their wingnut media in their headlong push to destroy Sen. Obama and snatch the nomination he's rightfully earning. The latest ploy comes as an attack on Gen. Merrill McPeak (USAF-Ret.), advisor to Obama, whose statements regarding Israel's returning to pre-1967 borders have been seized upon as a sign of McPeak's and Obama's anti-semitism. And the vehicle they are using to spread this manure? Why the American Spectator, the same publication that was working 24/7 during the Clinton administration to smear the Clintons with Troopergate, Whitewater, Vincent Foster-- you name it, the Spectator defecated it. This following only by days HRC's meeting with the editorial board of Richard Mellon "My Girlfriend's a Pro" Scaife's Pittsburgh wingnut paper, the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, previously best used for lining the bottom of birdcages.

We're waiting for Sen. Clinton to have a regular guest spot on Hannity's and O'Really's shows.

Known By the Wingnuts You Cite

As reported in today's WaPo, the Clinton campaign sent out an e-mail to the media containing "a blog posting by National Review columnist Kathleen Parker, who called 'nonsense' the idea that the former president attacked Obama at a campaign event in Charlotte." What Bubba Clinton said in Charlotte:

"I think it would be a great thing if we had two people who loved this country and were devoted to the interest of this country. And people could actually ask themselves who is right on these issues, instead of all this other stuff that always seems to intrude itself on our politics." (He then dropped Hillary's name in case anyone was confused about the point he was making. If Bubba's talking about political baggage, he is one super-sized steamer trunk himself. Ahh, those Clintons sure love them some Walnuts McBush!!)

This increasingly execrable campaign has now stooped to quoting a wingnut column to support their transparently false claims of innocence in the matter. Well done!

Obama, Clinton, and McBush

One of the threads of the last few days has been "What impact will the Rev. Wright controversy, and the subsequent Obama speech, have on the voting public?" The controversy continues to be flogged by those wishing to distract people from issues that are damaging to their cause (i.e., the Rethugs and their network, Fux News, are desperate to distract attention away from 7 years of unrelenting Rethug incompetence), or by those thinking it could help their cause (i.e., the Clintonistas using the controversy to dissuade superdelegates from backing Obama). We saw this cartoon, by Chris Britt of the Springfield (IL) Journal-Register (via C&L), that says it all (note especially the final frame, with the TV turned to Fox News). It would appear from recent news cycles that, aside from the above-named provocateurs, attention will slowly be turning away to focus on the next colorful item that can be dangled in front of the deep thinkers in the MSM.

Meanwhile, Gallup is showing McBush with 47 or 48 % of the vote in match ups with Obama and Clinton. Yes, it's mid-March, 8 months to the election (sigh), but it boggles the mind to think that nearly half of the electorate wants another 4 years of Bush Rethuggery. McBush has been variously referred to as "St. John McCain," "Teflon John," etc., and his fawners in the media are legion (see below). If the Democrats ever get behind their candidate and start directing fire toward McBush, his numbers will go down. But the longer we wait for that to happen, the more time McBush and his wingnut media can define (i.e., personally attack) Obama and/or Clinton, and make McBush look like the elder statesman. And the longer it takes for the public to connect the dots.

"Smear Machine"

The Huffington Post has an illuminating piece from Frank Schaeffer, who with his father, far-right "Christian" leader Francis Schaeffer, helped broker the marriage between the talibangelist community and the Rethug Party in the 1970s. Schaeffer has a unique perspective on the controversy surrounding some of the notorious pronouncements of Barack Obama's pastor, and how the far right and Clinton campaign are working the same "smear machine" to discredit Obama by any means necessary. (Exhibit A, for Ass: Here's an analysis of this morning's Wee Willie Kristol NYT poop pile (h/t to Marc Ambinder, via LG&M)).

HRC's Strategery

Kos has this great post about the Clinton slice-and-dice, slash-and-burn, choose-your-metaphor campaign.

Not Connecting the Dots

The most recent NBC/WSJ poll illustrates how so many Americans fail to connect the dots:

43% say they're worse off than in 2004;

50% to 37% is the generic Democrat to Rethug party preference margin;

Obama 47%, McSame 44% (Clinton 47%, McSame 45%);

Clinton 47%, Obama 43%, the choice of Democrats only;

45% to 38% is the margin by which Democrats think Obama would be the strongest candidate against McSame.

You see what's curious about these numbers. Aside from the oddity of some Clinton Democrats supporting her while at the same time thinking Obama would do better against McSame, you have the larger conundrum of a certain slice of the electorate willing to give the Rethugs another 4 years. Four more years of pounding trillions of dollars down the wrong rat hole (Iraq); four more years of torture; four more years of the growing income disparity between the wealthiest and the rest of us; four more years of stagflation; four more years where we have to hold our breath that a vacancy doesn't pop up on the Supreme Court; four more years of neglect on global warming; four more.. oh, you can fill in the rest.

This has to be a "change" election, where the question is simply put, "Do you want four more years of reckless incompetence and diversions?" First, the Democrats have to pay attention (no thanks to HRC, who is framing the election on McSame's terms), then they need to get the message across to others in the electorate who are still having trouble connecting the dots.

Class Vs. Ass

To put a cap (for today anyway) on the Geraldine Ferraro mess, read how someone with humor and grace responds to an ass (see picture, left).

We're counting down the hours until tonight's Countdown with Keith Olbermann on MSNBC to see Keith's Special Comment on the Clinton campaign. Last night, he exhibited the anger we and other progressives are feeling at the increasingly shabby, win-at-any-cost, break-any-rule, smear-by-surrogate campaign being run by the Clintonistas. What will it take for the grownups in the Democratic Party to take these putzes out of their sandbox and confiscate their mud pies? At what point do they recognize that not one, but many lines have already been crossed by these hacks?

UPDATE:Watch or read Keith's comment tonight, courtesy of Crooks and Liars.

Magical Moments in History

"We've got them injuns right where we want 'em", quote we're magically attributing to Gen. George Armstrong Custer, Little Big Horn, Montana, just prior to his "great victory."

"Wouldn't a Clinton-Obama ticket be just peachy?", thought magically attributed to the game-playing, losing Clinton campaign and being swallowed by too many magical-thinking Democrats. Of course, this is an insult to Obama and his supporters who are ahead in primaries won, delegates won, and popular vote won. The sense of Clinton entitlement is becoming so thick you can cut it.