Now if you will notice Warren really stresses how intelligent and formidable Hillary Clinton was back when she was First Lady. And she also kind of gives Hillary a pass, to some degree, for her vote later which ultimately undid all of the work she did previously.
As grownups of course we understand how politics works.
However we also know that the main criticism against Hillary is that her positions change with the polls, and that she is not a person of substance.
I do not agree with that completely, but I would be lying if I did not admit that it was reason for concern.
Now this does not mean that I will not vote for Hillary.
I will.
It also does not mean that I think she cannot win against any of the Republican choices.
She can. And most likely will.
However it does mean that we need to be aware that Hillary Clinton is a political animal, and that the issues she supports so strongly right now, such as gun control and her stance against the Trans-Pacific Partnership, might not be the issues she supports once she sits behind that desk in the Oval Office.
Which is yet another reason that she would be well served by a Vice President Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren in my opinion.
Hillary Clinton does not strike me as the sort of person to be influenced by a Vice President. Her choice for veep seems likely to be solely for the potential for electoral votes.
ReplyDeleteI do think Hillary Clinton DOES accept advice and DOES make good use of advisers. But she seems to depend very much on long term relationships. Her veep choice maybe relegated to a minor role.
Many presidents have operated in that way.
Virtually every vice presidential choice on a ticket is made for electoral reasons. The chemistry between the President and Vice President, if they're elected, is a wholly separate matter.
DeleteMostly, a Vice President makes very little difference in a President's administration. We need to have a competent, intelligent person selected, but not someone cynically chosen who's incapable of handling the Presidency. Vis: Sarah Palin.
Why would we want a Julian Castro as Vice President, if, heaven forbid, something happened to President Clinton? I don't think she'd choose him, or anyone like him, who isn't capable of stepping into the Oval Office.
Polls told her to vote for the Iraq War, then she later pulled the lame "everyone saw the intelligence and thought Saddam had WMD" when we know that is a lie--the WMD evidence was flimsy at best and she knew that, but she also knew that if she didn't vote for the War she might not get re-elected.
ReplyDeleteHow many voted for the Iraq War?
DeleteAlmost the entire House and Senate voted for it, except for a handful of holdouts.
Bernie Sanders being one.
I don't fault Hillary on her vote.
Hindsight is 20/20.
Like any employer, we look for competency in our leaders. I think (hope) Hillary is honest, we know she is intelligent, and will be able to handle the job.
ReplyDeletePresident Obama is an anomaly, a leader that is very competent, intelligent, and can hold his own with any world leader. What is different about him, or maybe it's just me, is we like him; we really like him. That shouldn't be a factor but we are human, and so it is. I don't know if I'll see another President in my lifetime that I truly admire as much, but no doubt there will be competent leaders in the future. I hope anyway.
Mildred
No. Hillary should NOT pick Bernie Sanders or Elizabeth Warren as her VP. People seem to forget the importance of a strong Congress and both of them are outstanding Senators. They're best positioned in their current roles to do the most good. Taking them out of the Senate for VP means we may lose that vote. Remember Senator Himbo from MA?
ReplyDeleteA strong Democratic Congress is just as essential to Hillary getting her work done as President as anything else. Let them stay where they are. She should pick someone like Julian Castro.
I agree totally about needing Sanders and Warren in the Senate. If/when Hillary (or Bernie) is elected POTUS, they will need to find competent people for cabinet positions. A strong majority in the Senate is crucial for accomplishing anything and getting past the gridlock. Hopefully, the number of Democrats in the House will also increase. Julian Castro will be an excellent selection for VP.
DeleteThat was then, this is now..
DeleteCLINTON/CASTRO
Kick ass and make this world a better place for all..
Totally agree with you on the need for strong allies in the Congress. Warren and Sanders are powerhouses who should keep their day jobs.
DeleteI disagree on Julian Castro. He's nowhere near ready. He's a Latino who doesn't speak Spanish (how does that happen growing up in San Antonio??), and prior to being HUD Sec he was a figurehead (mayor in a city manager-town council style government in an overwhelmingly Democratic city; election was a forgone conclusion). I like him and think he has huge potential, but he's a Palinesque pick for VP-- he'd be all about optics; a cheap ploy to appeal to Latinos.
He was only chosen as HUD Sec to put something reasonable on his resume in the hopes it'd be enough for the VP slot for 2016 or the Presidency in 2024. I'd love to see him go from HUD to the Senate (Ted Cruz's seat? Wouldn't that be great?!) or to TX governor's mansion and THEN a run for VP or President in 2024. If Hillary chooses him, it's a pretty blatant optics choice, and I hope she's smarter than McCain was.
Bernie isn't running again.
DeleteHe won't be in Congress unless he's leading it as VP.
Sorry, but I don't support Castro. He doesn't have enough experience to be President and if anything happens to Hillary, he'll be President.
The party is split between Hillary and Sanders. The only way to have the strongest ticket is for both of them to be on it.
The Vice President doesn't "lead" Congress. The only responsibility the VP has in the Congress is to break tie votes in the Senate.
DeleteAnyone making the argument that Hillary "is not a person of substance" is being intellectually disingenuous. There are many valid criticisms of her, politically and personally, but that ain't one of them.
ReplyDeleteShe is the most qualified person in the race, bar none, and will be one of the most qualified persons to work out of the Oval Office. (I love me some Bernie, but the party faithful will never allow him to be the candidate. And, I'd be happy with either Bernie or Hillary, so I'm just trying to be realistic.)
Watch this video of a dog doing something that Sarah Palin never would do.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.vine.co/v/exQnLZgjYHY
You're welcome.
Either would be a dream team. Bernie or Lizzie for VP. Lizzie Warrens turn for Prez is coming in '20 or'24. A political dynasty to save the world. Hooha
ReplyDeleteName me a male politician (or female for that matter) except for Bernie Sanders who does not change their position for one reason or another, including polls.
ReplyDeleteYou know what polls indicate? What people want. And public servants are supposed to listen to the people and do what they want. Being elected is not a carte blanche to do whatever you want. That is what the Republican Party does.
I don't want a George Bush that doesn't change his position or his decisions regardless of any new facts or updated data.
I want someone that will be constantly analyzing new information and input from the people and modify their positions based on new information.
I'll vote for Bernie if Hillary ends up being the nominee, I'll vote for her no problem.
And it won't be an anyone but the Republicans vote.
Either would make a fine president.
My personal preferences is for BOTH to be on the ticket. Don't care who is on top.
"I want someone that will be constantly analyzing new information and input from the people and modify their positions"
DeleteSo why elect a person at all? Maybe we need just elect a computer to count poll numbers and run algorithms and print out new changed directives on a daily basis.
Your reasonings are, not very reasoned. A 'LEADER' does not change opinions based on polling or even overwhelming popular support. Sometimes a leader has to do the most unpopular of things, if it is the right thing. Your description of the president you want, reminds me of the carpenter who keeps going around and around each leg of a table, sawing off the leg ends bit by bit trying to get it to sit level and not wobble. We all know how that ends.
Forgive me, but aren't elected individuals (Senators, Congressmen, Members of Parliament etc.) SUPPOSED to represent their constituents and vote as their constituents would wish? If it helps them get re-elected, that's an added bonus.
DeleteBut if you idealists want absolutely representation and perfect democracy, then you must insist on election reform. How about limiting every individual, corporation and organization to a $5,000 donation per election? And outlawing PACs and SUperPACs? How about limiting a Presidential election period to 6 months? How about a Federal Election Commission actually doing something worthwhile, such as setting the borders of congressional districts, and closely monitoring all voting methods and voting sites? Yes, the list could go on and on, but to criticize Clinton for changing her mind "just to get re-elected" is petty at best.
The bottom-line question about hillary is:
ReplyDeleteo) given her record of opportunism with only one constant: advancing her career and hubby's (or were the race-baiting prison and welfare bills idealistic?)
i) given her mixed ideological upbringing, exposures, and "moderate likes" that span from the openly racist rightwing reactionary world (campaigning for white fascists b.goldwater, r.nixon), to "realistic" by-bribe-only anything-for-WS race-baiting, gay-baiting, welfare-baiting "progressivism"...
ii) given her demonstrated appetite for money and for the lifestyles of the rich and famous...
iii) given the generous bribes she&he keep receiving/accumulating from WS, the "sweatshops of america!" council, and the "private prisons R us" trade group...
can she be trusted with the hopes and the vote of mpoverished usa workers of any race?
Hillary is a money grubbing war monger. If you want more war, she's your man!
ReplyDeleteHogwash!
DeleteHillary is a liar, corporate lover, and all about free trade. Don't believe for one minute she has evolved on this. On the TPP: "CNN has reported that during her tenure as U.S. secretary of state, Clinton publicly promoted the pact 45 separate times. At a congressional hearing in 2011, Clinton told lawmakers that "with respect to the TPP, although the State Department does not have the lead on this -- it is the United States Trade Representative -- we work closely with the USTR." Additionally, secret State Department cables published by the website WikiLeaks show that her agency -- including her top aides -- were deeply involved in the diplomatic deliberations over the trade deal."
DeleteWall Street is happy if either Jeb or Hillary is elected because they said either one, is the same.
I admire Elizabeth Warren much as I admire Bernie Sanders. But she still has a long way to go in American politics. Hillary Clinton has stood the test of time and experience and she certainly has emerged as a genuine "stateswoman" as the French newspaper Le Monde described her after last week's appearance before the latest House Witchhunt committee. I'm not at all sure that either Warren or Sanders could have withstood so much insanity with such aplomb.
ReplyDeleteBeaglemom
Nothing will motivate Republicans more than Clinton being the Democratic nominee.
ReplyDeleteHillary is a moderate democrat leaning to the right of Obama. She is " the democratic Mitt Romney"...Well, that is too damn cozy to the rest of us democrats.
DeleteShe is a war hawk and supports Israel no matter what they do.
So she survived the Benghazi questioning with aplomb. BFD!!! They didn't ask her the right questions....We didn't have an embassy in Benghazi and the CIA has a big office there???? Why??? Clinton never talked to Stevens....Why? just like secret service, she didn't waste her time on those things...read the email...send it on. the big questions were why were we there and what was the CIA doing? Why didn't she call Stevens herself? Because it wasn't worth her time.
When Hillary tried to call him out for not voting for the Brady bill, Bernie explained he couldn't due to the add on to the bill......that a gun shop could be held responsible if someone purchased a gun and then later used it on someone. Bernie is correct when he says that you can't just hold the owner of the shop responsible if he followed all the rules in selling that gun......not something illegal as then he could be held liable.
Hillary was a hypocrite. She brokered/negotiated the sale of US weapons, including biological and chemical warfare to various countries for a donation of $100,000+ for the Clinton Foundation.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/h-a-goodman/president-hillary-clinton_b_5525235.html
Elizabeth Warren had a meeting with HRC years ago as First Lady about the Credit Card Bankruptcy bill that would make it far more difficult for lower income people to claim bankruptcy. HRC help to defeat this bill as First Lady. However, later as a Senator in NY State she voted in favor of this Bankruptcy bill and it passed, further hurting families. She could have used her clout to have prevented it from passing. And now there is this: http://www.ibtimes.com/clinton-foundation-donors-got... She IS NOT A PROGRESSIVE. She is a political opportunist.
ReplyDeleteRepublicans believe they can beat Hillary. Here is my opinion on Hillary....I was a Bill/Hillary big time fan...but when Bill did the bill to take away education grants from those imprisoned.....his prison policy was disasterous, as was his running " on a ticket of reeling in the excesses of big business, Clinton quickly became the financial district’s best friend. During his years in office he completely failed to act on regulating derivatives, a central cause of the crash. In 1999, he repealed the Glass-Steagall Act, a nifty bit of legislation that effectively blocked the creation of today’s dangerously unstable super-banks. As The Guardian noted in 2009, sub-prime loans before the repeal accounted for only 5 percent of all mortgage-lending. By the time of the crash, they’d hit 30." He relaxed lending rules that allowed people to be able to buy properties they absolutely could not afford. He passed DOMA....His Presiding over NAFTA was disasterous for the American workers. He repealed the glass -stegall act because that was what Wall street told him to do.
That was Elizabeth Warren in 2004.....That is not the warren you will see or hear today. Hillary is not about to reinstate Glass-Stegall Act....Warren has put together a bill to reinstate the act. We will see what Clinton might do with this if elected.
"While Republicans have been distracted by phony scandals surrounding Hillary Clinton (like Benghazi), they missed one of the dirtiest scandals ever to emerge involving the former First Lady and current front-runner for the Democratic nomination in 2016.
ReplyDeleteA damning new report from the International Business Times explains how Hillary Clinton used her position as Secretary of State to create a pay-to-play atmosphere for world leaders seeking military equipment and defense contractors looking to make a few extra billions.
Here is what the IBT report uncovered:
The value of these sales to these countries were double the value of those approved by the Bush administration over the same period of time.
Total sales topped $151 billion countries that gave to the Clinton Foundation. A 143% increase for those countries over what they got during the Bush years.
Here is an example of how the pay to play scam worked: Saudi Arabia wanted F-15 fighter jets, which they received after making a $900,000 donation to the Clinton Foundation. Clinton personally approved that deal. This happened after Hillary complained about the country continuing to ignore the money that was flowing from Saudi Arabia to terrorist organizations. In short, she knew that the country was funding terrorists who were fighting American soldiers, and still was willing to sell them heavy artillery because they gave her group money.
These countries that were receiving sweetheart deals from Clinton were violating human rights left and right, and that’s according to information that the State Department had. Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar, Kuwait – all of these countries had been singled out by the State Department for things like corruption, violation of civil liberties, and violently retaliating against political opponents. But Hillary looked past all of these atrocities when she gave them massive weaponry."
This included BIOLOGICAL/CHEMICAL warfare.....who in the hell needs that???? The Clinton Foundation made out like fat rats.
https://www.quora.com/Uranium-Gate-and-Related-Clinton-Foundation-Scandals-Spring-2015/If-Hillary-Clinton-did-nothing-wrong-why-does-the-Clinton-Foundation-have-to-refile-5-years-of-tax-returns-after-the-book-Clinton-Cash-disclosed-unreported-donations.
ReplyDeleteThe errors generally take the form of under-reporting or over-reporting, by millions of dollars, donations from foreign governments... For three years in a row beginning in 2010, the Clinton Foundation reported to the IRS that it received zero in funds from foreign and U.S. governments, a dramatic fall-off from the tens of millions of dollars in foreign government contributions reported in preceding years. Those entries were errors, according to the foundation: several foreign governments continued to give tens of millions of dollars toward the foundation.
In fact, this may be the tip of the iceberg. In response to Reuters findings, the Clinton Foundation acknowledged that it might be necessary to review its tax returns extending back 15 years.
by Truth-out:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/14401-hillary-clintons-legacy-as-secretary-of-state
this is a must read on Hillary's areas of what she supports:
"the damage Clinton has done, or her embrace of much of the dangerous neo-conservative doctrines of the previous administration."
During the Arab Spring, Clinton pushed for stronger US support for pro-Western dictators in Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen and Bahrain, as well as the Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara. She successfully convinced the initially critical White House to support the right-wing golpistas in Honduras, who ousted that country's democratically-elected government in 2009. She was a major proponent of NATO's military intervention in Libya's civil war and has encouraged a more active US role in the Syrian conflict."
cont- she insisted that a Russian and Chinese veto of a UN Security Council resolution critical of Syria had "neutered" the Security Council's ability to defend basic human rights, yet she has defended repeated US vetoes of resolutions critical of Israeli violations of human rights. Similarly, she has criticized the Russians for supplying Syria with attack helicopters which have been used against civilian targets, but has defended the US supplying Israel, Turkey and Colombia with attack helicopters despite their use against civilian targets.
ReplyDeleteSupport for Women's and LGBT Rights
To her credit, Hillary Clinton has been more outspoken than any previous Secretary of State regarding the rights of women and sexual minorities. This appears to be more rhetoric than reality, however.
Please read: http://www.truth-out.org/opinion/item/14401-hillary-clintons-legacy-as-secretary-of-state
Clinton's Support for Arab Dictatorships
ReplyDeleteIn the often contentious debates within the administration on how to respond to the civil insurrections in the Arab world challenging US-backed dictatorships in Tunisia and Egypt in early 2011, Clinton was among the most reluctant to support the pro-democracy struggles.
During her first year as Secretary of State, Clinton visited Morocco during an unprecedented crackdown on human rights activists. Instead of joining Amnesty International and other human rights groups in condemning the increase in the already-severe repression in the occupied Western Sahara, Clinton instead chose to offer unconditional praise for the Moroccan government's human rights record. Just days before her arrival, Moroccan authorities arrested seven nonviolent activists from Western Sahara on trumped-up charges of high treason, who were immediately recognized by Amnesty International as prisoners of conscience. Amnesty called for their unconditional release. Clinton decided to ignore the plight of these and other political prisoners held in Moroccan jails.
Clinton is totally supportive of Israel, Netanyahu.....and said if necessary we would bomb /"obliterate" Iran if they try to harm Israel. Clinton has even opposed humanitarian efforts supportive of the Palestinians, criticizing an unarmed flotilla scheduled to bring relief supplies to the besieged Gaza Strip, claiming it would "provoke actions by entering into Israeli waters and creating a situation in which the Israelis have the right to defend themselves." Clinton did not explain why a country had "the right to defend themselves" against unarmed ships carrying relief supplies that were clearly no threat to Israel. Not only did the organizers of the flotilla go to great steps to ensure there were no weapons on board, the only cargo bound for Gaza on the US ship were letters of solidarity to the Palestinians in that besieged enclave who have suffered under devastating Israeli bombardments, a crippling blockade golpistas and a right-wing Islamist government. Nor did Clinton explain why she considered the Mediterranean Sea off the coast of the port of Gaza to be "Israeli waters," when the entire international community recognizes Israeli territorial waters as being well to the northeast of the ships' intended route."
ReplyDeletePlease read article on Clintons' really nonaccomplishments on secretary of state and what she did. This is who you want....you should at least read the consistent complaints about her and why Obama didn't mind her leaving as sec. of state. John Kerry has put her to shame on what he has done. so she racked up a million milles for NOTHING.....big deal....Kerry is getting it done.
Politics is an ugly business. They run using poetry and lead in prose. I'm still on the fence over whom I'll cast my vote, both are capable but I'm leaning more toward Hillary for her long career and previous experience in the White House and on the world stage.
ReplyDeleteI was surprised, after all the friction she had with Candidate Obama, that she accepted his offer and did the hard work for our country.
And the water tastes better in the White House.
ReplyDelete