SubscribeAnd he was upset with his own campaign after a low-level staffer referred in a press release to Clinton as "(D-Punjab)" because of her ties to supporters of India. "I don't want you guys freelancing and, quote, protecting me from what you're doing," he lectured his staff. "I'm saying this loud and clear—no winks, no nods here," he said, irritated to take the heat for a clumsy dirty trick he had not known about and would never have authorized. "I'm looking at every one of you. If you think you're close to the line, the answer isn't to protect me—the answer is to ask me."It's exactly that kind of dignity and integrity that helped set his campaign apart from-- and above-- any other in my memory.
With all of this post-mortem, throwing-under-the-bus activity by Republican faithful of their sacred goat Sarah Palin, I'm hopeful that she'll last all of five minutes in the 2012 primary.No, no, what liberals need to spend the next few years doing is convincing conservatives that they're TERRIFIED of the powerhouse that is Sarah Palin.
The debates unnerved both candidates. When he was preparing for them during the Democratic primaries, Obama was recorded saying, "I don't consider this to be a good format for me, which makes me more cautious. I often find myself trapped by the questions and thinking to myself, 'You know, this is a stupid question, but let me … answer it.' So when Brian Williams is asking me about what's a personal thing that you've done [that's green], and I say, you know, 'Well, I planted a bunch of trees.' And he says, 'I'm talking about personal.' What I'm thinking in my head is, 'Well, the truth is, Brian, we can't solve global warming because I f---ing changed light bulbs in my house. It's because of something collective'."
On a cold midmorning in January 2007, Hillary sat in the sunny living room of her house on Whitehaven Street in Washington, a well-to-do enclave off Embassy Row where she lived with her mother and, on occasion, her husband. She was finishing a last round of policy prep with her aides before getting on a plane to Iowa for her first big campaign swing. In a moment of quiet, she looked around the living room and said, to no one in particular, "I so love this house. Why am I doing this?"She didn't seem like the reluctant candidate.
Her policy director, Neera Tanden, and her advertising director, Mandy Grunwald, laughed, a little too lightheartedly. Clinton went on. "I'm so comfortable here. Why am I doing this?"
Tanden spoke up. "The White House isn't so bad," she said.
"I've been there," said Clinton.
"I'm saying this loud and clear—no winks, no nods here," he said, irritated to take the heat for a clumsy dirty trick he had not known about and would never have authorized. "I'm looking at every one of you. If you think you're close to the line, the answer isn't to protect me—the answer is to ask me."Who else feels we just elected Jed Bartlet?
That December of 2006, Obama told Craig and Stevens, "Lay off me for a while. I've got to talk to Michelle." Obama went off to Hawaii with his wife and two girls for the holidays. "I thought, 'We're dead'," recalled Craig. "He's not going to be able to do it."Chapter 1, Section 2:
Obama had laid out his vision for the campaign on the day after the midterm elections in 2006.Midterms happened on November 7, 2006. Why would you lay out your vision for your presidential campaign to other people... before you had your family's sign-off on running in the first place?
a special team of reporters who were granted year-long access on the condition that none of their findings appear until after Election Day.So this isn't a case even of holding back information. These journalists are reporting information they would never even have had access to without the arrangement for this special story. It doesn't really preclude the activities of other journalists who are reporting on the campaign in more traditional ways - in fact, the intra-trade gossip that probably flowed from this Newsweek story may have resulted in more hints and leads for journalists doing regular reporting on the campaign trail.
But maybe they didn't try any of this because they kept underestimating him?One of the themes that kept coming up during the election and in the article was the idea that both Hillary and McCain thought very little of Obama at the end of the day. They seemed to be shocked that people paid attention to him -- "I don't expect everyone to like ME, but how can they possibly go for HIM?" was the tone that came through at a number of times.
“You don’t say that out loud,” McCain said. “If you have to do things, you have to do things, and you work with the Pakistani government.”To me, this seemed like an attempt to claim all the experience, all the knowledge, all the foreign policy skill -- 'I've been everywhere, man!' But it backfired for me and, apparently, a lot of people. Playing the experience card made him look (1) old, like your grandpa recounting war stories; 2) scary and black-hatted and sneakily Cold War-ish and 3) outdated and ineffectual -- you have that much experience and have had that much involvement and this is the world you created?
"America remains a center-right country. Democrats should not make the mistake of viewing Tuesday's results as a repudiation of conservatism or a validation of big government. Neither should we. Instead of throwing in the towel, as our opponents demand, we must redouble our efforts to develop forward-looking solutions to the challenges Americans face - solutions rooted in the enduring principles of reform that define us as a party. We need to focus on winning the issues, one by one, and presenting principled, superior alternatives that reflect the center-right priorities of the American people, rather than the self-serving priorities of Washington."You see what he did there? "Center-right". Even GOP pols like Boehner are disavowing the Talibaptists. The "anonymous source" telling FOX that Palin didn't know what countries were in Africa and thought Africa was a country is a part of that. Just as many had predicted, Palin and her snake-handling zealots are now seen as an unstable liability. I think only John Bolton remains a fan of Palin (anyone watching BBC on election night might know what I'm talking about here), as the rest of the GOP is taking that "shameful morning-after" routine with her and the other religious extremists.
I hate Clinton as much as the next guy, probably more than the next guy, but part of what makes this such a trashy read to me (if enjoyable) is how blatantly biased it is towards Obama.I'm not sure. Around the primaries I was pretty neutral between Obama and Clinton but as things wore on my vagueish concerns about Clinton's pre-demonized nature morphed into concerns that she just wasn't very good at landing effective punches against an opponent. Obama, everything else aside, was just a lot better at playing the game of politics effectively. I don't mean that in a bad way -- being the president is a fundamentally political role. And the ability to accomplish one's goals without thrashing is critical.
# O NOES MAVERICkS! PLEEZ DONT UNLEASH YOUR AWESOME BASE-MOBILIZNG POWERZ ON US!excellent. the plan is already working.
Earlier this week, Obama campaign advisors told Herald correspondent Casey Woods that, while not fluent in Spanish, Obama can understand it, and that he picked up this skill as a Chicago community organizer. That may be stretching it: In an interview earlier this year, Obama told me that he doesn't speak Spanish, nor has he ever visited a Spanish-speaking Latin American country.Whether he speaks, understands or is simply parroting what an advisor is telling him, I don't doubt he'd be able to pick it up quickly if he needed to, and may well have a vested interest in doing so considering the growing importance of both the Hispanic vote in the US and Central and South American interests internationally.
(Several wealthy women who had raised money for Clinton decided to raise money for McCain, one of them, Lynn Forester de Rothschild, later said that Obama was an "elitist" who talked down to "rednecks".)Priceless.
During one of the the debate preps, the light blew, flickering on and off like a strobe light from the 1970s disco craze. Obama stood behind the podium, quietly singing the song "Disco Inferno," last popular in the heyday of "Saturday Night Fever."I'm loving this.
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Here are some choice quotes from the second chapter on McCain:
"We're up, boy, we're up," Graham murmured softly when the numbers turned. "Boy, we're down," McCain replied moments later. (McCain and Graham often call each other "boy," another obscure McCain bonding ritual.)
Among Weaver's jobs was combing McCain's hair.
I look forward to the chapters they release tomorrow.
posted by inconsequentialist at 7:09 PM on November 5, 2008 [1 favorite has favorites]