McCain’s Rovian Lipstick Diversion

I rarely agree with journalist Andrew Sullivan, but this time he nailed it. Here’s an excerpt from his blogpost on John McCain’s Rovian diversionary tactical ruse to get the media’s scrutiny off of the McCain/Palin ticket and the important issues facing the country. Sullivan is unequivocal in his condemnation of McCain. So it’s come to…

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IN WOMEN’S EQUALITY DAY SPEECH, HILLARY WILL LOOK WITH LONG EYES

All eyes will be on Hillary Clinton when she speaks tonight at the Democratic National Convention.

Media pundits and McCain loyalists will be parsing her every word, scrutinizing her every nuance, analyzing every element of her body language for quite a different reason. They love a political food fight. They’ll pounce on any whiff of tepidness, real or imagined, in her support for Barack Obama’s presidential candidacy. The Republicans have even set up a “Happy Hour for Hillary”, lying in wait to whip up animosity toward Obama, whether their spin is real, or if all else fails, conjured up by their Rovian attack dogs.

But while talking heads will strain to see any shred of conflict between the Democratic nominee-to-be and the second-runner, some of us will be looking at the occasion with what the Tohono O’Odham people call “long eyes”.

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John Edwards and the Brotherhood of the Traveling Pants

How many male politicians do you think are burning their little black books and expunging e-mails today, as another of their brotherhood bites the dust from his own lack of zipper control?

We have way too much information about John Edwards and his self-described narcissism. Clearly, like any good lawyer, John Edwards can look us straight in the eye and lie like a rug, as he did initially about his affair with Rielle Hunter.

But then sex, lies, and politics go together like peanut butter, jelly, and bread in America. And sex scandals are the one aspect of government that consistently works across geography and party lines. After all John McCain has admitted to affairs himself. There’s no partisanship in bed, except for short-lived tactics where the sway of sex can be used to bring one’s opponent down.

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WHO IS JOHN McCAIN? Hint: Not a Moderate, in Case You Were Wondering

Jake Tapper, ABC News Senior National Correspondent, in his blog “Political Punch” June 27 post “McCain Gambles with Awkward Joke” started a bit of a blog-o-flap among some feminists who though the senator’s remark about wife beating grossly inappropriate and perhaps insensitive to domestic abuse. Here’s the relevant excerpt:

In an interview with the Las Vegas Sun, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., was asked by columnist Jon Ralston why he didn’t choose Gov. Jim Gibbons to chair his Nevada campaign…
Maybe it’s the governor’s approval rating and you are running from him like you are from the president? Asked Ralston in a question McCain clearly found loaded.
Said McCain, chuckling, “And I stopped beating my wife just a couple of weeks ago.”
Some have found the subject of McCain’s joke — wife-beating — inappropriate.
To be clear, McCain was alluding to the fictitious leading question “When did you stop beating your wife, senator?” It’s a bit of distasteful DC yuckery so commonly quoted it’s hackneyed.
But considering the subject McCain was discussing at the time, to allude to that joke was, well, …..awkward!
Gov. Gibbons last month filed for divorce from his wife Dawn citing incompatiblity…

There are several issues here and I’ll take a moment to sort them out:

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A DOCTOR WHO WAS THERE DESCRIBES ABORTION PRE-ROE

Repairing the Damage, Before Roe by Waldo Fielding M.D., in today’s New York Times is a must read and must share. Fielding is 80; his generation of doctors knows the real stories about the injustices of illegal abortion. An excerpt:

With the Supreme Court becoming more conservative, many people who support women’s right to choose an abortion fear that Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that gave them that right, is in danger of being swept aside. When such fears arise, we often hear about the pre-Roe “bad old days.” Yet there are few physicians today who can relate to them from personal experience. I can.

I am a retired gynecologist, in my mid-80s. My early formal training in my specialty was spent in New York City, from 1948 to 1953, in two of the city’s large municipal hospitals. There I saw and treated almost every complication of illegal abortion…

Now it’s up to the generation now present to make the coat hanger (photos of which accompnied the article) a symbol of women’s empowerment rather than victimization.

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The Democrats’ Cow Pasture

Today’s the big day when the Democrats will find out whether they can effectively get out of the pasture of cow patties they created for themselves without either stepping in too many or causing a stampede among the supporters of either
Sens. Barack Obama and Hillary Rodham Clinton. Check out this very thorough analysis Anita, a reader of Heartfeldt placed on another post.

The Democratic Party leaders voted on Aug. 25, 2007, to sanction Florida Democrats for moving the date of their presidential primary to January 29, a week before the February 5 date which the party’s rules had set as the official start of primary season. They excepted the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary which have traditionally been the earliest–no one wanted to tamper with that little bit of presidential election theater even though it gives two small states way more influence in framing the narrative of the race than they deserve. Then in typical Democratic party fashion, they allowed South Carolina and Nevada to go early in the interest of geographic and ethnic diversity. New Hampshire’s state law requires them to hold their primary at least a week earlier than any other, setting off another series of oscillating primary date debates.

To make a long story short, it began to look something like the old children’s game of placing hands over hands into a tower and moving whoever’s hand was on the bottom to the top of the tower with increasing velocity until everybody disintegrates into a writhing pile of bodies on the floor. Michigan retaliated by moving their primary to January 15, and they were sanctioned accordingly.

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Should Hillary Quit? Definitely Not.

So my Los Angeles liberal friend called while I was on the treadmill this morning. She helped me get an especially good workout today. In fact, I got so worked up I was panting.

LALF: What about your girlfriend?
(I didn’t have to ask her who she meant.)

Me: It’s highly unlikely she’ll prevail at this point, but she ought to stay in the race through the rest of the primaries. Let the process run its course. Then the winner can win with honor and the loser can lose with honor and they can join hands with dignity to go defeat John McCain in November. I hope on the same ticket, but even if not, they’ll work together.

LALF: But that’s not what people are saying out here. They’re all screaming for Hillary to quit.

Me: They wouldn’t stop a football game in the last quarter just because their team was winning. Why would they want to stop the presidential primary before the last states have voted?

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Barack’s Hubris

Oh honestly. At 9:53pm Barack Obama called John McCain to congratulate him on winning the Republican primary and tell him he looked forward to running against him in the fall. Now that’s hubris way beyond the confidence Clinton exuded in the famous Katie Couric interview when she said she’d be the Democratic nominee and was excoriated by the press. OK, Chris Matthews, are you going to notice and beat up on Obama?

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