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Mar
7
One of the most persuasive legal arguments anyone can make is often preceded by, “even if we accept everything as true…”
And so I’m going to start this post with: Even if we accept everything that Democratic primary presidential candidate and Senator Barack Obama foreign policy advisor, Harvard Kennedy School of Government/Yale grad/Harvard law school grad/Pulitzer Prize winner for a book about genocide Samantha Power said here about Democratic primary presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is true, what in the world did Power mean when she characterized Ohio as being “obsessed”?
Here’s the Scotsman section about that:
…clearly rattled by the Ohio defeat, Ms Power told The Scotsman Mrs Clinton was stopping at nothing to try to seize the lead from her candidate.
“We f***** up in Ohio,” she admitted. “In Ohio, they are obsessed and Hillary is going to town on it, because she knows Ohio’s the only place they can win.
“She is a monster, too – that is off the record – she is stooping to anything,” Ms Power said, hastily trying to withdraw her remark.
Ms Power said of the Clinton campaign: “Here, it looks like desperation. I hope it looks like desperation there, too.
“You just look at her and think, ‘Ergh’. But if you are poor and she is telling you some story about how Obama is going to take your job away, maybe it will be more effective. The amount of deceit she has put forward is really unattractive.”
And the whole she asked for it to be off the record once she said it thing? I don’t know how the Scotsman got her talking, but their publishing of it was completely legit. I’ve also had to remind a local politician that communications with me were on the record, unless specifically identified otherwise. That’s just how it works, and they know. Power really should know given her background.
As for Ohio being obsessed? We’re obsessed about our plight, about our hopes and our dreams, for Ohio and beyond. What political campaign doesn’t have as its goal to get its supporters to be obsessed? I resent her remark that, “In Ohio, they are obsessed…”
What a naive statement. I hope she wasn’t advising on how to handle Ohio for our primary.
By Jill Miller Zimon at 11:24 am March 7th, 2008 in Barack Obama, Campaigning, Ohio, Politics, WH2008
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27 Responses to ““Ohio is obsessed” says Obama foreign policy advisor, but over what?”
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Obama foreign policy advisor
That would be ex-advisor (link).
I predict McCain in November; Obama’s team will and are embarrassing him, they will prevent him from any potential selection as VP by Clinton and she will not take the VP from him. They are fracturing the party, and you can blame it on Obama, he needs her to win, he needs to be her VP and his potential is for 2016 and he and his people are actually blowing that opportunity. They will get aggressive and prevent solidarity in the party, prevent it from even being possible to run on each others tickets and in result insure the republicans get the white house.
It says a lot about the class and integrity of the Obama campaign that she is gone for using the word Monster. The first and only smear I have heard from anyone in the Obama campaign
The Clinton campaign should follow suit with her staff, but don’t hold your breath.
Obsessed? She should pay attenton to the considerable number of Obama supporters who are obsessed with Obama and gan give no substantive answer as to why they support him. People in glass houses should not throw rocks.
anyone think she isn’t a monster?
That’s irrelevant, you know it and it’s also not the topic of this post.
What do you think she thinks Ohio is obsessed about?
i’ll decide what’s relevant to me, jill, thank you. like the fact that you were so ashamed of supporting hillary clinton and in the end voting for her that you can’t bring yourself to even say it in writing.
someone once said the definition of a gaffe is the accidental telling of the truth.
Whatever, Tim.
When you want to address what’s meant by “Ohio is obsessed,” I hope you’ll post about it.
jill, cut the crap. you’ve been saying for weeks you aren’t supporting hillary, leaning democrat, blah blah blah, and here you are literally repeating word for word the latest line of attack from the hillary campaign. word for word.
ohio being obsessed isn’t what’s irrelevant now, since ohio has already been race-baited and fear-mongered into voting for your candidate with a net gain of 9 delegates for the candidate you refuse to say in writing you support.
This post is about someone calling Ohio obsessed. If you want to write a post at BSB about whether a vote is an endorsement or not, go for it.
no this post is about you parroting precisely the same words that every clinton surrogate has spewed in the last 24 hours, jill. which is the entire content of this post, save your ohio spin.
if you want to split hairs and parse whether or not you voted for hillary, whether or not that vote was an endorsement, and whether or not that endorsement includes your active participation in the gutter politics the clinton campaign has engaged in over the last 3 months, that’s fine. knock yourself out.
personally, i can’t fathom how that logical pretzel twisting makes the slightest bit of sense to you, but hey, blogging is a sociological experiment in many ways, and it’s kinda fun to watch you wiggle around in it.
If, Jill’s blogging is a sociological experiment.
Then, Tim’s blogging is a sociopathic experiment.
In Ohio we are obsessed I believe means we are obsessed with the Clinton’s. I saw quite a bit of evidence of that at the events here in Toledo where people waited in line for hours to see Bill Clinton and Hillary Clinton. Even some Republicans I know went to the Bill Clinton event just to be able to see him. Since I was there talking to people and seeing why they were there, I experienced first hand the many reasons why people were supporting Hillary or wanted to see her or Bill. I think the Obama campaign under-estimated the way some in Ohio still feel about the Clinton’s and what Ohio was like then compared to now.
The irony is some of those who supported Clinton did so because of hope, hope that under her America would have a chance of returning to what it was like under the last Clinton. The logic to them is that it is more possible because they feel they “know” them. Some of course were probably more pragmatic as to their reasoning, as I was.
At the Obama event I attended people yelled, “Yes we can” at the Clinton event people yelled, “Yes we will”. Dedicated Obama supporters and dedicated Clinton supporters both believe their candidate is “the one” – it’s the rest of the people who have not made up their minds that will come into play.
I’m not engaging with you because you demonstrate no sincerity whatsoever in actually wanting to do so. You are in “trying to get them to gotcha mode.” I’m not interested in playing.
If you want to talk about the difference between exercising the right to vote versus being a supporter a candidate the way you are, you’re on. If you want to talk about why Power would talk about Ohio being obsessed, ditto. Otherwise, it’s not a happening thing here.
Following my better judgement, Anon, I will say, no comment. But thanks – my sociology professors would be proud.
The more things change, the more they stay the same re: “Dedicated Obama supporters and dedicated Clinton supporters both believe their candidate is “the one” – it’s the rest of the people who have not made up their minds that will come into play.”
Thanks for the comment, Lisa Renee. I think when it comes to active supporters, they all can be described as obsessed. It just looks so weird when you see it in the context of the Power interview, but I guess it’s really just an observation.
Hi Jill,
I read it as “they” as meaning the Clinton campaign, not the people of Ohio. But if it is referring to the people of Ohio I would guess she would be referring to NAFTA because I believe she was discussing this in conjunction with the perceived attack on Austen Goolsbee in the “NAFTA-gate” memo scandal.
newsflash jill – i don’t want to talk about Hillary Clinton’s talking points, which you so obviously have parroted, both here, and on the BBC at 3 a.m. London time for all the expats listening on short wave in Liberia.
i’m not interested in Hillary smears except to the extent that I can discredit them, because i’m an Obama supporter.
you want to talk about Samantha Power. now, why would that be? because you’re oh so objective and impartial and undecided and un-endorsing and don’t support anyone, you just vote?
give me a break.
for all the huffing and puffing you have done about being a partisan blogger and how that makes you so different from other MSM, you sure are acting just like the MSM. guess you want to have your cake and eat it too.
Tim, what you write does’t resonate from anything I’ve written or said. Why you are so unhappy about how I write or what I say, I just cannot fathom. I’ve always been honest about the conflicted way I feel about a lot of different things. I wish I wasn’t so unenthused this year about the prez candidates but that’s the way it is.
Your ranting and raving about parroting etc. doesn’t make it so. It’s your perception – and of course, you are welcome to it.
not ranting and raving jill. just trying to make it clear to your readers, as you pointedly have not, that you are not neutral.
you are a hillary supporter, and you are parroting those talking points word for word, and you want your readers to think that this is somehow a neutral observation on your part. it ain’t. and it hasn’t been for weeks.
for example, why did you originally entitle this post “Samanta Power called Ohioans obsessed – though obviously not enough about her candidate” – a line which appears in my browser as the title of this post, but not on your blog as you have edited it.
one headline is blatantly partisan, the new, improved, edited version is couched in some “gee, wonder what that means” journalistic curiosity. what a crock.
jill, there was a time when this level of duplicity used to upset you, or at least cause you to pause and wonder about someone’s agenda and credibility. i guess when you’re doing it, someone calling you on it is ranting and raving.
Tim – I’m the first one to walk, blog and talk about your incisive mind when it comes to politics. You can see what I say however you want to – I’d only suggest that if you want to persuade anyone that a) I’m a Clinton “supporter” b) I’m parroting her talking points and c) I think I’m neutral, you went to law school – line up the evidence. I suspect it will be evidence that you’ve interpreted this way – and that’s fine. But I don’t imagine you’re going to find a ton of readers here or people who know me who will feel the same way.
As I wrote before – I can’t figure out why you insist on characterizing what I’ve written and what I say this way. What’s your MO here?
(the title thing has to do with wordpress SEO crap, Tim – I’ll send you the screenshot)
you know what my MO is, jill. no one knows what yours is.
that’s the point.
Well – I don’t think “no one knows” mine but I’ll take that as a compliment and a sign that I’m doing what I want to do.
I just want it to be August 30th, Tim. No one wanted Ohio’s primary to be pointless more than me.
if what you are setting out to do is be deceptive in your motives, congrats. mission most assuredly accomplished.
remember that bullshit detector bloggers have? pegging right now.
I can’t control what you think, Tim – no one can.
As I’ve mentioned before and sent you, here are my straw polls from 1/07 and 4/07 – I stand by them. If I’ve learned anything from the race so far, I’ve learned that when you want someone who isn’t running strong, you have to help them if you really want them – I fault myself for not fighting harder for Biden or Richardson:
1/22/07:
And from 4/28/07:
This is exactly the problem I see with Obama supporters, if they don’t like what they see or hear, they go completely ballistic, overly derogatory and just downright scary in the way they beat someone down. Is this the hope and change that we face if Obama is elected President ? You will conform to our views or else we will find you and flame you and beat the crap out of you one way or the other. Is this the inclusion everyone is talking about ? We must believe in what you want us to believe and nothing else ? If so, that is not the America I want.
Thanks, Peter – I’m pretty sure you aren’t alone in your observations and sentiments. How do you feel about the choices left at this point?