for the good sense. I just quit reading the nonsense. It is good to have it said.

So much calculated Triangulation, I wonder if Hilary really made a mistake?

Is Obama considered dangerous by a vast (right wing) conspiracy? They must have a lot to gain from the size of the contributions to politicians, and also much to loose. Hilary getting cozy with Murdock & Scaife is an indicator of the right moneys' behaviour.

Hilary's correct. Obama's a target.

but I have pretty much gotten out of my system. The latest gossip is boring so I don't pay much attention.

The race has gotten boring.

I have given up thinking Obama is our 'hope for change', but if the insane self-destructiveness we have seen in the White House since 2000 can be toned down a biot, I'll be happy enough.

It would be nice to have a President that is not trying, on purpose, to trash America's name and bankrupt the nation.

McBush ain't it.

Coupling the recent remarks from Reverend Hucklebee with her own rancid racebaiting of the bubbas, I am less inclined to airbrush the warts off this wretched behavior. But then again, perhaps she was just channeling her inner Angela Lansbury .

The meaning wasn't lost on me, but the comment was still in poor taste. Just bringing it up in the context of her candidacy is tacky.
Can we expect for the next few weeks or maybe months you sulking over Obama and sympathizing for Hillary?

Great book.

Hillary's statement struck me as disjointed and random. It offended many but that wasn't her intent. I think she just drifted off into some state of muted reverie and stepped right into her Bill Buckner statement.

There are quite a few folks out there, not political junkies, who will mention the unmentionable. Clinton did it in a way that jarred those folks and the more involved who remember Kennedy-King-Kennedy.

Of course, Clinton, as "co president," must think about this from time to time:

1990-1998
Morbidity and Mortality Rates for Iraqi Children Under Five

Estimated Excess Deaths in the Likely Analysis: 227,713
http://tinyurl.com/52vfnc

Or maybe she doesn't, who knows.

The problem with our politics is this: the outcome produces those who, like Harry Lime in The Third Man, seem to have, or at least fail to express any qualms about actions that kill a lot of people. I'm sick of that. It's immoral and it reflects a poverty of intellect that is stunning. It's not done in my name or the vast majority of citizens, nevertheless, it occurs and it must stop. No more national security sociopathy.

Maybe someone should ask Hillary about those disappeared kids.

That was pretty much it.

Normal people do think in terms of allusions. Assassination of minority leaders is a pretty big theme in this country.

It's just not a cool comment no matter what optics you try to spin it.

All that you're doing is taking your rep to the same place as Clinton.

I thought it might be bad taste for her to bring up a Kennedy tragedy in view of Ted Kennedy's cancer diagnosis. It never occurred to me to connect her statement to Obama. I guess people hear what they want to hear.

As to Michael's discussion of our "national security myopathy", this is indeed yet another campaign completely devoid of any reference to the destruction we are wreaking on Iraq. In that regard, the most important statement of the week is not something that came from Clinton, Obama, or McCain, but from the Shi'ite grand ayatollah ali-Sistani, who allegedly has said the killing of American troops in Iraq is consistent with Islam. He is supposedly distraught over the destruction in East Baghdad from our air and land campaign, and he now wants the U.S. out of Iraq. Have you seen the pictures of the damage to Sadr City? I haven't. I'm not sure any exist, other than what the Pentagon is holding but of course won't release, in their vigilance to keep the reality of this war away from the attention of the American public or world opinion.

So here we are parsing words to help us decide on our next president, when we should be figuring out a way to truly understand what our military adventurism means to the victims.

a lot of this process is absolutely insane. This massive bunfight over who gets to run as 'leader' of the slightly less right-of-centre party than the other is a little odd to watch from the outside. Why on earth are so many people so heavily invested in a race for the steaming pile of turds (realistically whoever wins this race inherits a whole pile of crap which is not at all easily fixed)? Neither Clinton nor Obama are going to fundamentally fix anything, just tweak and play around the edges where it ain't dangerous/controversial, so at the end of the day, who cares? It's all dem vs rep anyhow...

By the way, hands up everybody who has never made a mistake.

why does he perpetuate the Kenyan garb meme and others, how strange

Saturday, May 24, 2008
Clinton Touches off National PTSD

Senator Clinton's reference to the assassination of Robert F. Kennedy in June of 1968 does not seem to me consequential, for all the brouhaha it has provoked. She was just saying that many previous primaries have gone on into June, including that of Bobby Kennedy before he was cut down.

The idea that she was thinking of the possibility that her rival, Barack Obama, might meet a similar fate is absurd. But I saw pundits on cable t.v. intimating that it was plausible.

I fear she inadvertently stumbled into a hornet's nest, though.

Because fears for Obama's safety are widespread, and they are shared by Homeland Security, which gave him Secret Service protection 18 months ago.

It is well known that Colin Powell's wife did not let him run for president because she was afraid he would be assassinated. Imagine the power of that fear to shape American life. Imagine if Powell had run and won, forestalling W. from ever coming to power.

Former Republican presidential aspirant (and apparently huge tool) Mike Huckabee recently went so far as to joke about Obama being shot at. He was speaking at a National Rifle Association event:

' Huckabee made an off-color joke during his speech in Louisville, Kentucky, when a loud bang was heard off-stage. "That was Barack Obama," Huckabee quipped, "He Just tripped off a chair. He was getting ready to speak. Somebody aimed a gun at him and he…he dove for the floor." '

The shadow that falls on African-Americans who devote themselves to public service at the highest levels is that of Dr. Martin Luther King.

In evoking the tumultuous year of 1968, Clinton was trying to remind people of the long and divisive Democratic primary. But without meaning to, she reminded them of April 4, not June 5, of MLK along with RFK.

I don't think it is healthy that the information age causes such memes to circulate with such velocity that they are given far more significance than they deserve. Seeing Hillary abjectly and in a stunned voice apologize for any offense made me feel sorry for her. When you speak in public, you always risk misspeaking or having the audience misunderstand your intent. We make our presidential candidates speak constantly in public for 2 years straight, now. It is like a medieval form of torture. It is amazing that anyone runs this gauntlet.

Elections should be about issues, not about this sort of hothouse speculation about personalities.

But there is one sense in which her campaign, at least, bears some responsibility for her current straits. Clinton operatives behind the scenes have been smearing Obama as a Muslim, and it was they who dug up that photo of him in Kenyan clothes. Clinton even said Obama was not a Muslim "as far as I know." The malice demonstrated in those actions laid the groundwork for people to believe that Clinton was capable of such hostility toward Obama.

The incident, it seems to me, does tell us two other things.

The first is that the strategy of the Clinton camp, of continuing to campaign even after victory at the polls became numerically impossible--in hopes that Obama might stumble and alienate sufficient numbers of superdelegates--was not crazy. I don't approve of it, but that it could work or could have worked seems clear. It could easily have been Obama who stumbled yesterday. Ironically, it was Clinton.

The second thing the incident tells us is how traumatized the nation still is by those horrible killings 40 years ago, and how much unfinished business of healing those wounds there is. Hillary didn't mean to pick at the scab. But she did. And we bled a little, all over again.

posted by Juan Cole @ 5/24/2008 06:30:00 AM

Rome Burns and all we talk about is whether we get Hillary or Obama.

I did inhale.

on the war. In his much referenced pre war speech, he said this several times: 'Now I'm not opposed to wars, just stupid wars.' That's really pathetic. But he didn't "co-president." If that's what happened, then she needs to tell us what she thinks about all those dead kids facilitated by our tax dollars. When they kill people without a crime or a trial, our chief tyrants need a real good explanation and see at least some signs of remorse (even if it's a Meg Ryan moment, it would acknowledge basic humanity).

Obama is less than inspiring on foreign policy. The strange remark about Pakistan early on and Zbig's presence as foreign policy adviser are both troubling.

Dodd showed courage and a real shift toward truth. Kucinich is himself, which is always more than enough. On foreign policy, I'd add Paul to the list since he takes a truly anti-war, anti interventionist stand on our adventures. His domestic and global environmental policies are dreadful, but he does deserve credit for consistency on foreign policy and also civil liberties, imho.

As a fellow Canadian I think this discussion is inappropriate and also not what you should be discussing.

Leave this to the racists among us.
Albert

But listening to her statement in entirety, considering tone of voice and inflection, there is no indication she was even thinking of Obama and the potential for assassination that has likely been in the back of all of our minds since he announced.

If you read the words or listen to a piece of her statement, you can get that. But in entirety? No way.

is a Rorsach blot. There are a thousand ways to read it. As an example of races staying unsettled until June, it makes no sense, as the Kennedy assassination took a race that appeared settled and unsettled it until August. That's where the parallel gets uncomfortable, as this race too appears settled and likely to be unsettled only by a catastrophe for Obama. Which need not be violent, of course: live boy, dead girl, whatever.

And it is true, of course, that Clinton need not actively stay in the race to profit from an Obama assassination; nor does she to profit from a more conventional implosion. But she was specifically answering a question about why she was staying in the race and why others oppose this. I don't think many dispute that the Clinton campaign has stayed in largely hoping for a fatal error or past scandal from Obama. Logically, she need not stay in for this reason, but she has.

:)

that Keith Olberman completely lost it on dissing Clinton's offhand examples of campaigning into or after June.

Olberman really is a leftist loudmouth, nearly as scornful as Limbaugh, and hardly an example to our children of good listening, legitimate differences, or thoughtful discourse.

The editorial board that interviewed Clinton said they saw no underlying commentary about assasinations in Clinton's comment on RFK. Can't we trust them on this and not high-blood-pressure Keith? Or just go with RFK, Jr's comments?

This isn't even a molehill, people.

... made by Huckabee at the NRA meeting a few days back about guns being pointed at Obama, a person would think someone in the Clinton camp learned a thing or two from that. Then again, maybe they did.

These contests are too scrutinized for anything to be a slip of the tongue. Someone purposely added the RFK statement into that address for a specific intention.

so will lessons be learned? nahhh its all about link love :D

Politico
By: John F. Harris
May 25, 2008 11:52 AM EST

The signature defect of modern political journalism is that it has shredded the ideal of proportionality.

Important stories, sometimes the product of months of serious reporting, that in an earlier era would have captured the attention of the entire political-media community and even redirected the course of a presidential campaign, these days can disappear with barely a whisper.

Trivial stories — the kind that are tailor-made for forwarding to your brother-in-law or college roommate with a wisecracking note at the top — can dominate the campaign narrative for days.

Who can guess what stories will cause the media machine to rev up its hype jets?

Actually, I have gotten pretty good at guessing which ones will. So have many of my colleagues and a generation of political operatives.

This weekend’s uproar over Hillary Rodham Clinton invoking the assassination of Robert Kennedy as rationale for continuing her presidential campaign is an especially vivid example of modern journalism as hyperkinetic child — overstimulated by speed and hunger for a head-turning angle that will draw an audience.

The truth about what Clinton said — and any fair-minded appraisal of what she meant — was entirely beside the point.

Her comment was news by any standard. But it was only big news when wrested from context and set aflame by a news media more concerned with being interesting and provocative than with being relevant or serious. Thus, the story made the front page of The New York Times, was the lead story of The Washington Post and got prominent treatment on the evening news on ABC, CBS and NBC.

What gives?

Politico’s top editors draw on their experience at the nation's largest news organizations to pull back the curtain on coverage decisions and the media mindset.

I should say at the outset that I have a pretty good vantage point on this particular case — both as witness of and participant in the echo chamber.

On Friday afternoon, I heard my colleague, Politico reporter Jonathan Martin, bellow in excitement as he called me over to his desk.

Martin was furiously typing away, not looking up as he told me the latest: Clinton had given an interview to the editorial board of the Argus Leader newspaper in South Dakota in which she answered inquiries into why she is staying in the race by citing the fact that it’s only May, and RFK had been shot and killed in June.

Here is what I was thinking: Wow. Maybe she has come unhinged? It’s not as though such macabre thoughts have never occurred to me, but for Clinton to give public voice to such a scenario is bizarre. This is going to be a big story and is almost certainly going to shadow and quite likely accelerate the final chapter of her presidential campaign.

Here is what I said: Martin, quick get that item up!

He needed no prompting.

As leaders of a new publication, Politico’s senior editors and I are relentlessly focused on audience traffic. The way to build traffic on the Web is to get links from other websites. The way to get links is to be first with news — sometimes big news, sometimes small — that drives that day’s conversation.

We are unapologetic in our premium on high velocity. In this focus on links and traffic we are not different from nearly all news sites these days, not just new publications but established ones like The New York Times.

There are probably a dozen websites with a heavy political emphasis whose links are sought by all for the traffic those links drive.

Martin was quick getting the item about Clinton’s Argus Leader comment up on his Politico blog.

But not as quick as The New York Post, which was the first outside South Dakota to notice Clinton’s inflammatory remarks (Martin himself knew about Clinton’s remarks from the New York tabloid’s story). The Associated Press, in what looked at first blush like a classic example of what reporters call “burying the lead,” had no mention of Clinton’s RFK remarks in its original dispatch on the interview.

I urged Martin to keep his foot on the gas: Be the first to post reaction from the Obama campaign. Obama spokesman Bill Burton quickly obliged, denouncing Clinton’s comments and saying such sentiments have “no place in this campaign.” Burton’s comments quickly went into Martin’s blog post. Soon enough, several websites and cable news outlets were giving the story trumpet-blaring treatment.

Perhaps half an hour after the story broke Martin called me back over to his desk. It turned out the Argus Leader had video of its big interview. I huddled over Martin’s computer as we watched.

It was a deflating experience.

The RFK remarks were deep in a 20-minute clip of an otherwise routine conversation. Then, once we actually got to the relevant portion of the video, it was hardly an electric moment.

Clinton does indeed mention the Kennedy assassination, speaking in a calm and analytical tone: “My husband did not wrap up the nomination in 1992 until he won the California primary somewhere in the middle of June, right? We all remember Bobby Kennedy was assassinated in June in California.”

Martin and I both thought we saw a slight twinge in Clinton’s facial expression, as though she recognized she had just said something dumb.

Whether she recognized it or not, she had.

But it was also clear that Clinton’s error was not in saying something beyond the pale but in saying something that pulled from context would sound as if it were beyond the pale.

It would be a big story if Clinton said something like this: “Hey, I know it looks bad for me now. But, think about it. Obama could get shot and I’d get to be the nominee after all.”

It is a small story if Clinton said something like this: “Everyone talks like May is incredibly late, but by historical standards it is not. Think of all the famous milestones in presidential races that have taken place during June.”

It seems pretty obvious that the latter is what Clinton meant, and not too far from what she actually said. It was not surprising that the Argus Leader’s executive editor, Randall Beck, put out a statement saying, “Her reference to Mr. Kennedy’s assassination appeared to focus on the time line of his primary candidacy and not the assassination itself.”

Make no mistake. Clinton stepped on a rake with her comment and got bopped in the face. This was entertaining political slapstick, for those of us who like that kind of thing. Little wonder she apologized.

But Clinton’s clumsiness does not excuse news media clumsiness in making a minor story seem like a major one. A note on the randomness of the news: If this really was a big story, then the media has blown it for months. Clinton made similar remarks to Time magazine back in March. (The Wall Street Journal reporter with Clinton has an entertaining look at how the pack traveling with the candidate initially missed the story.)

Keeping one’s journalistic bearings amid a hype storm is a challenge for every publication, this one included. In the early months of this publication (we launched in January 2007), a short news item broken by Ben Smith about John Edwards’ $400 haircut became one of our most-trafficked stories. I thought we handled that news nugget with a decent sense of proportion. The item, for instance, never led our site. But it’s true I was not exactly despairing when other websites and cable TV networks went way overboard on the story, with citations to Politico.

Nor is this column intended as a mea culpa for Hillary Hype. Velocity is a virtue in the Web world, and we are not going to stop trying to be fast off the mark — for relevant and fairly reported stories. What Clinton said about Robert Kennedy, whether it was cold or just a bit clueless, was newsworthy, and Martin’s original blog post was responsible in framing the context of her remark. He was equally quick to post her clarification and apology. The uproar was never the lead of our site.

But it was striking to see the broadcast networks and big papers, which were still going at full boil that evening and the next morning even though they had plenty of time to assess the (dwindling) significance of the story as the day wore on. (Meanwhile Friday, Obama was giving a major foreign-policy speech in Miami to unveil his plan for Latin America.) In an earlier era, these establishment outlets prized their role in promoting and preserving high standards of relevance.

In this era, with their business model challenged by the Web and other forces, and in the same scramble for audience as everyone else, these fabled elite media organs are if anything more buffeted by sensationalism and whimsy than their new media counterparts.

Once, the elite papers and network news set the agenda, and others followed suit, following up on what these establishment pillars deemed important.

Now it’s just the opposite. The conservative old voices increasingly take their cues from the newer, more daring ones.

The distinguishing feature of most political hype storms is that they pass quickly. Who the hell can remember what we were up in arms about last month? Wasn’t it something about Sinbad and a telecom lobbyist who was bitter about being a Muslim?

In that sense, a news culture in which — like the amplifiers for “Spinal Tap” that go up to 11 — everything is exaggerated may not seem like a big deal.

But the consequences are more serious than meets the eye. The uproar du jour mentality in the media can be a hassle for public officials, but it can also be their friend. Hillary Clinton, for instance, can be glad that a serious look by The New York Times about Bill Clinton’s dealings with a Canadian tycoon trying to curry favor with a dictatorship never generated much interest from other media.

Politicians know that as long as they have a base of support they can probably ride out any story confident that the pack will soon move on. Only a news media with the focus and discipline to distinguish a big story from a small one can hold politicians accountable — and produce the work that deserves an audience.