Despite Oft Spoken Admiration...

“Despite oft spoken admiration”, Samantha Power said in her resignation, “the woman is a monster.” Well isn’t that grown-up. She obviously had analyzed Hillary Clinton’s foreign policy stance on issues, investigated how Hillary dealt with economic issues, and evaluated her positions on education and health care, and determined (with all the information she had) that the candidate was a monster. Is it any wonder that the Obama people are afraid of surrogates speaking for the campaign. First the Congressman who couldn’t think of a single thing that Obama ever did, and then this “senior” policy official, who characterizes the other candidate as a monster.

But here’s what I think is the best part of the story. After Samantha finished her interview, she then decided the comment was off the record. In case she didn’t know it, and just for future conversations she has with the press (if she should ever get a public policy position again), nothing after the fact is off the record and, now—given the proclivity of news people not to care about confidences—nothing is off the record. And further, there are actually people who are saying, “he should have stood by her and not made her resign”. Are they kidding? Why would you want a moron as one of your top advisers? Am I being as harsh as Samantha was on Hillary. I hope so.

People are also outraged about Larry David calling Hillary a nut. I hardly think this is worth a mention. When we were in New Hampshire, Larry was at Obama headquarters being a celebrity and he liked it there. (We were there trying to get David behind the scenes on election eve). Mr. David is a comedian and if someone reads what he writes or speaks, they are likely to thinks it’s all in good fun. Probably not in this case, but he’s a citizen and has the right to say what he wants. He is not part of the campaign. I’m not even sure he endorsed Obama or has appeared at those “Hollywood” events as a supporter. And Larry is not an expert in anything, nor—in my opinion—is he funny. Richard Lewis is funny. Jerry Seinfield is funny. Larry David is less important than he thinks he is. But that’s not my point. A celebrity surrogate is only there to attract the attention and participation of a crowd. An advisor/expert is supposed to represent the candidate on issues about which they are an expert. Well she is an expert on genocide and now I think she’s pretty well versed on suicide as well.

The Wyoming results are 58% Obama and 41% Clinton. It was not unexpected. What do cowboys consider important issues? Clearly they were not buying Hillary’s “can they pass the crisis test.” I admittedly am not well versed on cattle issues, but I guess they think the “deer and antelope” will play nicer with Obama in office. Or maybe they don’t trust McCain—who Hillary has been endorsing over the last week or so.

So what is going to happen over the next six weeks? My guess is that the Clinton people will not even acknowledge the Obama win out west. They haven’t recognized any of his wins, other than to say they were not important. The Obama people will have to stop insisting that Hillary has to release her tax returns and find something real to talk about.
They both need to stop talking about who will be whose Vice President. I think that it seems like a dream ticket but whoever is the Vice President better get prepared for four years of abuse from the President and his staff – that’s the reality in the White House. If you don’t believe me, ask Al Gore. Who, despite every talking head suggesting that Al can mediate the election and talk the candidates into coming to some kind of agreement to save the party all the angst of a fight at the convention—can’t. Mr. Gore never wanted the Clintons to be a part of his campaign in 2000. Probably as a consequence of the President’s impeachment but also because they treated him so badly for eight years. And yes, he did do more than most Vice President’s who preceded him, but reinventing a government by giving out little hammers for minimal change—was not a real job. Gore has the stature to impact on the environment but not on these Presidential candidates.

Whew. So I leave you with this. The Clinton people bought file footage for the “3 a.m.” commercial, and one of the kids in the film has endorsed Barack Obama. We’re just sayin... Iris