This is interesting….

Commenter Felizarte recently posted this interesting tidbit:

Talk of replacing Biden with Hillary must be under discussion. I just got a follow-up survey from –William Arnone Phone: 212-773-3285 asking me if I would change my mind about voting for McCain if Biden was replaced with Hillary.

I wonder if someone could find out who this character is. I of course said NO, a hundred times.

How To Win The Presidential Argument: Democrats Don’t Get It

Go Away, You Fucking Idiot!

I have maintained for years that Democrats, in general, have been historically good at governing, but terrible at framing. When a Democrat has been good at both, he has been able to achieve the White House and stay there for the full amount of time allotted to him, unless tragedy has cut his life short (as in the case of John F. Kennedy). However, this combination is so rare that only one President since FDR has achieved it: William Jefferson Clinton. His wife, Hillary Clinton, also possesses that combination, and even more strongly than he. But alas, her own party wanted someone different, someone who possesses a Red-Sea-parting penis, who could bring them new voters and kick the old, non-Whole Foods-going, non-computer-using Clinton Democrats to the curb.

How’s that strategy working out for them so far? Well, let’s see. McCain is kicking Obama’s ass in the Western and Southern states that Obama was supposed to turn blue. The swing states, which Hillary easily won in the Primary, are starting to move towards McCain. So, as we Hillary supporters all have been saying for several months, Obama’s proposed “New Democratic Party” and “New Electoral Map” were vaporware.

For being aware of these facts, and for knowing that Obama is illegitimate, unqualified and unelectable, I personally have been accused of being stupid, angry, a liar, immature, hateful, a Rush Limbaugh devotee, and a Republican by people who do not know me. People who do know me have been telling me I’m wrong and I should listen to Gloria Steinem and Hillary Clinton when making my choice. Why? Am I not allowed to do my own research and make up my own mind?

Apparently not. Because here’s something else we Democrats suck at: Winning an argument.

The Week That Was Lipstick On A Pig

There has been much tragedy this week, and we honor and send out blessings to all.

Politically, in case you were in a rabbit hole — I wasn’t, just occupied — and missed what Obama handed us in lieu of practical statements about how he plans to save the country, let’s just say he’s up to par, and following in his own silent footsteps. His followers have been begging him to carry a big stick, but really Obama doesn’t need any prompting from them. In fact, he’s been serving up pigs on a stick all year.

Whereas Obamabots see hopenchange, I see kvetching. He doesn’t like this. He doesn’t like that. Oy! You know what? That never worked when my family did it to me. I’d just shut them out, and my ears would go mute. My kids hated it when I did it to them, too, although I swore I’d never act like my parents. (R U laughing yet?)

When I got older and a little wiser, I learned that people grow with the touch of encouragement. That’s how all my favorite teachers inspired my creativity. Predictably, you know where I’m going: that’s what Hillary had — a plan or a program to nourish each facet of our society and nix what might be holding it back.

To me, Obama’s way of kvetching, even with a wink and a smile, reminds me of how I felt when treated that way: doesn’t work for me. I don’t feel inspired. In fact, I see his style as a direct extension of the practices in his church. Although he didn’t hear anything for twenty years, he might have absorbed the approach anyway. It posits that: if we put others down, we’ll all be the better for it. Actually, Senator, that’s been bothering me during your entire campaign. What’s new about put down politics? That way of operating certainly goes against the change I’d like to see in the world.

My approach to religion — whether in temple, visiting a church, or sitting with a group in meditation — is to raise myself up high enough to be able to change whatever is not working in my life, instead of trying to debase others whom I could falsely blame. Sure, I falter, but I try.

Where’s the part where you talk about what you will do to help our struggling nation, Sen. O? Raise taxes, give another rebate, re-up the faith-based initiatives? That’s it? All I can remember are the smears. That’s right, Senator, keep hitting harder, as your bots say. It’s bound to inspire.

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-

Obama’s Lipstick Smears on the Mirror:

My List of What’s Wrong with America, from My Speeches

1. Clingy, bitter folks with guns or religion
2. Small town Pennsylvanians or Mid-westerners
3. Canada’s NAFTA
4. 1 leftover fleck of dandruff on my suit
5. Non-French speakers
6. Gucci-loafer wearers
7. Under inflated SUV tires
8. Using heat not sweaters at home
9. Mayors
10. African American deadbeat dads
11. Hillary makes my nose itch
12. Parents don’t read to their children
13. Seniors lack computer skills
14. My low pay grade

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

Internal List of WWWA

1. Gay-rights friendly SF mayor
2. Candidates want to debate me
3. US Constitution and Bill of Rights
4. Bill Clinton was POTUS
5. Bill Clinton was a popular POTUS, especially with African Americans
6. McCain’s female staffers earn more than mine
7. A confounding number of states
8. Like I’m supposed to say know ? when life begins
9. Foreign countries’ size to threat ratios
10. White women think they’re entitled X that, the preachers said it
11. Women keep stealing my spotlight
12. Pit bulls and pigs are related?
13. Soccer moms
14. Fake columns

.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.-.

I think we can all rest assured that the Dem’s selection, Barack Obama, is the guy who can best answer those 3am phone calls. Don’t you agree?

In this latest of Obama’s backtracking incidents, we all heard him claim that he was talking about Senator John McCain’s policies in his “lipstick on a pig” remark at a campaign event. After watching Gov. Sarah Palin make her enormously popular debut and acceptance speech during the Republican National Convention, where she extolled the tenacity of soccer moms in her joke about lipstick and pit bulls, I got Obama’s meaning. It was unmistakable and immediate. Just like when he gave Hillary the nose finger, the audience laughed, so they heard him loud and clear, too.

I heard, “any woman but that one.” Palin’s initial popularity is the direct recipient of Hillary Clinton’s years of hard-fought work, and being used as a target in this campaign and throughout her many years of service. You might have just as well plastered the face of Sarah over the Hillary punching bag and said, “hit ‘er, boys!”

Not to get off topic, but I’m angered and ashamed when my feminist friends still imply “anyone but Hillary,” or that “she’s still pissed at Bill and should have left him.” Who are they to judge? Why do they lose their sense of sisterhood, and think it’s funny to put other women down — women of compassion and accomplishment — to say they’re evil or conniving? It feels downright cruel.

I’m not stupid, I get the policy differences, but when did they even try to help out Hillary? She’s the champion of “women’s rights are human rights.” She’s the one who would have really hit it home for women. Now that they’re Roe v. Wade scared, they care? Where were they when real change was possible?

I always thought that Dems were the party of compassion, but this year Republicans learned from their opponents’ mistakes. Democrats thought they were helping themselves to the Republicans’ game by learning to hit harder and avoid another Kerry wimp out. Instead, McCain/Palin and their Party’s down-ticket candidates will reap a harvest from the Democrats’ toss away of their real winner — a lady. Repub women and men stepped forward in defense of their own and said, “we’ve got your back,” and “sexist attacks will not stand,” and they benefited in the polls. Well, what d’ ya know!

While helping to propel a revolution, progressive women in the sixties still often felt undervalued in their roles, as if, “get me more coffee, will you, hon? I’ve got lots of work to do.” That’s what I hear when I listen to Obama, and it’s a mystery to me that my longtime feminist friends don’t.

Here’s the link to SNL’s hysterical Palin/Clinton 9/13/08 skit (sorry about the commercial.) Unfortunately, WordPress doesn’t let me embed it, and NBC nixes all YouTubes for copyright infringement. I think it’s the perfect dessert for this post, as the Tina Fey/Amy Poehler parody illustrates my point perfectly. Enjoy!

[cross-posted from Lady Boomer NYC]

Who’s Sorry Now?

Obama slips precipitously in the latest Hominid Views simulation based on 6 recent polls:

Obama- 272 EVs; McCain- 266 EVs

The Repubublicans haven’t even rolled out their big guns yet- the 527s.   Well, you can’t say we didn’t try to warn them:

Sunday: Getting our post-primary dander up

What is it about our culture that demands that women go back for additional training if they want to apply for the same job as a man?  We all knew that a certain amount of sexism was exerting itself early on in the primary season.  Barack Obama lost many of us permanently when he made the “likeable enough” comment during the New Hampshire debates.  And we all witnessed the horror of the gangbang debate in Philadelphia where Tim Russert actually encouraged each of the other other candidates to take a turn with Hillary.  Then Chris Matthews did his thing afterwards and pretty much told her the next day to not cry about it.  I don’t recall her complaining about it.  It was more like “bring it on”.

And they did.

But those instances are merely the outward manifestations of some internal conviction.  The source of the misogyny that plagued Clinton and is now hurled with abandon from the left at Palin is something more sinister and evil.  It is a truth universally acknowledged that a man has native and latent abilities that he merely has to assert that women only acquire by more rigorous and extensive training.  We’ve seen evidence of this in our own lives.  My Brook must repeat a year of pre-algebra while her nationally ranked peers proceed to enriched algebra.  Why?  In spite of the fact that her test scores all year were A level, she didn’t do her homework.  Until she learns to do it, the fact that she scores in the top 2% nationally in math among 12 year olds is of absolutely no value to her teachers.  Or there was my female supervisor who was passed over for head of the department for a man who stayed in the shadows for years, biding his time and not doing much of anything while she picked up the slack and managed the paperwork.

Many of us sat in rapt attention while Hillary Clinton ran circles around her male counterparts in debate.  There wasn’t a subject they threw at her that she couldn’t respond to with confidence and an in-depth knowledge and command of the policy.  Obama was clearly out of his league.  It was embarrassing.  And yet, the next day, the media would fluff him and some of them were even believing it.

The most irritating episode of this spectacle came when Jonathan Alter wrote this column in Newsweek in March of this year, speculating that the Governorship of New York should be offered to Hillary as a consolation prize for her to just drop out of the presidential primary.  Here’s the most puzzling and offensive part of the piece:

In the event that Paterson had to resign, the New York State Constitution calls for a gubernatorial election this November. Clinton would be the favorite in that contest if she were interested. Were a politically wounded Paterson to serve out Spitzer’s term, which ends in 2010, Clinton would no doubt be a strong potential candidate to succeed him.

Under the scenario sketched out by the insiders, serving two years as governor would give Clinton the executive experience to become the prohibitive favorite for the 2012 Democratic presidential nomination.

I’m sorry, say that again?  We are expecting Hillary Clinton, two term senator, former first lady of Arkansas and the United States and aide to a two term president who had her own office in the White House, to take remedial training in governor school before she can compete against a less than one term senator with absolutely NO experience working in an executive capacity at all?

It occured to me that the hatred of Clinton was so extreme among members of the press that they didn’t REALLY believe this.  They were just stating some absurd scenario to get her to go away.  But the phenomenon seems to be seeping into Sarah Palin’s coverage as well.  The President of the US is a position in the Executive branch of government.  You would think that having been an executive of a state as big and as important as Alaska would have given Palin more relevant experience than less than 142 days of experience as a US Senator, which is in the legislative branch of government.  Palin has had almost two straight years of work as a governor before she was tapped for VP.  Obama had slightly less than a year and only 142 days of actual work before he decided he was ready enough to be President of the US in a branch of government where he has never held elective office.  And instead of this provoking any questions about HIS qualifications, it is HER’S that are being dismissed as inadequate.

We are now hearing that it is ‘hubris’ for her to pronounce herself ready to occupy a spot a level down the ladder while Obama is eminently qualified to succeed to the most powerful position in the world.  Indeed, there is virtually nothing that he can not do.

The problem was not Hillary Clinton, though I am beginning to wonder what she did to the media that makes them carry this permanent grudge and unstoppable urge to crush her.  The problem is this deeply ingrained, old-husband’s tale that women are not as good as men.  No matter what they do, no matter what they achieve, no matter how much they give, they will never be as good.  But even more disturbng is the fact that this is a belief that seems to be unique to American society.  In other countries, even one as oppressive to women as Pakistan, it is possible to elect women to high office.  But in the US, the most qualified person for the job was hamstrung by this neanderthal belief that she wasn’t ready, despite her display of knowledge and command and extensive resume as the guy she was running against with the razor thin CV but the leadership brain structure that only needed to be activated.  Is it because we as a country haven’t reached a state of economic desperation that we still have the luxury to let men play at being leaders?  When we get to that stage, will we then be willing to let a woman of greater potential have a crack at it?  Does the entire country have to be on the verge or past ruin before we correctly assess and weigh the experience and abilities of all persons applying for the job and award the job based on merit?

It must be nice to be a man in America.  Your abilities are almost never questioned.  One almost imagines American men waking up in the morning and quietly uttering the prayer, “Oh God I thank thee that I was not born an American woman.”

That’s gotta stop.

In 2008, we have the opportunity to make sure American men get the message.

Hillarious insight from mwb from the comments:

I think we need to add a new term to the lexicon to sum up that prevalent bit of sexism. I’m calling it Penis Years* (not a coincidence that it echoes the term dog years.)

* Penis Years: Each year of any experience of a person with a penis is equivalent to five years of experience by someone without a penis.

Swanspirit has an “extension” to the definition of Penis Years:

The measurements of PENIS YEARS …. as with fishing … are usually not well defined by any specific or traditional system and are always greatly exaggerated

Use liberally.

Waiting for tomorrow: Counting down the pounds to Election Day

It’s amazing how fast time flies when I’m waiting for tomorrow. For weeks now, I’ve thought: OK: Tomorrow, I’m going to start my health care blogging again. And I will get back in shape. (snort) I don’t know if anyone else has noticed it or not but, it hasn’t happened.

If I don’t do something now — the whole election could be over and I’d have precious little to show for it. But, if I snap into focus? I could lose 15 pounds by election day. And considering how easy it would be to gain 15 pounds by then if I don’t? The incentive is overwhelming.

I have found that making a quick plan each morning keeps the day in focus. Without a plan my days drift by in a pleasant haze. (trembling a little) Can I stick to it this time? Maybe Just Today?

---

Just 4 Today, I’ll drink my fiber supplement twice, drink 2 liters of water , walk 2 miles, NOT eat between meals & NOT take seconds.

Meanwhile?

What are you going to do today?