The “Incompetence Crisis”

Posted: March 27, 2009 | Author: | Filed under: A My Pet Goat Moment, Global Financial Crisis, Hillary Clinton: Her Campaign for All of Us, No Obama, president teleprompter jesus, PUMA, Team Obama, U.S. Economy, Voter Ignorance | Tags: , , , , | 10 Comments

rassie-pollAll last year,  ALL  I heard was how experience didn’t matter.  I heard that being ‘ready on day one’  was a meaningless campaign slogan.  I was told that what mattered was perceived good judgment, intelligence, and speaking skills.  I remember watching the first Democratic Debates and thinking, this guy isn’t ready to be dogcatcher, let alone President. There were no wonky answers on economics or foreign policy.  There was never a show of any detailed plan.  There was always just a nice speech read from a teleprompter with a preacher’s patois, incredible (somewhat contradictory) promises, and messages that could have come from a motivational seminar instead of a political campaign.  I never got on the bandwagon.

I finally found a home over here in the Pumasphere with people of similar thought after being treated like a scourge by other sites (blog or MSM) that had gone over to the hope side.  I’ve been getting used to my role as pariah. I was thinking I’d have to live with it for at least a year.  I figured I’d start getting the you were so right calls sometime in the fall.

Boy, was I wrong!

I figured that because of my experience during the early calls for the Iraq war.  I was the one saying “Iraq has nothing to do with 9/11.  Iraq is a different agenda.  Iraq is a bad idea.”   I actually had some one get up in a restaurant to tell me what a lousy, unpatriotic American I was that didn’t deserve to live in the US. I became a the scourge of all true American patriots.  I’ve been thinking that my 9/11 protest was just a character building experience that would serve me well during the Obama fascination period and that it would probably take a few years of, yet again, being a scourge to all true American patriots before the worm would turn.  Luckily, I found a other like minded out in the Pumasphere so I don’t have to be quite alone as I was with my opinion on the Iraq Invasion.

I think I can honestly speak for a number of us around here.  We didn’t expect to be proven so right so quickly.  At least I didn’t. I was hoping that maybe it wouldn’t be as bad as my gut and head had deduced.  So many of my friends said, he’s not Dubya, so he’s got to be better, you’ll see.   After all, we’d get rid of a lot of really evil signing statements that restrict women’s reproductive choices, the right of all people to love and marry whom they wish, and we’d move ahead on science again.  I’ve said this before, but nearly any democrat would have done any of those things–including Joe Lieberman. Lieberman is one of those folks that I consider marginally a democrat, but even he would have done those things if he were POTUS.  We certainly wouldn’t see any nasty supreme court appointments either.  These were marginal hopes and small changes that I could cling to while knowing that eventually, I would be proven right.  I just didn’t even imagine it would wind up quite like this, quite so fast.

So, if I haven’t made myself clear here, Rush Limbaugh and Governor Jindal may be cheering for a failure.  I’m not in that camp at all.  I’ve just been quietly sitting here telling myself that with all the beautiful things written into the constitution as well as the resiliency of the American people, that perhaps it won’t be quite as bad as I thought it would be.   After all, we survived the incompetency of George Bush and the lunacy of Dick Cheney. Things can’t fall apart that fast!

Boy, was I wrong!

Pumas are the new Cassandras.  Our warnings, unheeded, demonized, and marginalized, are now the stuff of MSM op ed pieces.  I’d like to point you to a few that are searing Obama with legitimate criticisms.   I would think they came from one of the edgier Puma sites but they don’t.  One is from CNN. The other from the UK’s Prospect.  I also have two from the NY Times.  These comments are simply alarming.

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Whither Hillary?

Posted: December 5, 2008 | Author: | Filed under: Hillary Clinton: Her Campaign for All of Us | Tags: , , | 3 Comments

I’m always overly pensive at the end of the semester. The weather even obliged.  It was just cloudy and chilly enough to keep me inside at my desk.  I finished my last lecture today and was hard-pressed to find good news for my students other than it would all be over shortly.  There’s a certain melancholy that comes with all endings.  It leaves a me with a sense of wistful calm.

In case you haven’t been watching the economy, it’s not good.  The labor statistics that came out today were beyond grim.  Even President Bush has decided that something has to be done about the auto companies if just to stymie job loss for the time being.  Speaker-of the-House Pelosi is even open now to using the green incentives money set aside for the Detroit three ( no longer worthy of being framed the BIG three anymore) to go after fuel efficient cars with less impact on the environment.  This entire day seemed to be wrapped up in one big moment of quiet resolution. 

I poured some wine and decided tonight’s newscast for the day would be News Hour with Jim Lerher.  The end of the broadcast was a conversation that was billed this way:

Brooks and Marcus
Analysts David Brooks and Ruth Marcus weigh in on the news of the week, including the return of auto executives to Capitol Hill.

The conversation did include the inevitability of something for the auto executives as well as this week’s discussion of Team Obama and the future of his ‘rivals’.  Ruth Marcus took some time to discuss Hillary’s acceptance of SOS and was generally complimentary.  Her only question was that of potential Big Dawg drama.  Then, magically, some analysis caught me by surprise.  She asked if any one had noticed how generally sad Hillary had looked on Monday while accepting SOS besides her?  I think both Jim Lerher and David Brooks were also surprised by the comment, but after some reflection agreed.  Yes she did look a little wistful with a hint of quiet resolution.  Ruth said that she decided to follow-up later with a ‘close friend’ of Hillary about the observation.  (Yes, that well known journalistic  teaser yet again, she had an ‘unnamed’ source.)  Ruth said the friend was well acquainted with the tinge of melancholia and that it was the result of Hillary knowing “her political career is over”.  

USA-OBAMA/CLINTONThat bit of self-reflection hit me on a real basic level.  It sounded quite believable, but I was glad when David Brooks cracked a joke about the Clintons always managing to come back when you least expect them.   But know I’m thinking again and I’m still coming back to this gut feeling that she probably has got that right but I’m still not sure why I feel that way, let alone, why she might feel that way.

I have to say, I’m feeling a little blue about the idea of not seeing Hillary on a campaign trail again.   Maybe it’s just the time of year, or the weather, or this glass of red wine.  Maybe you can convince me that one shouldn’t trust what’s been said by a reporter’s unnamed source at the end of a semester.

Obama is not Winning Hillary Clinton’s Supporters or Independents

Posted: August 21, 2008 | Author: | Filed under: Hillary Clinton: Her Campaign for All of Us, No Obama, PUMA | Tags: , , | 5 Comments

A new poll has just shown that 52 % of Hillary Clinton Supporters (WSJ/NBC poll) will support Obama.  The same poll showed that 17% of her supporters will be voting for McCain.  These new figures should be sending superdelegates into high concern mode as they head towards Denver.  While Obama is running neck-and-neck with McCain, any generic democratic candidate has a  10% lead while Senator Hillary Clinton is still showing a 5 – 8% lead over McCain.

A Wall Street Journal/NBC poll also points to a big challenge for Sen. Obama as his party gathers in Denver next week for its convention: rallying Sen. Hillary Clinton’s supporters to his cause. Only half of those who voted for Sen. Clinton in the primaries say they are now supporting Sen. Obama. One in five is supporting Sen. McCain. The Republican has reached out to Clinton supporters by offering steady praise for the former first lady and hinting that he’d be open to a running mate who supports abortion rights.

source: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121926582869857905.html?mod=hpp_us_whats_news

Is the press finally seeing that Senator Obama is a seriously flawed candidate who is unlikely to win the Presidiency?  Will the superdelegates wake up to the same realization before it is too late?

Overall, the poll finds the race a statistical dead heat, with 45% favoring Sen. Obama and 42% Sen. McCain. …Sen. Obama’s campaign faces a critical task in Denver: bringing Sen. Clinton’s supporters to his side. Among all voters, 11% say both that they would vote for Sen. Clinton if she were running against Sen. McCain and that they aren’t ready to back Sen. Obama against the Republican.

These voters seem like natural Obama backers: They are not happy with the direction of the country, they don’t like President Bush, and they want Congress to be controlled by Democrats. Ideologically, they are liberal or moderate. Demographically, they tend to be female with incomes below $50,000 — two groups that lean Democratic.

Yet people in this group view Sen. McCain more favorably than they view Sen. Obama, and they are uncomfortable with the idea of Sen. Obama in the White House. One in three sees Sen. Obama as “arrogant and cocky,” an image the McCain campaign has aggressively tried to create for him over the past month.

These disaffected Democrats could make a difference in big states where Sen. Clinton did well, including Ohio and Pennsylvania.

Can we say PUMA?  This is definitely a display of the size of the PUMA movement.  While I’m still betting Obama takes Biden to shore up his complete lack of foreign diplomacy, new rumors of a Hillary VP are found in every MSM outlet this afternoon.  Why put the obvious presidential candidate at the bottom of the ticket to drag the inadquate Obama up in the polls?  If I were Hillary, I’d run as fast as I can from this proposition, even though she’s already being blamed for Obama’s sagging poll numbers by all the usual suspects.

Superdelegates!!  PLEASE WAKE UP!  Put CLINTON first, and OBAMA second and I bet you’ll see those poll numbers shoot up in no time!

Meanwhile, CNN is reporting that Hillary’s Debt is still high.

Well over two months have passed since Hillary Clinton formally abandoned her White House bid, but newly-released Federal Election Commission reports show the New York senator has made little headway in paying off her sizeable campaign debt.

According to an FEC report filed Wednesday, Clinton’s debt as of the end of July stood at just under $24 million — a decrease of only $1.2 million since the end of June. More than $13 million of that total is owed to the New York senator herself, while close to $11 million is owed to individual vendors. Clinton has suggested she is not seeking to pay back the money she owes herself.

The report also shows Clinton was only able to raise $2 million in the month of July — down from close to $3 million in June. By comparison, Barack Obama raised over $50 million for his White House bid in the same time period.

The report comes as some high-profile Clinton backers have expressed disappointment Obama has not made more of an effort to help his onetime rival retire her campaign debt.

source:  http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2008/08/21/disclosure-repots-show-clinton-still-deeply-in-debt/

What do we have to do to set all of this RIGHT?

We have NOT come a long way, baby

Posted: July 30, 2008 | Author: | Filed under: Hillary Clinton: Her Campaign for All of Us, U.S. Economy, Uncategorized, Women's Rights | Tags: , , , | Comments Off on We have NOT come a long way, baby

I’m the stereotypical PUMA.  I came of age in the 70s and joined the UWAG (University Women’s Action Group) while at the University of Nebraska working on the first of several degrees.  I remember fighting hard to get tougher rape laws in place including getting officers assigned to rape cases out of the Property Crimes Department and lobbying for laws that would let raped wives charge their husbands with rape.  This was not possible at that time.  We’ve made considerable progress on that front.  We now don’t need two to three people to witness rapes in order to get rapists prosecuted.  We also can charge our husbands with rape.  Violet crimes against women are no longer consider property crimes.

I also worked hard for the ERA.  That failed to pass although I travelled to both Missouri and Oklahoma to try to get the last few states to pass it.  I also was trying to fight Nebraska’s attempt to take back it’s pro-ERA vote sponsored by my local state senator who was also a neighbor and father to two of the least popular guys in my high school.  I always thought he’d sponsor the bill because neither of his sons had much luck getting dates back in the day.  He was mad that women could actually support themselves and therefor not have to marry the first thing that comes along to survive their adult lives.

I’m now an economist, and perhaps Equal Pay for Equal Work is the subject that is nearest and dearest too me.  We have another chance to right this problem.  What amazes me is that the current pay gap faced by my young daughters today –one being 25 and in her last year of med school and the other 18 and heading to university–is the same pay gap I faced at their age. This is one legacy I’d rather not leave to them. Women still earn 77 cents to men’s $1 for the same job with the same qualifications.  There is not one state in the country where women have gained traction on men’s pay.  There is an act now in Congress seeking to right this wrong once in for all,  it is called the Paycheck Fairness Act.

The Paycheck Fairness Act would “close loopholes that have allowed employers to avoid responsibility for discriminatory pay” and strengthen accountability in the workplace. The legislation increases penalties for sex discrimination in pay unless the company has a business-related reason for the inequality in wages. The PFA puts gender discrimination sanctions on equal footing with other forms of wage discrimination ­ such as those based on race, disability, or age, allowing women to file lawsuits for compensatory and punitive damages. The bill also prohibits employers retaliating against employees who share salary information with their co-workers. The legislation also strengthens opportunities for women. The Act requires that the Department of Labor “improve outreach and training efforts to work with employers in order to eliminate pay disparities” and “creates a new grant program to help strengthen the negotiation skills of girls and women.”

Source: From the Progress Reporthttp://pr.thinkprogress.org/

So think about which Senators would be most likely fighting for gender equality that would be the sponsors of the bill?   Yup, it’s our Hillary again. Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-NY) and Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) put this bill into play

The Institute of Women’s Policy Research found that this wage disparity will cost women anywhere from $400,000 to $2 million over a lifetime in lost wages. An April Senate report found that in contrast to previous slowdowns, the current economic downturn “is hitting women harder than men. They are suffering more job losses and larger reductions in wages than the general population.” 

I, like any parent, want to leave my children in a better position in life.  Just by having daughters instead of sons, I know they will suffer the same paycheck inequality that I have endured throughout my adult life.  This is yet another reason to thank Hillary and to write your Senators and Congress to support this Bill.

The senators that are sponsoring this bill:

The Paycheck Fairness Act is co-sponsored by Senators Joseph Biden (D-DE), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), Sherrod Brown (D-OH), Maria Cantwell (D-WA), Christopher Dodd (D-CT), Russell Feingold (D-WI), Tom Harkin (D-IA), Edward Kennedy (D-MA), John Kerry (D-MA), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ), Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Barbara Mikulski (D-MD), Patty Murray (D-WA), Jack Reed (D-RI), Harry Reid (D-NV), Charles Schumer (D-NY), and Bernard Sanders (I-VT).

Also, NOTICE who’s name is missing?  

For more information please go to Senator Clintons site:

http://clinton.senate.gov/news/statements/details.cfm?id=272301&&

Senators Clinton and Murray take on the HHS Department

Posted: July 17, 2008 | Author: | Filed under: Hillary Clinton: Her Campaign for All of Us, Women's Rights | Tags: , , , , , , | Comments Off on Senators Clinton and Murray take on the HHS Department

Yesterday, folks woke up to the new assault on birth control.  Shero’s Senator Clinton and Patty Murray are on top of this.   Both penis-impaired presidential candidates remain silent.   The is especially appalling because ONE of them was endorsed by NARAL.

From our Sheros:

“It is outrageous that the Bush administration is once again putting ideology over women’s health. Instead of undercutting access to contraception and family planning services, the Bush Administration should put prevention first,” said Senator Clinton.

“On the first day of his administration, the President reinstated the Mexico City global gag clause, a harsh, anti-family planning policy that hurt the world’s poorest women and children. Now, on his way out the door it appears that he is trying to limit women’s health care options here at home,” Murray said. “This misguided attempt to restrict health care services and limit access to contraceptives defeats our common goal of reducing the number of abortions in this country.”

Additionally, both Senators sent a joint letter to the Secretary that heads  the Health and Human Services Department:

Secretary Michael O. Leavitt
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services
200 Independence Avenue, S.W.
Washington, D.C. 20201

Dear Mr. Secretary:

It has come to our attention that the Department of Health and Human Services may be preparing draft regulations that would create new obstacles for women seeking contraceptive services.

One of the most troubling aspects of the proposed rules is the overly-broad definition of “abortion.” This definition would allow health-care corporations or individuals to classify many common forms of contraception – including the birth control pill, emergency contraception and IUDs – “abortions” and therefore to refuse to provide contraception to women who need it.

As a consequence, these draft regulations could disrupt state laws securing women’s access to birth control. They could jeopardize federal programs like Medicaid and Title X that provide family-planning services to millions of women. They could even undermine state laws that ensure survivors of sexual assault and rape receive emergency contraception in hospital emergency rooms.

We strongly urge you to reconsider these regulations before they are released. We are extremely concerned by this proposal’s potential to affect millions of women’s reproductive health.

Thank you for your attention to this matter.

Sincerely yours,
Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton
Senator Patty Murray

If Obama is serious about getting women’s votes, then he needs to get serious about standing up for women’s rights.  Where is the voice of the presumed democratic candidate for president on this issue?  It’s time for all women to get behind the movement to stop Obama’s  throne grab in Denver.

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