Nah, this is better conversation than normal. Opposing sides and opinions are always more interesting than what this message board normally produces. And It wasn't even me participating in a HRC conversation!
WTF, do you mean she didn't do it willingly? She has no agency at all? She was under the Imperius curse?
As I've written before, I'm not much for this "was a good candidate was a bad candidate" analysis, because ti's done after the fact. It always reads to me like those bad sports fake psychology assessment, when the team that loses the PKs was mentally fragile and the team that won was not. Run 10 PKs shooutouts and probably each team wins 5. If Hillary was a bad candidate, then certainly was Trump; If Romney was a bad candidate, well he would have rolled in '88. Daddy Bush was a good candidate in '88 and a bad one in '92, I guess. Same guy. Dole was fine, he just went up against a relatively popular incumbent. McCain was fine but no Republican could win in '08, after the war and with recession arriving. Etc.
And in terms of resumes, before Hillary, the most qualified candidate ever was-- Herbert Hoover. And the least qualified? Abraham Lincoln.
You mean the guy I voted AGAINST in the labour leadership election back in 2016, (so, 4 years ago), and went for the other guy, not because I thought he was a great candidate but because he was the other candidate. That guy?
Yeah the guy you spent the year defending tooth and nails and pretending he had a chance to win the elections.
Again, we can use another 'phrase' if you like. But it's important to remember that although I used that phrase, I didn't actually write those articles, did I. Neither did I write Donna Brazile's statements about HRC's excessive influence in the DNC. Unless we're now calling her a right-wing hack? There were FAR worse stories out there but, (contrary to some of the sanctimonious horseshit from some on here), I DO know the difference between a biased, partisan hatchet job and something that's considered and measured. Well not from the foundation, particularly, no. It was more in terms of her 'strong fund raising' that I had a problem with. That' was the comment at issue. So, what are we talking about then? We seem to be going round in circles with some people accepting there are points at issue to discuss and some not even accepting that. Those people seem to be suggesting that everything is like the barbarians at the gate. Like I say, people need to get a grip. So... it's OK as long as you 'have an ego'? And this is where we end up. The fact that donny tiny hands does something is the criteria. Actually, you have that completely the wrong way around. Someone else suggested it was OK if she have undue influence over the DNC BECAUSE she was 'a strong fund-raiser'. All I did was question whether that's acceptable and where the money comes from.
I don't know about 'selling books' particularly. Obama wrote a book, (quite a good one I believe), and I'm not aware anyone has a problem with that. Surely the issue is WHEN they get paid money and for what. If they get it after they've left power nobody should have much of a problem because it can't have influence. That was the point about HRC being SoS whilst her husband was doing that stuff... it's hard NOT to give the appearance of 'selling access'. As to whether I'm a Bernie Bro, I think he has the same sort of problem Corbyn had over here... that he's had the same bullshit dumped on him for 30 years so the fact most of his calls were right, (about wars, taxes, globalisation, etc. etc.), isn't relevant. It might be better to go for someone less divisive. That's why I voted for the other guy in the 2016 labour leadership election, (although I forget the name now as it happens ). Edit: Owen Smith... that was it
Indeed!!! https://www.bigsoccer.com/threads/fa...pposition-than-the-devil.414951/#post-9660798 That's the trouble with searching. You tend to find things, don't you.
Of course that's more on Bill rather than Hillary, but then again, she wouldn't have been a candidate without him. So that is a fair point.
It depends what's the 'it' is, doesn't it? If you mean an ex-president giving speeches and raising money for a foundation whilst their partner was SoS, have there been a lot of examples? Hmm... interesting question. I'm not sure.
Eleanor and Franklin's the closest I could find. But it is actually somewhat close, given that Franklin was the de facto SecNav at a time when the money running through the department was huge.
It turns out that not only Christians are hypocritical, double-standard frauds - Alan Dershowitz when Bill Clinton was impeached - Now today -
Lets not get carried away. This conversation is fairly interesting, but The Birds was an all-time classic.
Well yeah, I guess I was thinking more of being the one experiencing the pecking rather than watching others being pecked. Reminds me of the Mel Brooks quote, “Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when you fall into an open sewer and die.”
The clinton thread derailment was caused by him back at post 4364 leading to 3 days of train wreck I guess on topic posting is too much to hope for. This place is more like sunday dinner with my grandparents - hearing for the 1000th time about some shit that happened years ago I'll take the same approach. Slug a glass of wine, pretend to listen, and reverse derail them with comments about Rugby
It's interesting with how much we now know about the Ukraine fiasco, to compare with Mueller/Russia. It's changed my view a bit of the different elements of that scandal, because there are clear similarities. Maybe we can call if the Mos Eisley effect? Trump is surrounded by so many grifters and crooks in his near orbit. These people bring with them their own grifting and crimes - like Manafort. But also these people are highly susceptible to influence ops. Think of the parallels between Rudy getting played in the Ukraine, and Cohen getting played over Moscow tower. I mean it is embarassing how the President's personal lawyer was so easily compromised in both cases. Parnas/Rudy also has a lot of similarities to Stone/Assange. An actual foreign influence op. So I have come around to the idea that Trump/Russia was not one coherent conspiracy but more like the Mos Eisley Cantina. e.g. The Trump Tower meet may not be so directly connected to Stone/Wikileaks. Manafort part of a different scam. Papadopoulos may simply be a low end grifter that RIS made a play at. Flynn & Kislyak & Kushner - even another orbit? But what it does show is how rotten with crooks and foreign influence this Admin is. I mean that fact that POTUS tried to secretly & corruptly to get this dirt immediately compromised his administration to Zelensky. How much Kompromat do Putin, Erdolf, China have? The Saudis?
OK - that changes things a bit! The Trump cult essentially refers to the cult of personality. So the accusation is that like so many others, McSally was willing to trash her own personal reputation and go full Trumpian. i.e. join the cult. Cult membership involves ignoring reality, lying about everything, and debasing oneself at the feet of dear leader. Especially it involves believing that Trump is a great leader, genius etc etc and ignoring that he obviously a terrible leader. It is that lack of rational behaviour that makes it an apt description IMO https://www.vox.com/policy-and-poli...370/trump-republican-party-cult-steven-hassan Personally I think you could also argue it is more like Stalinism. Rewards in the system come from blind fealty and debasement.
But that assumes McSally, and a lot of the Reps, believe Individual One. I don't think they do. I think they kiss his ass because he has control of the money they need to get (re)elected. One Individual One is out of the picture, they will distance themselves from him. The speed of that will depend on their voting district. For example, I think McSally will go faster, but Kennedy go slower. And we all know that those in power under Stalin where there because of fear or ego (or both). It was the public which was enraptured in the Cult-of-Personality.
I agree It is clear many of them despise Trump based on their own public comments before he grabbed power. And since that time, it gets confirmed that lots hate him but are frightened. The true believers are fewer in number IMO
The thing is, these things do relate to one another. You suggested, (on topic), the way GOP senators are controlled by DTH, (through fund raising), and then stanger asked if that was the same thing that HRC did. I took him to mean the control of DNC through fund raising so suggested it was similar in some ways but they were very different individuals and the causes they were pursuing were completely different. We then went down the rabbit hole of my opinion about HRC which, (in much the same way I did with Blair), is... well, less than positive, shall we say Actually I think your original point, (about his influence through fund raising), is only partially correct and it's more through his political impact that he has control over them... but that's another matter. TBH I think a degree of 'variance' from the topic is OK. This isn't a legal matter and nobody's going to be sued if they diverge from the matter at hand. More to the point I think it IS important we bear in mind when whats happening is a substantial change from what's happened before but, just as important, when it's NOT. When it's 'unprecedented' to coin a phrase