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March 12, 2008 03:07 PM UTC

Hump Day Open Thread

  • 69 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

The punchline is self-evident.

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69 thoughts on “Hump Day Open Thread”

  1. Got another one yestaerday – is this clown really this clueless?

    I have lost track of the number of flyers I’ve gotten from this guy.  I’m sick and tired of his use of taxpayer dollars to effectively run a re-election campaign.

    Have you ever listened to this guy speak?  The average high school member of any debate club would embarrass him in a two-way conversation.  No wonder he is so dependent on these slick flyers that don’t really say anything but look real pretty.

    A classic case of style over substance and we’re all footing the bill!

      1. I think you’ve fallen into the Republican trap here.  They’re always thinking they have to choose one or the other and coming down on the side of empty suits like Reagan.  

        We may actually have both style and substance in Obama.  I mean, can a person be the editor of the Harvard Law Review and not have a sharp mind?

        Matthew

        1. The editor of the HLR is elected by the law students.  It is a political position. (Interesting precursor of his electability!)

          The year he was editor is the least cited edition in modern history, BTW. So I’ve read.

          1. Really, this is the best that you can come up with? So what if he was elected by the students of Harvard Law to be the editor of Harvard Law Review? As for citations, what does that have to do with anything?

            Since you seem to be fancy yourself as someone in a position to critique the Harvard Law Review why don’t you cite the prominent articles from that year and from surrounding years and give us an analysis.

            I’ll be anxiously awaiting professor.  

            1. That we don’t let Hillary Clinton get the nomination.

              Dems simply cannot win without almost all of the black vote and with a big turn-out among black voters.  The small percentage of black voters that the Republicans managed to poach on the basis of conservative social issues in 2004 contributed to putting Bush back in the White House.

              Hillary is so short-sighted she thinks it’s a good idea to trade the black vote for the bigot vote now to get a few more delegates and hope they forgive and forget in the general. Only a small percentage have to say “no thanks” and stay home to hand the general to McCain.  

              First she endorses McCain as a better choice than Obama.  Now this refusal to do more than wink at Ferraro and the bigot demographic while administering the slightest wrist slap possible.  

              This makes Obama our ONLY hope to regain the White House and the sooner we purge the process of Clinton’s destructive tactics by wrapping it up for Obama, the better chance we have.  

            2. I was refuting that the editor position was based on merit!  Get a grip!  It’s not “so what if he was elected by the students.”  It’s VERY much “what”, because it was held out that he got it on merit.  

              Why is this so difficult to grasp?

              As to your second demand, I’ll answer that when you tell me when you stopped beating your wife. I stated, “So I have read,” just to twart some fool asking me for proof.  And yet you still did.  

              Holy mud pie.  

                1. many of them include some of this nations greatest legal thinkers.

                  Harvard Law Review is incredibly competitive at an already competitive law school.  Its membership has included such diverse thinkers as Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Scalia.

                  Barack had a stupendous reputation at the law review and it is quite an accomplishment.  

                  When he says he will support and defend the constitution he knows what he is talking about.

                  http://www.boston.com/news/loc…

                    1. I was merely commenting on what an accomplishment president of the HLR is.

                      I think he’ll be a great president, because he is even tempered, can win over people and sees far off strategic consequences of seemingly simple decisions.

          2. If it was the least cited edition I would like to know and I would also like to know the reasons why.  Let’s dig into the story a bit.  Where did you find this information?

            Because I want to know the truth whatever that might be.  I think, from what I have read and seen so far, that Barack Obama is as substantive a person as Hilary Clinton.  I would be happy with either as the nominee, but I want to know the truth of all things regardless of how I might feel about the truth.

            Matthew

            1. …if it doesn’t take too much time. It wouldn’t really prove anything one way or another, whatever the outcome.  The True Believers will not believe if negative, anyway.

              I do agree with you that bottom line, HC and BO aren’t very different in many ways.  

              Whatever we argue here will have no bearing on Denver in August and then in November.

              It’s pretty much just fun for us wonks.  

              1. Thank you.

                I think it does make a difference come, or even May.  As a Democrat I’m going to be campaigning for the nominee among my friends, family, and acquaintances if no one else.  I want to come bearing the truth to these conversations because I think that is the best way to be prepared to convince them to vote for the man who I think most likely to be the nominee.  

                Matthew

    1. From your web page.

      That is the most ridiculous, innacurate claim possible.  Do have your head stuck up your Republican ass or something?  Pull it out and look around as to who the hypocrites and the perps are.  Yes, some Dems, but it’s pretty much a Republican Country Club.

      Let me save you the effort, I’ve done the research: http://coloradopols.com/showDi…

      Spitzer finally became the Dem I was asking Pubs to find.  But my challenge at the end of the piece still stands and still, no one has come up with anything.

      1. Lets think. The Dems are always the ones going off about how corrupt the Repubs are, but then they get caught red handed in the act themselves. William Jefferson of Louisiana who is being investigated for corruption charges and had a crap load of money hidden in his refrigirator. Then there is Governor Spitzer. Also, Alcee Hastings of Floridia, who before being elected to the house, was impeached as a federal judge because of corruption. There is the mayor of detroit who is deep in a sex scandal. Also, Jim McGrevey of New Jersey who resigned due to a sex scandal. Then the most famous of them all Bill Clinton who lied under oath. I could go on, but why bother. I am not saying that Republican are not corrupt, but liberals go around preaching it like they are innocent themselves and then they get caught. Anyone with power is more willing to become corrupt because they think they are above the law.

        1.    You latched on to this great issue in ’98, Newt Gingrich promised to not let a single day go by without commenting on Bill Clinton’s immorality (really ironic given what we later learned about Gingrich’s morals), and the high-water mark was the impeachment vote in Dec. ’98.

            You still don’t get it.  By giving the Dems an historical gain of five House seats in the sixth year of a president’s term of office, the voters in ’98 passed judgment on what Clinton did and what Gingrich-Delay did, and found what the Republicans did to be more offensive.

        2. It is worse anytime a Republican is embroiled in a scandal just because of the sheer amount of hypocrisy. Yes, there is hypocrisy on the Dem side too, but who’s really going around doing all the preaching of morals? If you cannot figure it out, the answer is Republicans. This hypocrisy is what the Dems are preaching about.

        3. At a glance, same old defenses, same Dem names, but not ceding to how few there are.  No, liberal DON’T go around preaching, THAT’S JUST IT!  Gawdalmighty, how slow can you guys be and still chew food?  It’s the rare Dem that holds himself up as virtuous and then falls.  Yes, Spitzer is one.

          The worst sexual offenses, both morally and legally, are committed by Republicans.

          Did you read my diary?

          Didn’t think so.  

          1. What bothers me is corruption, self-interest, incompetence, or a world view totally divorced from reality (left or right).

            Those that go after kids (Foley) or violate a law they enforce (Spitzer) need to go. But Craig, Vitter, Bill Clinton – who cares about their personal life. They’re human beings and therefore imperfect (and pathetic in what each did).

            Instead we need to look at how they govern.

            2. Their private lives should remain in as much as their lives are in line with their public proclamations and actions. Craig voted for antigay legislation. Vitter, I believe but am not 100% sure, sold himself as a “family values” candidate. Clinton’s clean as far as this hypocrisy angle is concerned.

    2.    And since there’s now a GOP Guv in LA, you Repubs should be leaning on Vitter the Trick to step down now so Jindal can appoint a successor.

      1. Vitter should step down. He violated the trust of the electorate. ANYBODY who distrusts the people should pay the consequences. You all think conservatives are willing to allow these type of people to serve but we are not willing.

        1. Vitter.  Craig.  Where are the resignations.  If there were half so much “outrage” there as there was at the chance to go after a Democrat, they’d be forced to resign.  But it’s not there.  While we’re at it, lets talk about O’Reilly, Coulter, and Limbaugh, all of whom should be at least out of work, if not in jail.

          I’m glad Spitzer stepped down, and he should have been removed if he refused.  I just wish taking moral failings seriously were not a one-sided event.

  3. Spitzer’s Media Enablers

    By KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL

    March 12, 2008

    The fall of New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer holds many lessons, and the press will surely be examining them in coming months. But don’t expect the press corps to delve into the biggest lesson of all — its own role as his enabler.

    Journalists have spent the past two days asking how a man of Mr. Spitzer’s stature would allow himself to get involved in a prostitution ring. The answer, in my mind, is clear. The former New York attorney general never believed normal rules applied to him, and his view was validated time and again by an adoring press. “You play hard, you play rough, and hopefully you don’t get caught,” said Mr. Spitzer two years ago. He never did get caught, because most reporters were his accomplices.

    Journalism has many functions, but perhaps the most important is keeping tabs on public officials. That duty is even more vital concerning government positions that are subject to few other checks and balances. Chief among those is the prosecutor, who can use his awesome state power to punish, even destroy, private citizens.

    Yet from the start, the press corps acted as an adjunct of Spitzer power, rather than a skeptic of it. Many journalists get into this business because they want to see wrongs righted. Mr. Spitzer portrayed himself as the moral avenger. He was the slayer of the big guy, the fat cat, the Wall Street titan — all allegedly on behalf of the little guy. The press ate it up, and came back for more.

    Time magazine bestowed upon Mr. Spitzer the title “Crusader of the Year,” and likened him to Moses. Fortune dubbed him the “Enforcer.” A fawning article in the Atlantic Monthly in 2004 explained he was “a rock star,” and “the Democratic Party’s future.” In an uncritical 2006 biography, then Washington Post reporter Brooke Masters compared the attorney general to no less than Teddy Roosevelt.

    What the media never acknowledged is that somewhere along the line (say, his first day in public office) Mr. Spitzer became the big guy, the titan. He had the power to trample lives and bend the rules, while also burnishing his own political fortune. He was the one who deserved as much, if not more, scrutiny as onetime New York Stock Exchange chief Dick Grasso or former American International Group CEO Maurice “Hank” Greenberg.

    What makes this more embarrassing for any self-respecting journalist is that Mr. Spitzer knew all this, and played the media like a Stradivarius. He knew what sort of storyline they’d be sympathetic to, and spun it. He knew, too, that as financial journalism has become more competitive, breaking news can make a career. He doled out scoops to favored reporters, who repaid him with allegiance. News organizations that dared to criticize him were cut off. After a time, few criticized anymore.

    Instead, reporters felt obligated to run with whatever he handed them. Consider the report in the wake of a 2005 op-ed in this newspaper by John Whitehead. A respected Wall Street figure, Mr. Whitehead dared to criticize Mr. Spitzer for his unscrupulously zealous pursuit of Mr. Greenberg. Mr. Spitzer later threatened Mr. Whitehead, telling him in a phone call that “You will pay the price. This is only the beginning and you will pay dearly for what you have done.” Some months later, after more Spitzer excesses, Mr. Whitehead had the temerity to write another op-ed describing what Mr. Spitzer had said.

    Within a few days, the press was reporting (unsourced, of course) that Mr. Whitehead had defended Mr. Greenberg a few weeks after a Greenberg charity had given $25 million to the World Trade Center Memorial Foundation — a group Mr. Whitehead chaired. So Mr. Whitehead’s on-the-record views were met with an unsourced smear implying bad faith. The press ran with it anyway.

    In 2005, Mr. Spitzer went on national television to suggest that Mr. Greenberg had engaged in criminal activity. It was front-page news. About six months later, on the eve of a Thanksgiving weekend, Mr. Spitzer quietly disclosed that he lacked the evidence to press criminal charges. That news was buried inside the papers.

    What makes this history all the more unfortunate is that the warning signs about Mr. Spitzer were many and manifest. In the final days of Mr. Spitzer’s run for attorney general in 1998, the news broke that he’d twisted campaign-finance laws so that his father could fund his unsuccessful 1994 run. Mr. Spitzer won anyway, and the story was largely forgotten.

    New York Stock Exchange caretaker CEO John Reed suggested Mr. Spitzer hadn’t told the truth when he said that it was Mr. Reed who wanted him to investigate Mr. Grasso’s pay. The press never investigated.

    Mr. Spitzer’s main offense as a prosecutor is that he violated the basic rules of fairness and due process: Innocent until proven guilty; the right to your day in court. The Spitzer method was to target public companies and officials, leak allegations and out-of-context emails to a compliant press, watch the stock price fall, threaten a corporate indictment (a death sentence), and then move in for a quick settlement kill. There was rarely a trial, fair or unfair, involved.

    On the substance, his court record speaks for itself. Most of Mr. Spitzer’s high-profile charges have gone up in smoke. A New York state judge threw out his case against tax firm H&R Block. He lost his prosecution against Bank of America broker Ted Sihpol (whom Mr. Spitzer threatened to arrest in front of his child and pregnant wife). Mr. Spitzer was stopped by a federal judge from prying confidential information out of mortgage companies. Another New York judge blocked the heart of his suit against Mr. Grasso. Mr. Greenberg continues to fight his civil charges. The press was foursquare behind Mr. Spitzer in all these cases, and in a better world they’d share some of his humiliation.

    Instead, remarkably, they continue to defend him. Ms. Masters, his biographer, was on CNN the day Mr. Spitzer’s prostitution news broke, reassuring viewers that the governor really was a “lovely” guy. Other news reporters were reporting what a “tragedy” it was that such a leading light in the Democratic Party could come to such an ignoble end.

    There’s little that’s tragic about Mr. Spitzer, unless you consider his victims (which would appear to include his own family). The press would do well to meditate on that, and consider how many violations they winked at and validated over the years. Politicians don’t exist to be idolized by the press, at least not by any press corps doing its job.

    Ms. Strassel, who covered Eliot Spitzer’s investigations, now writes the Journal’s Potomac Watch column from Washington.

    2. Balboni is right should post bits and then the link.

      Its important to drive traffic to good reportingso they can show page hits to advertisers.

      I posted a whole press release yesterday and I felt that was ok because it was a press release, but even that is borderline.

      1. Balboni is right should post bits and then the link.

        Its important to drive traffic to good reporting so they can show page hits to advertisers.

            2. Fair use is a doctrine in United States copyright law that allows limited use of copyrighted material without requiring permission from the rights holders, such as use for scholarship or review. It provides for the legal, non-licensed citation or incorporation of copyrighted material in another author’s work under a four-factor balancing test

                    1. the purpose and character of the use, including whether such use is of a commercial nature or is for nonprofit educational purposes;

                    2. the nature of the copyrighted work;

                   3. the amount and substantiality of the portion used in relation to the copyrighted work as a whole; and

                    4. the effect of the use upon the potential market for or value of the copyrighted work.

              http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F…

            3. But if it came to one in toto as an e-mail that would make for a much more difficult case.  

              And I did not have the URL to post.

              I’m sorry for having so upset the pedants out there, but I hope you took the time to absorb what the writer had to say (which was, after all, the point of writing it in the first place).

              2. I went back and looked at all these little posts — such an exercise — but no one had commented on the article.  Very curious.

                I’m waiting for the Honorable Mr. Barr to log on next to add his piece of condemnation.  No, not just condemnation, out right crime… Arrest that man!

    2. whose PhD is in physiology, not psychology or psychiatry.  Dr. Laura of failed marriages and Dr. Laura that has admittedly slept with married men herself. Dr. Laura whose mother died alone in her home and wasn’t found for two months.

      This lady can’t keep her own life under control and wants to tell everyone else how to live theirs ?  Please.  Of course she would be giving nonsensical advice like this.  I feel sorry for those who take her seriously.

      1. retired can endorse.

        active/reserve can not lend the authority of uniform (or something like that) to  candidate.  The line is kind of dicey.

      2. and that’s about it.  The tricky part is with reserves like Sen. Steve Ward and Rep. Joe Rice, who have to be neutered on active duty, then return to elective office.    

        1. I was hoping someone had more detailed information.  I also am wondering about his community organizing.  I know he worked on a housing project but don’t know the details.  There is a certain vagueness I would like to get beyond and am having trouble doing.

  6. Irony, she’s non political.

    she votes, but considers my relationship with politics on a par with being a trekkie. (not a trekkie, but my inner adolescent half-elf Ranger shed a tear when gary Gygax died this week).

    Maybe I can slip in with the choir–problem is I sound like Hillary when she sings (shudder).

      1. A great deal more was achieved… but then remember how long America (and her allies — I still remember the British Army of the Rhine) were on occupation duty.  

        One could argue that American troops are still on a kind of occupation duty in Germany and Japan (and it has all come about post-WWII).

        1. But in reality, the “occupation” of Germany and Japan was comparatively brief.  The Bush Administration wants what we have in Japan and Germany – a long-term regional military base with the co-operation of the government.  Unfortunately, due to the Administration’s incompetent “planning”, they’re stuck with a stagnant occupation instead.

          We should never have invaded Iraq; having decided to do so, we owed it to our soldiers to use the best planning available, and we didn’t; having bungled it, we owed it to the Iraqis to try to fix it quickly, and again we didn’t; now that we’re seen as an entrenched imperial presence, it’s time to leave.  We can do little good by retaining our huge military presence in Iraq now.

          1. The British Zone was administered by a military government for four years and by a civilian/military administration up through the second Churchill government — ten years in all.  

            It was a much more heavy occupation than what we see in Iraq.  We had National Service — full conscription — to maintain its upkeep.

            And no occupation was more “stagnant” than that posed by what grew into the Cold War — 35 years long!

            I agree with you — we never should have invaded Iraq (at least not without a proper Declaration of War by Congress, in accordance with the Constitution), but we might part company on the “fix it quickly” bit.

            I think that’s a big part of the problem.  Because there was no declaration of war, there was no conscription, so there weren’t enough troops for an occupation for the length of time necessary.  In comparison with Iraq, it took longer to establish the Federal Republic of Germany after the war.

            And Germany was a nation with a comparatively long history of democratic institutions.  Prior to the Third Reich, Germany had been a Republic for more than a decade, and had functioning democratic institutions as far back as the 1870’s.

            I entirely agree that it was poorly played in Iraq.

            By-the-way, America has been seen as an “imperial presence” for more than 50 years now.  That’s nothing new (read Graham Greene).  Mr. Bush merely confirmed it and Mr. Obama won’t accomplish much in changing it (and certainly not Mr. McCain or Mrs. Clinton).  President Carter tried, bless his heart.

            1. Comparative to what you were pointing out about our still-current troop deployments in Germany and Japan.  They aren’t, and weren’t for most of the Cold War, occupiers.  German occupation was also more complex because Germany was a much stronger power; the first few years of the occupation were spent tearing apart German war capability (and the next few spent rebuilding some of what was torn down…).  We can only hope that Iraq’s recovery is as swift – Germany was admitted into NATO only 10 years after it was the greatest threat to world security.

              The problem with Iraq wasn’t caused by the lack of a formal declaration of war, and the Democrats (cynically) offered to re-institute the draft to fill our under-manned ranks.  The problem was a failure to listen on the part of the Administration.  They failed to listen to Shinseki, to the Army War College, to the State Department…  It is a myth that we had no planning on invading and occupying Iraq; we had many years of planning – all tossed out the window when Bush, Cheney, and Rummy didn’t like the answers they were hearing.

              Re: “imperial presence”, I was referring specifically to Iraq.  There was a period of time after the invasion where the Iraqis were, for the most part, willing to give us the benefit of the doubt.  As you say, Bush confirmed our imperial ambitions to Iraq and the world.

              And as far as “fixing it quickly”, we have squandered immense amounts of resources in Iraq with no accountability and little to show for it.  Instead of competent administrators, the Bush Administration sent political lackeys; where the Iraqis needed to see Iraqi involvement we sent in foreign contractors.

              This Administration will bear the stigma of its horrid planning and wretched cronyism through the endless corridors of history.

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