Mrs. Smith Goes to Washington
The LA Times describes how the heavens expressed themselves as Hillary reached the end of the road.
On Wednesday afternoon, Hillary Rodham Clinton visited her Arlington, Va., campaign headquarters and disclosed that she would finally concede her long primary fight. That same afternoon, a fierce storm system developed over northern Virginia and unleashed a tempest of high winds, driving rain and even a tornado. The heavenly outburst was a fittingly symbolic expression of the anger and frustration that defined the last days of a candidate who once seemed to have a lock on the Democratic Party's presidential nomination.
The scene recalls the foreboding Shakespeare described at Caesar's as the Ides of March approached:
Caesar:
Nor heaven nor earth have been at peace to-night:
Thrice hath Calpurnia in her sleep cried out,
'Help, ho! they murder Caesar!' Who's within?
Calpurnia:
Caesar, I never stood on ceremonies,
Yet now they fright me. ...When beggars die, there are no comets seen;
The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes.
The reason Hillary lost to Obama, the LAT article argues, is that she became absorbed by Washington. Prior to which she and her husband were hungry, young, outsiders determined to "reform the system". Lulled by years in capital, she became an 'insider' -- part of the problem.
To understand this, flash back to the early 1990s. Bill and Hillary Clinton, like Barack Obama today, first ran against Washington, promising to shake up and reform the city's insular political system. Receiving these irreverent young Arkansans with suspicion, the capital's mandarins warned them to learn the ropes quick. "Washington has its own totems and taboos," the Georgetown hostess and former Washington Post reporter Sally Quinn wrote. "You have to run against 'inside Washington' to get in, and you have to become 'inside Washington' to stay in."
And having lost the outsider status, the LAT suggests the heir to the crusading mantle has fallen on the broad shoulders of another reformer from Chicago: Barack Obama.
Obama skillfully used the Iraq war to make a larger, devastating case about how Washington does business. His core themes of hope, change and judgment all flowed from the catastrophic war the Washington establishment had initiated. And Obama turned Clinton into the living representation of that establishment and its myopic vision. This was hardly a novel approach: Indeed, Obama's campaign had many echoes of Bill Clinton's run against George H.W. Bush, making it all the more remarkable that Hillary failed to anticipate its strength.
This of course, is pure revisionist hogwash. The idea of the Arkansas or Chicago machines coming to Washington in order to reform it is about as accurate as the idea that the Vandals came to Rome to clean it up. But it's fair to say that each successive waves of "outsiders" who come to Washington promise to do something wonderful. And to keep the illusion viable the props must constantly be changed. The Clintons initially looked the part. But in the intervening years they simply got too old, coarse and threadbare to keep the show going. When the freshness faded it became necessary to audition for a new outsider. Appearances are probably more important in politics than in conjury. The spangles fix our gaze on the stage while the real magic takes place behind the curtains.
Hat tip: Macho Response.
The real magic is in the illusion which takes one ordinary politician and invests him with the public's dreams; which makes him become the dream itself while in reality preserving the ordinary flack who periodically appears and disappears, never really leaving the stage. The original impetus to limited government may have been based on the realization that a political tableau always had to be kept at distance; acceptable as entertainment and never much more than that.
Every great magic trick consists of three parts or acts. The first part is called "The Pledge". The magician shows you something ordinary: a deck of cards, a bird or a man. He shows you this object. Perhaps he asks you to inspect it to see if it is indeed real, unaltered, normal. But of course... it probably isn't. The second act is called "The Turn". The magician takes the ordinary something and makes it do something extraordinary. Now you're looking for the secret... but you won't find it, because of course you're not really looking. You don't really want to know. You want to be fooled. But you wouldn't clap yet. Because making something disappear isn't enough; you have to bring it back. That's why every magic trick has a third act, the hardest part, the part we call "The Prestige"."
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29 Comments:
And, after Hillary read the headline:
Is Obama a Citizen of the US and is he eligible to be President of the USA? she said, “I have changed my mind.
"I am back in the race and I want all of Obama’s delegates – now!
"If not I am running as an Independent.”
Yeah, we're afraid to disqualify Obama politically with solid conservative economic and social issues, so maybe we can just disqualify Obama on a technical knock out.
I took that movie, in DVD form, out of the local library a month ago. The Prestige. Michael Cain, I believe, made that speech. I hate to give it away but...David Bowie played Tesla. I didn't find that out until "Special Features."
Before the Ohio primary, whenever that was, I tried to deal with these issues, humorously in Hope Preserved, a bedtime story for America. I give some background to the New Deal here which figures mightily in the fairy tale.
And here is how it starts:
Boys and girls, once upon a time there was a celebrated political hack and manipulative genius by the name of Rod Axle. Despite what you may have heard, a professional political hack is not necessarily a bad person. Narrow minded people use to believe this, but we now recognize the many great and varied contributions Political Hacks have made to our society: the current state of our politics comes readily to mind.
One day Rod Axle meets a handsome, well spoken fellow that he thinks will make a wonderful "canned" Candidate for President. He is a newly elected Senator by the name of Audacious Hope: known nationally as "Otto" Hope, the man for whom hope is both "Otto-matic" and "Otto-magic." He is the son of disgruntled immigrants. His parents moved here from Shangri-la and were always a bit disappointed in their new home -- it rains at inconvenient times, for instance, and people grow old and die. But they concealed their dissatisfaction from their son, who grew up well adjusted, considering.
It goes on and on, in the same vain. Does anyone want to help with the illustrations? It's got this magic cave and this wild...sorry.
This fellow describes what sent both Hillary and Barry:
The Audacity of the Democrats
The LA Times wrote:
"That same afternoon, a fierce storm system developed over northern Virginia and unleashed a tempest of high winds, driving rain and even a tornado."
Just imagine the cosmic disasters in store when Mars goes into retrograde, Dec. 2009 to May 2010. But together we can reverse that retrograde! Yes we can!
A teaser:
"The Democratic Party has devolved into a club for the illegitimately aggrieved, the self-absorbed, the self-hating and the perpetually pissed-off. It is a sanctuary where solipsistic malcontents and their disjointed causes find refuge and support. It has long ceased being an earnest gathering of broad minds where man's timeless problems are examined against the backdrop of the Constitution and solutions to them proposed based on the actual realities of the human condition. It is now the political province of the intellectually deceased, where frightened, lock-step ideologues and other small men and women concoct and promote divisive, destructive, weird and cowardly policies developed within a not-so-quaint, quasi-Marxist stricture of gender, class and race."
Am I paranoid if I agree with most of what Mr. DiPippo states in the article?
Link to Joe Buz article
Joe, excuse me for jumping in.
No Prob...did my link up thread not work?
His core themes of hope, change and judgment all flowed from the catastrophic war the Washington establishment had initiated.
Yet that 'catastrophic war' was as much a media creation as He who would save us from it. The US entered into it with the approval of an overwhelming majority of the Congress, and it became, if you will, a national task to oust Saddam and replace him with a more or less stable governance.
When this task wasn't completed within the attention span of a TV special, the media used the violence (much of it made deliberately for media by Al-Q) as a stick to beat the hated Bush administration, and turned the war in to a daily defeatist spectacle and blame festival. The Bush failure to counter this allowed its political opponents to eagerly abandon their votes to start the war, and to demand an untimely end and retreat, damn the consequences and screw the military guys involved and at risk.
The breathtaking stupidity in the failure to keep the names and strong anti-Saddam statements by all those now-righteous denouncers of 'Bush's war' before the public is long past remedy. Yet the tactic was always available, and the administration's rejection of its own club hurt the proper prosecution of the war.
Had the media had any regard for that national task, and reported the strong civil and military success of the surge as it might have in former wars, the US by now should have rebounded in its morale, and the Bush fortunes with it. But, no. Anti-Bush trumps national pride in MSM thinking, and only the empty rhetoric of an Obama will do to inspire the kiyoodling pack - regardless of his lack of any executive accomplishments at all, and regardless of his successful evasions in declaring details of any proposed policy.
A cynical, treacherous and dangerously short-sighted, accomplishment by MSM waiting for chronicling by a future Edward Gibbon.
Joe,
Didn't for me, but I often have OHS problems.. (Operator Head Space)
When the portents surrounding Hillary's concession are forgotten, the spotlight will shift once again to Chicago. This is where it all is.
The Obama story is intertwined with the emergence of a new power group in Illinois that has upset the traditional balance of power. Formerly its politics was a 3 layer cake. Chicago, Cook County and the State. Chicago and Cook County were traditionally Democrat. The State, until recently was Republican.
In terms of honesty there was none. But there was a check and balance among thieves. Recently however, new coalitions began to form; the most important being Arab Americans of which Tony Rezko, Ali Ata, and Aiham Alsammarae were examples. They quickly made alliances with the Daleys and Blags, and after a moment of hesitation, threw in with them.
Among their allies were the Nation of Islam folks and sundry other groups in the Democratic Big Tent, hard operators all. But the alliance was not limited to them. The "Chicago combine" as they were styled, seemed entirely ecumenical where money was concerned. The one color they saw was green.
But the ambitions of the combine were not limited to the state. They were going places. Blag, not Barack was originally slated to become the Presidential candidate for 2008.
A few years ago the FBI began moving into the state in such large numbers that it became the biggest Bureau operation in the United States. Their campaign against the Combine was called Operation Board Game. Obama was still a relatively insignificant figure then and the priority target was probably Blag.
Since then it has been war. Mostly off the pages, but war all the same. It was obvious to the Combine from the first that Board Games was a mortal threat to them, and they apprently tried to deep six it via their conduits to the White House. They failed, but Blag, Obama, Rezko and countless others have been legally and operationally wary of the investigation for a long time because they knew it was directed at them.
Fitzgerald has been circling around his real targets. One is definitely the governor. After sweeping up some minor players and making them turn sing, Fitzgerald went after Rezko, as a way of going up the ladder. There have been hints throughout his investigation that he will introduce other cases later, involving the Governor and possibly the Senator.
We are watching the flaying of Tony Rezko. Rezko was the low-hanging fruit. And he was in too deep to completely cover his tracks and high enough to know the real Mr Bigs. So Fitzgerald leaned on him. He's too hot for either the Blag or BHO to openly help. Tony might be their friend, but Tony knows the rules. All the same, every firewall firewalls than can be erected is probably going up.
As Rezko was pulled into the net, two types of connections began to trail from him. The first were hooks into the governor, the senator and to the various planning and regulatory boards -- his wires into the entire machinery of traditional state, county and city corruption. But the second set led to the Chicago Arab community.
They had been looking for a political role for a long time and hesitated between the Republicans and Democrats, often supporting both. But something changed in recent years to make many of the leading Arabs throw in with the Democrats.
Now the combine has mutated into something very large indeed. I believe the two factors were the possibility of national political ambition and the emergence of international connections. Quite independently of the traditional Chicago pols, the Arabs could reach back to their traditional contacts in the Old Countries. And we know what sort of countries those are.
One of those dragged in was billionaire and former Saddam moneyman Nahdi Auchi. Suddenly there synergy with the national political ambition angle. With Blag down, and Barack running unchecked down the field, the players were excited.
Where will it end? Who knows. But one thing to remember is that much of the Board Game investigation (which is being likened in Chicago to the second Untouchables episode) was run by the FBI. Fitzgerald might be in charge, but not all the pieces in his shop belong to him.
I think Fitgerald's problem is to decide where the investigation should not go. The corruption goes through all the levels of Illinois and all the way to the CPA day in Baghdad. This has given Board Games not only a domestic corruption angle, but national political significance and an international terror/espionage dimension.
A lot of Democrats and probably not a few Republicans, are in legal jeopardy if Board Games burns out of control. As it is, a whole bunch of both Republicans and Democrats are probably headed for indictment in some capacity or the other.
What's the end point? Originally it was probably to smash the Combine. Assuming that goalhasn't changed, my guess is that like the Capone investigation the denoument here will be indictments against major political figures ostensibly to do with real estate irregularities or financial shennanigans. But the substantial goal is to break down the power of a gang that has gotten too dangerous to allow.
I don't think anybody believes that Board Games will actually clean up Chicago. The dirt is too ingrained. But the investigation is probably intended to prune or limit the growth of the organization.
Obama's successful candidacy and possible, even probable victory in November potentially changes everything for the Combine. If he gets into White House he can ride back as the Cavalry. So with Blag circling the wagons and Rezko already hung up to dry a lot depends on Barack, one way or the other.
Rezko, for example, was trying to interest the Emir of Qatr in his deals. Another member of the Combine with connections in the Old Country was Ali Ata.
Another prominent Chicago area Arab-American with hooks into the Middle East was Talat Othman, the first man in history to open a Republican Convention with a Muslim prayer.
From 1978 to 1983, Mr. Othman was General Manager and Chief Executive Officer of the Saudi Arab Finance Corporation, Luxembourg, and General Manager of the Saudi Investment Group, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia.
So there's something in it for everyone. Democrat bashers and Republican haters. One can understand why the national media want to look away from this ocean of s..t where everyone is up to their noses in it. "Don't make waves. Don't make waves."
The Thunder Run has linked to this post in the - Web Reconnaissance for 06/10/2008 A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day...so check back often.
I see no larger truth in Democrat Party internecine affairs. Hillary lost to Obama for 3 reasons. None of them cosmic. and it was a very close run thing.
First. Everybody hates Hillary. They always have. She is not very likable. Further, she and he husband abused the party very badly. When Bill was impeached in January, 1999, he should have resigned on January 21. Al Gore would have been able to run as an incumbent. He would probably be finishing his 10th year as President currently.
Second. Obama's people did a great job of gaming the system. The rules of the Democrat party allowed them to game the caucus system in many states, most of those small and rural. They produced his pledged delegate majority.
Third. Hillary ignored the caucuses, to her detriment. But, the Clintons elbowed Tom Vilsack off the stage as a favorite son in Iowa when they knew they would have a tough time winning the state. Edwards was the Iowa favorite after Vilsack dropped out. But Obama won.
Time for Obama to throw Reid under the bus?
/crazy thought
One of the most impressive acts of misdirection during the past decade or so has been the ability of a left-leaning media-political complex to present itself chief critic and opposition to an establishment it also largely controls.
Thus, we are offered Bill Clinton and Barack Obama as 'alternatives' to an institutional Washington and a permanent government (courts, bureaucrats) which largely shares their worldview.
Here's the Invulnerable Wretch -
it's fair to say that each successive waves of "outsiders" who come to Washington promise to do something wonderful. And to keep the illusion viable the props must constantly be changed. The Clintons initially looked the part. But in the intervening years they simply got too old, coarse and threadbare to keep the show going. When the freshness faded it became necessary to audition for a new outsider. Appearances are probably more important in politics than in conjury...
Clarity re the limits of the Clintons or any career pols is always welcome - but Wretch is offering up an absolutely cynical take on Democracy in America - I'm reminded of a Third Worldist's line on American pols (And not for the first time - think again on that hanmas/Fatah Obama/Hillary equation that WRetch hasn't yet repudiated.) It occurs to me that Wretch's attempt to invent for himself an oracular voice of intellectual authority requires that he never allow that his opinions are less than infallible...It's the voice of a wannabe aristo - Someone who disdains the give and take of the USA - Further evidence that Wretch just isn't at home here - He's no Tocquville...
Though perhaps he's a master of the universe of Chicago politics. Don't know though, how's his most recent poltical projection look right now?...Would you trust the guy who offered the following reading of Hillary's pre-concession speech to give you the best analysis of Chicago politics?...
But it is the last line which is most loaded with menace. "I want … the nearly 18 million Americans who voted for me to be respected, to be heard, and to no longer be invisible." This is not a declaration of war. It's a proclamation of rebellion. Hillary is not going to win within the party frame so she will threaten to win outside of it.
The Nashville Post parses Hillary's speech as an invitation to make a deal.
Was Clinton essentially saying to Obama, “Listen Hoss, we can do this the easy way or we can do this the hard way. You can either pick me as your Vice President and we can hold hands together as a ticket and I can become your defacto co-president or I can continue this campaign as “a listening tour” on how to best serve the interests of my popular vote-winning 18 million voters all the way to the convention.”
Maybe. Hillary has done some dumb things and nothing prevents her from doing more dumb things. But if she has this move properly gamed out and is raising the stakes, then why settle for second place? Rebellion is an all-or-nothing business as Jefferson Davis well knew.
The rational interpretation is that Hillary is angling for the Vice-Presidency. But to win it -- and more -- she has to play as if she wants to be the Big Kahuna. If nothing else, Hillary can threaten to become Ross Perot in a pantsuit. "
On the other hand Wretchard, if Obama loses, it's Gotterdamerung time. Total destruction of the Machine, including not just Blags and Daley but Farrakhan, and the Arab Community around them tying into the ME terror regimes.
So it's high stakes.
The problem with the corrupt machines is that the components, particularly the Farrakhan ones, create opposition to Obama and Democrats. Farrakhan and ME terror regimes are just poison.
Whiskey & Wretchard:
Given the mix of Chicago-style politics, racially-driven "it's our time" politics, Arab-world money and (electronic or otherwise) voter fraud, are we seeing the unfolding of a scenario where Obama simply *can't* lose?
Wretch's inside dope on Chi-town seems to be based on Evelyn PRingl's pieces (I won't say reporting because the work in question seems to be extrapolated from earlier journalism in the local papers (who have since exonerated O?) I couldn't quite follow the line in Pringles Board GAmes piece, which Wretch invokes above - Given that the whole point of investigative reporting is to break it down, that doesn't say much for her work. Of course maybe I'm just exceptionally dim...
But, since I wasn't able to evaluate her info on my own, thought I'd look into her background - Turns out she is a pretty partisan Clinton supporter - But her real fave was...John Murtha...
"As for presidential candidates, the name John Murtha should be added to the ballot, as he seems to be about the only member of Congress willing to go public and speak from the heart when trying to get the rest of Congress to recognize the need for an immediate plan to rescue our young men and women stranded in Iraq."
That's from a Pringle piece in "Counterpunch" A deeply untrustworthy source of info run by Alex Cockburn (whose father was a proud Stalinist). The apple didn't fall far from the tree. Cockburn is known (on the left) for his being famously fast and loose with the truth. Great friend of Chomsky. A sharp and deeply unprincipled argufier - serous hater of Israel. Hard to imagine anyone at the Club id-ing too much with the angles of a Counterpunch reporter - cept maybe C-4...
Pringle's big gig prior to "exposing" Obama was following the money in IRaq and accusing Bushies of war profiteering. She probably scored a few points. And Obama - like pretty much EVERY pol - has had some unsavory connections. Taht's one reason WHY his inerntet approach to the moneyball has been so foundational. It's freed him from the REzkos. If O had not found a more democratic way to play the game, I'd be as skeptical of his rhetoric as you guys are...
Pringle. Not even a potato chip?! This is getting pathetic...
Wretchard - you are amazing. Where are you getting all this information? I'm stunned, particularly, in that you're delivering names, dates and times from Australia ... stuff I've never seen printed here in the US on either the internet or in MSM.
I knew the Muslims were taking over Detroit, but I didn't realize they had bought Chicago, too. You'd think Daley & Hoffa Jrs. would be annoyed about that.
P.S. I'm more and more seeing Obama and Michelle as MacBeth and his bloody lady, rather than some cheery MGM movie about newly-elected politicians moving to Washington, DC. Especially when you start talking about fierce storms, and thunder and lightening.
Couldn't you see MacBeth and Lady MacBeth doing a fist bump in celebration?
Unfortunately this is where the energy of our media "investigators" will go. The same folks who minimize the machinations of the Democrat Machine in Chicago will say that trying to rebuild a country in the middle of a war is no excuse. But from Sen. Obama they will accept "This is not the incredibly corrupt bastard I knew" as an excuse.
Those who fight the useless, pretend war in Iraq must be judged harshly. Those that fight the real war -- for control of the US government by the left -- must be given every understanding.
The Left thinks that Democratic Party Corruption in Chicago is cute. Sure they are corrupt bastards. But they are the left's corrupt bastards.
Benj wrote:
Of course maybe I'm just exceptionally dim...
At last something we can agree on!
Ditto in agreement.
Exceptionally.
Watch as a genuinely brilliant black writer smacks OB around and points him out for the offensive cretin he is.
http://townhall.com/columnists/ThomasSowell/2008/06/10/cocky_ignorance?page=full&comments=true
Chicago Trib piece linked to by Instapundit - I'm sure Wretch will get around to pointing Clubbers to it but just in case it slips him mind...
Let's clarify Obama deal with Rezko
Eric Zorn | Change of Subject
June 10, 2008
"John McCain didn't borrow money from a guy going to jail to build his house."
—Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) discussing Sen. Barack Obama on Sunday's "This Week with George Stephanopoulos"
Perhaps Graham was simply confused. After all, there are many fine points to remember in the story of the land deal involving Obama and fundraiser Antoin "Tony" Rezko, and off-the-cuff summaries can blur the truth.
Obama didn't borrow a dime from Rezko to buy—not build—a house three years ago.
But now that Rezko is, in fact, "going to jail"—he's actually already serving prison time after his conviction last week on federal corruption charges—and Obama is the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, it's time for a handy cheat sheet for pols and pundits tempted to incorporate this tale into their campaign narratives.
So for the gentleman from South Carolina and other befuddled parties, here are '08 things you need to know about how and why the Obamas and Rezkos purchased adjoining properties in the Kenwood neighborhood on the same day in 2005.
1. The deal could have gone down without Rezko. While it's true that the couple who sold the house to the Obamas and the adjoining vacant lot to Rezko's wife required the deals to close on the same day, there was at least one other serious bidder on the lot.
2. The Obamas did not get a special discount on the house. Yes, the original asking price was $1.95 million and the sale price was $1.65 million. But the sellers have confirmed that the sale price was the result of routine real estate negotiations and was the best offer they received on the house.
3. The sellers rejected two lower bids—$1.3 million, then $1.5 million—from the Obamas.
4. The Rezkos did not pay an inflated price for the vacant lot. Obama has said his broker told him another interested party had already put in a bid on the lot at or close to the asking price of $625,000. No one has challenged this.
5. The Obamas didn't get a special discount from the Rezkos when they later purchased one-sixth of the vacant lot to enlarge their yard. The price the Obamas paid, $104,500, was a neat one-sixth of the price of the lot and more than double the value Obama said his appraiser put on the strip. The remaining portion of the vacant lot reportedly sold earlier this year for $675,000.
6. The Obamas did not receive or borrow any money from the Rezkos to buy their house. They took out a $1.3 million mortgage and paid the balance with proceeds from Obama's best-selling books.
7. Obama hasn't done any political or personal favors for Rezko since this saga began. The best that critics can come up with is that Obama allowed the son of a Rezko business associate to serve a one-month, unpaid internship in his office in 2005.
8. The reason Obama is nevertheless correct in describing his actions here as "boneheaded" is that Rezko is and was a sleazeball. Many of the warning signs were obvious in 2005, and Obama blew through them.
That doesn't reflect well on him, I agree. But neither does it turn this otherwise ordinary real estate story into a scandal, or excuse those who can't, or don't want, to keep the above facts straight.
Clip and save.
American Exception - Unlike Others, U.S. Defends Freedom to Offend in Speech -
As more countries move to ban or restrict hate speech, some legal scholars say the U.S. should reconsider the broad scope of First Amendment protection.
Not sure how but I missed this page till now. Just a question about not doing anything for Rezko since 2005, but that would be since he went to Washington DC and doesn't include the letters written on behalf of a certain Iranian after 2005, and as most of his time has been spent running for a higher office it only makes sense that he would not have more than letter writing time for Tony, he certainly did not have time for his senatorial seat, for his constituents in Iraq or Afghanistan (I am referring to US troops, not those other constituents), and no time for dealing with the mundane and arcane aspects of being a freshman Senator and learning the ropes. That is some Odd-acid-tea, Awed-hasty-spree, or summin like that "OH" says alot.
If for no other reason the whole Chicago machine ought to be run down on principle, its wrong. If "OH" misses the mud and comes clean all the better for him, but with so many locked away from Illinois, his base is rather flimsy.
Meanwhile I think its time to put the planks of "OH" platform under the review, and see where the dream will take us. Will it lift us up in a rapture like embrace, or send us careening downward.
Doubt about his past doubt about his future. Audacity, indeed.
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