Fanning The Flames

It’s getting hot in herrre, so take off all yo…oh, wrong song.  Anyway, it’s getting hot in Denver.  We know the police are prepared for any eventuality, but is the fire department?  ‘Cause according to Politico, the Obama/Clinton feud might soon be burnin’ down da house.

As Democrats arrived here Sunday for a convention intended to promote party unity, mistrust and resentments continued to boil among top associates of presumptive nominee Barack Obama and his defeated rival, Hillary Rodham Clinton.

One flashpoint is the assigned speech topic for former president Bill Clinton, who is scheduled to speak Wednesday night, when the convention theme is “Securing America’s Future.” The night’s speakers will argue that Obama would be a more effective commander in chief than his Republican rival, Sen. John McCain (Ariz.).

I don’t blame Bill C. for being pissed.  Arguing that Obuhbuh will be a more effective commander-in-chief than a guy who actually was in command at one time, is a job better suited to the Impossible Mission Force than a mere former president.  Besides, Bill wants to talk about the economy.  Go figure.

It’s not just the Clintons who’ve got beef.  No sirree, Bob.  The Barackians have their panties in a bunch, too.

Some senior Democrats close to Obama, meanwhile, made clear in not-for-attribution comments that they were equally irked at the Clinton operation. Nearly three months after Hillary Clinton conceded defeat in the nomination contest, these Obama partisans complained, her team continues to act like she and Bill Clinton hold leverage.

Imagine the nerve of those Clintons!  Acting like a former presidency and an ability to garner 18 million votes entitles them to something!

A prominent Obama backer said some of Clinton’s lieutentants negotiating with the Obama team are “bitter enders” who presume that, rather than the Clintons reconciling themselves to Obama’s victory, it is up to Obama to accommodate them.

And to think some of their surrogates actually agree with them!  One of them even said this about Obrother:

“He has not fully reconciled,” said one political operative close to the Clintons, “and he has not demonstrated that he accepts the Clintons and the Clinton wing of the party.”

While the Clintons have a relatively easy job in Denver — to deliver gracious speeches and accept what are likely to be loud cheers from their supporters — it is “Obama who has the heavy lifting” this week, this aide said.

Barack’s Bill Burton thinks it’s much ado about nothing, though.

“This is the sort of story cooked up just to feed cable producers. Not an issue,” Burton said.
But it is an issue to some people in the Clinton orbit — precisely because they know how closely every public word from either Bill Clinton or Hillary Clinton will be scrutinized.

Hillary does seem more willing to play along, according to the article’s reporters John F. Harris and Mike Allen:

Hillary Clinton, who associates said seems more at peace with the results of the nomination battle than her husband, is treating her speech preparation as an all-hands-on-deck exercise, bringing back longtime aides who worked with her during the White House years and in her Senate office.

All hands on deck, hmmmmm?  Sounds reasonable that she would want her fomer speechwriters, her lawyer, Paul Begala, and former White House Chief of Staff, John Podesta in the bunker with her, to name a few.  Podesta seems confident:

He predicted that her supporters will “blow the roof” off the convention center with cheers for her, and that she will in turn make a rousing appeal for Obama.

Podesta, the founder of the liberal Center for American Progress think tank, said Bill Clinton’s challenge is harder. “I think he’s got a high bar because he needs to show enthusiasm, and the press will be looking for any stray remark as a sign that he doesn’t fully support” the Obama campaign, Podesta said, adding, “It’s a bar he’ll get over.”

Oh, yeah, we’ll all “get over it.”

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

Obama’s Risky Business

There’s an ambush a-foot in the media tonight.  There is another obviously apparent attempt to further hijack democracy by the wussy Barry and the Obamacrats who’re scared to death that Hillary Clinton will upstage The Chosen at his own coming out party.  If they only had a brain, they would be even more terrified that delegates and super delegates at the convention might realize that Obama’s wimp-out agreement to a roll call vote has the potential to expose Obama as the slimy, manipulative fraud he is, just by actually being conducted fairly.  Since Obama is all about style over substance, a halfway clued-in Camp O might then try to fight against such a thing happening by launching an all out media blitz pushing “unity,” and putting the onus of achieving it on HRC.  Ya think?

They could ask CBS News to push it:

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, hoping to unite the Democratic Party and cement her future in it, will gather her hard-won primary delegates Wednesday at a reception where she is expected to formally release them to Barack Obama, CBS News confirms.

Then push it some more:

The high-profile gathering of political regulars who once fought against Obama serves a dual purpose for Clinton: Show fellow Democrats that she can be a team player, and display her still formidable political strengths for the future. Many of her supporters want her to run for president again.

Camp Obiewannabepresident might then find somebody at Salon to hint that if the roll call proceeds fairly, Clinton would be guilty of aiding and abetting the Republicans! That would be so cool, and the Obamaschmoos could probably do it too, since Salon is a San Francisco mag, and you know much those folks love him.

When leading Republicans who are not working on the fall presidential campaign were asked to sketch out the best possible scenario in Denver to boost John McCain, they kept uttering those fateful two words: “the Clintons.” As GOP pollster John McLaughlin put it, “I’m rooting for the media’s tendency to focus on how the Clintons have taken over Obama’s convention.” Republicans saw other potential pitfalls for Obama — from delivering a vaporous acceptance speech to abandoning the safe center on policy issues — but the conversations kept coming back to the woman who nearly won the nomination and the way she will play her hand in Denver.

But what if it worked?  What if those media outlets went along and so many other ones did too ( see previous post ) that Clinton did release her delegates?  Out of the goodness of her heart.  Just so Obuhbuh could be coronated.  Wouldn’t that unify the party?  Wouldn’t it?

They couldn’t be that clueless, could they?

Wait a minute, that’s another movie.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

I Am NOT Getting Sleeeepyyyyy!

The media schmoos ( a much nicer word than “whores” ) are trying to hypnotize the voting public into believing that unity is possible in the Democratic Party, and that Hillary Clinton can, will and should make it happen.  Uh-uh.  Ain’t gonna happen.  No matter how many shiny objects they dangle in front of our eyes, no matter how many times they repeat their mantra ( “She will release her delegates, she will release her delegates…” ) makes no difference whatsoever.  Whether this is a carefully orchestrated campaign being launched by the DeaNC and the Obamacrats, or if the media schmoos are taking it upon themselves to promote this nonsense, it will fall flat.  Because it’s not about Hillary.  It’s about Barack.  We don’t want him to be president.  Period.  Exclamation point!   Get it, Devlin Barrett from AP?

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, hoping to unite the Democratic Party and cement her future in it, will gather her hard-won primary delegates Wednesday at a reception where she is expected to formally release them to Barack Obama.

How about your buddy, David Espo?

Clinton’s spokesman, Philippe Reines, said her meeting with her delegates this week will be an opportunity to “thank them for their hard work and support, and most importantly to encourage them to support and work for Senator Obama as strongly as she has in order to elect him in November.”

Lynn Sweet from the Chicago Sun-Times added her two cents:

Here’s the latest: The plan now calls for Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) to release her delegates next Wednesday afternoon at 1 p.m. That’s the day after her keynote address before the Democratic National Convention. That means delegates can do what they want during the Thursday roll call. Clinton herself will cast her superdelegate vote for Obama.

Then there’s that Reuters guy, John Whitesides,

Clinton plans to speak to her delegates on Wednesday morning and urge them to support Obama ahead of a roll call vote on the nomination that night, a Democratic Party source said.

Oh, and Steven Thomma and Margaret Talev from McClatchy want in on the act,

Obama aides fanned out to try to tamp down any lingering anger or dissent among Clinton fans that might threaten party unity at the carefully scripted-for-television four-day convention. Obama’s chief strategist, David Axelrod , stressed that Clinton endorsed the Biden pick, apparently hoping that would sway any disgruntled Clinton supporters.

And so do their co-conspirators, David Lightman and William Douglas, but they’re clearly delusional:

Hillary Clinton’s disappointed delegates arrived in this Democratic National Convention city Sunday upset that their candidate wasn’t even considered for the presidential ticket, but also insisting that they would fully support presumptive nominee Barack OBama .

Edit

What soothed a lot of delegates was the choice of Delaware Sen. Joseph Biden to be the vice presidential nominee Biden is proving almost universally popular at the convention.

The guys at the Nation are worried about Clinton’s potential for embarrassment,

Clinton could issue a call to arms. And she has an agreement with the Obama campaign to go forward with the nomination and roll-call. But Clinton and her aides are worried. Many of her delegates have formally endorsed Obama, and more than a few plan to vote for him on that first ballot. There is open discussion in the Clinton camp about what the embarrassment level might be?

Isn’t it sweet that so many people care?  About the exact same thing, party unity?  I’m verklempt.  But then, you can’t tell the truth about how Clinton supporters really feel, as Ed Rendell found.  Here’s the whole article from Politico about what happened.

Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell was supposed to give “closing remarks” during this afternoon’s Shorenstein Center-sponsored panel discussion with all three Sunday show moderators — NBC’s Tom Brokaw, ABC’s George Stephanopoulous and CBS’s Bob Schieffer — but instead, he opened up a can of worms about bias in 2008 election coverage

“Ladies and gentleman, the coverage of Barack Obama was embarrassing,” said Rendell, in the ballroom at Denver’s Brown Palace Hotel. “It was embarrassing.”

Rendell, an ardent Hillary Rodham Clinton supporter during the primaries, now backs Obama in the general election. Brokaw and Rendell began debating campaign coverage, including the on-air comments by Lee Cowan, and when MSNBC came up, Rendell went after the cable network.

“MSNBC was the official network of the Obama campaign,” Rendell said, who called their coverage “absolutely embarrassing.”

Chris Matthews, Rendell said, “loses his impartiality when he talks about the Clintons.”

At that point, PBS’s Judy Woodruff, who was moderating the moderators event, said: “Why don’t we let Governor Rendell sit down.”

That was met with applause from the crowd of big-time media figures, which included Arianna Huffington, Gwen Ifill, Al Hunt, and Chuck Todd.

Woodruff allowed Brokaw to respond, and in defending the network, he said that Matthews and Keith Olbermann are “not the only voices” on MSNBC.

I guess, even though he’s officially backing Obama, Eddie ain’t getting sleeepyyyy, either.  Unless of course, they sedated him after.  ‘Cause Ol’ Ed obviously didn’t get the memo.  The Dems are fine according to Jeanne Cummings, again of Politico:

When Barack Obama accepts his nomination on Thursday, he will sit atop a Democratic Party transformed and strengthened by its time served in political exile. The future — at least until Election Day — looks limitless.

Edit

It’s a richer party, literally and intellectually, after mastering Internet fundraising and establishing progressive think tanks and media watchdog groups to compete with a still formidable conservative brain trust.

So by now I guess I’m supposed to be under so deep that I would believe! truly believe!  ‘Fraid not.  Just pissed.  Enough to try to learn how to hypnotize people myself, even things out.

*Anybody else want to try this, do so at your own risk and get back to me, okay?

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

You Say Humility, I Say Copout

The fact that the reality of lowered expectations towards black Americans impacts Barack Obama’s candidacy is something I have written about before in a post called Barack Obama and The Trained Monkey Curve.  Simply put, the collective American assumption that black people have limited potential for accomplishment due to our inherent deficiencies accounts for the over-the-top praise of his otherwise average-ness.  These media-reinforced perceptions inhabiting the subconscious psyches of a great number of Americans is what lead Joe Biden to suggest that Obama is prepared to lead the nation just because he’s an articulate black guy.  Barack Obama’s own insecurities are what lead him to brush the insult off.

Now, the schmoos at Yahoo News are suggesting that lowered expectations somehow equate to humility:

Barack Obama took a sermon on humility to heart Sunday, predicting his presidential acceptance speech might not be the best at this week’s Democratic convention despite his famous oratory skills.

Lowering expectations is one of the oldest tricks in the political book, especially before a pivotal event like a political convention. And expectations for Obama are sky high because he’s delivered such rousing speeches before.

“I’m still tooling around with my speech a little bit,” Obama told reporters on a stop in this Midwestern battleground state. “May not be as good as the other headliners the first three nights, but hopefully it will make clear the choices the American people are going to face in November.”

Could it be that Obama is simply making an honest assessment of his speaking abilities?  Where before mediocre performances were unduly praised, perhaps he realizes that he is now more likely to be judged appropriately; as a presidential candidate and not as a black presidential candidate.  Humility doesn’t seem to have anything to do with it, otherwise, he wouldn’t be making excuses about a speech to be delivered in a freakin’ football stadium.

PUMA

Just Say No Deal

Got A Veep, Not A Nom

Barack Obama is not the presumptive nominee of the Democratic party.

I have said this before, and I’ll keep saying it.  Here’s why:

There is no rule in the politics of Democratic Party conventions that says that the contender with the largest number of pledged delegates short of the total required for nomination should automatically, by dint of that achievement, be handed the party’s designation.

Obama is being allowed to pretend he is the nominee by the Democrats because he’s the one a number of party officials want to nominate.  Super delegate votes are being counted in his delegate total, but his push over the top has nothing to back it up.

Nothing in the bylaws requires the so-called “Superdelegates” to declare a candidate preference ahead of the convention, and nothing prohibits them from changing their mind once they declare such a preference.

Clearly, the voters did not select Barack Obama to be the nominee; in fact, according to the voters it’s a virtual tie.  Allowing him to prance around the world “looking presidential,” even going so far as to choose a running mate, is simply another act in an elaborate stage production.  However, if the nominee status was a car, Obama would be arrested for taking it off the lot without paying for it.  It’s not his.

Many sources accuse Hillary Clinton supporters of being angry about the way she’s been treated, and they are correct.  But the sexism and disrespect shown her is only a small part of the reason.  The fact that she was not seriously considered for VP, though a slap in the face, is not surprising.  However, these are small things.

Obama’s not yet the nominee.  He shouldn’t be picking a veep at all.  It is the treachery of the Obama campaign and its validation by a complicit DNC and MSM that really bites.  In executing the Obama version of Howard Dean’s fifty state grassroots strategy, many questionable tactics were employed. Some say the activities rise to the level of fraud.