Tuesday, January 24, 2006

Swiftboating Our Own


There are still three years to go but already some Democrats are forming a circular firing squad. Karl Rove must be laughing so hard his pants will never dry. Can Democrats ever learn to allow candidates the dignity of running for an office before trashing them?

Of course thinking Democrats are courteous and mindful of what they say about their own. They know that every single word that is negative toward another Democrat is savored by the Repugnuts to be used against them in campaigns.

Although there have been minor criticisms, we have noted that deliberate trashing of a possible presidential candidate has been minor - that is until lately. Now the forces behind the scenes that run the Democrat Party are setting the stage to once again “manage” the grass roots to slime a potential candidate they have chosen to defeat.

Senator Hillary Clinton has a huge popular majority over any other potential candidate and their agenda is to bring her down any way they can. And, it is also the agenda of the Republicans who fear that she can beat any candidate they offer.

These Dem leaders are the same ones that spun the grass roots candidate Howard Dean off mark and put Kerry in place [“Because lil’ children, Kerry can win and Dean cannot”]. Hiding in the murky mud, they will twist the tails of Liberals to make them do their dirty work, knowing how easily many of them can be incited to hate.

Right now we see a pattern forming and there is still three years to go. There may have been others but Cindy Sheehan was the first to catch our attention as she ignored the words and deeds of other Democrats to aim hateful, unproven and ugly charges against Senator Hillary Clinton.

Her remarks got more play in the media than any dozen Hollywood stars caught with their pants down, stoked on dope or fornicating with totem poles. And she is one who sincerely wants an end to the Repugnuts constant wars and killing and has strived and suffered mightily with great risk to inform others and bring the Bush regime down.

Next it was Arianna Huffington who smeared Senator Clinton in her blog, not just once but at every opportunity – again while totally ignoring or being just slightly critical of other Democrats who have been just as blameworthy as the Senator.

And most recently, Molly Ivins has joined in the vicious, nasty chorus of Swiftboating Senator Hillary Clinton, with her latest column. As much as we love and respect Molly, we think she has miss-stepped here, as she did when she early on humorously introduced us to “Shrub” as a likeable and harmless boob.

One can laud her/his choice without slime-ing another. There are better ways to denote one’s preference for president without singling out one candidate to trash and accuse of things that plenty of other Democratic politicians are just as guilty of.

In the short run these three women have given great glee to those Democrats full of hate that fear the specter of a woman president. They have encouraged wanna-be writers and talking heads to bloveate in the same hate vein thus spreading the venom.

In the long run they have also given the Senator more publicity and awakened more people determined to support her if she does make a presidential bid. But this particular circular firing squad has fired a nasty volley at one of their own gender and given aid and comfort to those Democrats who would rather hate than win.

And most tragically, they have won the praises and admiration of Karl Rove and all his friends in the White House for doing their job so brilliantly for them.
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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Thank You!
Some leadership in the party would help.
Where is Tip O'neil when You need him?

beervolcano said...

Senator Hillary Clinton has a huge popular majority over any other potential candidate

Only to hardcore "base" Democrats.

The rest of the country hates her.

Her nomination in 2008 will mean another 4 years of Republican rule.

Hillary is a losing bet.

Anonymous said...

Our top priority should be to get the Republicans out of power. To that end we should rally behind any Democratic candidate who can win. I absolutley couldn't stand Kerry, but I voted for him knowing that he'd be a small step in the right direction - and we didn't take that step, and look what happened.

Whether anyone likes her or not, Hillary has the best chance to win against any candidate with an R after their name. And if she runs things the way Bill did, that's a thousand percent better than the way they're being run now.

You are absolutely correct that we need to quit doing Rove's job for him. We will never get this country back on the right track if we continue to eat our own.

Anonymous said...

I completely disagree with this post. We must not be afraid to criticize and temper the steel of every candidate for major office, with the understanding that once the choice is made in the primaries, we will pull for the surviving candidate. We're not 'giving' Rove anything in terms of ammunition. In fact, a vigorous and energetically contested primary race motivates more people and gets them involved. I think Howard Dean did a great job of getting people involved in the political process early, and they stayed in, worked hard, gave money and, in my opinion, won the election. So rather than continue to bicker among ourselves while the right cooks up yet another stolen election, I'm sure our time is better used by putting together our plans to win as many local, state, and Congressional races as we can possibly manage in November. Right now is a good time to be recruiting block captains, planning voter registration drives, doing fundraisers for candidates, and talking up the issues with our neighbors, coworkers, family, and friends.