John Oliver’s recent take on the primary process was on the mark, especially the part about how Clinton can’t do anything right:
Yes, the process definitely needs to change. For one thing, we need to cut down on the incredibly undemocratic caucuses that cut out anyone who can’t stick around for hours to listen to speeches, vote, revote, line up, line up outside, etc, etc. Katiebird shared her caucus experiences with me from 2008 and 2016. 2008 sounded like a nightmare. 2016, when she voted for Bernie was much easier. But it was still very time consuming. The elderly, working people and mothers with kids ain’t got time for that.
ahem, those would be the Clinton voters.
Then there are open primaries where anyone who has a grudge against one of your party’s candidates can game them. Independents say that if open primaries didn’t exist, they wouldn’t be able to vote in a primary.
Yes. and?
I’m not saying I’m unsympathetic to independents. I was one after 2008 for 5 years. I was extremely angry with what happened in 2008. But as we all know, the parties are private entities (that use public tax dollars for their primaries and caucuses) and they aren’t beholden to us. They hardly listen to their own voters. Why should pay any attention to independents?
But the thing that drives me nuts about Oliver’s piece and Greg Sargent asking if the primary process needs to be reformed yadayadayada, is why now? Why now, guys? This process was exponentially worse in 2008. We saw it on C-Span during the rules committee hearing when reapportionment of one candidate’s pledged delegates gave the other candidate the win.
You know, no one heard a peep from these same belligerent assholes about how unfair the system was in 2008. It’s only this year when their “more deserving male” candidate is losing by a wider margin because of closed primaries that we’re all supposed to have conscioussness raising sessions to talk about the primary system clustrfuck. When WE pointed out how the assholes were definitely, undeniably and in full daylight rigging the system against Clinton in 2008, we were called “bitter knitters”. Now, we have to be careful not to upset the fee-fees of the same bad actors.
Yeah, that’s not going to happen.
Atrios says nobody remembers 2008, that we are being silly, {{rolling his eyes}}.
You know, we don’t see it that way. And we’re really tired of having our votes and experiences of both of the horrible primary seasons for the Clinton voters invalidated.
Do not tell us that our experiences were unimportant.
Some of us are living with the consequences of that nasty 2008 primary season where Clinton still managed to get more of the popular vote and managed to lose the primary by the slimmest of margins. She had every right to take the fight all the way to the convention. She wasn’t harshing his mellow. HE was harshing HERS.
Do not invalidate her actions in 2008 when she tried with all her might to be recognized as being the first female candidate who had a legitimate right to the nomination and a real roll call vote.
Elections have consequences. We got the “liberal messiah” who wasn’t a liberal. And we got an very weak economic recovery and not one banker went to jail. And Clinton is stuck with an ACA that she can’t get rid of and can only tweak around the edges. Imagine how thrilled she is to take that on. And let’s not forget that there was no guarantee he was going to win in 2008. He wasn’t that far ahead in the polls, until the financial catastrophe in Sept 2008. He didn’t win the presidency in a landslide.
If there are people in the Clinton camp who are unsympathetic to the plaintive wails of the most persistent and aggressive Bernie supporters, it’s because they’ve been there before. These guys have no respect for Clinton or her voters. A Clintonista is a non-person. His or her votes are unimportant. They can be swept into the trash bin with impunity. The objections of a Clintonista doesn’t merit their attention. They are silly. The 2008 primary was so five minutes ago.
You know, that’s bullshit. We’re not having it this year. You might have come to Clinton begrudgingly this year but we aren’t going to forget any time soon. We see the sexism lurking beneath the surface of the “no one remembers 2008” crap.
Face up to it. There is still bitterness in the party over it because those guys who gamed the system in 2008 think they can still do it in 2016 and they think they can get away with it because the Clintonistas don’t count. The fact that they are wrong this year doesn’t mitigate the damage they are doing to the legitimacy of Clinton voters or the respect for the nominee that the party needs to project going into the fall.
Is that really the message we want to send to the country in the general election? Stop it.
Filed under: General | Tagged: Atrios, greg sargent, Hillary Clinton, john oliver, presiendential primaries |
The Confluence 
As they say Deja Moo – I’ve seen this bullshit before from Dem “leaders”. I’m still sticking knitting needles in my Rahm Emmanuel Voodoo doll and its rat-faced Axelrod companion became totally unrecognizable just two weeks of convention2008.
Once upon a time, I believed in open primaries.
Now, I’m ready to close them all and eliminate caucuses.
Looking back, I think I became a leftist for a while, rather than a mere liberal (which I now am again), because I was angry at the shenanigans of 2008, and the hard Left was the only position from which I could criticize Obama without risking the scarlet “R”.
I completely agree, I hated caucusing, and don’t know if I’ll be up for it again. And, really, the thought of other voters “gaming” the other parties primary is cheating, lying, and other reprehensible behaviors I don’t condone in any other part of my life.
Close those primaries, BOTH parties. And if an Independent wants to vote in a primary, choose a side, or get in on the ground floor of a third way.
I agree.
Just saw a local news post Washington state’s primary results. Hillary won the Washington State primary 354, 688 votes to Sanders 306,715 votes. Too bad it’s meaningless as far as delegates go, but to me it proves that caucuses are not representative of the will of ALL the voters.
http://www.king5.com/elections
Yes there is still bitterness. I am one of those bitter people and I won’t stand for anyone talking trash about Hillary.I was at that rules and bylaws committee meeting in Washington and I saw how Hillary supporters were treated. I went home and first thing Monday morning changed my voter registration from dem to independant. I. still believe if they would not have taken votes from her at that sham of a meeting she would be president today. They screwed her over and they screwed the voters of Florida and Michigan. Get over it indeed!
I had a moderately amusing meeting with some election officials when I tried to change my registration to PUMA. Oh there were some horrified looks when I told them what the acronym stood for.
I have been told that the parties pay for the primaries and not the states themselves. Is that correct? If so, then closed primaries seem fair to me.
I don’t think this is correct. Or at least it wasn’t in 2008 when the Florida fiasco happened. Florida and Michigan both balked at redoing their primaries due to high costs. The state objected which I think means they paid for the first ones.
The parties pay for caucuses I think but primaries are paid for by the tax payer. And as far as closed primaries, that’s really up to the state mostly. Here in GA we don’t register by party.
That explains why we have caucuses. 😦 I’m all for closed primaries.
Absolutely right in regard to the impossibility of ever forgettting how the DNC simplly fixed the system in 2008 so that Obama would win, thereby invalidating the votes and sentiments of the Hillary suppoters. Apart from the stealing of votes and the crooked caucuses, many people do not realize that Donna Brazile was able to set up an algorithm in the delegate counting, wherein districts with a higher percentage of Black voters, got more delegates. That algorithm is still in there. It benefitted Hillary somewhat this time. It will give any African-American candidate in the future a big leg up on winning the nomination. Obama’s people set the template: win 95% of the Black vote, and you will win Southern states by immense margins; and get valuable bonus delegates in all populous states. (Does everyone remember Hillary winning Ohio by ten points or so, and getting about four more delgates overall? That was why. The rigged delegate apportioning system probably cost her 100 delegates or so altogther).;Then just figure out how to game the caucuses, and all the primary wins that the opponent gets, will not avail her.
Even so, I do still believe that only Democrats should be able to vote in Democratic primaries, and that you should have to re-register six or more months before a primary. Because as it is now, the party with an incumbent candidate, or one who locks the nomination up early, can almost literally decide the nominee of the other party, which is a travesty of democracy. I don’t think that “Independents” should be allowed to vote in primaries. I understand how someone can be angry at their party and want to leave it, but if this conintues, we will have 50% or more of the country registered as Independents. At that point, they’ll let everyone vote in either primary, and Democrats will have no control over whom they want to choose. So I will never register as Indie One can choose to, but they should not get to vote in party primaries. The Democratic Party is still infinitely better than the Republican Party; and there has to be some sense of Party identity, if for nothing else than winning downticket races. People used to be able to pull a lever to vote for all the candidates of one party. That helped Democrats. All this indie stuff is helping Republicans, and part of the reason why we are getting annihilated in downticket races nationally. People who do not identify as Democrats are more liable to be tricket into voting for the Republican candidate, who almost assuredly spent more money to delude the voters into thinking that he is more alligned with their issues.
For a quick “solution” to all of this, I would suggest getting rid of all caucuses, which are highly undemocratic. Only party members can vote in a primary. If Indies want to form a third party, they can vote in that primary. Get rid of the ethnic bias in the delegate counting algorithm. One person, one vote. None of this will make me feel a bit better about the disgrace of 2008. The Democratic Party is still paying for it today. But at least those reforms would improve things going forward.
Amen to that but you didn’t mention superdelegates, which, IIRC, turned from Hillary to Obama almost en masse in May 2008 even though we all knew the kabuki going on with the FL and MI delegates meant that both candidates would arrive at the convention almost tied with a statistically insignificant edge by Obama due almost exclusively to the Michigan uncommitted delegates given to him even though he wasn’t even on the ballot.
Ok, my blood pressure is spiking again. I just get so angry with these jerks who act like disenfranchising 18000000 of us was no big deal.
It makes me want to deliver wedgies and swirlies to every one of them.
Yeah, superdelegates, I’m in favor of fewer of them and campaign contribution limits.
The precise shenanigans from 2008 should be put out there to emphasize how Hillary was expected to just take it.
But in trying to think of what Hillary can do to strengthen her candidacy, I came up with one obvious improvement, the other rather radical. The obvious: (please) stop with the chairman Mao suits, and dress more along the lines of the outfit when last testifying–open-neck blouses with a contrasting color to the jacket. (Look at Warren’s attire. I happen to be interested in fashion, but I think it’s non-trivial.) Now for the radical idea: what if she announced she was (amicably) separating from Bill? That might at least disarm Trump’s Bill attacks, but more importantly, let Hillary declare she’s going it alone. I expect radical disagreement on this one, but maybe it would help.
I couldn’t disagree more. Bill is her biggest asset. That’s why he’s under constant attack. They do not want him as her surrogate on the campaign trail because he’s very effective. If I were her, I’d embrace him in a unique way. I have a good idea that will resonate with a lot of people but I don’t expect she’s going to call me for campaign advice and I’m not typing it here.
As for what she wears, it’s totally up to her. She’s got long days ahead of her and she needs to feel comfortable and professional. That being said, that yellow suit she wore in her interview with Hamish and Andy looked really good on her and gave a positive and cheerful vibe. And who couldn’t use more cheerful positivity?
Thanks for your reply. Of course it’s up to her what she wears, but it’s not trivial. She can wear an open scooped top or blouse with a beautiful scarf (to hide whatever she thinks she needs to hide), or necklaces. Ideally, she’d have some from all over the world whose stories might even arise.
I thought that way too, about Bill being an asset, but, on balance, I’m no longer so sure. The very thought that her husband is seen as her “greatest asset” is part of a perspective that ultimately hesitates to give her the credit she is due, that constantly subtracts from her own accomplishments. She’s Bill’s wife and Obama’s secretary of state, she needs to shake things up. Amicably separated, he could still say why the country needs her.
I agree with you on the outfits. Apparently she or her managers don’t want to show her neck, but I think it’s silly. So she has some wrinkles. She is still quite attractive, and would benefit from dressing in a feminine way, and not being worried about some facial lines.
As to the other, you are not suggesting that Hillary divorce her husband, whom she loves, for political purposes? Bill and Hillary truly do care for one another, and have weathered many storms. He left the White House with a 68% approval rating. The pond waters that Trump is sliming in, were basically refuted back then. A number of women, for financial and/or political purposes, made bogus charges against him. As for Monica, she chased after him. It doesn’t obviate his responsibility, but it is right-wing smear nonsense. I am looking forward to Bill giving the best speech of his life at the convention, in support of Hillary.
I know all about the history and the right-wing smears, but to an uninformed public, it’s too complicated to explain, and just ignoring it won’t work for her.
I know exactly how you feel. It was so cavalierly done; and the people who did it, wore the mantle of virtuousness, because they were helping a Black canddiate to get elected. And then of course all those incredibly foolish and intransigent people on most of the blogs,, who were so certain that Obama was this magically gifted, great liberal hope, and wouldn’t even consider the facts, that it was actually Hillary.
One doesn’t often get second chances, but we have one here. It feels like trying to drag oneself up a mountain. Hillary should get 75% of the vote against Trump, if the populace were knowledgeable and rational. But they’re not; and the media has its own self-serving agenda. So we struggle along; and hopefully we are not borne ceaselessly back into the past.
This is a great post, and it so upset me that I went back to see what’s been written about her today. David Brooks wrote this short piece (she’s disliked because she’s a “workaholic” and her hobbies are “boring”): http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/24/opinion/why-is-clinton-disliked.html which infuriated me even more, but the comments are mostly great. 🙂
Yeah, I think the clintonistas finally discovered the power of the comments section.
Why is David Brooks Disliked? Because he chooses such inane topics and comes up with such ridiculous reasons and solutions, thereby wasting valuable real estate in the New York Times.
Ah Donald Trump’s personality cult is disgusting. Did you notice how all the people that appear for him on tv say Mr Trump this, Mr. Trump that
Someone said that the reason Trump wont release his taxes is because they will show he is worth much less than what he has said. I think they may be right
What if he has such good accountants that he pays a way lower tax rate than most middle class workers? I don’t think his lies and exaggerations have cost him anything among supporters – so being worth less than suggested wouldn’t be a problem for his campaign. Not paying taxes like the little people? That could be a problem.
Probably doesn’t pay no stinking taxes. He’s The Donald.
For years, I have absolutely refused to refer to Mrs. Clinton as Hillary. If I were personally acquainted with her, then I would call her Hillary. I think it unintentionally demeaning, from most people, when they call her Hillary; for others using her first name is intentionally demeaning. (I think it might also be genderism at work.) In writing I refer to her as Secretary of State Clinton or SOS Clinton. I’d love to see some on-air correction of some of the jerks who call her Hillary. “Oh, Mr. Gomer, I didn’t know you were friends with SOS Clinton?” Of course, I guess I’m just an antique fuddy-duddy.
She has encouraged people to use her first name. Once she becomes Madame President, that may change.
John Oliver makes good points, especially about caucuses. However, I do see a positive for super delegates. Party “professionals,” so to speak, should be more in the know about candidates and whether each will support the party platform (generally, not the one at the convention). If “the people” really want a non-party candidate, they can overrule the supers with votes, as they did for Trump (God only knows why).
1. The whole deal this election, as it was in 2008, is misogyny. Plain and simple. The only reason HRC has more votes now is the consciousness raising that has occurred in the past five years, in my opinion, about the recognition of the “rightness” of LGBT rights. Ditto voting rights, but the Supreme Court scotched that one.
2. The other big deal in this cycle is that the Democratic Party thought it was ok to allow a Socialist to run as a Democrat (in his words, a Dem Socialist). I do not think that anyone who has been a Democrat for less than a year should be allowed to run on the Democratic ticket. (If I had my way, it would be much longer.) I could care less about the Republicans but I think they will insure a Trump never happens again.
I believe that if Hillary had a true Democrat running against her, the race would have been over months ago. As it is, Bernie has no fear of destroying the Democratic party. (By the way, has anyone else noticed that even some TV hosts/guests are now using the Republican sneer language and calling it the “Democrat Party?”)
3. I hope that there is no change for all primaries/ caucuses to allow Indies to vote for the Democratic nominee. And could we campaign to get people to stop doing this: “I voted for X as a protest but I know Y will win and I will vote for Y in the general.” Stupid, and partly how BS has votes he does.
Finally: Whoever wins the presidency will reveal how misogynistic our country really is, or not, in 2016. And by what margin.
I couldn’t disagree with you more on item 1 of your list. I think the gains LGBT people got in the last eight years has been mostly for the benefit of upper middle class professional men. And that’s ok. But the notion that ANY of that has filtered down to women is refuted by the evidence. We have more laws restricting reproductive rights, zero progress on pay check fairness and a very patronizing president who is always thinking that American women are about the age of his daughters and have just about the same degree of agency. His wife is the equivalent of the well off suburban SAHM who gardens and doesn’t have to work. (What has michell been up to since 2009?). The portrait the obama’s represent is definitely upper middle class and retro. Women aren’t really important in that world. Men do all the heavy lifting while women let their Bar credentials expire.
So, no, if anything we’ve had a roll back for women. I’ve frequently said that fully raw cannibals will get constitutional equality before women do and just because this election season will make us very aware of the misogyny, we would be very naive not to believe we are on our own.
It’s going to get very ugly before this is over. I think Hillary is the only woman who can do this. But if she fails? It will be a very long time before any other woman attempts it. There’s no one on the horizon of either sex that has her depth and breadth. It will almost impossible.
Damn, whatever happened to the Fully Raw Cannibals? They had three big hits back in 1989 or so and then just kind of vanished into the aether…Oh wait, those were the Fine Young Cannibals. My bad. 😛
She must not fail.
She’s the woman who crushes the head of the serpent beneath her heel.
Ssssweet Sssssue, pleasssse do not compare ussss to that fassssscissssst esssssss oh bee Trump.
Lol.
ROTF!
“But as we all know, the parties are private entities (that use public tax dollars for their primaries and caucuses)”
Here in Colorado, at least, caucuses are entirely paid for by the parties. This was one of the “justifications” used by our then-Republican legislature and governor for abolishing the primary in favor of caucus system to “save the public money” (in fact, their aim was to hobble the Libertarian Party by forcing it to pay for very expensive caucuses throughout the state).
Regarding ‘open primaries where anyone who has a grudge against one of your party’s candidates can game them,’ when I lived in Texas in 1990, which had open primaries, I knew several registered Dems that wanted to do exactly that. They thought if Clayton Williams was the Republican nominee, Ann Richards would be a shoo-in. Well, that thinking kind of backfired, because Williams came very close to winning.
the absolute stupidity of the democratic leadership to allow sanders to run is incomprehensible. caucuses need to go. closed primaries need to remain. verified voter registration a necessity. and to think reid is now making “suggestions” on who clinton should pick as a vice president is astounding. did they do that to obama?
Prolly did it for Obama too but in HIS case, he actually needed for Biden to be his running mate because Biden had the institutional knowledge, memory and connections that Obama lacked. I suspect Hillary was on that list too but she did some forward thinking and asked for SOS before the VP slot was offered. That would have been a smart move on her part. We never would have heard from her again as obama’s VP. He would have put the nail in the coffin of her career.
Am I surprised that Reid is making suggestions? No. It could be mansplaining or it could be collaborative. On the end, I think the decision will be hers alone. She probably already has someone in mind.
Propertius, I know it is complicated. In fact, I don’t think any changes will occur in the primary process. But, it sure is crazy and the video at the top just underscores how illogical it is. I just resent that Indies and Republicans in many states can vote in the Democratic Party primaries. It is not a United States candidate, it is a particular party candidate. Let the Indies have their own primaries and convention. What is the point of having Parties if anyone can vote to choose a Party’s candidate?
Thanks for the reminder about “who pays” though.
Not disagreeing with that at all – “open” primaries make no sense whatsoever to me. If you want a voice in who the Democratic nominee is, then ferchrissakes register as a DEMOCRAT.
I just now saw this article in Slate that articulates my position about ‘protest votes’ and what they can do to the country. It went up after my post, I think.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2016/05/a_letter_to_a_bernie_or_bust_voter.html
I’m on a road trip for the next couple of weeks, and going to see her speak tomorrow! Any ideas for signs? 🙂 Then, driving across CA, NV, WY, MT, ID and OR. Eager to assess the signage and bumperstickerness! I put my bumper stickers on yesterday. Whoo hoo!
And those bad actors were WRONG about Obama. They thought he was some kind of liberal. And those of us who tried to tell them he wasn’t were booed and shouted down and banned from so-called progressive websites.
Why should we trust their judgment about their new favorite darling?
Clinton is to the right of Obama on foreign policy. That’s what cost her the nomination in 2008. That’s what should cost her the nomination with Sanders. When Trump said,correctly Bush/Cheney lied us into war in the middle of m-i complex North Carolina he committed an act against the Elite more than any considered by either Clinton or Obama–but not than Kucinich or Sanders, if we compare times and true reformers.
I’m not voting for her based on the left’s standard of what they perceive to be the correct foreign policy. I’m voting for her based on reality of the world. And I was very strongly against the Iraq war. But here’s the thing, I was also against pulling out troops from Iraq and Afghanistan too suddenly because to do so would be like playing Jenga.
That right there gave ISIS a fighting chance. So our Nobel Prize winning president could very well have caused this rise of extreme militant Islam by catering to the left and its peace at all costs philosophy.
Perfection isn’t possible. And countries do bear some responsibility for their outcomes after US intervention. But I know she sees the world as it truly is. It’s neither white doves or Hawks.
Agree on all counts. Frankly, everyone should have paid attention when Colin Powell said that Iraq was like Pottery Barn: “you break it, you bought it.” We did a fantastic job of breaking Iraq, and then we basically just left it broken – no functioning government, no civil service, no infrastructure, sectarian violence and no law enforcement – so of course it provided an opening for armed fanatics to move in.
Everyone remember Shinseki’s testimony before Congress, when he said we’d need at least 500,000 troops and 10 years to stabilize Iraq? That got him sacked (by Bush) as Joint Chief, but he was dead right.
I think the Administration certainly botched Egypt, Libya, and Syria. How much of that was due to Clinton won’t be known for decades (my suspicion is that this is another case of her boss mistakenly thinking he’s the smartest guy in the room). She can’t help but be tainted by that, even if she had nothing to do with it (just as Humphrey was tainted by Vietnam back in ’68 and ’72). It’s not fair, but I think it’s inevitable. In a better world, she would have quit as SOS to run for Governor of New York in 2010. She would have escaped blame for the worst of Obama’s missteps, she’d have added a governorship to her resume, and New York would have been spared the execrable Andy Cuomo.
I’m supporting Bernie, and I’m doing it for exactly one reason: the Democratic Party has been running away from the New Deal just as fast as it can ever since Reagan. It’s time to reverse that. If it takes a nasty floor fight at the convention to do that, then so be it. We’ve had floor fights in the past and they were pretty acrimonious: one of those led to some guy named Roosevelt getting nominated (barely). Another committed the party to civil rights (in 1948, no less), at the cost of splitting off nearly all the Southern states. Another resulted in the nomination of JFK. Floor fights and platform battles are not the end of the world. Sometimes they’re necessary.
I’d agree to a floor fight in 2008. She had a very legitimate case for one. But we all know how that went.
This year, she’s clearly winning. There’s no taint of primary misdeeds, no matter what the Bernie Bros say. And while I would like her to focus her attention on income instability with a white hot intensity (many people have fallen lower on maslow’s pyramid to worry about income inequality anymore. They just need a steady reliable paycheck), I would really like it if the party rallies around her and supports her to the fullest this year. That means NOT giving in to every demand that the losing candidate is making. She can afford to be generous to him but for the sake of the party, he needs to accept defeat when it comes. And he needs to reign in his supporters and give her the spotlight.
Unlike Obama in 2008, who the media rightly identified as a moderate to conservative democrat who wasn’t going to upset their self images, Clinton as a woman will get FAR FAR less gentle treatment at their hands. The year to protest was 2008. Not 2016. We tried to warn people but they wouldn’t listen.
No floor fights. Bernie will lose any advantage he thinks he can gain from it if the perception is that she will have to battle her own side all the way to November.
Whatever chance there was to rescue the New Deal went out the door when the crash came and employers used that as an excuse to jettison all committeemen to to employees and Obama did absolutely nothing to stop it. I’m living in that brave new employment world, o still have more than a decade before I can retire and every day is a nerves racking tightrope of trying to keep a job and not spend any money.
If you voted for Obama in 2008, don’t make my life worse by treating the convention as your day to introduce a little energy into the Democratic Party. I guarantee this year it will misfire.
In any case, she is More liberal than Obama ever was and if she’s able to sweep more women into Congress on her coat tails, then the whole ballgame could change for the better. What she will be able to do will depend on who is on capital hill.
IOW, she has to be perceived to bend Bernie to her will, not her to his, if she has any chance of projecting a strong confident leader of her party.
Do you understand what she is up against and why Bernie needs to not go there? This is a much harder fight that what Obama went thru in 2008. Much much harder. The bias is baked into American bible based culture. If she is forced to concede too much, she will look like a two time loser in the primaries for her party.
Once was enough, her candidacy could not withstand another assault by a male challenger, especially one that is losing and whose gains would be marginal at best, a devastating loss in November at worse.
Seriously, think this over. Strategically, Bernie can only win by allowing her to be the top dog and agreeing to live with her generosity. There is no other winning scenario.
There is not going to be a floor fight. From what I understand Schumer is going to take care of Bernie and Bernie will do as he’s told or he will get a primary opponent in Vermont, there will be no funding from the DNC nor any help for him with reelection.
Actually people are really tired of Obama’s foreign policy. And the fact that she appears hawkish is actually in her favor this year. Bernie has no clue when it comes to foreign policy. People will pick strong and wrong over weak and right any day of the week. Obama just never has projected the toughness needed to the general public and it’s why his foreign policy numbers have been a problem.
Goodness, we haven’t seen a party struggle so crucial since the Presidium boldly embraced renewal to take the great leap onwards to de-bifurcatory cadre consolidation! All glory and honor to your Верховного Совета as you perestroika yourself into oblivion.
When your delegitimation and collapse is through, we’ll explain the rules developed countries live by.
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/ProfessionalInterest/Pages/UniversalHumanRightsInstruments.aspx
…”we’ll explain the rules developed countries pretend to live by, when the actual sovereign entities, the great multinational corporations, allow it for the sake of appearances.”
FIFY. 😈